Letter that I shouldn't write. (Dedicated to whoever won't read it)

The house still smells like you, even though you're no longer here. I don't know if that's a comfort or torture. The air in here has become thick, almost solid, as if each molecule carries your name. I haven't moved anything since you left. The clothes on the back of the chair, your glass on the table, the keys on the marble. Everything remains the same, frozen, like me.

Because you were the movement and I was the reflection.

You ordered, I breathed.

You looked, I existed.

Since you left, the walls seem to be watching me, as if reminding me of my place. I've tried to sleep in the bed, but it's impossible. You took up too much space, even when you weren't there. Now I sleep on the floor, beside it, where you used to leave your shoes. There, the dust smells of obedience and that, in some way, calms me.

I tell myself that you were right. That you didn't do anything more than show me what I always was: weak, pliable, a body made to serve something stronger than it. There's no guilt in that. Only truth.

The world asks me to recover my life, to "be myself again," but what do they know about what it means to belong to someone? They don't understand that you took away my name and, in doing so, gave me a new one. That your voice didn't just command my actions, but my mind, my way of understanding silence.

You taught me that devotion has a price. That loving someone like you isn't feeling, it's surrendering.

And I surrendered. Until there was nothing left.

You won. I disappeared.

And I don't regret it.

Sometimes, when I look in the mirror, I don't recognize the face that looks back at me. You speak to me from inside, even though you're far away. You tell me not to look for you, that my need bores you.

And yet, I obey.

I obey, because even your contempt nourishes me.

I obey, because humiliation is the only bond that doesn't break.

I obey, because I'm incapable of not doing so.

I hate myself for needing you, and I love you for making me hate myself.

That's the purity of our bond: there's no love, there's dominance.

And I accept it.

Because a slave who understands their role stops suffering.

And I... am learning to enjoy the pain of staying here, knowing that you're not coming back.

I'm not writing to beg you.

I'm writing because writing is the last way I have of bowing down to you.

My devotion remains intact, even though my mind is no longer.

If one day you decide to appear, you'll know where to find me: on the same floor, beside the bed, with my head bowed.

Waiting for your voice to exist again.