Faceless Page 7

  Everyone cheers and I open my eyes. My mother cuts up the cake and offers me a piece. I gag when the buttercream frosting hits my tongue; I think it tastes sour but no one else seems to notice. Dad’s already on his second piece. I put my plate down on the little table beside my bed, right on top of my hand mirror.

  Just because I can taste again doesn’t mean that things taste the way they did before. Maybe my donor hated buttercream.

  Maybe she hated her birthday. Maybe I will hate mine from now on.

  I wake up screaming for the fifth night in a row. My mother is in my room so quickly that I wonder if she fell asleep at all tonight or just stayed up waiting for me to start shouting. My dad follows close behind, hovering in my doorway, looking groggy. Mom doesn’t turn the lights on in my room, but light from the hallway spills in through my open door, silhouetting my father.

  I’ve been home for almost a week now. There is no more plaster mask wrapped around my head, no more sterile gloves required before I can touch my face, just an army of ointments and pills. Dr. Boden said the scars on my skin—and on my donor’s skin—would fade over time, though they’ll never be invisible.

  The only thing stranger than my new face is the fact that my parents are sleeping in the same bed again. I can practically feel their unified presence radiating concern from the other side of my bedroom wall.

  My parents think that my nightmares are about the accident. They think that being just down the street from the scene of the crime is what’s keeping me up at night. I don’t tell them the truth. It’s not my accident I dream of, but my donor’s.

  Of course, I don’t know anything about my donor’s accident except that it involved a car, so the dreams are different every night. I don’t even know if she was the only person killed in the crash.

  Some nights, she’s driving, and someone else runs a red light and plows into her. I wake up with the sound of screeching brakes and twisting metal in my ears.

  Some nights, she’s walking down the street when a car whips around the corner out of nowhere and speeds up onto the sidewalk, throwing her into the air. She lands, backward and broken, several yards away in the parking lot of a fast food restaurant and slowly begins to bleed out.

  Some nights, she’s in the passenger seat beside her boyfriend or her husband. Maybe her kids are in the backseat. And I wake up to the sound of their screams.

  My whole life, I made my dad kill the spiders and bugs that snuck into my room. Once, my dad caught a mouse in the kitchen and I cried because the poor thing was squeaking with pain and fear until Dad set him free in the backyard.

  Now someone else died for my face and I’m supposed to be happy about it.

  Dad thinks that maybe the nightmares are because I have to sleep on my back while my face continues to heal. “Ever since you were a little kid you always slept curled up on your left side. Maybe this is messing up your sleep patterns,” he suggests with a shrug. He doesn’t mention that I slept on my back the entire time I was at the hospital and my nightmares didn’t start until they brought me home, nearly a month after the transplant, just a week before the first day of school. He doesn’t mention that if I happen to shift onto my left side in my sleep, pain shoots viciously up my side, waking me up like some kind of cruel alarm.

  “Oh, sweetheart.” Mom picks my fluffy pink comforter off the floor and tucks it around me. I used to sleep with the blanket pulled up around my neck, but now I can’t stand the weight of it. “You’ll feel better in the morning,” she says.

  “Serena is coming over in the morning,” I say quickly. Now that I’m home, I have my cell phone back; Serena and I arranged a visit over texts less than twelve hours ago.

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” I think she’s worried Serena will hug me too tightly and smush my new nose or something. Or maybe she’s worried that when Serena sees my new face, she’ll turn tail and run away as fast as her legs can carry her.

  “I do,” I say firmly. I miss my friend. “I think it’s important to try to do something normal,” I add, because that’s the kind of thing Mom would say. Not that I believe it, not even for a second: What could possibly be normal about Serena seeing my new face for the first time?

  To my surprise, Mom smiles. “I’m so glad to hear you say that,” she begins, “because I have a surprise for you.”

  “What?” I ask nervously.

  “Chirag is coming over tomorrow, too.”

