Just breathe, just focus. You know he’s going to be in that room, you know he’s going to look right at you. All you have to do is not let it get to you. Let your skin crawl, let the rage stir, but above all else, do not let it show. Composure. Poise. Head held high. Do not let him get to you.

​

The court is in session, the judge is speaking. You can't really absorb what's being said. Everything is a dull, throbbing migraine of faces and words, just pointless fucking words. Sterile, meaningless, useless words. They do not convey what really happened, they cannot relay the horror he has put you through, the damage he has done to you.

​

But here you are, watching strangers piece together parts of a story that only your bones could properly tell. And your so-called peers? This jury of idiots? These are the people responsible for coming up with a verdict that is fair and impartial- only there for the juicy details and a vacation from work. You know that whatever sentence he gets will never be enough. After all, having a rich father, a connected father, it practically guarantees his freedom has already been paid for. He'll walk out with a smile on his face.

​

And you just know he'll do it again, there's not a bone of remorse in his body. You know you'll never be able to sleep soundly knowing he's out there somewhere. His face, god, his fucking face. You want to poke a hole through it, that paper-thin disguise of innocence. You want to rip it open, to tear through the mask and pull the skin from the muscle, to let it hang off his skull from bloody tendrils and expose his carcinogenic fucking insides.

​

But that's the part you'll leave to me. Don't you worry, he will suffer. I will make sure of it. So for now, tell your story. Expose this inhuman monstrosity. It doesn't matter if you're believed, just tell it. Because I promise you, I believe you. I know what he did. You and I have that in common. Only I didn't escape. I didn't get the chance to tell my story. What I got was a tire iron smashing my head in and thrown in a river so very far from home, so very far from anyone who ever knew me. Just gone.

​

And then I heard you one night. I heard your cries for help. They woke me, they called me to you. And now I'm here, ready to help. After he walks out of here today we'll have some catching up to do. The bone-breaking, flesh-tearing, eye-gouging type of catching up. And when I'm done, you can rest assured he will never hurt anyone again.