I was not the author of my injury.

I was its target, chosen and prepared for, and the proof was in their own voices.

I have met other survivors since, in Emil’s Room, and I tell them some version of this when they are ready to hear it: that the person who plans to hurt you was always going to find a reason, and that the reason they chose is not the same as a cause you supplied.

You did not do this to yourself.

Somewhere, before it happened, they decided.

That sentence gave me back my innocence, and I have never surrendered it again.