I am nothing and everything at once.

To other people’s eyes, I am a shadow, a lingering presence. I am the product of a child’s imagination, made up and forgotten. I am the stare that you feel at the back of your neck, the whisper of wind against your ear.

I am invisible.

I am invisible to everyone except for her.

My appearance changes irregularly - sometimes I am the animal familiar from the latest TV show, other times I’m a little girl with black pigtails and sapphire eyes. But something that never changes, no matter what, is the comfort I give.

Whenever I see her parents screaming at each other, I drift over. And together, huddled and warm, we listen to the shatter of glass and the crack of a belt. We listen to blood-stained screams and angry muttering. We listen to the swish of an alcohol bottle and the hiccup of the father. We listen to the subdued sigh of the mother.

We listen and we shiver and we suffer.

But we suffer together.

I offer her a ghostly hug, and she accepts with a small smile. I drape my invisible arms over her shoulders and let her cry her heart out.

I stifle the overwhelming urge to protect this child, this soul too young for any of this torment.

And I let my eyes close, let myself fade away as the little girl sleeps.