Chapter 16

May 21st, 2003

You'd think normal wednesdays in May near the end of ninth grade would be pretty normal, right? Yeah, well, not really. Most of the time things don't go quite to plan, but I've learned and mastered the art of just kinda winging it at this point, so nothing really phases me anymore.

It was a bright 'summer' day from what I can recall, pretty mild in temperature. No more than twenty degrees or so, and that meant it was team sports day according to Mr. Fields, the gym teacher. I'll be honest, I liked Mr. Fields. He was one of the few physical education teachers that actually would participate in the sporting events taking place and not just stand off to the side and blow his whistle like Mssr. Alouette. This meant that Mr. Fields was quite a bit more athletic than most of us kids, and could and would soundly whoop our asses during dodgeball and floor hockey, and almost take pride in doing so. But the guy was young, like twenty-six, so he could be excused for still maintaining his youthful attitude and abilities.

But that was fine, he was a fun guy, and he also taught tenth grade physics. I think we all appreciated Mr. Fields. And just between us, most of us girls liked the way his ass looked in those black jeans he always wore. Just saying. It was excellent.

Ah, getting off topic thinking about butts again. Anyway, my point was, our gym class in ninth grade was always something to look forward to because we were always genuinely expected to follow the 'physical' portion of physical education, and that meant we were always beat and dead tired by the end of the seventy minute period, and usually still sweating profusely in our chairs during english or psychology or whatever we had afterwards. I would show up to calculus and vectors with my hair plastered flat onto my head and Em would show up to geography in an entirely new outfit than the one she started the day in. It was a good thing Phys Ed was second period and not third, or else we'd be showing up to lunch too tired to even lift our sandwiches and too gross to even want to.

Now, this was a time of segregated gym classes. There was a boy's gym class and a girl's gym class. We were separated for who knows why, and this seemed to irritated the surprisingly progressive Mr. Fields. The usual drill with women's Phys Ed was that half the year would be low-stress games like ping-pong and badminton, and the other half of the year in a health class learning about how we were all going to contract HIV and the benefits of abstinence. Yeah, Mr. Fields didn't like this. His ideology was more like 'you girls are human beings too, we're gonna use every ounce of strength you have and prove ourselves better than the boys' class. I certainly appreciated this sentiment.

So we played football, like the boys. We played full-contact soccer, like the boys. We played real dodgeball using those heavy rubber exercise balls, like the boys. We played baseball and softball, just like the boys. See where I'm getting at? We played real, hardcore sports monday to thursday, and on fridays we'd sit in the classroom on the second floor and Mr. Fields would lecture us about regular women's health topics like proper body care and the benefits of safe sex and consent and body positivity. So instead of half the year wasted, it was more like one fifth. Hoo-Rah.

Lucky us then, that the teacher for the boys' class, the venerable rugby star Miss Johnson, who had played on my sister's team back in high school, always liked Mr. Fields' idea of combining the two classes and having proper sports days where we would play one another. These were good days, and they were made especially better when we played girls vs. boys floor hockey or soccer when we were allowed to, that's right, have full contact. I'll remind you this was two thousand and three, still before all child safety rules were actually enforced in schools, so we could basically do whatever we wanted. Got hurt in gym glass? Get up and deal with it. Got burned in chemistry? Should have been wearing safety gloves, idiot. Fell down the stairs? Your problem now, what are you, five?

Miss Johnson was cool, though. Since her and Winter had been friends on the rugby team in highschool and they still kept up, there would be days when I would come home from school and Miss Johnson would be sitting at our breakfast table having tea with my sister, chatting about stuff and things, usually. Whenever she was around our apartment, I was instructed to refer to her by her first name, Lex, and when at school I was to use 'Miss Johnson or I'd receive detention. And detention with Miss Johnson actually meant running laps. I'm not kidding. That was the punishment ten years ago when they were students, so that was what we got to do, too.

