The Boy Who Took

Once there was a tree. You remember how this goes. And she loved a boy.

Which is a weird way to start a story, honestly.

Because what kind of tree loves?

And what kind of boy just takes?

Mine was the kind who didn’t know better.

And hers was the kind who never learned to stop bleeding.

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I. The Swing Years

Back then, I thought love was about showing up. Or maybe just about someone being there. And she was always there. I’d swing from her branches, climb her trunk, carve my initials into her skin like it meant something.

I’d run from screaming parents, unfinished homework, and the creeping realization that nothing in the world felt safe—except her.

She never asked for anything. Never pushed. Just waited.

And that? That’s how the rot begins.

Not in the fruit.

In the pattern.