So over it

I have stirred my coffee into a vortex this morning.
It's whizzing around my cup as I move my spoon round and round, staring off into the distance.


Still hot though, thats progress.
There has already been one cup of coffee fall victim to my meandering brain this morning.


It's Tuesday.
And like some sort of medium, I booked Monday off for a rest day, to gather my thoughts and mind, reset and recharge and press pause.


Sometimes a day of self care is much needed, but in the realms of mental health you don't feel justified to call it a sick day, because those are for days where you are.... sick?
And whilst mental exhaustion is a totally valid reason in a world where employers are more accepting - a day of annual leave is just what the doctor ordered.


And thank fuck I had yesterday. For me.


Because I sat in my dinosaur pyjamas morning, noon and night and spent most of it, crying and / or eating take out on the sofa, whilst occasionally laying in the lap of my wife, who stroked my hair and watched trash TV with me.


There's context, I'm not a total fruit loop - this is not what I define my usual self-care days!


My Sunday started like a dream, I went for breakfast with my lovely Sarah, met her friends at a local farm, chased chickens (it's my new thing) and stroked sheep.
Then in the afternoon we took Sarah's mum and dad to a gay pride event - yep, you read that right. We took the Mills family to a gay pride event.
And what a day.

I had my beautiful Valerie singing her little titties off to every drag queen that graced the stage, whilst drinking pink gin, sat on a bench in the sunshine, and it was amazing.
The very definition of inclusivity and love and hope and a vision of what the future could be.
Happy, gay, safe.


How ironic.
I glanced at a man who looked familiar, but I have an unhealthy habit of seeing "that face" in the fact of many who are not actually him.


But no, in the middle of gay pride, there he was.
Smirking.
I asked Sarah to confirm, is it him, am I seeing things.


He walked past us smiled and blew me a kiss and went on his way, partying to the same drag queens my mother in law had fallen in love with just hours earlier.


I felt sick. My hands were shaking. I didn't know what to do.
I looked at Sarah and she cried.
Floods of tears.
This stopped mine.
I was in shock, but she was in pain.


Crying.
She was angry, and upset, and mourning a past life where she felt she could have saved me if she had been in my life.


Tears turned to rage and I had to hold her wrist to stop her from running over and smashing this man to the ground. Utter utter rage.


I knew how she felt.
I was stood in a park celebrating a safe gathering for the gay community, coming together to share in love and peace and hope, and there in the middle of it, was the man who stole my youth.


I had thought of this moment often, what would I do if I saw him again, what would I say?
And my thoughts were more aligned with that of some murder documentary on Netflix and therefore not the place for public discussion.


The audacity, to see me now, in 2019, and to blow me a kiss. When I'm stood with my wife, in a safe space and he is there. Smirking. Like I'm 19 again and he can still have what he wants.


Sarah's raging and wants to kill. To protect.
And me? I'm surprisngly calm. A switch in my head has flipped and I'm past angry and I'm past hate.
I'm in 2019 and I'm not letting that man have another second of my life.
Not one more.
Especially not now.


I have fought harder than most I know to be able to stand here, to have a life, a wife, a family, a job, a house, a hope, a friend, a future. And that creature, that fucking Thierry Mugler Angel smelling doused bastard, has no place in this world, not in my life. Not now.


He is the boogeyman. He is the bad man. He is the nightmare that creeps in the darkness.
He is the man who stole my innocence, who broke my fertilility, who laughed when Police questioned him.


And if any rage remains, it's at the absolute failing of our justice system.
I rant about this on the way home to Sarah.


"I should have gone to prison, so that says it all,"
The system doesn't work.


"He should still be in prison, he isn't,"
The system doesn't work.


"Bad people are supposed to be locked up until they realise what they've done and fix it, until you feel truly sorry and make it right, you're not supposed to get out,"


And here we are nearly 20 years later, and he hasn't learned his lesson.


Should I commander justice and fight him again? Should I be the protector of other women? I feel guilt, that I left him standing there. Potentially to go on to attack again.
But I'm tired.
I fought.
I did.
I did what was right.
I can't keep doing it.


He stole my 20's.
He's not having my 30's.


Not one ounce of my happiness or my hope.


He can stay in the darkness and remain a nightmare.


But on this tuesday morning whilst my damn coffee has gone cold.
I'm working.
I'm focusing.
I'm keeping my shit together.
Because if I don't.

I'll cry in a coffee shop.
And I don't do public crying.


So it's work.
It's Sarah.
It's friends and family.
And that man, is just a bad dream I had once.