So this particular wednesday was one of those crossover episodes where Mr Fields and his troupe of bloodthirsty girls faced off against Lady-Mountain Miss Johnson and her army of boys for a be-all take-all deathmatch of epic proportions. And this time, it was floor hockey. A truly Canadian pastime, that we all could enjoy. Although I remember Em not being exactly good at it or enjoying it much on account of how tall she was, meaning the sticks were always a little on the short side and would make her hurt her back from bending over. But for my tiny ass? Oh, let me tell you. This was my calling. There was only one left-handed hockey stick for us to use, and I had already lay claim to it, being one of two southpaws that I knew. And that meant I could slay.

My team, we'll call the Dream Team, was currently faced off against wouldn't you know it, Jaune's team, which we'll call the Loser's team. It was myself, Em, a stout and athletic girl named Ruth, an actual league player named Taylor, Valentine 'Victory' Mateo, and the tiny but flexible Jessica Harcroft playing net. See, when you're Mr. Fields' favourite, you get to pick your own team first, and that's what I did. Since I was Team Captain, I got to play centre and take face-offs against Team Loser's centre, Ryan, who also happened to be Em's boyfriend. That meant I had every opportunity to make that theatre nerd pay for stealing Precious Emerald's heart and stomping all over it like boys do when they're fourteen.

The ball hit the floor, dropped by this kid who couldn't play on account of his broken arm. I sneered at Ryan and made him jump, giving me time to take the serve away and pass it back to Ruth, who took it and played it up the court past nearly the whole team.

"C'mon! Go through him!" I shouted up at her, watching her duck and dive around Ben, one of the defensemen.

"Cross over!" Taylor shouted, hip-checking the shit out of Carter, the other defenseman.

Ruth passed across the court, the little red ball fired like a cannonball to the actual hockey player, who chose to deke around Jaune and make him look like a fool with a broomstick instead of a reasonably competent hockey player, which I'll admit that he was.

Ryan tried to stop me from advancing up the court, but I didn't let him, plowing my shoulder into his chest and bulldozing him aside.

"Yeah, you show him!" Em called from behind me, keeping the net adequately guarded. "Suck it, Ryan!"

"You guys are so mean!" he complained, tumbling to the floor.

Honestly, that's what you deserved, Ry-Guy. As of yet, no whistle had been blown, and that meant I could continue my assault up the court to join Taylor and Ruth as they passed the ball back and forth between the defensemens legs.

"One time!" I yelled as I entered the end zone at a full sprint.

Ruth got my gist and directed the ball to me. I was almost foaming at the mouth as I cranked back the stick and detonated the ball through their goalie, a particularly handsome boy named Markus's five-hole. A centimetre higher and I'd have destroyed his testicles, but I got a goal instead.

"Hell yeah!" I cheered, raising my stick above my head like a Tusken Raider.

"Good shot, kid." came the call from Miss Johnson. "Keep your stick below your waist, though. You might take someone's eye out."

"Yes ma'am. Sorry."

"Fair goal!"

I turned back to the centre of the court and jogged over, watching Emerald pick poor Ryan off the floor. I think he should have stayed there, honestly, but we had a game to play. I let Em take the face off this time against Jaune, just because I wanted to see him flinch and get flattened by her. You have to remember, most of the detriment I applied to Jaune was for my own amusement. And amused I was as the ball dropped and Emmy's shoulder met with his face as she won the face-off.

"Go!" I yelled, as the ball fired back to Valentine, who in turn fired it across to Taylor.

Our plan from the outset was to use our bigger players like Valentine and Ruth to punch holes in Jaune's team's defensive line, and then use Taylor, the veteran hockey player, as sharp needle to get into the endzone before using myself and Emerald as the heavy-hitters to score goals. And so far, this strategy had worked wonders, since we were up three-one.

"Push through! Push through!" I commanded, taking a run up the left side across from Taylor.

