Questions

“What happened?”

“Kashley, don’t be rude!” her father says, scolding.

“It’s OK, Trey.” I look into her six-year-old eyes, this little blond beauty I have loved for four incredible years. She is not my daughter, but, like her father, she is my closest friend. The friendship between us confuses outsiders, but has a closer-than-family feeling to us.

I realize with surprise that neither she, nor her father, ever asked me about the scars on my face before. But Kashley is six now, with more than the usual amount of curiosity that comes with this age. I should have known that she, like many before her, would eventually ask.

“When I was four years old, I did something very stupid and hurt myself.”

“Four, that’s lower than me, right?”

Laughing, “Yes, Kashley, four is younger than you.”

“What did you do?”

“You know what an extension cord is, right?”

“Yes, of course!” she says, rolling her eyes at my questioning her having such basic knowledge.

“Well, I played with an extension cord. I tried to plug a cord in it, and couldn’t get it to fit, so I put it into my mouth and bit down on it.”

Eyes fly wide open as her mouth drops, “Wow, that was stupid!”

I can’t help but laugh, waving my hand at Trey, letting him know that everything is fine; he does not need to scold or correct her.

“Yes, Kashley, it was very stupid. I was electrocuted, which means I got burned. I had to go to the hospital, and the doctors had to fix me.”

“Did it hurt?”

Did it hurt…. Yes, but not in ways she would understand.

* * *

It’s my birthday. I’m six today. I have to spend my birthday in the hospital, but it is fun. It’s my third operation, Mom says this one will fix me better. The nurses are nice to me; one gave me a big book with colored pictures of my insides to look at! Mom and Daddy keep bringing me new toys and crossword puzzle books. The big ones, like Nanna does when Granpop is in his shop. I am so happy, my first real crossword puzzle book! All the nurses and doctors and Mom and Daddy put such big smiles on their faces and laugh and keep saying there is nothing to worry about. This will make you better Laura. This won’t hurt.

But I am a smart girl. I see lots of disgust and horror in their eyes. They look at me and see a monster. When they look at me. People don’t look at me. I bet that nurse doesn’t know I have brown eyes. They use big words thinking I won’t understand. I just listen and figure out how to spell the words in my head. Then I go find them in the book Aunt Viola gave me for my birthday. I like to do that trick, spelling in my head then finding out what it means. That way they can’t use words to hide stuff from me.

It’s a big book, called a “dictionary,” with a word I don’t know: “Unabridged.” I find it. Unabridged means not abridged. So I find abridged, which I figure out means shorter. So this dictionary is not shorter. Does that mean the dictionary has every word in it? I think so! It’s a big book, so heavy it makes my legs tingle! I am going to read every page and learn every word!

The nurse comes in when I am on the second page and tells me to put my book away. She says I need to sleep now because tomorrow is a big day. I ask her how to spell “keltoid.”

“Keltoid? Where did you hear that word?”

“Doctor B said it to Mom. Mom said is Laura ever going to be normal and he said he didn’t know, cause I am keltoid.”

“Oh, you mean keloid! Don’t worry, keloid is not bad. The doctor is very good and he is going to fix you up tomorrow. You will be able to drink out of a cup without a straw and smile again.”

I open the dictionary as the nurse makes shu-shu noises tucking the covers around my legs. She tells me again to put my book away just as I find the “C” part. “What are you doing?”

“I am finding keloid.”

Laughing softly, “Honey, keloid starts with a K not a C.”

“Oh, okay, I get those mixed up sometimes.”

I find keloid in the dictionary, which leads me to “fibrous,” which leads me to “sinews.” The nurse stands there, watching me. She can see I have brown eyes. “So I’m not normal.”

“What honey?”

“I am not normal. It says so right here. See? The stuff the doctors do, they can’t fix this. It can’t be fixed,” I say, touching my face.

The nurse sits down next to me on the bed and looks at the definition. “Keloid is scars, like when you hurt yourself falling off your bike. When it heals, it leaves scars. Keloid is just scars, they do not hurt.”

“Scars can’t be fixed.”

“That’s right, honey, scars can’t be fixed. But the doctor can make them smaller.”

“But they can’t be fixed. They don’t go away.”

“No.”

“So I’m not going to be normal.”

She brushes my hair away from my forehead, leans over and turns off the light. She stands up, reaches over me and tucks in the covers, placing the book under my arm. Turning, walking towards the door, she says, “You are normal, honey, and no one can change that.”

But she’s not looking at me.

* * *

It was a dark, angry time in my life, my world was destroyed. It was an accident, but to me it was the darkness of hell that befell my daughter. The corner of her mouth and side of her face was destroyed by an electrical burn. I saw nothing but darkness through that period. Yet there was a small, constant light as she spoke to me, never putting blame to anything or anyone. She walked, her head held high, even though people stared at her, gawking, and cringing. Her eyes always smiling at us, her mother and I. Through this period of examinations, and painful operations, never did she founder or complain, always soothing me, reassuring me of her strength. Strength we parents never had. Slowly through her strength, we went together as one through this period of darkness toward the light.

