By: Harris Mellor
vanilla frappuccino
I avoid mirrors often. I’m told that it's not that bad even though I know self consciously that it takes over my life; however, today I must look at myself in the mirror like I used to do. I loved when I could look in the mirror and admire the color of my eyes without being horrified by my appearance. I was told that I should be showering more--they recommend seeing a dermatologist. People can be cruel. I hadn’t looked directly in a mirror for four days.
Why are you lying to them...tell them that you refuse to look in the mirror anymore. Tell them you keep the lights off whenever you're alone so that you don’t see the red dots all over your face that no one else seems to have. Tell them you have tried everything and it just doesn’t go away...it's life. They don’t understand because they have never had it, it's so embarrassing.
I need to look at myself today...I need to assess how bad it has gotten.
The bell rings. I throw my hood on and run outside and to the buses. I sit alone on the bus, have my hood covering most of my face, and my head is buried in my phone so no one can take another embarrassing photo that I don't want to look at. The bus stops. It's my stop. Thank the bus driver, get off the bus.
I sprint into the house, and my mother greets me gently.
I slam the bathroom door. I can’t let her see me like this. The kids at school thought it was worse than ever. I can’t imagine any mother would like to see the monster that puberty has created. She probably doesn’t even recognize who I am anymore. She acts as if the red bumps haven’t been forming furiously on my face for months now...she tries to ignore it, to make me feel better. What have you become? You used to be so handsome, you would get compliments, now I feel complimented when people don’t stare at me from a distance.
The lights in the bathroom are off, and I move my hand over to the bottom of the light switch about to flick it on and reveal to myself what I have become. I feel the irritation on my face. When I smile, I feel the dry skin that forms around the whiteheads spread amongst my face. I hate it, I refuse to smile anymore because when I do there is literal pain. I really don’t want to turn these lights on...please God make the red dots go away. Suddenly, I realize I need to do this. I place my finger under the switch, and flick the light on.
Fuck.
My forehead is littered with red dots, surrounded by white pus at the top of each papule. My nose is filled with blackheads, and cystic acne that is starting a war under the crevices of my skin. My cheeks...oh my cheeks. They are so irritated, the redness would make one think I was born with rosy cheeks, but upon closer inspection they will realize that the irritation has just been piling on. Tons of red dots lay atop my irritated cheeks and they are spread out like buried treasure. The acne spreads down to my chin, and even near my mouth. How the hell are you going to kiss a girl now? You're not...you’re disgusting.
I then frantically look for Q-Tips in the drawer of the bathroom. Q-Tips were a more effective way to eliminate whiteheads. I yank them out of the drawer, and there are plenty.
I take two of them and put them in between pimple number one. I press…..I press….I presssssssss POP! That's one. Blood begins to ooze. Onto number two. I press…..I press….I presssssssss POP! That's two. More blood oozes. This process continues until I get to six.
Suddenly I take a look into the mirror, and blood is streaming down sections of my face. It seems as if I had been mauled by a bear. Directly above the bathroom mirror is a picture of me and my five siblings as young children. I looked happy. I looked so happy when I was younger, and I was proud of who I was.
The tears combated the blood, and made my face seem like a war zone. The pimples mixed with the watered down blood from my tears left quite the spectacle on my face. It was as I was watching the tears flow out of my face however, where I noticed something about myself while looking in the mirror.
My eyes are so damn green. They are the greenest eyes I’ve ever seen. I’ve never seen someone with such green eyes. And they are actually pretty, they are glassy and vibrant. I love my eyes.
I smile.
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