The moment I finally exhaled

Some moments in life don’t come with a countdown. You don’t get a warning, a manual, or a guide on how to survive them. You just wake up and step into them — heart clenched, breath trapped, memories roaring.


Today was that moment.


We met.

A decade since.


She stood near him. Nervous, stiff, giving cold, clipped replies. I could feel it in her posture, her breath, her refusal to meet his eyes for too long. She leaned into her aunty. She clung to her stepfather. She found safety in their presence, and I understood that more than anyone else ever could. Slowly, she softened just enough to make it through.


But me? I couldn’t even breathe.


Thirty-two minutes.

Thirty-two minutes of memories crashing into me like waves I had spent years trying to escape.

The smirks during the hearings.

The echo of my screams.

The humiliation in the courtrooms. 

That twisted attempt to seduce me amidst the trauma.

The judgments that stole sleep from my nights.

The victories I couldn't celebrate — because trauma never gave me a break long enough to savor them.


I sat, silent and invisible.

Not a single word.

Not a single exhale.


The meet was inevitable. I knew that. I had braced for it. Prepared myself mentally — at least I thought I had. Told myself I would be strong. Told myself I would digest it all.


But strength is funny — it doesn’t show up when you command it.

It shows up when you break.


Did I exhale when we got up to leave?

No.


When we stopped for dessert?

No.


When I sat waiting for that dessert, feeling the weight of every breath I had held?

No. That’s when I wanted to run. Not walk — run. Away from the room, the people, the history. Run from the memory that sat beside me like a ghost only I could see. But there was nowhere to go. No place that was far enough.


Even when we got home, I still hadn’t exhaled.


And then Mum asked, “Are you okay?”

Once.

Twice.

I nodded. I lied. I tried to convince both of us.


Then she asked a third time. This time, she followed me as I aimlessly struggled to open a bottle of water. And that’s when it happened.


I exhaled.


I cried.

Not a neat cry. Not one of those silent dignified cries.

No — the kind where your body caves in.

The kind where your head is too heavy for your neck and falls on your mother’s shoulder.

Where your knees weaken and the wall you lean on feels as weak as you do.


It was her hands.

My sister’s hands.

Their love. Their presence.


It was their whispered strength, saying without words:

We were there when it all happened.

We stood by you then.

We still do.

We always will.


That — that — was when I let it go.

The breath. The pain. The fear.

The moment I had been holding in for ten years.


I exhaled.

And I am still learning how to keep breathing.

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