Survivor Story
The Exit Sign
Nurse Manon runs the patient-gym program I've recently enrolled in.
It's the first time I try pilates and my mind ruins it.
She follows me to the safety of the large bathroom where the showers are, drags chairs from the hall into the middle of the room, and asks if I want to talk about what just happened.
I was doing my best to follow instructions, to keep up.
Suddenly, my mind receded from my body as it slipped into a hell I thought I'd escaped.
I refused to come undone in front of total strangers, so I left as swiftly and discreetly as I could.
She throws out lines you'd expect would make sense.
Everyone struggles at first. Some of these people have done this for years. You seem very hard on yourself.
"It's not that," I say, desperately not wanting to talk about anything trauma related but it's all I can think of.
"I can't connect to my body in the present,"
I stare at my hands, at the amethyst ring I got myself right after I filed charges for everything Earl did to me over the course of our relationship.
"I'm mad at myself, I should be over it by now." I say avoiding her gaze.
Tears sting and I don't know what to do with the shame. I don't know what to do with the self-hatred and the sense that I should be anywhere but here.
Please don't make me say it, my thoughts scream.
I run my thumb over each side of my ring, a kind of octave prayer to stay in the present.
"I get these flashbacks sometimes," I say, my voice small and distant.
"The abuse?"
I nod, sensing she knows enough to understand the type of abuse I mean.
I'd mentioned I'd been in an abusive relationship during one of the weekly walks.
"Look at the exit sign," Nurse Manon says, pointing to the red glowing sign above the doors.
I stare, trying to understand what she means.
"Go look at it from the wall by the sinks,"
I stand, step to my left and back by the space beside the hand dryer.
"Now stand directly under it and look up,"
The red glow remains.
"What did you notice?"
I glance back at her, then up at the ceiling again.
"The sign is the same but my perspective is different." I say.
"Trauma stays the same, but you don't."
The words settle like stepping stones.
What was done to me doesn't define me.
You can find your own exit sign, too
- Gabrielle Sojourner, she/her
Gabrielle Sojourner was born in Los Angeles and raised in Paris, France. She has published her short fiction in Flash Fiction Magazine and will reluctantly admit that she hoards books as much as she actually reads them. You can find her on Substack writing her way into a new life in her newsletter Sirop de Citron: Bringing Myself Back to Life.
