Once upon a time, I had near perfect dimples. The last day I ever smiled with those dimples would come and go before I realized it would be the last day. It all started in the afternoon, when General Pratab slapped me so hard my face bled. He thought he was saving my life.
+ + +
I had found the General years before, starving outside his home, freezing in the zero degree Washington State winter. Walking right up to the nearest door, we shouted for someone to come out and explain themselves. They did, however poorly.
The General was a tiny pup when they found him, abandoned by a dumpster with small incisions all over his body created by what looked like a pocket knife. They had treated him, but he was too big now and they did not want him “rambling around the house”. They told him to leave, but he didn’t seem to understand.
I took General Pratab home that day to the open arms of my household who turned him from a growling mass of nerves to an overfed, overgrown puppy. My family took care of over 15 outdoor farm dogs, but Pratab lived inside. He was never really playful, but he was friendly, and would walk around in a sort of zen-like trance most of the time– befriending only the strangest of our friends.
After two years, my parents decided that we had proven ourselves enough to adopt another indoor pet friend. So we did.
Rajah was a basset hound and beagle mix. He was a puppy when we brought him home to live indoors with General Pratab.
Over the years, the General had forgotten his unhappy youth, or at had at least stopped snarling about it. When Rajah was brought home, I think the General started to remember.
After watching him sulk around the house for a week, I gave up on patience and, in all my infinite childhood wisdom, decided to force a friendship by tricking them both into a corner at the same time and giving them treats.
At this point, everything happened quickly.
Rajah’s basset nose smelled the treats I was hiding and he leaped toward me.
Pratab saw this as a threat, though it wasn’t one, and he slapped me out of Rajah’s way. I was only 10 years old, and we were about the same size, so his blow knocked me across the room where I broke a vase I had never liked anyway. I was able to stand up but was knocked down by the full weight of the General. His blow had triggered something in his mind, and he was snapping and growling as if I was the devil incarnate.
My family has always been good in emergencies. I watched from the corner of my eye as they sprung into motion. My eldest brother grabbed my siblings and huddled them off to a safe room. My mother put together the first aid kit and went to get the car warmed so we could leave immediately. My father had the task of pulling General Pratab from me.
I was inches from the General, and I saw the moment clarity returned to his big brown eyes– seconds before my father yanked him off of me. Pratab did not attack my dad. He went willingly– ashamed and confused by what he had done. I saw self-hatred in his eyes, something I didn’t know a dog could feel at the time, and, though bleeding from a wound he inflicted, couldn’t feel anything for him except the deepest sympathies. He wasn’t a violent animal. Even in a rage, he only hurt me by accident– sheer size against softer, human skin.
I walked past the room where my siblings were huddled as they cried. I made a joke about how the General never liked my kitten sweater, but I was covered in blood and barely able to talk, so the joke fell flat. My wound was dressed, and after about a month of drinking everything through a straw, I was fully recovered.
My legendary dimpled smile was gone forever. The skin on my face was pulled too far to recover it, but I was none the worse for wear.
People would refer to that day as “the attack”, but the wording was too unfair for me to handle. The General didn’t attack me. He tried to save me. I asked for them to instead call it “the last day of dimples”. It felt more like a coming of age story that way.
When my wounds healed, I noticed that the General trusted me more. He would sit at my side in companionable silence and I began to recognize the pattern of his behavior that I had noticed before, but couldn’t quite explain. You see, he trusted those who were damaged infinitely more than those who weren’t.
A dimple or two was more than worth that sort of friendship.
Still, for years, people would stop to ask me what happened and I would start the story the same way.
Once upon a time, I had near perfect dimples…
+ + +
19 years later, I still carry the same scars on my face and no one ever asks me how they got there. I’m too old, it’s too rude, and when you get right down to it– no one cares. I don’t mean that in a self-pitying way, only that as you age, there are other concerns. No one looks too closely at scars– physical ones or otherwise.
Friends I’ve had for years still sit me next to their dogs, never thinking about my continued fear of the animal. Never asking, never knowing.
My facial scars hide mild phobias, but they pale in comparison to the emotional scars I’ve accumulated since that day through a thousand other stories. Much like General Pratab’s, my scars hide memories of the darkest side of human nature.
Today, I truly grasp the dreamlike reality he was trapped within. I understand the occasional blankness, and the need for alone time. I understand the way he found comfort in those with their own obvious scars. He didn’t make them share their stories, or spill his own, but he would scoot himself closely in companionable silence.
Every once in awhile, I smile in a mirror and see a dimple-less grin decorated in scars, and I wonder if I’m the only one who sees it that way. Every few days, I pass my reflection, and see the cynical light in my eyes and I wonder if no one else remembers the actions that lit that spark.
It’s surreal.
No one sees the scars that have marked me for all eternity, but when I look at myself, it’s hard to see anything else.
I find myself drawn towards those with scars of their own– not to hear their story necessarily, or to share mine– but just because I feel safer there. These instant friendships, and chances at earning trusts, are worth so much more to me than the cost of those silly little scars that never seem to fade.
That’s why I call that day, “the last day I had dimples”, not “the attack”. It’s a coming of age story, you see– not a tragedy.
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Click for all of this week’s entries! The theme is “The Last Day”.
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One day, when I have plenty of time, I’ll shrink this story down to half it’s size. When you’re short on time, do you end up using more words, more pictures, less words, or…?
Be sure to check out the other #RTTBlogHop posts this week. They are stellar (and most are shorter than mine, I promise). http://www.inlinkz.com/wpview.php?id=342618