For years, I have been convinced that the most difficult thing about that fire was learning to live with my scars. But then, one night in my senior year, I understood that what the fire had left me was not just a charred interior and scarring skin; it was much more than that.
I was only nine years old when my home caught on fire.
I remember getting up in the middle of the night and feeling pain in my chest because of all the coughing. The smoke was thick and black, covering the entire room and obscuring everything from sight. My mother could be heard somewhere in the house, calling my name desperately. As soon as I attempted to stand up, I felt the smoke burning inside my lungs.
After that, everything seemed to happen in a split second. While I was being pulled out of my burning home by the firefighters, who had arrived there after receiving an emergency call, the flames were spreading rapidly through the kitchen.
I survived, but not without injuries.
Burns on my face, neck, and arm took a long time to heal, leaving scars that could never fully fade away.
For a while, I refused to look at myself in the mirror because I disliked the way I looked. However, sooner or later, you learn to recognize yourself again despite everything.
One thing that would always remain difficult was to cope with other people.
Children looked at me all the time. They would whisper behind my back and ask me a bunch of questions. It was rare when anybody would be openly nasty to me, but simply those stares made me feel alienated.
By the time I reached high school, I was an expert in pretending nothing bothered me.
I stayed by myself, studied hard, and tried not to attract anyone’s attention. Therefore, when the time came for the prom, I told my mother I could not care less about attending it.
“You cannot avoid everyone forever, Cindy,” she said to me one day while washing the dishes. “There was a single incident in your life that had to happen once. Do not let it rule your decisions anymore.”
“It is not avoiding them,” I protested.
But deep inside, I knew that she was right.
After several weeks of trying to convince me, I finally agreed to attend.
Together we purchased a dress, and for the first time in many weeks, my mother seemed excited about something concerning me. On the day of the prom, she styled my hair while I diligently covered up the scars on my neck using makeup.
At that very moment, standing in front of the mirror, I actually felt like a beauty once again.
However, it all changed when I stepped into the gym.
Everything was decorated beautifully. Lights adorned the ceiling, music filled the air, and everybody appeared confident and happy. Groups of students took photos, and couples started dancing at the center of the dance floor.
While all of this happened, I was left alone at the refreshments table pretending to text somebody.
None of the students came to talk to me. While some greeted me politely, others seemed to ignore me completely.
After an hour, I realized that I was done.
But then Caleb Harper came up to me.
Caleb Harper was a familiar face to everyone in school. Captain of the football team, a real catch, good-looking – everyone’s attention automatically went to Caleb Harper.
Which is why I figured he was kidding when he approached me.
Instead, he nervously reached out his hand towards me.
“Would you dance with me?”
I must have heard him wrong.
“I’m not kidding?”
He nodded.
Carefully, I placed my hand on top of his.
The moment he took me onto the dance floor, I knew people were watching. Girls would gossip amongst themselves, while the guys were just plain astonished.
But Caleb did not care about them.
And soon enough, neither did I.
We danced most of the night. He entertained me by telling ridiculous jokes and made me feel like there was nothing wrong with me.
The night just flew by, and when it was over, I wished that it wouldn’t end.
Following the prom, Caleb stayed behind with me rather than going back with his friends.
“You enjoyed yourself tonight?”
“Yeah,” I answered honestly. “It was better than I anticipated.”
His face was smiling, but there was something else about him that made me think he was hiding something from me.
Once we arrived at my front porch, we paused for a moment, both of us being awkward.
“Thank you for tonight.”
“No problem.”
And then, he looked at me straight in the eye.
“See you.”
He left, and as he did, I felt happier than I had been in a long time.
The following day, a loud knock interrupted the silence.
Half asleep, I came down the stairs wondering what if it could be a neighbor.
But I was shocked.
Two policemen were there standing next to Caleb’s parents.
Suddenly, my insides tightened.
A policeman approached me cautiously.
“Cindy, when did you see Caleb last?”
“I saw him last night after the prom,” I replied hesitantly.
“Did he say where he is headed after that?”
I shook my head in denial. “No. Why?”
They glanced at each other nervously before one of them addressed me again.
