Broken: THE DEPARTMENT SET THE FIRE
[Lights dead low. I drag the CHAIR like a body across the stage. Drop it with a violent crash.]
ME (voice trembling with fury):
She doctored allegations—
stitched lies together with trembling hands—
but the monster wasn’t her.
Not alone.
No.
The monster was the department
that handed her the scalpel
and said,
“Cut him open.”
[I sit slowly, shaking, like the weight of it is crushing my spine.]
They didn’t just ignore the truth.
They executed it.
They strangled it in the dark
because it was easier
than admitting they were wrong.
Easier than facing the mirror
and seeing cowardice staring back.
[I pull out the PIECE OF PAPER—my “case.” My “identity.” My “crime.”]
This—
this pathetic sheet
was all they needed
to decide who I was.
Not my life.
Not my voice.
Not the witnesses who stood up
and said,
“We saw everything.
He didn’t do this.”
[I crumple the paper violently, hands shaking.]
But the department didn’t care.
They didn’t want truth.
They wanted closure.
They wanted convenience.
They wanted a villain
and I was the easiest one to paint.
[I drop the paper. Stare at it like it betrayed me personally.]
Her witnesses?
A choir of hearsay from her church—
people who only ever believed her noise.
But the department…
the department turned that noise
into a siren
and blasted it through my life
until everything I loved
shattered.
[I pull out the PEN. Hold it like it’s the only weapon I’m allowed.]
And the heartbreak—
the heartbreak is this:
She admitted it.
In court.
Under oath.
She stalked me.
She catfished me.
She hunted me
with a mask she made
and then blamed me
for the shadows she cast.
And the department?
They didn’t flinch.
They didn’t pause.
They didn’t say,
“Wait—this changes everything.”
No.
They said,
“We believe her anyway.”
[I slam the pen onto the chair so hard it echoes.]
That’s when the rage hit.
Not at her—
not anymore—
but at them.
The machine.
The engine.
The institution that took her lie
and forged it into a weapon
with my name carved into the blade.
[I stand. Kick the chair backward so it crashes into the dark.]
They made her powerful.
They made her untouchable.
They made her lies
louder than my truth
and heavier than my heart.
[I kneel. Pick up the paper. It’s wrinkled, broken—like I was.]
But I’m still here.
Still breathing.
Still fighting.
Still dragging myself
out of the grave they dug for me.
[I smooth the paper out with trembling hands.]
This—
this is where I reclaim the narrative.
This is where I write myself
back into the world
they tried to erase me from.
[I write on the paper with slow, furious strokes.]
Because I survived her.
But surviving them—
surviving the department—
that was the real war.
The heartbreak.
The betrayal.
The injustice that carved itself
into my bones.
[I rise, holding the paper like a flag of defiance.]
And now—
now I speak.
Now I roar.
Now I stand with the truth in my fist
and the fire in my chest.
ME (voice breaking, then exploding):
She lit the match—
but the department poured the fuel.
And I’m done burning
for their convenience.
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