Episode 1: The Chrysalis of Shame

After a few months of school, I guess I thought she had forgotten about it.  We sent her out to the bus, contained in her chrysalis of shame, but instead of the beautiful butterfly emerging from its shroud, Emma wrapped herself in it.  Emma’s twisted body remained stiff, which made it easier to see that something wrapped all around her. 

So the day came.  She burst through the front door, reached under her sweatshirt, and ripped Velcro—it all harmonized with the grim look on her face.  She pulled the brace down and away from her body and—in one motion—she whipped it into the couch.  “I’m not wearing that anymore.”

Before I could move close to her, she ran to her room.  As she fled, she dropped her backpack and kicked off one shoe, then the other. Then her sweatshirt.  Breadcrumbs of sorrow, and they were easy to follow. I found her sobbing into her mattress. 

I spoke in my gentlest voice:

“Tell me all about it.”

Now when I ask Emma to tell me all about it, she takes me at my word.  The story leaves out zero details, and it takes about as long to tell as it did to live.

She was in class, trying to pay attention, and she noticed a boy, down the row from her, trying to get her attention without making noise, or drawing attention to himself.

He sat up, ramrod straight, while smiling at her. 

No one noticed, but Emma did. This boy, who secreted his wickedness across the temporary trailer-qua-classroom. His side-eyed stare.  His half smile. His silence. He knew her secret, and he was willing to let her know he knew. 

While Emma wore it, the brace constricted her abdomen to the point where she could only bend at the waist, C3-PO style.  And it was tight: she got about an inch taller whenever she was wearing it.  And this kid knew it.

As a dad, I prayed for relief, hoping that her secret would soon be revealed. But she was clear:  no one will know.  No one can know.  We gave her logic, old-people advice. She was only giving power to the one who knew.  She was going to be trapped by this shame, this secret.

Since Emma was blessed with sweetness from her mother, she got the free gift of stubbornness from her father.  So we knew she didn’t want to let this boy tell her secret.

Then, we remembered Emma’s superpower.  She certainly didn’t get it from me.  She would gain freedom.  Some superpowers follow a matrilineal path.