Little Red

You came in July and sat around in windows and doors, you’d fill the walls and watch me in the bath. I was young and naive; fantasy and fiction had not yet separated themselves from reality, so your arrival didn’t need explaining. 
Sometimes you were a little broken, but you’d show up anyway. Your silence above all the hullabaloo was comforting, and my own to keep. 
It was July when you came, and I couldn’t pull the bottom of my hair down to my bum in the bath anymore – you just sat and watched and said nothing. In dreams I was 4 again, still untouched, and you covered me from head to toe, but I was weightless. 
Come June, I would awake in a girl’s room with everything in its place – dolls house, books and all and touch my cold head. You climbed the walls in the reddest rage, watching a chemical Winter steal away my softness. 
In December, you went away for awhile and we’d forgotten how to sweep up all the hair. Just so you know, I forgive you now. 
But December passed long ago, you still visit every now and then and we sit in that familiar silence away from all the hullabaloo. 
It is July again, and little red breaks an old silence to whisper to me a reminder of a life long conquered. 

But off you go again, into a healed Winter this time only to return upon my call.