Em was in a good position near centre-court, lined up for a reasonable shot. She did the usual 'two-smack' of her stick on the floor to signify she was open. The pass went wide to her front, and I watched diligently as she chased it down with Ryan in hot pursuit. They hit the edge of the court at the same time, their sticks intertwined and clattering with that familiar sound of scratchy vinyl plastic. Emmy wasn't getting anywhere battling with him like this, and I could see the frustration in her eyes.

"Get out of the way, Ryan!"

"You want the ball, you're going to have to go through me."

"Ryan!"

"Nuh uh."

She scoffed and brought her stick up level, holding it in both hands. With a mighty shove, Ryan was once again on the ground and complaining and the ball was free for the taking. Before she could, however, a whistle was blown and Miss Johnson was running over.

"Stop, stop. What the hell are you doing?"

"What, he said to go through him. Besides, he's my boyfriend, I'm allowed."

She gave Em the most incredulous of looks, almost to question her very existence.

"Wh- no, two minutes for cross-checking. Go sit on the bench."

"C'mon, it's all in good fun."

"No, it's a penalty, Emerald. Do you want two minutes more for arguing?"

"...No."

"Bench."

"Okay."

Em shuffled off and sat down on the bench that separated our court from the one next to it, her stick between her legs and a sad look on her face. Hey, I thought the play was fair, we had to makeup for our lack of brute strength somehow. Who cares if it's against the rules? Besides, this was a semi-contact game, no one had stopped me from shoulder-checking and no one had stopped Taylor from hip-checking literally all of Jaune's team. We were directed to the left-side face-off circle painted into the floor in our own endzone. And now since we were four-on-five, I had to play double duty watching both Ryan, the centre, and Jaune, the left wing. Goddamnit, Emerald.

"Look what you did, Ryan, you made a girl cry."

"She checked me, you saw it."

"I saw you tryin' to keep the ball away from her."

"Thats… the point... of the game?"

The ball dropped and I went shoulder-first into his chest again. Not sure why he hadn't learned this was my tactic yet, but he fell victim to it anyway. I got the ball again and handed it off to Ruth, who got herself around Ben and Carter with relative ease. Unfortunately, we were not the only ones who thought picking a real hockey player sounded like a great idea, Jaune had had the foresight to do just the same, claiming Bailey Linton, a seasoned league player for his own team. So Ruth lost the ball to him.

Bailey charged up the centre of the court like a runaway locomotive, easily slighting around Taylor and Valentine, and brought himself up to our net. With me doing all the work stopping both Jaune and Ryan from advancing, there was nothing I could do except watch as he did his best fake-out to try and land a back-handed shot over Jess's stickside arm. Even with her gymnastic attempt at a save, this was a goal. Disheartening, I know, but that was the price we were paying for Ryan being a bitch and falling over.

At the next face off I let him have the ball, not wanting to break my collar bone from repeated trauma, and took off after him as he backed it away and into his own endzone. An advantage I hoped, since this put me closer to their net and the cute boy guarding it.

"Give up the ball, Ryan."

"Catch me, first."

"I will injure you, Ryan."

"Like to see you try."

I like to think I got along pretty well with Em's boyfriend. He was pretty cool, he had good manners and generally didn't swear all that much, and since he was a theatre nerd he was sometimes even funny. He was kinda cute, I guess, maybe he was more Em's style than mine. I managed to get the ball from him with a bit of struggle, squiggling my stick in between his feet and nearly tripping him up in the process. I could see Em's giddy face from the bench as I roughed my way through her boyfriend, clearly enjoying the punishment I was giving him.

"Oh, look at that, your distraction has been your end."

"What?"

Of course, during the act of looking at Emerald, he had gotten the ball back from me and passed it down the court to Jaune, who was in our endzone.

"Ah, shit."

I spun around and took off after him, my shoes squeaking loudly against the hardwood, stick sliding along the ground. Since the majority of us were up the court in the opposing endzone, this left only Valentine and Jess to do the hard job of stopping Jaune from advancing. Unfortunately, since Jaune and I would play street hockey together every winter in the cul-de-sac behind my apartment, he was much better than our remaining defenseman and easily swooped around her. I, however, was still much faster than him and easily caught up and flung my stick out to deflect his shot.