I never knew my father saw my strength as something beautiful. I think about how often over the years I heard him brag about how strong I was. I hated my strength: it isolated me. Sometimes I wanted to scream at him that there is more to me then strength. I never felt strong: I just felt alone and afraid. I was too young to know it, but acting strong was a way to hide the fear and loneliness.

I know I was wrong to snoop through Dad’s private papers, but I will never apologize for it.

* * *

The Berlin Wall would come down later that day, but I didn’t know that yet. All I knew, as I rushed into the office late for work again, was that Bill wanted to see me in his office, probably to fire me. I enter Bill’s office, apologizing as I close the door behind me. He just waves me quiet, saying there is someone he wants me to meet. We leave the office; he hails a taxi even though it is a warm fall day, perfect for walking. We stop, just eight blocks later, in front of D.C. General, enter the building, up the elevator, down the hall.

I don’t need to read the signs to know this is the pediatrics wing, I recognize it immediately. I spent more time than anyone should in pediatric wards: they are all the same. There is one difference, though, from the wards of my youth: there is a playroom at the end of the hall, where I would expect a barren waiting room. I hear children playing, at least two of them arguing over a red crayon. I know who these children are without seeing them. They are me.

Cinderella, in the form of a five-year-old, runs up to Bill and hugs him enthusiastically. Eventually, her deep blue eyes meet my brown eyes.

“Do you want to color?” she asks me. I look at Bill.

“Laura, this is Nicole.”

“Nice to meet you, Nicole.”

“Nicole is my daughter.” Silently, I nod my understanding.

Looking down at this small beauty, I tell her yes and sit down on a small chair at a small table. Four hours later, we children of various ages have shared our names and in blunt bits and pieces, our stories. Each a bit different, yet all with one common element: extension cords. Seven-year-old Paul asks me how many stitches I had, which started a heated competition over who had the honor of the most. I let six-year-old William (“not Billy, that’s a goat”) win, with his 800 count. Telling them of my thousands of stitches over a dozen operations is unneeded.

This wasn’t the first time I told my story to children: for as long as I can remember I have told my story to curious children who boldly came up to me in various public places and asked what happened, that is those who didn’t run from me in horror or maliciously tease me. I’ve told my story to PTA groups, church groups, and other adults, hoping they would take precautions within their own homes for their children. However, this was the first time I told my story to children who are me. The first time telling my story without explanation, without words of pity, looks of horror, or worse: forced words of sympathy from those who simply cannot sympathize. Those who cannot understand that it is neither the injury nor the surgery that causes pain, but the difference between the injured and uninjured that causes the pain.

Twenty-five long years of life to find pure, clear, simple acceptance, acceptance in the form of children, from children, to the child I was and still am.

A nurse comes in to end the play; I gently awaken Nicole, who had fallen asleep on my lap. She sleepily stretches, then goes to her Dad, hugs and butterfly-kisses him with her eyelashes. She can’t form a kiss with her lips yet, but she can make the kiss sound with her tongue. She whispers in Bill’s ear, and I hear him say “Of course, Sweetie, go ahead!” She runs to me, hugs me, and touches my face, as deep blue eyes touch brown.

As her dad takes her back to her room, she says: “Daddy, will my doctor make me so pretty?”

It’s a silent taxi ride back to the office. I don’t remember if Bill or I spoke them, but the only words were “Thank You.” When I get home, I turn on the TV to ecstatic pictures on every channel of the Berlin Wall coming down. I sit up all night long, watching, crying, laughing, finding myself kindred to those European strangers, feeling walls within me falling as their wall fell.

* * *

There are no photos of me from age 4 until about 8. It’s like the deformed, hideous me never existed. I once asked Mom for a photo of me during those years – she was so offended you’d have thought I’d asked about her sex life. I want to be normal. I want to be like other people who have faded childhood photos in a dusty album they rarely look at on a high closet shelf. But none of those tokens of childhood exist for me. Mom’s told me many times she didn’t have photos taken because it was “for the best.” I will always wonder: best for whom?

* * *

I open the doors and walk into a miniature Beverly Hills, sleek chrome and leather chairs arranged like a yuppie coffee shop without a trace of that well-known doctor’s office scent. This is the only place in the world I can touch my past and find my unknown self. I present myself to a chic receptionist, who to my shock leads me right down the hall towards an examination room.

“The doctor is waiting for you.”

“I’m not here to see the doctor, just my records.”

“I know, Miss DiFiore.” I think this is the first time a medical worker has ever referred to me as anything other than my first name.

I was surprised at how easy it was to arrange seeing my now-ancient records; quite shocked they still existed! One simple phone call, a 45-minute drive and I’m here. So easy to learn the secrets Mom worked so hard to protect me from. So easy to open up the past denied me without my permission, so easy to see the unseen. She opens the door, and a man I considered my second father is standing up, leaning on a cane.

“DOCTOR B!! OH my GOD!!”

“Miracle! Look at you!” Lots of hugs and smiles… I can’t believe he is standing here, the man who did his best to give my parents a girl who wasn’t gruesome.

