Touching Scars(30)

I’m not sure how long I laid there, but I figured it was time for me to get up and shower. I’d dwelled on what happened for far too long and I had errands to run before the bar opened. Ed needed me to head to the post office to mail his bills and then to the grocery store to get things such as limes, lemons, maraschino cherries, and oranges. I got up from the floor and headed to the shower to strip down but was brought to a stop in front of the mirror. On the left side of my neck was a deep red line. The knife hadn’t broken the skin, but it had apparently bruised me. Great. I’d have to think of something to tell Ed, Mel, and Beaver because they would undoubtedly ask me about it, unless of course, I braided my hair to the side to hide it. I stepped into the shower and stood there for a while, just feeling the spray soothe my muscles. It helped relax me enough that my hangover was slowly subsiding. I made a mental note before I got out that I’d need to carry a bottle of water around with me today. Rehydrating myself would keep the nausea from rearing its ugly head.





I loved stopping in the post office for nothing more than to talk to Marg and Henry. They ran the place and had for the past fifty years. When I looked at them, I could see what Ed and Rose might have been like. I made me hurt a bit for Ed because his love was gone, but I also liked knowing that he had had a love like that.

Marg ran the front counter, weighing packages, selling stamps, and putting the mail in people’s PO boxes. Henry typically worked in the back and sorted the incoming and outgoing mail. They’d broken down and hired someone younger to go out and actually drive the mail car after Henry had a heart attack in front of someone’s house five years ago. Since then, he and Marg decided that it was best to keep him close by in case something else happened. He’d received a pacemaker after the attack, but it still scared poor Marg to death that she’d almost lost her husband.

“Good morning, my lovely young girl. And how are we doing on this fine Tuesday?” Marg greeted me with a warm smile.

I looked into her kind light blue eyes that reminded me so much of my own grandma and answered, “I’m doing all right. Just dropping off some of Ed’s mail. Do you have anything back there that you’d like me to take back with me?”

“Well, let me check.” She walked in the back for a minute and came out with a small stack of envelopes. She handed them to me. “Here ya go, my dear.”

“Thanks, Marg. I’ll let Ed know you said hello.” She said ‘yes ma’am’ to my retreating back. But before I left, I decided to ask a question.

“Hey Marg, can I ask you something?”

“Of course. You can ask me anything you’d like.”

I chewed on the inside of my cheek, unsure of where to start. “Henry served in the Army, right?”

“He sure did. Did twenty-three years. Why’d you ask?”

“Well, because I have this friend. I knew him from a while ago, and he recently came into town for some work.” I divulged this bit of information, knowing that she’d never go around gossiping. “Anyway, he just recently got out of the Army, but I’d heard he’d done some time overseas. He seems…different.”

She nodded her head in understanding. “That’s because he is, honey.”

“What do you mean?”

“Let me tell ya somethin’, when Henry came back from World War II and fighting in Japan, it was like the Army gave me back a different husband. He’d seen things that couldn’t be unseen. People were shot right in front of him, some of them by his own hand. That naturally changes a person. Henry had changed to protect his mind from going crazy. If he dealt with all of it at one time, he would have self destructed.” She leaned against the counter. She looked at me thoughtfully, then reached across the counter and patted my cheek. I hadn’t even realized I had walked back towards her. “If you’re worried that you won’t see the same person that your friend once was, don’t be. It takes time for them to understand it all, and I’d like to believe that they do it in their own time. He’ll come back to you, honey.” She gave me a small smile and a knowing look.

I nodded, rubbing my lips back and forth. “Thanks. I appreciate your honesty.” I made my way out of the post office and started my car. I sat there, looking out my windshield, letting this new revelation sink in.

Timber had never been my favorite person in high school. But then that one day — the day that he spoke to me in the parking lot — I had started looking at him differently. He’d made an effort to see if I was okay. None of them ever stooped to my level and tried to talk to me. I never felt like I was worth their time. He made that all different that day. That was the day I stopped viewing him as a self-centered asshole. I had begun crushing on Timber. I felt like he wanted more than his friends did. I had started paying attention to him outside of grading his biology papers. He no longer stood off to the side while his friends teased those that weren’t a part of their clique. He would tell them to leave them alone then distract them with something else. Many nights after what Adam did to me, I had laid in bed and wondered what Timber would have done if he knew what his friend did. I made up a whole fairytale in my head that he had come into the shower room before Adam had succeeded in taking advantage of me. He draped a towel around my shoulders and comforted me, after he had kicked Adam’s ass, of course. That dream was all I’d had to help me sleep at night. It brought me more comfort than I should have let it. So many nights I had let myself close my eyes and drift off to my own imagination giving me relief.