Saint Valentine

There are a lot of things for a fourteen year old girl to hate about Valentine's day, especially if it ends up landing on a school day. So many pretty girls bouncing around the hallways and skipping up stairwells with arms full of bright red balloons and those stupid candy roses that the French club sells every year as a fundraiser. Damn that French club and their stupid candy roses.

The worst thing about the French club's candy roses is that if someone buys you a rose that means that on Valentine's day you will get that rose delivered to you in class. Sort of like in the movie "Mean Girls" where Cady buys all of the plastics a candy-gram for Christmas, and then they get delivered to them in class and all the plastics get a candy-gram except for Gretchen Wieners. None for Gretchen Wieners. Watching everyone else get a candy-gram must have been hard for the incredibly fictional movie character Gretchen. I know that watching everyone else get a stupid French club candy rose was hard for the incredibly real and lonely me.

I quickly left school that day, itching to get as far away from the hell that is a school day that coincides with Valentine's, and once at home I felt refreshed by the neutral beige palate of its interior. My house was pristine, everything dusted and spotless at all times, smelling like vanilla candles and dimly lit so that anyone that entered looked fantastic because the lighting was just right. My friends loved coming to my house, however they were also slightly frightened of it. It was like stepping into a museum where you know that if you touched anything or stepped too closely to that one of a kind antique a guard would quickly reprimand you for being so careless and endangering the delicate masterpieces surrounding you. So while my friends stood in awe of my perfectly scented and lit beige toned home, they also knew to tread with caution, because even the air seemed all too delicate.

I was standing by the window when I heard my mom's car pull up in the driveway. A hot flood of anxiety began to rise in my chest, as it always does when mom comes home. My mom has good days and bad days, it's just unfortunate that most days are bad days. If mom walked in the house with a smile, or even a simple "hello," I knew that it would be a good night; I knew that I could make it through the night. But looking out the window and into the driveway, I could tell from the way she got out of the car that today would not be a good day. I quickly looked around the living room to make sure that nothing was out of place, no pillow was slanted incorrectly, the television remote control was lined up perfectly at the desired four inches from the edge of the coffee table. Everything seemed to be in order as mom entered the front door. I stood smiling at my mother, hoping to provide enough positive "Valentine's day" energy to overpower any negative mood she might be in. That worked probably forty percent of the time; if I used my personality to overcompensate for hers I could shift the negative energy that she possessed, at least for a little while.

Before I had a chance to warmly wish my mother a happy Valentine's day, she threw down her purse next to the piano and stood directly in front of me. "Lift up your shirt," she said in a firm and terrifying voice.
"What?" I asked. "What for?"
"You heard what I said," she barked. "Lift up your shirt now."
"Mom, I'm not lifting up my shirt unless you tell me why." I could feel my chest tightening and my face beginning to flush. My thoughts raced to find the answer for what I should do next. Before my mind could come up with an answer, I was pushed to the floor with my mother on top of me. She grabbed the bottom of my red t-shirt and pulled it up quickly, a look of confusion coming over her face. She stared into my eyes, and for a brief moment I thought I had gotten away with it, that my secret was still mine to cherish.

It's amazing how fast your body and mind can shift from feelings of relief to feelings of despair; your entire self being swept away within seconds and your world being forever altered. Without saying a word my mother began unbuttoning my jeans, and I knew better than to fight her. I layed there while my mom pulled my jeans down around my thighs, her eyes fixed on my lower stomach.

"What is this?" she asked with hatred in her voice.
Silence. My mind froze and my voice refused to be heard.
"I said," she repeated loudly, "what is this?"
"Stretch marks mom," I replied meekly. I couldn't think of a better excuse, how else would I explain the rows upon rows of vertical, red, one inch lines that covered my pale white skin.
"These," she said sharply, "are not stretch marks Katelyn. I know what you've been doing. One of your friends told me that you've been cutting yourself. She just walked right up to me and told me that you cut yourself all the time, that she'd seen the scars. Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was for me, to have a teenager, for god sakes, walk up and tell me my daughter cuts herself?"

"Which friend told you?" I quietly asked, although I already knew the answer. It was Brittany White, she was the only one that knew, and she only found out because I got careless. I let myself change in front of her one night when I was sleeping over at her house, and I wasn't careful to make sure that she couldn't see my stomach. I can't believe that dumb bitch told my mom. What a cunt.

"Well?" My mom barked. "What do you have to say to me? What am I supposed to do with this?" You could see in her eyes that my mom's head was spinning and rage was boiling up inside of her. I wished that my dad would come home, that he would walk in the door right this second and save me. But I also knew how sad and disappointed he would be when he found out about the cutting. Maybe it was best if he didn't come home tonight after all.

"I don't think you have to do anything about this mom," I said as I began to slide out from underneath my mother's grasp. Pulling up my pants, my mom ordered me to go to my room and "think about what I've been doing." First she made me give her my cell phone. Really smart, I thought. Take the cell phone but leave the razor blades and safety pins. I sat on the edge of my bed completely numb. I knew that what would come next would not be good. And to think, earlier in the day my biggest concern had been that I didn't get a stupid candy rose from the French club. I would kill to be thinking about candy roses right now. Happy Valentine's day to me, I thought as I heard my mother open the door to my bedroom.