Whisper From My Monster You don’t remember it all. Not the way I do. You remember the fear, the silence, the way the world shrank to nothing but pain. But the worst of it? The blows, the words, the nights that stretched too long? I took them. You were small, trembling, a thing made for warmth, for kindness, but left in the cold, left in the dark, left to break. So I wrapped myself around you. Stone and shadow, claws and fangs, a beast made for battle, for suffering, for you. They came with their cruelty, and I did not fight them. I let them hit me instead. I let them scream into the hollow of my chest, let their hands bruise stone, let their hatred crash against me. I did not flinch. I did not fall. I took it all so you wouldn’t have to. You hid your face against me, curled beneath the shelter of my wings, and I told you, without words, that no matter how long the night was— I would not move. You were too soft to withstand it. So I became something that could. I became the thing they could not break. The gargoyle at your back, the beast that did not sleep, the silent, watching sentinel. And now, you are older. Stronger. You ask me why you can’t remember it all. Why your mind is full of shadows, why your scars feel like echoes instead of wounds. It’s because I took them, too. I swallowed them whole, buried them deep in my stone flesh, locked them away where you would never have to see. I have carried them all this time. I have never let them go. But one day, you will not need me. One day, you will stand without my wings around you. One day, I will crumble into dust, forgotten, nameless, and you will not notice I am gone. And that will mean I have won. But until that day, I remain. Curled around you, silent and watchful. Between you and the dark. Between you and the past. I will not fall. I will not move. I will take everything, until you are free. tattoo idea