Betty

“A girl comes of age against the knife. She must learn to bear its blade. To be cut. To bleed. To scar over and still, somehow, be beautiful and with good enough knees to take the sponge to the kitchen floor every Saturday. You’re either lost or you’re found”

“Who am I?” I asked.
“You’re you, Betty,” he said.”

“I realized the sun that shines on me would always have a cloud”

“You know what the heaviest thing in the world is, Betty? It’s a man on top of you when you don’t want him to be.”

“God hates us, Betty.”
“The Carpenters?” I asked.
“Women.”

“I had my father’s eyes, but now my mother’s pain”

“What do you do when the two people who are supposed to protect you the most are the monsters tearing you to pieces? No wonder Mom still hurt. She hadn’t been loved enough”

“Only nine years old and I was floating over the world, seeing fathers ruin their daughters. Brothers ruin their sisters.”

“Say you’re beautiful, Betty,” she said as she turned me to face my reflection.
“But I’m not.”
“Who has told you this?”
“My mother.”

“Don’t let it happen to you, Betty. Don’t ever be afraid to be yourself. You don’t wanna live so long only to realize, you ain’t lived at all”