Miracle. That was his nickname for me. Miracle, because I never went into shock. Miracle, because I never cried. Miracle, because I lived when I should have died. The fuse never blew. The damage – the burns – indicated I was electrocuted for several long, long minutes, more than enough time to kill me. No one knows how I broke away from the live current. The theory was our dog thought I was playing tug-of-war and pulled the cord from me.

“My God, look at you!” Hugging me, I smell his warm pipe smell. I loved when he visited me in the hospital because he always smelled real. We talk for a while; I tell him about my five years of travels around the world; he tells me how his son and daughter run the practice now, about retirement and moving from cold New Jersey to warm California.

“I can’t believe you are here!” I say.

“I couldn’t pass up the chance to see my little Miracle again.” After more small talk, he raised the reason for my visit.

“Well, young Miracle, shall we open up the past?” as he lifted a folder from the counter and placed it in my hands.

“Not so young anymore, Doc, I just turned 30!” I say, hefting the weight of the folder he handed me. It’s thick. Four inches, maybe five. DIFIORE, L.A. in faded hand-written letters across the top. Scuffed, bent corners, some stray pencil marks, a few small tears on the cover, page edges yellowed. I run my hand across the cover.

“You know the grafting technique we used on you was experimental at the time.”

I look up at him.

“Of course, it’s been fine-tuned over the years, but at the time, well, you were one of my first successes. The technique is still used today.”

“I didn’t know that.”

He continues to talk about advances in reconstructive surgery techniques, but I don’t really hear him. I keep rubbing my hand across the folder. I look up, down, then up at him again. He winks at me.

I stop rubbing the folder. Ghosts of voices more than two decades old start echoing through my head… shouts of “Scarface! Scarface!” in childhood playgrounds I could not play in out of fear I might hurt the tender grafted skin … Mom arguing with my teenage self to “Put some makeup on!” hoping simple makeup would hide the evidence of my difference. Scarface… scarface… so many voices of so many faces that never saw me as anything but an injury.

I push the voices away and open the folder.

Taped to the inside of the cover are photos of me, the first thing seen upon opening the file, as if these faded photos are the most important thing in all the thickness of dusty pages. Of course, they are the most important things, for they are me. Me. I see me, a me I never saw except in the eyes of horror on the faces of others.

Me.

Now I know why Mom had no photos of me. Now I know why there were no mirrors in our house. I see me as many cruel, teasing kids saw me. I see me as many ignorant adults who wouldn’t let their kids play with me in case I was “catching” saw me. But I don’t see a hideous, deformed, and grotesque monster. I don’t see horror. I don’t feel horror. I don’t see why. I do see a kid. I see me. I’m just a kid. A badly injured kid: but just a kid.

I don’t see why they couldn’t see me. Why they could only see the injury.

I’m just a kid. I was just a kid.

Hours and years of time pass as I read the entire file, page after page of examinations and operations, almost snuggling with Dr. Briggs as he leads me through those mysterious primeval years, much as a prosecutor leads a jury through the history of a crime. Eventually, I say goodbye and thank you, with more hugs and smiles.

His last words to me: “You just keep on smiling, Miracle.”

I never ask for copies of anything. I don’t need them.

* * *

My last operation occurred just before I turned 14. Six months afterwards, my Mom and I went to Dr. B’s office for the follow-up appointment. I remember sitting there on the exam table; Dr. B shining a bright light across my face to highlight scars invisible to all but his professional eyes. I remember his index finger running lightly across my reconstructed lips, cheek, jaw; his eyes frowning slightly as his finger ran across the remaining, still-visible-to-all scars at the corner of my mouth.

“Smile.”

I force a big grimace out of my lips and laugh at his “stop goofing off” look.

“Come on, Miracle, you know what I mean. Just smile naturally.”

I smile naturally, and see warm approval in his eyes.

“Nice, very nice. There you go, Miracle. Just keep smiling and no one will ever notice.”

* * *

“Did it hurt?”

Did it hurt. Yes, but not in ways she would understand.

“Yes, sometimes it did hurt.” Never lie to a six-year-old: their egocentric view of the world has the amazing side-effect of always knowing when someone is lying to them.

“Did you get a lot of shots?”

“Yes, I had a lot of shots.”

“Yuck! I hate needles! Was your mommy mad at you?”

“No, my mommy wasn’t mad at me. She was scared. I was hurt very bad. She was worried the doctors would not be able to fix me. Mommies don’t like to see their kids hurt.” Yes, I understand Mom now.

“I never touch the cords. I only use the switch like Daddy says,” she proudly says.

“That’s very smart, Kashley!”

“Can I touch it?”

“Yes, go ahead.”

Small light fingers trace the now faded, lightly visible, nearly two-inch “C” shaped scar at the corner of my mouth, eyes wide with wonder. “It’s, it’s soft! It feels normal!” she says with surprise.

“Of course!” I say, laughing.

“Does it hurt?”

“No, Kashley, it doesn’t hurt. It’s just a scar. Scars don’t hurt.”