The Scars that Make Us

Thud. Thud. Thud. 

For the past eleven years, it was the same frantic race for the same minuscule amount of time. One hour. Then, she’d have to wait another 8,766.82 hours—an entire year—for the chance to funnel back to her again. But that wasn’t the worst part; with time slipping away, her opportunities were dwindling. She had exactly a dozen chances—not a baker’s dozen; twelve. She wasn’t sure how she arrived at that time-constraining conclusion, but she had, nonetheless. After that, the rest of her existence would echo in her ears, mingling with the relentless thudding that haunted her now. It was nearing 2:00 a.m., the witching hour, and the relentless pounding was about to take its one-hour commercial break from her mind—with just one shot left.

As the iridescent glow of the front porch light engulfed the entryway, Tilly worried her parents might come undone over her tardiness. Yet the argument she’d just had with Mark lingered, far more troubling. She wiped the tears from her cheeks before they could fall, darkening her blue satin dress with faint smudges of makeup. It was silly to care about that now, especially since she’d have to mend the strap that had been torn away. Tilly and her mother spent a lot of hours making the perfect dress.

Doing her best to silently turn the knob and muffle her footsteps as Tilly slipped inside, she pressed the front door shut with her hands to keep from waking anyone. With a sudden turn of her wrist, she snapped the deadbolt into its catch, the loud click breaking the barrier of stillness, and continued her trek upstairs with the tippy-toe action of a child sneaking in for a cookie late at night.

Reaching the top, as the faint light cast through the windows and displayed a monochrome kaleidoscope of shadows around the room, an occasional screech resonated from a tree branch scraping an unseen pane.

Continuing past her parents’ room, she sighed in relief when she saw the door closed. Tilly was always surprised when it was, figuring they’d be awake until she safely returned. Then it occurred to her that with her and Gabby gone, the adults may have celebrated on their own. While she was at her high school prom, and her kid sister was at a friend’s slumber party, her parents had the chance to enjoy themselves in private throes of passion.

Tilly’s bedroom was the last room at the end of the hall, but this was when things always got confusing for her. The door was nearly closed as she cautiously approached it, afraid to see who would be deeply snuggling in her bed this time. It was always someone new, each at a different age and with a distinct personality, and she had to convince them to leave. However, without the ability to provide anything more than creepy groans, she found it impossible. She’d tried every approach, from acting shy to attempting to scare the hell out of them. Yet every time, they sank deeper into the bed, sometimes slipping beneath the blankets, where they’d remain trembling for the rest of the hour. Their reactions only fueled her impatience and desperation each time her efforts backfired. Then, she’d have to wait another year for the anniversary, witnessing the victims suffer the agonizing death intended for her, leaving her stuck in purgatory until her twelfth defining event. If she failed this time—the twelfth—it was game over, and she’d be trapped with the ever-present thudding in the void.

The door to her bedroom felt heavier than it should have as she pushed it open on its hinges. A tall, thin window flanked each side of the bed, with white, wispy sheers hanging weightlessly from the curtain rod. A gentle breeze permeated the light drapes, causing them to drift and shift sporadically but beautifully, like an out-of-sync water ballet. Though the leaky seals kept the drizzly rain out, when the air outside shifted violently, the windows inhaled through the gaps, like the final, dying breath of an old man.

There stood her four-poster bed, its tall white spindles marking each corner, with a lavender dust ruffle skirting along the bottom. A matching quilt draped languidly over the outline of a sleeping body. A light, comfortable snore released in rhythmic ripples, like the waves vibrating across the pond out back. Tilly couldn’t help herself; her shoulders lifted and released in a sigh. Instead of rattling the sleeper while they slept, urging them to leave, she’d plan something new.

Always flustered and rushing to beat him to the punch, she waited patiently this time, scrunched in a ball at the foot of the bed as one of the windows slipped open. This set the curtains fluttering as Mark’s sizable hands cupped the bottom edge, pushing the window up and dragging himself through onto the floor. Afraid, fully aware of what was coming next, she hunkered down further, glancing at her vanity behind her. The back of her chair blocked most of it, but she remembered fixing a hangnail just as Mark had pulled up, honking his car horn for her, like a lunatic, for all the neighbors to hear.

