I, Scar

Written

by Ted Naughton

"To be alive at all is to have scars."

— John Steinbeck

People always talk up their scars, don’t they? — specially on Twitter.

They call them their seams of healing, a part of their life story.

I admire them so, but I do wonder whether they have really internalised this healing.

One of these inspirational thoughts I read said the Japanese repair cracks in leaking vases, fill them in, and that in their culture they say the imperfection makes the object more beautiful, unique.

I see him glance in the mirror, I’m not sure cracks in faces are the same.

A sign of an accident, a survived one but an accident nevertheless. Scars are ugly, aren’t they?

He is ashamed of me. Am I an ugly scar?

Personally, I think he’s ashamed of how he got me. Vanity. Through insecurity, through fear. Not my fault.

No, don’t mind if I do. I’ve waited a long time to tell the story. It’s never the right moment.

He had a spider nevai on his cheek — a bloody splattered veiny blotch that scuttled on his cheek.

It upset him.

He had never felt attractive to begin with, always felt second rate in the looks department. Compared to his youngest brother, he was not the pretty one.

His brother was the ladykiller and he liked boys. This meant his brother wanted to kill him.

He had attacked him once in his furious hatred. Pinned down in their garden his brother had hissed into his ear ‘I know what you are’. He knew too; ugly and gay.

His father did not help. He had not wanted the boy at all and had told him this regularly. He ignored his son and spoke over him when he tried to talk to him.

His son decided it was easier to hate his father and the older man seemed happier with that simpler emotion.

But when his hatred of his dad’s treatment grew into disdain, that (bizarrely to me) made his father furious.

Hah! He had learned to escape his father’s influence through the poker face of indifference.

Scar.

I exist.

I do not mean to cause him pain, but I do. I’m on his face and he truly believes I have ruined his life. But I think I love him — I do not want to fade away and leave him.

If I was on a little dog or kitty face — I would not show so much and they would not suffer.

They would not scan the mirror obsessively. They would be glad their wound had healed and be grateful that they were alive to enjoy today.

The laser cut too deep, burnt him too much.

Shock.

But that punch of lightning created me! Yes, I know like those campy black and white Frankenstein movies, but sometimes I also feel like that

Michelangelo ceiling where God creates humanity with his sparky, fork lightening finger!

Hey, I didn’t ask to be born but I’m glad I was!

He was SO disappointed with me. He had some sort of breakdown. My creation had ruined his life.

Just as his father had said his birth had done to him.

I did my best to heal. I wanted him to love me. Even though he wanted me to disappear, I tried hard to please him, to appear as if I had never existed.

But I could not — his face would never be the same. He would have to live with the fear of having to explain why I was there waving back when he looked in the mirror.

I was supposed to be unnoticeable, to solve a problem of which he was a bit self conscious, to boost his ego and his confidence.

Instead I became something of which he was very ashamed. I would have

liked to have pleased him.

He hated the doctor who treated him. I had mixed feelings, like he’s kind of my daddy. But what a pretentious arsehole.

He pretended that everything was alright that the treatment was a success.

Complications.

Try this ointment.

It’s hardly noticeable.

It’s just a red mark.

The doctor sneered at him when he dared to complain.

I saw that he wanted to kill his consultant. I sensed he wanted to mark him like he had done to him.

He wished he could wake up and I would be overcome, gone like a difficult time he had lived through.

But I am here.

If only he could learn to accept me.

I think he should talk about me more, be open about his mistake, his regret. I love him for all his frailty, I love him for his shame, his deepest scar.

I only wish he would accept me, loving me I dare not ask, but recognising that my existence has been a healing experience.

I love you, I think. If only I could tell you that your suffering and your scars have made you more vulnerable, more interesting than before.

Those ugly taunts, your real and imagined rejections, have transformed you into a beautiful creature.

Like the sizzling erratic life force of lightning.

Those pits on your cheek that I know so closely, hold the shadows of your pain.

They dance lightly over your face and sweep my folds and dips; fingertip sensations.

I imagine it is a caress for me when I’m lonely.

If only he could tell other people his story, everyone has shame, everyone has scars, maybe somebody, one person, could find it in themselves to give him their forgiveness.

I know he cannot find it within himself.

He has somehow created a hideous monster out of his experiences where I can clearly see his wholeness like a seeping exquisite Japanese vase.

So I have written this for you, my child.

I know instinctively you will turn away from it, arch towards the safety, the ease of shadow.

But my story exists in the world as a sign of my love for you.

When you are ready, it is here to listen to.

About The Author:

Ted Naughton (he/him) is a gay writer who lives far, far out in the boggy woods with his rescue dogs and his demons.

Ted Naughton has facial scars.