"I've got you now, Jaune! Give up the ball!"

I made a mad dive forward at the ball. Jaune cranked his stick back for an absolute haymaker of a slapshot.

See, at this point, I should have learned that Hockey is a contact sport of epic proportions. Including the times I had knocked Ryan to the ground and put massive bruises on Jaune and his teammates' legs with the end of my stick. These plastic sticks were basically like bladed lances. High-sticking penalties in real Ice Hockey are no joke, since the real sport was played usually with carbon-composite sticks made of a dense weave of fibreglass and carbon fibre that was both viciously sharp and incredibly dangerous to get in your skin if the stick were to splinter. You know that pink stuff behind the walls of your house and how your parents were always telling you not to touch it? Yeah, that's because the little pieces of glass fibres in it can get lodged in your skin and cause crazy rashes. Same with carbon fibre. Now, imagine those little fibres being lodged in your face by a high-sticking. Not fun, hence the rule 'sticks below the waist'.

Well, in order to get a complete wallop of a slapshot, your stick was naturally going to drift above the centreline a little, that much was clear. And with the weight of the plastic head of these school sticks, that upward swung was going to carry a lot of momentum. This meant that the end of the stick before and after a slapshot was something you probably wanted to avoid getting hit by on any part of your body.

So I dived for the ball at Jaune's feet, just as he was cranking back for what was likely going to be the hardest slapshot of his life.

What I remember from this most was seeing the ball on the court, followed by sudden, violent, searing pain in my face. I fell quickly to the floor, my face on absolute, unadulterated fire. I couldn't see. The pain had literally momentarily blinded me. I honestly felt like I had been shot in the face.

I remember trying to cover my face with my hands, but my cheeks being literally too wet to hold on to, the acute taste of iron-y blood in my mouth, and a definitive gap in the skin of my cheek. But I specifically remember the point at which my left eye just kind of stopped working. Everything was hazy for a few moments, the lights from the overhead lights blaring down through the bloody ocean on my face, and then the left side of my vision went slowly dark, and faded out. And then I noticed how quickly two-dimensional the ceiling became. It was awful. Jaune's face phased in and out from the left side of my vision, past the dark part and into the light. The pain in my face had started radiating down my neck and into my chest, bleeding through me and cutting off the feeling to my left arm and shoulder.

Was I crying? Yes. Was most of those tears blood? Also, yes.

"Holy fuck, are you okay?!" Jaune almost yelled.

I didn't have the ability to respond.

"Oh my god, your face!"

Normally, that would be an insulting thing to say to someone. I didn't have the ability to take offense. Emmy's face was the next to appear from the right side. I saw her cheeks go quite green, nearly the colour of the eyeliner she was wearing. She seemed horrified. After this, I just kinda scrunched up my eyes and tried to wait out the pain. See, when I had broken my leg, the pain wasn't this constant. This was likely the worst pain I had ever been in, and ever would be in for the rest of my life. This pain continued, pulsing every time I tried to breathe. Unfortunately, that was an action I required to perform so I didn't pass out and die of oxygen deprivation.

So everything after this point was a feeling, and a dull ringing sound as my left ear had also stopped receiving signals slowly as well. At some point, something was pressed onto my face and held in place with what I can only assume was a fair bit of force, but I couldn't decipher between hard and soft pressure on my face. After what was probably only ten minutes, the paramedics arrived. It had felt like I had been bleeding for an hour and the pain had been a part of my entire being. I actually, in that moment, completely forgotten what not-pain felt like, and even my own name. I'm serious. I actually didn't know what to say or how to say it when the medic asked me to say my name as I was lifted onto the stretcher and lifted up. I remember the dull sounds of someone saying 'concussion', which honestly I wasn't even mad hearing about.

