Borrowed Words

“Wrong. Damaged.” Words a child hears from a parent are not debated — they are absorbed as facts about the world and about himself. Psychologists call this introjection: the outside voice becomes an inner one, and from then on the person carries his abuser inside his own head, no belt required.

Then the trap snaps shut: “if father and Jacob see the same thing — it must be true”. But two cruelties agreeing does not make them truth: both are looking not at Simon but at their target. There is no defect. There is a verdict passed by the one who beat him — and learned by heart by the one who was beaten.