[ She wants to tell him she doesn’t have that measure of hate, but she does. For all that she feels she deserves whatever enmity he carries, for all that she feels she doesn’t deserve to hold any for him, she does.

I spurned him, says the part that wants his cruelty. Abandoned him.

But under it there is a small cry of her own, too. He left me. If he loved me as much as he says he did, why didn’t he come to me. Why didn’t he demand to know why.

She thinks perhaps it was because he never thought she was real. That he is as ready, as expectant, as she is to be thrown aside. It doesn’t matter to the little ghost, who is young and only cares that she is alone. ]

It will be hard for me, for I think that I deserve it.

[ She shakes her head a little. ]

More than that. Sometimes I wish for it, because I know how to be hated for what I have done. I do not know how to have done it and still be loved.

[ A pause for an unsteady breath, and then: ]

I want so much to still be loved.