Sit and Stare

Trigger Warning: grief, regret, death, disfigurement.

The sun is drawing away, slowly at first, like an evening steam train. It takes the daylight with it and leaves my room in semi-shadow.

‘Your mum, she left these for you, to open on your sixteenth birthday. I don’t know what they are, I promised I wouldn’t look. I never have.’

I sit and stare at the white envelope and the red velvet box that Dad has placed before me on the dressing table. They lie in front of the mirror I covered eight years ago, half a lifetime back. A blue silk scarf is draped between me and my fears.

‘Do you want me to stay while you open them?’

‘No, thank you. No.’

‘Happy Birthday Liz.’ He closes the door behind him.

For Liz on your 16^th Birthday.

Shaking hands lift the letter. I slide a stiffened forefinger into the corner gap and run it under the glued-down flap of the envelope. I force paper from paper, releasing a prisoner from eight years ago, back into the cruel world. Shame-filled air catches like crumbs of self-hatred in my irritated throat.

What will she say?

I feel the same dejection I had felt at six years old when she’d yelled at me for losing her keys. Bryn had been locked out 'til Dad came home. The poor dog was soaking and shaking for nearly an hour while Mum searched under cushions and moved the furniture.

'He can't fend for himself out there! And what if there was a fire!? We'd be trapped!'

She'd left me to sulk in my room back then. She was doing it again now.

The paper inside the envelope is the same pastel pink of my favourite childhood skirt. The skirt I had on in the clinical corridors that day. And have never worn, or looked at, since. It still hangs in my wardrobe. I can't let it go. But it is shrouded in black plastic, shielding me from the memory of that sterile smell, those beeping machines, that doctor's face.

I gradually edge the paper out into the room. The flowing calligraphy brings back dozens of playful memories. That careful lettering in reverse, that backwards font. She’d leave messages in my lunch box or under my pillow or in my shoe. Secrets. Just for me.

I need a mirror. Of all the things. Of all the God damn things.

I count to three, somehow thinking that will enable me to whip the scarf away from the glass, like pulling off a plaster. But my rigid hands stay statue still on the table. Maybe it is a plaster, with a festering wound underneath that will only heal if the air can get in. Ripping it off will hurt. I’m not ready.

I try to decipher the letters myself but her elaborate italics have always bested me.

Breath held, eyes closed, I count to ten. I’m still not ready. I puff out an invisible cloud of despair. My stony gaze lodges on the first mysterious line of text.

The sun is forging its way behind Radley Hill. While the sky is rejoicing in those familiar Battenburg colours, my room is growing gloomy. I light a candle to illuminate the letter with its flickering glow.

She’s forced my hand, so I inhale a wisp of resolve. With one palm resting on the envelope, I reach the other forward. Tentative fingers take hold of the silk scarf that has protected me for so long. I pull back on one corner and it slinks across the top of the mirror. Suddenly the weight of the fabric pulls the rest of it away and the glass is revealed.

My gaze falls on the pine frame, then on the table-top, then back on my hand, everywhere but on my own reflection.

‘How can you look at yourself?’ I hiss under my breath.

I fit the edge of the page to the base of the looking glass. Holding one hand to my brow to avoid any unintentional glimpses of my face, I begin to read.

Darling Lizzie,

I wipe my eyes but the letters still blur.

You will be 16 when you get this, and I will be gone. I’m sorry I asked you to wait so long to read my words. I’m even more sorry I can’t be there to see you on your Sweet Sixteen. My beautiful girl.

I pull my eyes from the page and steady myself for a moment. She doesn't seem mad, but this was so much worse than a shivering, wet dog.

You are beautiful. No matter what you tell yourself. And I ask you to look into the mirror now and appreciate that.

I lift my head but close my eyes. How can she even think that I might be beautiful?

I blindly face the mirror, knowing the girl in it has her eyes closed too. The shame is shared between us.

I feel the paper in my hands, recall her citrus perfume, and gather my strength. I gradually part my eyelids, letting the light in, glimpse by glimpse. The fuzzy colours become an image.