  My heart starts pounding, just like it did when the nightmare ripped me from sleep. Maybe I’m still dreaming. No; my subconscious wouldn’t do this to me. Even in my worst nightmares, I’ve never dreamed about Chirag seeing me this way.

  My mother never exactly encouraged Chirag to come over before. And when he did come over, she’d insist that we sit in the living room with the lights on. Maybe she hated the idea of her little girl having a boyfriend; hated that this was a part of my life she couldn’t control. Dad was so much cooler about it than she was. But tonight, there’s something almost wistful in her voice when she says Chirag’s name, like she’s worried that I’ll never have another boyfriend again and she wants me to make the most of this one while I’ve got him.

  I take a deep breath. “What do you mean, he’s coming over, too? How did you know Serena was coming?”

  “Her mother called me to make sure it was okay.”

  I shake my head. I love being able to shake my head again, for all the good it does me. Mom never listens. If she’d been listening, she’d have heard that even though I’ve talked about Serena coming over every day since I got home from the hospital, I’ve never asked for Chirag. Not once. No matter how much I wanted him to wrap his long arms around me and kiss the top of my head and tell me: It’s all right, it’s all right, it’s all right. I miss the sound of his voice and the way he smells and the rough calluses on his thumbs rubbing the back of my hands. It’s very strange that there is one person—the same person—whom I most want to see and most dread seeing.

  I don’t even pick up the phone when he calls. Because he would ask to come over, and I wouldn’t know how to say no. But he can’t see me this way. How can Mom not understand that? Once he sees me, he’ll never want to wrap his arms around me again.

  The last time I gave myself a good hard look was the day I left the hospital, with my therapist nodding her approval. I can still picture the hot-pink jagged scars on my cheeks; the mark where they’d attached the new chin; the cheeks, still comically full. The tip of my donor’s nose was smaller than my old nose, almost aquiline. And she didn’t have freckles; even beneath the swelling and the scars I could see that her complexion was pale, like mine, but milky white. I bet she was proud of her complexion. Maybe it was her special vanity. Maybe she wore sunscreen and hats even on cloudy days, just to be safe. My own freckles remained on my forehead but then stopped abruptly where my skin met my nose and cheeks.

  I hate this face. It was easier to look at nothing than it is to look at a stranger’s nose and cheeks and chin pasted onto me.

  I should have listened more closely when they explained my options, the differences between the transplant and skin grafts. But I thought that Chirag seeing me with someone else’s face would be better than him seeing me with no face at all.

  “What time is Chirag coming?”

  “Eleven, same as Serena,” Mom replies.

  I stiffen. In more than a decade of friendship, Serena has never been on time for anything. Which means that Chirag will see me first. I glance at my clock; he’ll be here in less than eight hours. He’ll be right on time. He’s never late.

  “I only wanted Serena.”

  Mom sighs. I used to have her chin, her nose, my dad’s cheeks. I wonder if they feel like they’re living with a stranger when they look at me now.

  “Chirag has asked to visit every single day since you came out of the coma. You should have heard how thrilled he was when I finally said he could.”

  For some reason, all I can think about is the silence
in my hospital room when Dr. Woo said I’d have to be on birth control. I wonder if my mother thinks that Chirag and I have had sex. Maybe that was why she never wanted to leave us alone in the house together.

  The truth is, we hadn’t actually come all that close. I never even told Serena that. Now I could kick myself for waiting. We should have done it months ago. I thought I had all the time in the world. Now I’ll probably be a virgin forever.

  “Fine,” I say, leaning back against my pillows. They’re arranged so that not only am I on my back, but I’m also practically sitting up. “But if I have some kind of panic attack when I see Chirag, it’ll be all your fault.” I imagine myself freaking out when he walks through the front door. My eyes rolling back into my head like someone possessed; my fingernails digging into the flesh of my new cheeks. Not that I’d be able to feel it, anyway.

