This is so stupid but I literally can't sleep and I feel like if I don't say this somewhere I’m actually going to explode. You ever feel like you're leading two different lives and both of them are just... exhausting? I’m sitting on the floor of my bathroom right now because it’s the only place with a lock that works. My mom is asleep in the other room but I can still hear her breathing through the wall—or maybe it’s just the guilt, I don't know. I just came back from a date and I feel like a total idiot. Like a literal criminal for just existing in a bar. You know that feeling when you're finally out, right? The city is loud and there's people everywhere and for a second you think, okay, I'm just a normal girl in a cute top. I'm twenty years old. I should be allowed to have a drink and talk to a guy without feeling like I'm betraying an entire lineage of women who suffered so I could be here. But the second I sit down, it starts. The voice. It’s not even a real voice, it’s just this... WEIGHT in your stomach that says you're being "too much" or that you're "loose." It’s like my brain is programmed to ruin anything that feels good. So I’m with this guy, let’s call him Ben. He’s nice. He has these clean fingernails and he actually listens when I talk, which is weird enough for this city. We're at this dive bar and it smells like stale beer and floor cleaner and the music is so loud you have to lean in to hear anything. And I want to lean in. I want to touch his arm. I really, really do. My heart is thumping against my ribs like it’s trying to escape my body. But then my phone buzzed in my pocket and the whole fantasy just shattered. It was my dad. "Where are you? Your mother needs her meds and the kitchen is a mess." Typical. I’ve been the one doing the grocery shopping, the cooking, the laundry, and the emotional heavy lifting since I was ten. I’m basically a fifty-year-old woman trapped in a body that wants to go home with a guy named Ben. I looked at the text and I felt this heat crawl up my neck. It’s not just the chores. It’s the fact that if they knew I was even LOOKING at a guy like him, they’d look at me like I was absolute garbage. Ben saw my face change and he asked if everything was okay. I laughed—you know that fake laugh you do when you want to scream? I told him it was fine, just family stuff. "Family stuff." That's the code for "I am the unpaid maid and therapist for three adults who can't boil a pot of water without me." And God, I wanted him to touch my hand. I wanted to feel something that wasn't a damp dishcloth or my mom's forehead when she has a fever. I wanted to be selfish for once in my miserable life. I wanted to be one of those girls who just... goes for it. But you can't, can you? You can't just turn off the shame. It’s like it’s baked into my DNA. Every time I even think about going back to his place, I see my grandmother's face. I see the way they talk about the girls in our neighborhood who "lost their way." It’s so tiring. I’m sitting there trying to be sexy and fun, and inside I’m tallying up how many hours of sleep I’ll get before I have to wake up and make breakfast for everyone. I’m twenty years old and I feel like I’m a hundred. We left the bar and he walked me to the subway. He leaned in to kiss me and for a second—ONE SECOND—it was great. He tasted like mint and cheap whiskey and for a moment I wasn't the "good daughter" or the "responsible one." And then I pulled away like he’d burned me. I literally stumbled back. I felt like I was going to throw up right there on the platform. I told him I had to go, no explanation, just ran down the stairs like a total freak. He probably thinks I’m insane. I probably am. I’m twenty and I’m scared of a kiss because I’m worried I’ll come home smelling like "sin" or whatever the hell they call it. It’s just so UNFAIR. My brother gets to stay out until 4 AM. He doesn't have to touch a single plate. He can bring girls over and my mom just winks and makes them tea. But me? I'm the "gold" of the family. I'm the one who has to stay pure and perfect while also being the one who wipes the counters and pays the electric bill. I’m so TIRED of being the anchor. I want to be the storm for once. I want to be the one who leaves and doesn't look back, but I can't even leave a dive bar without a panic attack. So now I'm here. 2:15 AM. I just finished scrubbing the dried tomato sauce off the stove because I couldn't go to bed knowing it was there for me to find in the morning. My hands smell like bleach and I'm crying over a guy whose last name I don't even know. This is so pathetic. I’m literally the main character in a tragedy that nobody else is even watching. I just want to want something without feeling like I’m breaking a law. I just want to be a person. Not a daughter, not a sister, not a nurse. Just... whatever is left when you take all that other crap away. But I don't think there's anything left.