Sister Catherine’s Orphanage for Difficult Children

When he tells me,
“You’re overeacting”.
It’s like he scooped up my feelings,
crumpled them into a ball,
and used them to pratice
his free-throw shot
from across our bedroom.

When he tells me,
“It’s not as bad as you think it is”.
I know he’ll never understand.
He will never feel the ocean of anxiety,
the hurricane of guilt,
or the tsunami of responsibility my mother puts on me.
I am the glue holding the jagged fragments of her happiness together,
fumbling with each piece,
slicing my fingers on her sharp edges
as I try to find a way to put her back together again.

When he tells me,
“Everyone argues with their mother”.
I try to forget the time she called me a fat pig,
or accused me of doing nothing but hurt her
since the crown of my newborn head
emerged from the incision for my c-section.

I try to forget the time I accidentally left my lunchbox
on the front porch in the fourth grade.
Our dogs were grateful for the mid-morning snack,
But mother ignited fury in her eyes,
raised her fist clutching to the keys to her car,
and drove them into my abdomen,
trying to find the ignition
that would turnover my engine
and make me the daughter
that she always wanted.

When he tells me,
“You’re being dramatic”.
I try to forget the time my tiny body
was escorted in the backseat of
our rusty Toyota
to the front steps of a building
I had never seen before.
It was so dark outside,
the streetlights struggled to illuminate
any shade of hope.
“This is Sister Catherine’s Orphanage for Difficult Children”,
my father explained.
“You’re too much to handle,
and we can’t take care of you anymore”.

He turned around,
and followed the damp walkway
back to his car.
I cried and pleaded for forgiveness
until my lungs gave out,
earning myself a second-chance
and rescue from the pseudo-orphanage.

When he tells me,
“Just try to sleep, you’ll feel better in the morning”
I try to convince my body to forget
all of the bad things
that happen in the night.

When he tells me,
“I can’t be with you anymore, you’re too much to handle”
I remind myself that nobody
will ever want to keep me.
I am too complicated
and slippery to hold on to.
Maybe I will ask
Sister Catherine
for a place to stay.