they stabbed you, and you apologized
for getting blood on the carpet,
a soft gasp breaking the silence
as if the air had betrayed you,
as if your lungs couldn't hold the weight
of what just happened.

“i’m sorry,” you said,
the words slipping out like instinct,
a reflex you learned long ago—
to take the blame for things
you didn’t cause,
to hold the hurt
as if it was always meant to be yours.

you dropped to your knees,
not from the pain,
but from the desperate need
to stop the stain from spreading.
your hands, shaking, pressed into the wound,
but they didn’t care,
they didn’t move.
they just stood there,
still holding the knife,
still holding the power
you had handed them
a thousand times before.

the red seeped between your fingers,
dark and warm,
but all you could think about
was the mess it left behind,
how you’d clean it,
how you’d explain it,
how you’d make them believe
you were sorry for breaking their peace.

“it’s not your fault,”
you wanted to say,
but the words twisted themselves
into knots in your throat,
because maybe it was.
maybe if you’d been quieter,
better,
less of whatever it was
that made you so easy to hurt,
the blade would have stayed
in its sheath.

they didn’t speak.
their silence filled the room,
thick and suffocating,
like smoke after a fire
that left nothing standing.
and still, you looked up at them,
eyes wide, searching for something—
a flicker of regret,
a shadow of love,
anything to tell you
this wasn’t what they wanted.

but they turned away,
wiping their hands clean
on a cloth you’d launder later,
their footsteps fading
into the next room,
where life would go on
as if nothing had happened.

you stayed there,
kneeling in the growing pool,
pressing harder against the wound,
telling yourself
you could fix this,
that it wasn’t too late,
that you were strong enough
to take the pain
and make it disappear.

but the blood kept coming,
slow and steady,
a quiet rebellion against your hope.
and as the room blurred at the edges,
your hands fell to your sides,
and you realized, finally,
that you had never been fighting
to save yourself.

you were fighting to save them—
from guilt,
from shame,
from the weight of knowing
what they’d done to you.

and in your last moments,
you still weren’t sure
if it was love or fear
that made you let them do what they did to you.