“The Sugar Plum Lie”
by Adena M’lynn
slippers soft as lullabies,
tutus blooming like springtime in her chest.
Each night, she whispered wishes
into the seams of her pillow,
braiding tomorrow with glitter
and the promise of an “attagirl”!
But no one told her that monsters
don’t always live under beds—
sometimes they live down the hall,
smell like beer and betrayal,
and wear the face of someone who says “I love you”
without meaning it.
She danced anyway,
even when the music got swallowed by screams,
even when the lights flickered
like the truth no one would name.
She learned how to bend before she learned how to break—flexible like forgiveness she never owed.
The sugar plum fairies stopped coming.
Replaced by silence,
and a body that never felt like home again.
A stage turned into a cell,
a costume into a mask
she wore just to survive.
Now she doesn’t dream in pink—
she dreams in warning signs,
locks on doors, escape routes.
But now,
when the world is quiet—
too quiet—
and her heartbeat still startles at shadows,
there’s no melody.
Just the echo of silence
where music used to live.
The glitter is long gone,
swept into the corners with everything else
that was too painful to keep
but too heavy to throw away.
She doesn’t dance.
Not even in her mind.
The stage is abandoned.
The slippers rotted soft with dust and time.
The little girl inside?
She stopped speaking years ago.
She knows better now.
Fairies aren’t real.
Magic was a lie.
And safety—
that’s just another word they use
to sell dreams to children
who won’t survive them.
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