she's home

Lyrics

My giddy child, my baby girl
Perfect baby, perfect world
Brown hair soft, brown eyes bright
Straight-A student, future light
You laughed easy, learned so fast
Teachers said, “this kid will last”
I thought love would keep you safe
Didn’t know one moment bends a fate
It was just one person, just one face
Met you when you were eleven years old
One wrong soul in the wrong place
One quiet poison, slow and cold
Didn’t come loud, didn’t look mean
Came in calm, came in clean
And something shifted deep inside
Something bright had learned to hide
From honor roll to holding pain
From raising hands to skipping days
From open heart to locked-up eyes
From truth to fear you couldn’t describe
You didn’t wake up wanting to run
You were changing just to survive what was done
Years moved fast, the house got tense
Little warnings made no sense
Perfect kid turned teenage fire
Anger sharp, trust on wire
Doors slammed hard, words cut deep
You were hurting, losing sleep
Straight-A girl, now skipping class
Running from a broken past
You know how bad it got back then
You’ve owned it now, no need to pretend
But I knew even through the rage
You were still my little girl in a cage
Then one night you didn’t come home
Silence learned how to grow bones
No goodbye, no “I’ll be back”
Just gone — and the world went black
She ran away
And I was scared she’d die
Every day
Felt like a goodbye
One person changed your whole damn life
One moment cut us like a knife
I heard sirens and my chest went numb
Every ring thought “this is the one”
I checked streets like they owed me truth
Checked shadows hoping they were you
I slept with my phone like it could save
A daughter I was terrified to name
Out loud, in past tense, in prayer
I just begged the world: “keep her here”
Birthdays passed like open wounds
Empty chair, empty room
Holidays hurt more than they should
Smiling felt like lying good
The whole family carried the weight
Trauma didn’t discriminate
It lived in walls, it lived in air
It lived in fear we couldn’t share
I blamed myself a thousand ways
For every no, for every day
I replayed eleven in my head
“What did I miss? What wasn’t said?”
I made deals with a God I barely knew
“Just let my daughter live — that’s all I’ll do”
She ran away
Almost five full years
Five years of fear
Five years of tears
Five years wondering where you slept
If you ate, if you cried, if you felt loved yet
You weren’t bad — you were wounded
You weren’t lost — you were hunted
By a moment you didn’t choose
By a trust you didn’t know you’d lose
One person doesn’t get your name
But they changed the whole damn game
Five years later — then your voice
And my heart remembered choice
You came back older, tired, real
And I dropped to relief I could feel
No questions first, no blame that day
Just “thank God my daughter stayed”
You weren’t broken — you were brave
You lived through what should never stay
Straight-A heart with battle scars
Still soft, still kind, still stars
She ran away
But she came home
That’s the truth
That saved us all
One person hurt you long ago
But they don’t own who you became — no
Now you’re full of love, you give it away
Because you know how pain can stay
You protect, you feel, you stand tall
Big sister heart, strength in all
You turned survival into grace
Turned fear into a safer place
My giddy child, my baby girl
Perfect soul in a brutal world
Not defined by what was done
But by everything you’ve overcome
My first born daughter, living proof
That light survives the hardest truth
You’re here.
You’re safe.
You’re loved.
And I thank life — every day —
That I got my daughter back.