So apparently, Jaune had remembered that I kept my wallet in my backpack, specifically in the left-side tiny pocket, zipped up with the little Stitch keychain. He had run into the girl's changeroom and grabbed my wallet and health card to give to the paramedics, which was something I genuinely commend him for doing. I don't even care that he went into the girl's changeroom. I couldn't say my own goddamn name at the moment, so he gets a free pass. In fact, he can have as many free passes as he wants. The ride in the ambulance was painful, as every bump in the road added to the pain in my face as my body was jiggled around. Jaune never one let go of my hand the entire ride, calling Winter on my phone and alerting her to my predicament and which hospital I was being taken to.

Twenty-five minutes later, I was pushed into the Emergency Room at CHEO, Jaune still carrying my bag and holding my hand as I was guided to a proper hospital bed. Winter intercepted us at the door, having tore ass across town to show up before us and immediately started yelling like a banshee upon seeing me. I don't remember anything after this point because I was quickly sedated. I was completely okay with how quickly I found the pain disappearing and the void consuming me. I was out, and the pain was gone, and that was ay-okay with me.

/.../

Ketamine is a helluva drug. A seriously good drug. Picture a large field of daisies, spanning out for many miles in each direction. Now imagine you're floating around above it about five feet over the ground, leaning back in a large recliner. Now imagine that the field of daisies is actually made of plaid flannel and arced down and creating a lovely deep crater to float through, shifting between green and yellow with red stripes, and orange and blue with white stripes.

I really liked the inclusion of these ethereal walls of sanity, also made of plaid wallpaper, that slowly passed through me. It carried my body over the field and rotisseried me clockwise over my own central axis. And there I floated, bewitched by my own sense of wonderment and fulfillment at the easy prospects of the world. I had no cares, only carefully selected colours and the calming, droning sounds of what I might have wanted to describe as a C-Major chord, played on a violin with an endlessly long bow. Jaune could play violin. I think I remember him being kind of good, actually. And his dad was teaching him guitar. Jaune would look cute playing guitar, right? Probably. I hope so. I think so. Yeah. Maybe I outta learn guitar too, I wondered. Yeah, we could start a band! Play music!

The colour didn't fade, not for a while. I was left to my own sense of disastrous serendipity for as long as I liked. All I needed was a nice cool lemonade and a sunhat and I was sure I could watch the play-dough clouds for hours, endlessly spinning and morphing through my mind and soul as my cool was soundly kept. Sensations came through like each non-sequitur thought and made my brain feel like a strong mix between jello and cheese curds, pouring through my veins like glue. Maybe I was just hungry, though. Caught in that middle ground between wanting to eat food and wanting to be food. Food had it great. It existed solely to please us and nobody was ever upset when it appeared. Food was that one thing that we all universally wanted to be in our lives and cherished like our own children. If only I could be food. Then I'd love me a whole lot!

But that's the human condition, isn't it? To be wanted, to be desired? Desire was a strange emotion. A strange affliction. I was afflicted by it. Many people are. I desired many things, and many people. One people, actually. But beyond that, I desired. I was human. That's what we do. We desire.

And I desired J-

/.../

Waking up from just how stoned I was was not a pleasant experience. Especially waking up mid-vomit as my body decided it had enough of the light and the drugs in my system. Luckily I was wearing a hospital gown and not my lucky Star Wars shirt that I had showed up to school in, or I might have been a little upset. I mean, yeah, we have a washing machine, but that takes effort and I wasn't in any kind of way to expend effort right now. Not with how disastrously fucked up on painkillers I was. My eyes, or actually just my eye as I only had use of the right one, was puffed up and hard to see out of, but upon waking up I did manage to get it open to survey my surroundings.

"Oh, welcome back, Weiss."

My sister was just to my right side, in a swivel chair, still in her blazer and slacks, literally fresh from the office.

"Glad to see you back in the land of the waking."

I tried to speak, but my mouth didn't really react to the signals my head was giving it.

"Sssshaffen…"

"Shh, don't talk, you'll rupture your stitches."