Lifting her head to peer over the lumpy blankets, searching for Mark’s hulking form, she prayed to God he wouldn’t pause to glance beneath the bed. The chance he’d spot her wasn’t great, but it wasn’t nil either. Still, craning her neck, she shot her arm toward the vanity, fingers scratching blindly in the dark, searching for the file. Her fingertips brushed against something thin and flat; she snatched it back, holding it up in front of her eyes. For a fraction of a second, Tilly ran her fingers along the pink-handled nail file, wondering how many like it had ever been wielded as weapons. It certainly wasn’t sharp, but it was her only option… or was it? Against a man with the enormity of Mark—nearly a foot taller and twice her weight—was she batshit crazy right now?

Awkwardly struggling to get his gigantic body to his feet, Mark extracted a hammer from where it had been lodged in the back of his pants’ belt loop. As he raised it over his head, moonlight from the window caught on the metal, casting a dazzling spark around the room. In that instant, a slowed replay of the previous eleven times she’d witnessed innocent people hammered into a bloody pulp gurgled in her stomach. Without a second thought, Tilly leapt to her feet, nail file in hand, and, pressing her palms together with her fingers locked, drove it down hard, sinking it into the highest part of the blanket with all the force she could muster. The file plunged into the blankets up to the handle, and when she yanked it out, the fabric puckered before finally letting go. A dark crimson patch began to spread from the piercing hole, saturating the blanket.

First, the absolute shock of seeing Tilly rise from beside the bed caught Mark off-guard. But when the figure in the bed jolted upright in confused pain, clutching the spot where the nail file had pierced, blood streaming between her fingers, Mark staggered back in disbelief—especially in realizing it was a different young woman, not Tilly. Her body was so toned she looked like a female Apollo Creed, her initial devastation transforming into a writhing fury. With her short, tightly balled-up hair and every muscle tensed, she leapt from the bed in one swift movement and raised her fists. She was poised and ready for whomever had dared to violate her sleep.

Hammer still undisturbed over his head, Mark stood frozen, uncertain of his next move. His opponent, nearly his height, delivered a swift one-two punch to his chin, snapping his head first to the right, then to the left. His eyes, shadowed yet wide with surprise, reflected his shock. The hammer slipped from his grip, clattering against the floorboards as it fell past the back of his head.

That’s when Tilly shifted from her knees onto her feet, dropping the nail file. Flinging herself across bed, she pushed the muscular girl out of the way. 

The young fighter wasted no time, darting for the door and disappearing with her clamoring footfalls down the steps. Meanwhile, Tilly scrambled, climbing between the sheets and covering her head beneath the blankets. Her labored breaths rose audibly from under the covers as Mark brought the hammer down with all the brute force he could summon, driving it through the blankets and into Tilly’s shoulder with a sickening crunch that filled the room.

Shrill screams rang out as he drew the blankets back with one hand and climbed onto the bed, straddling her petite form. Stunned, despite the bleeding shoulder and throbbing pain, Tilly could only watch as the rest of history unfolded.

His face, looming above Tilly, morphed into a gnarled grimace as the hammer fell again, landing squarely in the middle of her forehead and plunging into an irregularly shaped hole with a resounding thwack! Rocking the handle forward and back, he worked the hammer loose, the metal head bucking free with a wet suction, flinging blood across the room.

Over and over, Mark lifted the hammer and brought it crashing down on its mark… Tilly was finally free…

Meanwhile, hoarse shrieking jounced about as the bedroom light clicked on, illuminating a wall adorned with posters of boxing legends: Muhammad Ali, Mike Tyson, Sugar Ray Leonard, and Laila Ali. Atop the dresser, a few ribbons and a gleaming trophy with golden boxing gloves invited visitors to pause and take in the scene.

“Latisha,” a female voice called out. “Latisha! Latisha, wake up.” Her mother approached the bed, where Latisha thrashed in the blankets, fists flying, her voice frantically screaming out in fear and anger.

Finally, the turbulence halted, and the physically fit young woman propped herself up on one elbow, breathing heavily as she pushed herself into a sitting position. Sweat glistened across her forehead, gathering at her hairline and trickling down her neck. “I did it,” she said, a Cheshire grin spreading up to her shiny dark eyes. “I finally fought back, instead of just lying there and taking it.”

Latisha’s mother, finally unafraid to approach her daughter, settled onto the bed. Taking her daughter’s face tenderly in her soft palms, she leaned in and whispered, “Always defend yourself, baby. Never stop.”

Latisha pulled back and looked intently into her mother’s singular, equally dark eye. Then her gaze shifted to the other side of her mother’s nose, where her eyeball’s imposter lived beneath a jagged scar, a cold and hard iris, never moving. “I’ll carry you with me, Mama—every step of the way.”

Neither of the women noticed the small scar on Latisha’s shoulder—the faint remembrance of Tilly that made it all possible.