I was raised in a cage In a home where control replaced everything else I remember I was around 12. I started talking to my room. I couldn’t hold it in anymore, so I created something in my head — an entity that could see me, hear me. It was as if my room came to life at night, when I was finally alone — finally allowed to exist — and it listened to me. I would ramble. Whatever needed to come out. There was an urgency to it, like pressure building with nowhere else to go. It was the only time I felt safe. And then a new day would come. Same house. Back in position. Doing, feeling, and saying what I was expected to. Because I was never allowed to actually exist. I was an object. And you know how people treat an object. They look at it. They occasionally dust it off. They keep it as decoration. An object is not expected to have needs. It doesn’t speak or feel. It serves. And that was me. You would think I at least found somewhere to write — to express what was aching inside me. You...