Free

The sun warms up my body, the sea breeze caresses my skin. I've felt stares on me as I walked down the shore. People looked at my pale skin, so pale it's blue from the veins underneath. They looked at the bruises and the scars all over my body, painful reminders of the hell I'm just out of. My bones poke through my skin, I know it, I look like a scarecrow. But it doesn't matter now, nothing matters, my scars will fade, I will regain my weight. However, not all the scars will heal this fast, there are scars that will take much longer.

I lie on the sand, my eyes shaded behind the sunglasses, still not used to the brightness of daylight. The sea laps at my feet and I doze off. In my dream, I'm still locked in that house. In my dream, I spend the nights scrubbing floors and dusting furniture, cooking meals, my days ironing and doing laundry in the basement, sleeping barely four hours a day. In my dream she hits me, she hits me hard for any reason, for something she thinks I've done wrong. She hits me and I feel bones breaking. She hits me and I bite my lips not to scream, I force myself not to cry. In my dream, I can feel the pain, in my dream, it hurts so much it wakes me up.

The sunlight returns me to reality. A reality where no one can hit me again, where I don't have to spend the night doing housework. A reality where I'm safe, safe after all this time, safe after years of imprisonment.