is helpful but didn’t fix anything. All the money in the world couldn’t erase the damage done. As a teen, I made sure I let him know it often.
Edward did the best that he could, I know. I did the best that I could too, and, unfortunately, while he had his own issues to work through, he fared much better than I did.
It’s part of the reason I’ve kept that secret hope of a sibling for Freddie in my heart. It would be another chance at the relationship Edward and I were robbed of when our parents died.
Thankfully, Edward was always a patient man, particularly when it comes to what he believes in, and he believed in me. Yes, he admonished me for the outburst, but he also bought me another, this time allowing me to choose the camera for myself.
Instead of going for a fancy digital model, I selected a Nikon 35mm. I was drawn to the process of developing film. Truly, that was the only thing that excited me about the idea of photography—the hours I’d get to spend tucked away in the dark.
It was quite a surprise when I discovered the real joy was behind the camera, with one eye pressed to the viewfinder, the other closed tightly so that my whole world narrowed into what was in front of me. And that world was completely shaped by me. No one else.
It was life-changing. I was able to take the emotions I had bottled up inside and place them outside of myself. I could look at them from a different angle. I could detach.
I’m not sure if it achieved the goal that my therapist had intended since I soon moved on to another. But even through the long string of specialists that followed, I clung to my photography. It was an art that became a fast friend. An only friend sometimes. In the darkest days with Frank, taking pictures was most often my only form of escape. No matter how much he bruised and mangled my body, he had no power over what I chose to express. He didn’t get to be the author of the stories I told.
I learned to tell those stories in other ways over the years, more destructive ways. Sex has become another favorite method of expression as long as I am the initiator, because though it involves a participant, I get to choose it. After all the men in my life that chose what happened to my body for me, fucking at my whim is a powerful reminder that I’m the one who has control now.
It’s a false reminder, though. I might be able to direct how and when and what happens physically during the act, but I still can’t control the things that happen inside me. It’s the same across all forms of expression, whether it be with my pussy or my camera or a knife, I can only control the external, and not even much of that.
The reality is I am still powerless.
I am still subject to my emotions.
I am still shaped by the actions of people outside of me.
I am still very much human.
* * * *
It only takes a quick trip to the restroom to pull myself together. I’m still flushed with humiliation when I walk in the door, partly because I didn’t take my key and had to knock to be let in, but it’s not so bad I can’t show my face.
Dr. Joseph would count that as growth.
I’m more reluctant to name it so until I discover what I do in the future. The important reactions aren’t always immediate, I’ve found, but rather what happens later, usually in the dark, when I’m alone and free to really express myself.
For now, I’m composed enough to be attentive to the students, mentoring them through the rest of the day’s activity.
Not all the students, of course. I stay clear of Hendrix, unable or unwilling to even glance at him. I’m not sure if I’m too angry or too embarrassed or if I’m simply too scared to see how he might look at me now. To see if the reflection of me he wears in his expression has changed.
It’s a tension that I carry throughout the rest of the class, as I count down the time remaining before this exhausting session is through. Half an hour. A quarter of an hour. Ten minutes. Now five.
Finally, I give this week’s assignment and dismiss them.
I turn my back to them immediately, not