I never say what I want to say. The words get stuck in my throat, and what comes out is not what I’m screaming inside my head. My lips are painted with the ghosts of a thousand whispered confessions, murmured to the night and lost in the nothing. Bravery would unleash those secret things and leave my throat unobstructed, but I have always been scared. Words are both weapons, and chains, and I am trapped by things left unsaid. I am small, and I was never meant to be a hero.