“Cindy, did you know that Caleb had anything to do with the fire that happened at your place years ago?”
“What?”
He told me that Caleb had provided them with some information related to the fire, which happened around ten years ago.
Apparently, according to him, he had witnessed something the night that the fire consumed my home.
“What kind of something did he witness?”
Before he had a chance to reply, Caleb’s dad interrupted gently.
“He didn’t mean for any of this to happen.”
The cops informed me that Caleb’s older brother, Mason, was known for getting into trouble as a kid. When my house caught fire, Caleb had followed Mason around town and watched him leave my house before smoke came from the windows.
It seems that recently, when Mason was about to be released after his second offense, Caleb felt like revealing what he had witnessed.
After talking with the cops, Caleb went missing and they needed to know if I knew where he was.
I told them no.
Technically, it was the truth.
But once they left, I kept thinking about those abandoned buildings on the outskirts of town where Caleb and his gang used to gather.
So I gathered my bag and headed to the bus stop.
For the first time in years, I knew I was getting closer to finding the truth.
But once I got to the old buildings where Caleb had hung out, there were some football players lounging around one of the buildings.
As soon as they saw me coming their way, the conversation halted.
A player smirked. “Are you looking for your prom date?”
There were quiet laughs all around.
“No. I need to speak to Caleb,” I said clearly.
None of them would make eye contact afterwards. One of the players let out a sigh.
“Most likely at Taylor’s place.”
He told me where it was, and after twenty minutes, I found myself standing outside a tiny blue house in the other side of town.
It was Taylor who opened the door, looking surprised at seeing me.
However, before she even had the chance to say something, footsteps followed behind her.
Caleb entered the hallway.
The instant he saw me, he turned pale.
“Were you there on the night of the fire?” I blurted out right away.
There was silence.
Eventually, he nodded.
“Yeah.”
Listening to his admission physically twisted my stomach in agony.
He joined me on the porch.
“At nine, I tagged along with Mason because it seemed like fun,” he confessed softly. “I watched him climb through your kitchen window, and then I saw smoke.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I was afraid,” he answered honestly. “If I said anything, I’d destroy my brother.”
It drained him to admit it.
“I was carrying that for years,” he added. “But once we were going to the same school, I didn’t know how to come near you.”
That wasn’t all he said.
Before prom, he had heard a few boys laughing about how no one would dance with me due to my scar.
“I got mad,” he stated softly. “And I realized I had been pretending all this time that I wasn’t bothered.”
I just stood there staring at him.
“It’s not because I feel sorry for you,” he said, “that I asked you out. It’s because I like you.”
Neither of us could speak after that.
Then I asked the question that had really been on my mind.
“Why did Mason do it?”
“I honestly have no idea,” Caleb replied with slow movements.
That afternoon, we took the drive to the prison where Mason had been taken.
Upon seeing him walk into the visiting room, it wasn’t fear that came to my mind.
But exhaustion.
I made eye contact with him.
“Why would you burn down my home?”
Immediately, Mason shook his head.
“I never meant to.”
He told me that when he was fourteen, he would always be sneaking into other people’s homes to see what he could take. The night in question, he sneaked into our kitchen through an open window.
Once inside, he lit a cigarette.
But then he heard someone upstairs moving and got scared, leaving him no choice but to leave.
He said, “I didn’t even realize I set it on fire until the next morning.”
For many years, Caleb assumed that his brother set the fire on purpose.
And now here we were both sitting, understanding that it was all just from one careless act.
Mason looked at me with all of the guilt on his face.
“Sorry, Cindy.”
And oddly enough, sitting there listening to him, I found that I was not angry anymore.
I was mostly just very, very sad.
Sad that one reckless mistake took away so many people’s lives.
Sad that Caleb had been living with the guilt for years after such a misunderstanding.
Later on that day, Caleb and I went back to the police station to repeat all of Mason’s confession.
When the policemen asked me whether I wanted to file a complaint, I simply shook my head.
“No,” I whispered.
Since no one could make those scars disappear.
But I finally knew that it did not have to dictate my life anymore.
At least not anymore.
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Bored Daddy
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