  “I’ll risk it,” Mom says, smiling. “Besides,” she adds brightly as she gets up, “he’s going to see you at school soon anyway.” She makes it sound like a threat, like I’m a bratty little kid who wants summer to last longer instead of the girl who has, until now, always been excited for the new school year. She turns down the hallway to go back to her own room and Dad hesitates, then comes inside and kisses the top of my head, the only part of my head that’s really kissable anymore.

  Softly, he says, “Maybe you’re having nightmares because you’re scared to see your friends. Maybe your dreams will get better once you’ve gotten it over with. Like ripping off a Band-Aid.”

  He smiles before he switches off the lights in the hallway and my room goes dark. I listen to the sound of his footsteps fading away, the sound of their bedroom door clicking shut behind him. I never thought seeing Chirag would be something I’d want to get over with.

  Alone in my room, I do what I’ve done every night since the nightmares began: I close my eyes and imagine myself dancing with Chirag, the same way I did when the pain overwhelmed me at the hospital. I imagine the soft green silk of my dress against my skin and I picture Chirag fixing one of the dress’s skinny straps when it falls off my shoulder. It is the old Maisie dancing with Chirag, the girl who had only one scar: on the right side of her neck, just below her hairline, from the time when she was six and her best friend tried to do her hair and burned her with her mother’s curling iron. I can still remember the sound the curling iron made when it touched my skin, a strange sort of steaming sizzle that sounded like someone gasping.

  In my fantasy, Chirag presses his lips to that one single scar as we sway in time to the music.

  In the morning, I draft and delete a dozen text messages to Chirag. I start with explanations.

  I should warn you: I don’t look the way that I used to.

  Did my mom tell you about the scars on my cheeks?

  But I can’t bear explaining, so I hit delete and try lying instead:

  I’m not feeling so good today—not up for visitors.

  The doctors said I can’t have visitors so we’re going to have to cancel. Something about germs. Too bad!

  I don’t know if my mom told you, but I have to wear a scarf across my face at all times. So you won’t actually be able to see me.

  And then, the biggest lie of all:

  I don’t want you to come over. Don’t.

  My finger hovers above the send button. It would be so easy to let the message go out into the ether. I close my eyes and imagine the sound his phone will make, alerting him that he has a new message. Other couples have pictures of the two of them together on their phones, selfies they took as they kissed or made funny faces. But Chirag’s phone has a candid shot of me crossing the finish line at a track meet. My arms overhead, my smile wide, grinning from ear to ear.

  I imagine him looking at that photo and smiling as he slides his finger across the screen. Then I picture that smile fading away when he discovers that I don’t want to see him.

  Would he know I was lying? Because I do want to see him, so badly it makes my stomach hurt. I just don’t want him to see me. I wish the doctors really had given me a medical scarf to wear over my face. Gauze to wrap around my forehead and across my nose, like some kind of grotesque bride.

  Delete. I toss my phone on the bed and start getting dressed.

  I used to spend a ridiculous amount of time looking at myself in the mirror before Chirag came over. It was so stupid; it’s not like he didn’t see what I looked like every day at school. Not like he didn’t see me a million times during a run, sweat dripping down my face and my hair in a messy ponytail. But still, when I knew he was coming over—which I always thought of as a date, even when we didn’t actually go anywhere—I fretted and fussed in front of the mirror, trying this barrette and that blouse. I wanted to look pretty for my first real boyfriend, for the person who told me that I looked beautiful no matter what I was wearing.

  He always said that he liked me best in jeans and a plain top and no makeup (though I never really wore any makeup unless Serena made me). So I pull out his favorite pair of jeans—dark blue and ripped just a little at the knee—and a plain white long-sleeved shirt. I don’t know why I bother. It’s not like he’s going to be looking at anything but my face.

  Would Chirag even recognize me if we bumped into each other on the street? He always said he loved my eyes, and they’re the same at least. Maybe he’d know me by my eyes.

  Or maybe he’d just know it was me because of the scars on my face and running down the left side of my body. How many other girls in town have been burned like that?