"Uhhhh."

"Jaune hit you in the face with a hockey stick by accident."

"Uhhhh…"

"Cut your face open pretty bad. That stick did a number on you, honey. You have a concussion, don't move so much."

I didn't move so much.

"I'm not mad, if you're wondering. I understand that accidents happen. You just got a little hurt, and it happens. I'm not mad."

I was silently terrified that she was going to slaughter poor Jaune over this.

"The doctor said that your zygomatic bone and supraorbital foramen were exposed. That stick was apparently razor sharp, you're lucky that you'll be able to see out of your eye after this."

"Uhhhh…?"

"Yes, you'll be fine eventually. I'm reading your chart, here. You have twenty-eight stitches in your face right now, and I'd like you to not move your face and burst them. I'm surprised Lex didn't faint when she saw you, she's never been that good with blood. You had a pretty serious contusion on your face."

I tried to nod, but I couldn't. My head was in some kind of neck brace I guess to stop me from pulling the skin over my face by moving it.

"Honey, stay still. You're gonna be here a while, and I'm here for you. Your face is pretty badly messed up. I have to change your bandages, wanna see the cut?"

Uh, not really, but I wasn't in any position to object since I couldn't talk or move my head. She reached carefully out and slowly peeled the medical tape off my other cheek and lifted the brown-stained mess of gauze and cotton padding off of my left half. With the amount of blood in the bandages you'd have thought I was gonna look like Two-Face or something under all that. Luckily I couldn't actually feel that side of my face yet, since when she finally held up a mirror for me to look at myself, I almost screamed at my reflection.

Because cutting down the left side of my face, from the middle of my forehead to just below my cheek, was the massive vertical slice that had been sewn up with what looked to me like black cotton string. I looked like Frankenstein's goddamn monster. I looked like some kind of sick science experiment. My left eye was swollen and bloodied from all the seepage from the five inch long serration.

"Uhhhh!"

"Yes, I know it looks bad, sweetie. But to be fair, your skull was showing, this is the best the doctors could do. But now we match, right?"

She pulled up her bangs so I could see the little cut that passed through her right eyebrow, given to herself after falling off the monkey bars when she was like nine or ten. This… didn't really make me feel better, since this injury couldn't be hid by stylish bangs or thick eyebrows. This one literally shone out of my face like a spotlight, saying 'look at me, I'm deformed!'

"Uhhhh…"

I did my best not to break down and sob my guts out as my sister carefully dabbed at my skin with an alcohol wipe, cleaning the dried blood away from the very dark red line that passed through my eye socket. It didn't even hurt, since I was still very stoned and the paralytic they had given me was still active in my face, but I knew it was supposed to hurt and that made me sad anyway. I watched her in the mirror apply some Vaseline to the area around the cut , making sure not to soak my stitches, and covered the whole thing up with another box full of cotton balls and gauze before taping me up again. I tried to pout. My face didn't move.

"Look, I know it sucks. It's gonna be a big scar. But you know what? It's gonna be a cool scar, you're gonna look like Kakashi. Don't you wanna be that cool?"

I mean... maybe. I certainly felt like an anime protagonist sometimes.

"It was an accident. Accidents happen. Poor Jaune is sitting out there in the waiting room right now thinking you're gonna hate him forever. You're not going to do that, right?"

Of fucking course I wasn't going to hate him. I was angry about the scar on my face, but I didn't hold him accountable. Hell, up until Winter told me that he had caused it I had assumed it had been something else. Stray ball, someone's elbow, who knows. It was only once she had told me that Jaune had cranked me in the face with a hockey stick because he didn't know I was literally diving for the ball did I make the connection. It wasn't his fault. I didn't even need to forgive him because in my opinion it was my own stupidity and competitiveness that had put me in that predicament. I knew he was going to take it poorly, thinking he had handicapped me in some way, but that was just him being dramatic as always.

"Do you want me to go get him?"

