He always made sure I knew I didn’t belong. Every dinner with his friends was a reminder. Every joke that landed at my family’s expense, every time he corrected how I spoke or looked at me sideways when I mentioned where I came from. I started softening pieces of myself just to survive the rooms he brought me into.

What he didn’t know was that I was collecting every moment. Storing it somewhere deep. Every insult. Every time he made me feel like I should be grateful just to be chosen. That kind of pain doesn’t evaporate. It ferments.

I didn’t ruin him the way I could have. I didn’t take everything the way he once took from me. But I became everything he tried to convince me I could never be. And I did it without stepping on anyone to get there.

The best version of me is the one that held fire and grace in the same breath. The one who chose mercy when destruction would have been easy. The one who doesn’t flinch anymore when people like him enter the room. I became someone he has to look up to now. Someone who doesn’t need his validation, his name, or his table.

And still, I carry softness. Still, I honor the younger version of me who sat quietly through it all, thinking maybe she was the problem. She wasn’t. She was just getting ready to grow into someone he could never contain.