Mr. Perfect Must Die--Valeria

            I sit here looking back at all of our old pictures, all I could think about is how we fought seconds after the smile was captured. All I could think about was your silent yelling, your clenching fists, your twitching eyebrow, and blackened eyes. All I could think about was how you pushed me, how you pulled me, how you shook, how you bruised me because you couldn’t recognize your own strength. You yelled at me for being silent but, as soon as I spoke your eyes called me names; I preferred to sit there in silence and physically deal with it rather than emotionally. My confidence, my independence was completely destroyed because you were better than me and I didn’t realize your dominance until it wasn’t present. You didn’t let me work, you controlled what I was allowed to wear, who I was and wasn’t allowed to talk to. You told me that I didn’t need those things because I had you and I believed you. Everyone around me always reminded me about how great you were and how lucky I was to have you. Teachers praised your intelligence, friends praised your character, and others praised your appearance. I always said you were perfect; that’s what you appeared to be. Mr. Perfect accepted into UCLA, Mr. Perfect being rebellious with a tattoo, Mr. Perfect with the clear skin and intense figure. In theory, you were perfect: asking me to be yours under the fireworks at the happiest place on earth, going on lavish dinners, shopping sprees, setting up a teenager’s ideal romantic setting. I remember all of the long car rides where we just drove and talked about our future together but now seems like a waste of time. I spent two years of my life dreaming about a happy ending yet, it never came like you promised. You begged me to stay with you, cried whenever I was at my strongest but, as soon as I left like I threatened to do so many times and never accomplished, you didn’t say a single word. All of the I love yous that I believed because we were living a teenage fantasy disappeared in a matter of seconds. You didn’t care about me, you just needed me to make your reputation stronger than what it was. Meeting you was too good to be true but by the way you were talked about in such a high status manner I thought maybe it was meant to be. Even after you yelled at me in public, after you punched things in fits of anger, I still believed we were going to get married. I only saw the good things about you, the good things that everyone else also saw but you were more than that. Everyone thinks that you live up to your status, and I am here to tell them that you don’t. Erik, Erik with a K not C, was a controlling, dominant, abusive, boyfriend. There, I said it, everyone knows.