  The doorbell rings promptly at eleven. I let Mom answer it. She’s home, even though it’s a weekday. She’s taking a leave of absence from her job to take care of me. Dad is back at work; it must be hard for him, going into the office each morning after another night interrupted by my screams, like the daughter they brought home from the hospital isn’t a teenager but a newborn baby who still hasn’t learned to sleep for more than a few hours at a time.

  From my room, I can hear Mom saying hello brightly, like Chirag is a long-lost friend she’s been waiting to see. I consider staying upstairs, but I guess my mom could just send him to my room to find me. Now that she doesn’t have to worry about what we might be doing behind closed doors.

  So I pad down our cool terra-cotta stairs in my bare feet, past all the old photos on the walls. This house is like a shrine to a face that no longer exists.

  I should have worn shorts. My legs weren’t burned at all. I squeeze my left hand into a fist, trying to ignore the way it still hurts. What if Chirag tries to hold my hand? Will he notice how tight the skin is? Will the ridges of my scars disgust him? I stuff my damaged hand into the pockets of my tight jeans, even though the denim scratches the tender skin.

  Chirag is facing my mother, his back to the stairs, so I see the flowers before I see his face. Lilacs. I wonder where he got them this time of year. I’m pretty sure they usually bloom in the spring. The slim muscles in Chirag’s back flex under his T-shirt as he tightens his grip on the bouquet, squares his shoulders. His caramel-colored skin peeks out from the borders of the shirt—at the neck, his arms, just above the waistband of his shorts—and I remember that it is always, always warm, every time I touch him. For a split second, my heart forgets about the way that I look and starts beating a little bit faster, excited to see him. He spins around before I reach the first floor.

  I can tell that Chirag is trying very hard not to react to my face. He probably practiced in the car on the drive over: imagining what I would look like and trying to keep his face neutral, as if nothing had changed. Ever the scientist, he probably did research, Googling pictures of face transplants so he’d know what to expect. But now his dark skin looks positively ashen. His Adam’s apple bobs up and down as he swallows: once, twice, three times.

  I linger on the bottom step, tapping one foot against the terra-cotta floor. Chirag steps toward me, holding the flowers out in front of him. “For your birthday,” he says.

  “Thanks,” I say, though I’
m still standing too far away to take them from him. I don’t make a move to come any closer.

  “Those are Maisie’s favorite.” Mom takes the lilacs out of Chirag’s arms. I want to tell her that of course Chirag knows they’re my favorite. But I don’t think they’re my favorite anymore, because now the smell is making me queasy.

  The flowers out of his hands, Chirag steps forward, his arms lifted slightly, like he wants to hug me. I shake my head, and he drops his arms immediately. He nods, letting me know that he understands.

  It was always like that for us. A glance across a party could communicate everything: I’m bored, let’s get out of here. Or: Can you believe that outfit? Or: I know I look like I’m engrossed in this conversation, but really all I can think about is kissing you.

  “We should sit down,” I say carefully, stepping toward the couch as Mom disappears through the swinging door that leads to our kitchen.

  The living room is airy and bright, sun streaming in through the windows. I wait for Chirag to sit first, then I sit all the way across the couch, pulling my legs up in front of my chest and wrapping my arms around them. I used to sit right next to him. Maybe it would feel amazing to slide across the couch and rest my head on his chest and let his arms wrap around me. Maybe I would even cry and tell him how awful it’s been, how much I’ve missed him, how scared I am, listen to the steady sound of his heartbeat against my cheek.

  Instead, from my side of the couch, I stare at the features I know so well: his long arms and wide chest; his slim waist. I’ve always loved the way he looks. It’d be a lie to pretend that my feelings for him don’t have something to do with how he looks. So how can I expect him to still love me when I looks so different? Sometimes I wonder if even my parents can love me the same.

  “Serena should be here any minute,” I offer. Serena can talk her way through the most awkward of situations.