My eyelids had swollen to twice their normal size and were reddened and itchy. If you peered at me you would see my bloodshot gaze peering back at you from out of the swollen eyes and you would (maybe) recognize me but you would (probably) glance quickly away.

Dared not scratch my eyelids with my fingernails yet could not resist.

Such itchiness is painful yet exquisite like touching yourself in the secret forbidden place. Like the itchiness of the mangled skin on my forehead that if it was touched, at once began to hurt. No, no!—don’t touch.

No one could see the secret wound. Hidden beneath a Band-Aid.

She’d given me aspirin, to help me sleep. Several low-dosage aspirin, for children.

(But was I still a child, at twelve? I did not think so.)

Miriam had wanted to drive me to the hospital last night to have the wound examined, stitched. To x-ray my skull. My knee.

But Mom had been agitated, frightened. So much blood!

Mom had seemed more upset by the blood, the fact of the blood, staining my clothes, my sister’s jacket, dripping onto the linoleum floor when Miriam led me staggering into the kitchen, than by the wound itself.

Insisting upon treating the wound herself. Not wanting to make a fuss.

Not wanting a hospital, emergency room. The attention of strangers.

And so with shaky fingers treating the wound herself. Applying pressure to it, to staunch the bleeding. Rinsing with cold water. Applying iodine that stung like fire.

Then, neatly covering the cut with a large square white Johnson & Johnson Band-Aid.

Recalling how when the children were young such accidents happened all the time. Cut knees, cut elbows, falls from bicycles, swings, tripping on the sidewalk, banging heads. Kids!

It was true, the small wound on my forehead above my left eye turned out not to be very deep. Head wounds bleed like crazy, that is a fact. Getting blood all over everything! Oh Violet. Isn’t it just like you.

Sorry. Of course I was sorry for having bled onto people’s clothing including mine, and onto the floor which Mom kept spotless as best as she could. Sobbing, sniffling, apologizing.

Telling myself I should be grateful that the cut hadn’t been deeper, my eye had not been gouged out by the icy edge of the step. And Mom assuring me how lucky I was, damned lucky no serious damage to my face or to my head, clumsy as I’d been, careless.

Good that your father isn’t here, to see this. With all that’s going on in our lives . . .

Relenting then, seeing how pale I was, and apologetic. Kissing my forehead even as she scolded me. As if she couldn’t help herself, she was my mom after all.