I didn’t mean to scorch them.

I only meant to keep them warm.

But I was all fire.

And fire doesn’t know the difference between comfort and catastrophe.

It just burns. That’s all it knows.

The people of my sins weren’t fools.

They saw the blaze before they stepped close.

But they came anyway.

With bare feet and open hands.

With questions like, “Can you be soft?”

With eyes that begged the answer to be yes.

I said yes.

I meant maybe.

I gave them flame.

They came for steadiness, and I gave them smoke.

They came for truth, and I gave them noise.

They came for something solid to lean on, and I gave them sermons dressed as answers, deflection dressed as strength.

I was trying. I need you to know that.

Trying not to become the world who lit me on fire first.

Trying not to pass down the damage that taught me silence was safer than softness.

But no one tells you how loud the past gets when someone shows up quietly and stays.

No one tells you that kindness can feel like threat when your whole life has been defense.

No one tells you that you can confuse loyalty with pity, concern with control, help with shame.

So I mistook closeness for danger.

I mistook care for judgment.

I mistook every act of love as a setup for loss.

And I lit the fuse before anyone else could.

They didn’t leave in storms.

Most of them just stopped knocking.

Some left their names in the dust, right where I could trip over them when the house went quite.

They didn’t demand explanations.

They didn’t throw my mess back in my face.

They just walked away, burdened with things they never asked to hold.

The fire didn’t start with them.

It started the first time I was laughed at for crying.

The first time help was offered with a hook in it.

The first time tenderness cost more than it gave.

So I made sure no one could ever say they hadn’t been warned.

I made a life of it, warning people.

Wounds mistaken for personality.

Pretending it was natural.

Thinking the loneliness earned.

And they never knew.

I wanted to be safe for them.

I wanted to know how.

I wanted to be a place that healed, not another reason someone had to.

But I didn’t know how then.

So when they left, I didn’t chase.

I stood in the wreckage and pretended it was integrity.

Preached sermons to no one about the beauty of solitude.

I claimed the fire made me stronger.

It didn’t.

It made me alone.

What I said was passion was panic.

What I pretended was strength was armor.

What I mistook for honesty was polished deflection.

It was fear.

It was pride.

It was a boy who never got rescued, learning to set fires just so someone might finally look his way.

I see that now.

And if any of them are reading this,

the ones who sat through the noise,

who cleaned up after the flare-ups,

who never asked for sainthood but earned it anyway.

If they’re still carrying any part of me they never asked for, I’m sorry.

I didn’t mean to burn you.

I only had fire.

And you deserved a home.