I cried the whole way home and then in the waiting room at the hospital. Not only did I use my dad’s shirt as my personal Kleenex, soaking up all my tears, but the blood from the cut on my forehead kept saturating through the gauze, staining the shoulder and collarbone portion of his white shirt.
While my dad was consoling me, he whispered softly,“Sweetheart, what do I always say before you leave the house?”
“But it wasn’t my fault,” I told him.
“Then whose was it, the person who dug the hole or the person who wasn’t paying attention, and as a result, fell?”
“The person who dug the hole.”
“So I’ll ask you again. What do I always say when you leave the house?”
“To be safe.”
“And were you?”
“No.”
“Accidents happen, but this could have easily been avoidable.”
“I promise I’ll be more careful next time.”
“Oh, I know you will be. Do you want to know how I know that?”
I shook my head.
“Because we always learn from our mistakes.”
He was right, it had made an impression on me over the years. Even if I didn’t understand the significance of that moment as a child, I certainly could relate to it now as an adult. If we didn’t learn from our mistakes, we’d never grow. If we didn’t own up to our part in things, then we weren’t taking responsibility for our actions. While whoever dug the hole in the sand at the bottom of the slide had likely done so with malicious intent, it was me who didn’t pay attention to my surroundings or where I was running, which caused me to trip into the hole and smash my forehead into the bottom of the old-school metal slide.
I rubbed the tips of my fingers up over the bridge of my nose to in between my eyebrows, where the indentation of my scar served as a physical reminder. Even though scars were usually permanent, I’d found over the years the marks from the four stitches had softened and were less noticeable. In fact, it wasn’t something I had thought about in a long time until now.
The innocent memory stirred up a sense of longing.
My family was far from perfect, but we were still a family—until we weren’t.
After Annabelle’s death, the bond that held us all together splintered. She was the apple of my mom’s eye, the person who could do no wrong, while I was an afterthought until she had the urge to highlight all my downfalls. My dad tried to overcompensate where my mom fell short, but I knew he would side with her if the chips were ever down. Sadly, I was right, and it was a tough pill to swallow when he delivered my mom’s wishes over the phone that I wasn’t welcome back home or at the funeral.
He broke my heart that day . . . or what remained of it.
Seeing me, my face, it would be too much for them. I was a physical reminder of all they had lost, even though I was still here. Still willing to walk through the door and forge our relationship, even if it meant swallowing my hurt.
For reasons I never understood growing up, I lived in my sister’s shadow, but through it all, I would have never characterized myself as jealous or resentful of all the attention she received. I would never because I knew she needed it. She lived for it, thrived on people pleasing, and even blossomed under positive reinforcement, whereas I was more laid-back and confident in myself and my abilities, or so I believed at the time.
It wasn’t until we moved out for school; she went to Houston, and I to San Diego, that I realized with change comes a fresh perspective. When you’re in a certain environment, you don’t know any different, but once I left home and traveled across the country, I felt I truly came out of my shell. I learned freedom was only freedom when I could be myself and discover who I was on my own and not under the watch of my mother’s critical eye.
“Hello,” a woman’s voice called out, pulling me from my thoughts. “Lakelyn?”
My body jerked around in surprise to find a woman eyeing me curiously.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.” She watched as I stepped off the ladder. “You must be Lakelyn.”
“I am,” I answered, laying the paint roller on the tray.
“I’m Brooke, Boden’s sister.”
If she hadn’t introduced herself, her eyes would have given her away—the similarities between the two were striking.
“It’s nice to meet you. Unfortunately, your brother had to run out. He shouldn’t be long, though.”
