On calling control “love”

Here is the thing no one tells you about a cage built by someone who says they love you: the door is never locked. You could leave. That is what keeps you. If the door is open and you stay, then it must be love, and the problem must be you.

I married that logic three times. Each one looked nothing like the last. Each one was, underneath, the same room I grew up in.

If any of this is landing too close to home, that is not an accident. It is why I wrote it.