Free Scar Girl by Len Vlahos Page B

the Scranton essay instructions and get everything I could think of down on paper. Then I could go back and edit later.
    I had this English teacher in high school who liked to say that “all good writing is rewriting.” I didn’t know what that meant at the time—if she hadn’t taken pity on me, I think I would have failed her class—but now I understood. The musical equivalent is “We’ll fix it in the mix.” When you record music, you try not to worry too much about equalization or effects when you’re laying down basic tracks. You just need to make sure the performances are good. Anything else can be corrected when you mix all the tracks down to the master. Fix it in the mix.
    I didn’t know where to start my story, so I started with the obvious: the day I got these scars, the day I was tied to a tree during the thunderstorm. At first it was hard to drag those memories back to the surface. I’d spent a lifetime trying to bury and forget them, like they were the bones of someone I’d murdered. But the more I wrote, the more I needed to write.
    I filled pages with details of the storm and the aftermath of being severely burned: the endless medical tests and procedures, how other kids treated me, all that time I spent with Dr. Kenny.
    By the time I got to the part of my narrative where I met Johnny, in middle school, the pencil was flying across the page. I remembered every detail like it was yesterday. I could still see the bully—Billy the Behemoth—who Johnny stood up to on my behalf. I could still see Johnny’s eyes staring Billy down.
    I finished writing that scene and put the pencil on my desk. Maybe, I thought, the story of my life is really the story of my friendship with Johnny. I never had any siblings, and Johnny was like an unofficial brother. And like all brothers, we loved each other as much as we resented each other.
    But did our relationship really define me? Was I so dependent on Johnny that my life didn’t have meaning without him?
    No. There was something else besides Johnny. Something bigger. Much bigger.
    I smiled as I picked up the pencil again. It felt good to write. Felt good to get so much of it out of me. After a while, the writing wasn’t even about Scranton. The exercise became its own reward.
    CHEYENNE BELLE
    A late-term miscarriage was what the doctor called it. Anything before twenty weeks—and we figured out that I was sixteen weeks—is a miscarriage. Anything after is a stillbirth. That’s what they told us.
    I just lay there and cried. The doctor left the room so my sisters and I could have a few minutes. I don’t know how long I cried, but it was a long time.
    I had only just decided to keep the baby, but maybe I’d been leaning that way all along. I mean, I’m definitely pro-choice and all—who am I or anyone else to tell girls what to think or what to do with their bodies—but given who I am and how I was raised, I don’t know if I could’ve made any other decision. It was my choice to keep the baby. I mean, think about the words to “Lullaby.” Of course I was going to keep the baby.
    By that point, though, none of that stuff mattered.
    The doctor’s words— There’s no heartbeat— were stuck in my brain like a skipping record. What the hell was I supposed to do with that?
    Once I calmed myself down enough, I had only one thought. I squeezed Theresa’s hand and said, “Get it out of me.” She nodded and went to get the doctor.
    An hour later, after more paperwork, after Agnes went home to get her money and had come back, the doctor was administering a local anesthetic.
    The procedure for getting a dead baby out of you is pretty much the same as for an abortion. Either way, it’s fucking awful. It’s called a D & C. I didn’t want to know anything about it, but Agnes kept asking questions.
    â€œWhat does that stand