h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

How do we manage to find each other? The Broken Ones. We know there has to be a better place. Salvation. Hope. A Safe Haven somewhere.

The anonymity of words without faces. No physical contact or abuse here. At last the body is safe. No hitting or slapping or pinching or twisting or burning. No way to be forced into a submissive posture held for hours on end.

No thrusts and lances of pain while your body is being forced open, held immobile, penetrated, violated.

Physical pain, no matter how intense, once the stimulus is removed the body can quickly forget … until it happens again. The sheer desperation of - Please, don’t do it again - falls on deaf ears. The scars remain. Etched into the body, the soul, and the mind.

You must want it to continue. Why else wouldn’t you break the cycle. Could it be the words? Words can hurt. Words do hurt.

Stupid. Dumb. Worthless. Don’t tell. This is for your own good. It’s all your fault. Crazy. Sick. Incompetent. Don’t listen to her. Don’t waste your time. You may watch ME live life and perhaps I will throw you a crumb. I am your master; you are my servant, my slave. I have total and complete control over you. You are here to serve my every beck and call, my every whim.

I used to be intelligent. I was a gifted child. Gifted in negotiation. Fight your own battles. I don’t want to referee. Let me alone. I’m just a kid. Let me sleep.

Book smart, not street smart. Want to come in back, little girl, and see the new shipment of sweaters that I haven’t unpacked (come into my parlor said the spider to the fly – want to come up and see my etchings). He gets a suspended sentence and counseling. I have to live with the shame. Don’t touch. Don’t hug. Don’t kiss. Those are dirty. I am dirty. Eat. If you are fat enough, no one will want to touch you. They will Leave You Alone.

The feeling of cold steel at your throat. The baby moving inside you. If the baby hadn’t moved, maybe you might have fought. Would it have been a quick way to end it all? Your life isn’t worth the lousy $300 … it isn’t worth a cent! But the baby moved. It doesn’t want to die. It’s not fair to the baby. It didn’t ask to be conceived. You could have ended it. Abortion would have been so easy. But you didn’t. So, don’t fight. Maybe the opportunity will come again.

It came before. You held the razor to your wrist but didn’t have the will power to cut deep enough. Your first cry for help?

He’s back from his trip with his girlfriend. Degradation begins again. But he has a girl friend. Maybe he will leave your body alone. No such luck. He is interest in her mind not her body. He starts bringing her everywhere. You come with. You wait on them both. He ignores you, except in bed. She won’t give him what he wants, so he takes it from you.

Year after year goes by. Unless he tells you what to wear, you can’t get dressed in the morning. You become incapable of making the simplest decisions. You don’t sleep. You don’t stop eating. You start thinking of suicide again. Pills are quick. Pills are easy. Just take a handful and hop behind the wheel of the car. Go and go and go until you can’t go anymore.

And then you find salvation. The pedestal is there. The white knight awaits. He gathers in the Broken Ones. Safe Haven.