by Dionna Liggans
I bear a tiny scar shaped like a lowercase L on my hip and one in my belly button. I thought that stuff like this only happened in the movies, yet here I am being pinned down and taken advantage of. Here I am on this beautiful snowy December night crying silently as I keep my voice down for fear of waking my parents. The slight blue glow from the CD player casts haunting shadows across their faces as they tag each other in as if I were just a childhood game of jump rope. I close my eyes and wait for it to end. Months go by, no words are uttered. No one will believe me, they will all say it was my fault and I wanted it so I keep silent. Long nights are spent tossing and turning because the stomach pain is so excruciatingly painful. Hold yourself together I utter silently to myself. This is your secret. I go through the motions as the pain finally makes me collapse in class. My worst fears are confirmed. “You have pelvic inflammatory disease,” the doctor utters as I lay hopeless in the starch white hospital room. I take a deep breath and fill my lungs with the cold antiseptic air “what does this mean?” “Your fallopian tubes are severely scared and we’ll have to go in and take a look. You may end up infertile from this, but we don’t know for sure.” I stared as the doctor stepped out into the hallway, the only noise coming from the room was the sound of my mother’s tears falling on the cold concrete floor.
I bear a tiny scar shaped like a lowercase L on my hip and one in my belly button. I thought that stuff like this only happened in the movies, yet here I am being pinned down and taken advantage of. Here I am on this beautiful snowy December night crying silently as I keep my voice down for fear of waking my parents. The slight blue glow from the CD player casts haunting shadows across their faces as they tag each other in as if I were just a childhood game of jump rope. I close my eyes and wait for it to end. Months go by, no words are uttered. No one will believe me, they will all say it was my fault and I wanted it so I keep silent. Long nights are spent tossing and turning because the stomach pain is so excruciatingly painful. Hold yourself together I utter silently to myself. This is your secret. I go through the motions as the pain finally makes me collapse in class. My worst fears are confirmed. “You have pelvic inflammatory disease,” the doctor utters as I lay hopeless in the starch white hospital room. I take a deep breath and fill my lungs with the cold antiseptic air “what does this mean?” “Your fallopian tubes are severely scared and we’ll have to go in and take a look. You may end up infertile from this, but we don’t know for sure.” I stared as the doctor stepped out into the hallway, the only noise coming from the room was the sound of my mother’s tears falling on the cold concrete floor.
