As long as I remember, I was never just a child.
I don't mean that in the way people usually say it—about growing up fast, or being mature for your age. I mean it literally. I was never allowed to be one.
They told me who I was before I could speak.
"Walk straight," the women would whisper when I learned to stand. "He must walk straight."
When I cried, they didn't comfort me. They corrected me.
"Endure," my mother would say, her hands trembling as she wiped my face. "He endured."
I didn't know who he was at first. Only that whenever I did something wrong—laughed too loudly, frowned too long, asked why—the room would go quiet, like I had broken a rule I was never taught.
The town watched everything.
Not openly. Not at first. Just long looks that lingered a second too late. Murmured prayers when I passed. Doors closing softly behind me.
By the time I understood words properly, I understood one sentence perfectly:
"You must be an example."
They made me read before other children. Not stories—scripture. Passages I didn't understand, spoken aloud so others could hear my voice carry them. When I stumbled, an old man would clear his throat.
"Again," he'd say. "With reverence."
I learned early that reverence meant obedience.
They dressed me in plain clothes. White, when they could manage it. If they couldn't, they chose colors that wouldn't draw attention—because attention was supposed to follow me naturally. I was told that often.
"You don't seek the gaze," a woman once said while adjusting my collar. "The gaze seeks you."
At night, I would ask my mother questions.
"Why can't I play by the river?"
She'd hesitate. Always hesitate.
"It isn't fitting."
"Why do they stare?"
"Because they are afraid to be unworthy."
"Why do I have to do all this?"
That question never had an answer.
Instead, she would hold my face in both hands, eyes wet, voice breaking under the weight of something she never said aloud.
"Because God chose you."
I stopped asking after that.
Not because I understood—but because every time she said it, something in her sounded like an apology.
As I grew older, the rules multiplied.
I couldn't defend myself when other children pushed me.
"Turn the other cheek," the elders said.
I couldn't raise my voice.
"Gentleness," they reminded me.
I couldn't refuse requests. Ever.
"He gave freely."
They never said his name. They didn't have to. Everyone knew who they meant. Everyone except me.
By twelve, the reenactments began.
They didn't call them that.
They called them lessons.
Carrying heavy wood through the square while the town watched in silence. Standing alone for hours while passages were read about sacrifice. Fasting—not because I wanted to, but because it was expected.
"You're doing well," an elder told me once, placing a hand on my shoulder. His grip was tight. Possessive.
"The path is narrow," he continued, smiling like it hurt. "But you were born for it."
That was the first time I felt it.
Not fear.
Doubt.
Not about myself—but about them.
Because if this was holiness, why did it feel like a cage?
The night before my thirteenth birthday, I heard them praying outside our house.
Not for me.
About me.
I didn't sleep. I sat by the window and watched the torchlight flicker across familiar faces—faces that had smiled at me my whole life.
I realized something then.
They weren't watching over me.
They were waiting.
And for the first time since I could remember, I was afraid—not of failing them, but of what would happen if I didn't.
That was when I understood the truth.
Whatever they believed I was… it was no longer something I could survive.
And soon, I would have to run.