Boys Will Be Boys By Everette Leita-Butler

I grew up around a male dominated family. 

One blood aunt and three uncles to counter.

One girl cousin and six boys to counter.

One of me and three big brothers. 

I heard boys will be boys a lot. 

My cousin peed in the bath that my nan made us share.

Boys will be boys. 

My brother shoved me out of the way when trying to get to the ration of lunch.

Boys will be boys…

My uncle texted me, asking about my friend’s underwear.

Boys will be boys…

I learnt to accept this behaviour, 

I learnt to ignore it.

I was never told girls will be girls but instead,

“Girls are more mature than boys.

You just have to ignore them.”

So I tried.

I desperately tried to ignore when boys were being boys. 

I tried to ignore them calling me fat. 

I tried to ignore when they’d pull my hair.

I tried to ignore when they’d use me like a punching bag.

I tried to ignore the way they’d hate me for existing.

I tried to ignore it all.

To ignore the severing of my heart as he took my body like it was made for him. 

Tearing my delicate skin and bones and consuming what I had left. 

I tried to just allow it.

To push it from my mind like some sinful thought.

That what he had done was perfectly acceptable.

Boys will be boys.

And boys have ripped my soul shred by shred gorging on what they wanted.

Tossing scraps away. 

He took me for all I had.

And if that wasn’t enough another one of these “boys” 

A thirty-something year old “boy” came sniffing around for more. 

Boys will not be “boys”, they will become monsters if you allow it. 

Whatever monsters you have made

Will feast on the girls you raised to believe it is normal, that they can and should ignore it. 

I’ve given all I can. 

I was mature.

I was quiet 

I   was   a   good   girl. 

Now I am a decaying, mangled, ruined woman. 

Boys have been boys. 

and I, now, am nothing.