I undertake a half-hearted study of my washed out blue-grey eyes. Encircled in dark pools of sorrow, weighed under a heavy brow. Drained of the sparkle I see in the colourful irises of my friends. Even where the light catches them, they are dull and lifeless. Once they shone like sapphires. Like hers.

My gaze drifts to the edges of my face.

I recall the noise, the scraping metal, the smashing glass, the screams, the sirens.

I recall the colours, the blood red smears against the grey car interior, the flashing blue lights.

I recall being lifted through a broken window. Not comprehending that my eight-year-old body would never be the same again.

A tear leaves my cheek and drops onto my precious letter. I dab at the paper with my sleeve. There's a tiny smudge but the words appear clearly in the mirror:

Your face may not look how you want it to look, and that may have brought you pain. But those scars are the sign of your strength, your resilience, your resolve. My beautiful girl.

I love you, and will always love you, and will always be proud.

What happened was not your fault.

A sob heaves in my chest. It hurts to breathe.

I ask you, I beg you, if you haven’t already, forgive yourself now. You could not have known what would happen.

I trace the largest scar with one finger, from the corner of my eyebrow, as it snakes to my chin like a pale River Styx. I’ve never intentionally touched it before. It is uncomfortably smooth, it makes my spine tingle with intolerance.

Smaller scars keep it company. Some, mere flecks of discoloured flesh, some big enough to hold their own shapes. They intersect each other like a morbid roadmap of what happened on the High Street in 2010.

Dad had tried to warn me.

‘Put it away until we get home.’ He turned from the passenger seat to wag his finger.

‘But it’s my birthday!’

‘Lizzie! There will be no cake and no party unless you put that away right now.’

I’d never held a party popper before, or seen one being popped, only the coloured streamers that were left behind. How I loved those thin curls of bright paper. I'd gather them up on New Year's Day from the parties I was too young to attend the night before.

I took one last look at Mum in the rear-view mirror - slightly jealous of the pale pink lipstick and silver-grey eyeshadow I was too young to wear. I pulled the string taut, not intending to set it off, but there was a pothole in the road. The bump was enough. The noise and the coloured paper startled my mum. She jumped and shrieked in the driver’s seat. The other car came from the right. Ploughing into us, spinning us onto the pavement.

Before I knew it the fire crew were cutting me out. I didn’t see my parents for several hours, they were both unconscious in the hospital. Mum was in for days longer than me. Days of crying and uncertainty. Eventually, one rainy Wednesday, they took her for her final surgery. She handed something to Dad before the operation, 'Just in case.'

Complications, they said. Complications.

There never was a cake, or a party that year. Just flowers and a funeral. And two weeks off school.

Dad didn't smile for a very long time, but insisted on celebrations when I turned nine, and every year after. ‘It’s what your mum would want.’

That might be true but the guilt deepened with every ribbon-tied present. Every party game.

My brave girl. Open your gift. Remember me. Forgive yourself.

I love you.

Mum

Hot tears tumble down my pale cheeks. I protect the letter with both hands, choosing to save it instead of wiping away my sorrow.

I have her eyes. Maybe their colour will come back one day.

I sit and stare. Just sit and stare.

‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’

I look a bit like her now. If it’s possible to ignore my ugly right-hand side. Picking up the hinged velvet box, I feel its softness against my skin. I lift it to my cheek and let the texture brush over the parts of my face that still have feeling. It takes a little courage to turn on the lamp.

The subtle brightness in the room strengthens me to lift the lid. The interior is lined in black satin, and lying in the centre are my gifts. Pale pink lipstick, silver-grey eye shadow, and a small bottle of citrus perfume.

I sit and stare until the tears stop, then wipe my reddened face with tissues until the skin is dry but sore. With great care I apply the makeup and spritz myself with scent.

Slowly the image in the mirror changes. The hair grows darker, and shorter. The face gets fuller. The eyes are bright, solid blue.

Words, like a zephyr in the night, escape her lips.

‘I forgive you. I forgive you. I forgive you.’