My Scar
A Tale of Forgiveness and Friendship
I have my mother’s eyebrow lift; a quiet arch that says a million things. When it’s accompanied by a twinkle, there is mirth. If both brows lift, there’s a wealth of emotion. One brow is almost always a little higher than the other, and if you look at our photos you can see the curve on down the line — first my mother, then me, then my younger daughter.
But mine? Mine has a memory, too. Look past the arch and past my glasses, and there’s a hitch in the brow. A pale line, sometimes more noticeable than others. The line on my brow is the result of 7 stitches from a moment of my 6th-grade-self’s distraction. It’s more, though.
Short answer — I got hit by a kid on a bicycle, and his pedal opened up a gash.
Long answer — this is a story of forgiveness, and friendship, and finally learning how to be myself.
I had been walking home from school and had attempted to cross the street to talk to a friend. Laura, who had in fact been the friend across the street, ran to me and yelled at the boy on the bike. She helped me stay calm, told me to keep my eyes closed, and guided me at top speed back to the school so we could wait for my Mom. There was a LOT of blood. I was scared to death. She was calm and caring and somehow fierce in the face of crisis.
Here’s the thing — I had only just recently begun being friendly with Laura. She was, at most times, the class pariah. The mean girls in our school had convinced me to be nice to her for some plot I really didn’t understand, and I had been hanging out with her a little. I was starting to see the truth — Laura was really cool.
By the time of the accident, Laura had every reason to still doubt me. She had every reason to look at me and say “wow, that stinks…hope you make it home ok!” We were 11, maybe 12; still little girls. And she’d been deeply hurt by the same group I wanted to be a part of. None of that mattered. She ran and took control and acted with great compassion.
She had opened her friendship to me despite the possibility that I might be like the other girls. She dared to trust. That trust eventually helped me realize that the mean girls were wrong. It helped me see that, if they’d lied about Laura, they’d probably lie about me too. And I began to see I could be myself, fully, because there were people who didn’t expect me to be anyone else.
So, yeah, there’s a scar. I see my mother and daughter in the lift, and a way to be myself in the memory.