I tried to do a 'thumbs up' but found my left hand currently unavailable due to the paralytic. I held up my right thumb weakly.

"Okay, I'll be right back, sweetheat. Don't you go anywhere."

As if I could.

Within moments, my sister returned with a very fearful Jaune at her side. She had to basically corral him into the room since he barely could move forward to meet me. I must have looked like a disaster victim, half my face covered in gauze and my eyes all swollen, blood everywhere.

"W...Weiss?" he asked, carefully approaching.

"Juhhhh!" I tried, feeling my mouth barely able to move.

"Weiss, don't talk. We went over this."

"Uhhhh…"

Jaune stopped at the edge of my bed, his body very clearly showing remorse.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to… I didn't want… I didn't see you… I'm sorry, I-"

"Uh-uhhhh…" I managed, stopping his drivel. "Uhh fuhhhh…"

I don't think he understood.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you."

Winter leaned over his shoulder.

"I think she was trying to reassure you that she's fine."

See, she understood me just fine.

"I'm sorry."

It was really fine. I had a morphine drip going. I wasn't mad at him. I was mad at me.

"Jaune, it's okay," she rubbed his shoulders. "We're not mad at you. I promise."

We really weren't. But as usual, he thought everything was his fault, and that's okay. I was used to this, he's just dramatic.

He sniffled.

"Okay…"

"Uh guhhhh…!" I tried to reassure him. It didn't really work. I gave a thumbs-up instead.

"Weiss, no talking."

"Suhhruhhhh…"

Winter sighed and sat back down on the swivel chair and pulled alongside the bed. She leaned her elbows against my tummy and put her head into her hands, careful to keep all her weight supported by her arms and not my body.

"I think I'm going to take some time off work and homeschool you for a bit. At least until the stitches can come out, how does that sound?"

Sounded good to me.

"But you're still going to do all your school assignments, okay? Jaune, can you make sure to bring her assignments over after school for a bit?"

This, on the other hand, didn't sound so go to me.

"W-we don't h-have all the same classes…"

"I'm sure you can co-ordinate with Emerald and all your other friends, right?"

"Y-yes, ma'am."

"Jaune," she chastised. "I'm not mad at you, you don't have to call me ma'am. It's Winter, and that's final."

"Understood."

It was cute how hard he was trying to not be absolutely terrified by my sister and not cry.

"Good. You're welcome to come over as much as you like still. Especially after you were very brave in sticking with her in the ambulance and keeping her company. We love you very much."

"O-okay."

It was true. We did. Winter sighed and carefully wiped a dried steak of tear off my cheek.

"This is going to be hard to explain to Mom and Dad at Christmas, isn't it?"

It certainly was. We only saw our parents on holidays since I had moved in with my sister four years ago. They always did the 'oh, you've grown so much' thing, even though I was their own daughter. But no, they treated me like I was extended family, always fussing over their precious baby boy, Whitley, instead. Even though that little bastard was thirteen. So the sudden appearance of a giant facial deformity would likely encite a chorus of 'oh, what happened?' and 'did it hurt?' as if they only partially cared about me.

I kinda shrugged.

"Uhhhh…"

"Well, I'm sure they'll understand."

I hoped so. I mean, I knew that Em was going to think the scar was cool as hell. She was deep into reading Naruto at this point, and had already started putting up posters of Kakashi and Sasuke in her room, making it look like she was having a confusing fusion of aviation and manga on the brain. Which, honestly, she did.

The scar… was pretty cool, I guess. I never lost it, it became a permanent feature on my face. I lived my everyday life with the pink scar adorning my face, and nobody ever really seemed put off by it. Those who asked questions usually did so out of wonderment and genuine interest in it rather than digust and fear. It made cosplay both easier and much harder as covering a scar like this in concealer and putty was a royal pain, so I just made a list of cool characters with eye scars to do instead. I learned to embrace it, because it was who I was, and I didn't let it bother me.

Besides, if you think this is bad, you should have seen the other guy!