In recovery rooms, money looks like control—so you trade something else. Childhood trauma becomes currency: a pause after “step-dad,” eyes down on “night-time,” voice catching on “alone.” Once is vulnerability. Twice is instability. Not confession—calibration. Stand still by the coffee urn, reflective; people come, wanting to see themselves in your wound. She does. Calls him brave, writes the story in her eyes: wounded man, quiet strength, the one she can fix by being enough. He nods, lets her believe this is the first time—not the fifteenth.
Coffee, then her place. She thinks it’s spontaneous; he’s running a checklist—exits, mirrors, timing—waiting for her comforting touch to shift from pity to permission. “You’re safe with me,” delivered warm, measured, perfect. No feeling required. Reusable recovery phrases slide over everything: “opposite of addiction is connection,” “hurt people hurt people.” When it ends, gentle exit with scheduled tears: “It’s my damage, not yours.” No villains—just tragic misfit pieces. Truth: it wasn’t collision or healing. It was a sequence. Login. Session. Logout. Trauma as lock-pick, disclosure as leverage. Not broken—effective. A reusable tool, sharpened, no emotional fingerprints. He didn’t feel guilty. He felt nothing. Damage reported.