Balance Restored

After days carrying proof in my hands,

I want every screenshot

to become a match head

dragged hard against

his paper-thin reputation.

I want his name

to sound different

when people say it out loud.

I want his friends

to hear his name and hesitate

long enough for doubt

to enter the room before he does.

Revenge is not cruelty.

It is balance restored.

But I am not angry only at him.

I am furious at the audience.

At the friends who watched me drown

and questioned whether the water was real.

At the people who demanded composure

from the person with a knife in her back.

At the way a single kind act

can bleach fingerprints clean

off a crime scene.

So yes, I want him ruined.

Not redeemed.

Not understood.

Ruined.

I want his own words

to circle back like smoke rings,

drifting through the people

who defend him,

until understanding finally

enters their lungs.

Hatred blooms in love’s ruins.

I know admitting that is ugly,

but honesty is sometimes ugly.

Sometimes it appears charred,

heartbeat forgetting its rhythm,

still clutching the evidence

tight enough

to cut the palms open.