The Advantages of Being a Babysitter

"I have freckles, too. On my arms. See?” I pull up my sleeve to show you—the right sleeve—thinking it’s enough, but no, you are six years old, all fragile limbs and sunlight, and you want to see them all. What can I do? Grab your hand, stop you—no, not that one— How can I? I bite back a gasp as light, your light, falls on what’s had me wearing long-sleeved shirts on eighty-degree June days: the faint lines of old mistakes crossed with the harsh reality of the recent, scabs still not healed, the scar tissue I wear around my wrist like a bracelet. It isn’t bad. I’ve seen worse on other people’s arms, but this one’s mine. I hold my breath.

You don’t even blink.

Of course you don’t. You’re six years old, all questions and tangled hair. You don’t know. You don’t know. In the dark, with shaking hands, I have told myself over and over that it’s nothing, but to you, it really is. To you goodbye is as simple as “You’re dead! You’re dead now!” and “Now I brought you back." Where I see mistakes, you only see my arms.

And now you bring me back. I see them, too.