After Losing the Sense of Pain
The dog's teeth severed nerves, and with them, all sensation of pain.
After that, I grew even quieter, like a doll that only knew how to follow orders.
When my birth parents finally found me and brought me home, the girl who had taken my place wouldn't let me in. She held a fruit knife to her own wrist.
"If she sets one foot inside, I'll die right here!"
Tears streamed down her face, but the blade had barely broken the skin.
Expressionless, I walked over and took the knife. "Let me help you with that, sister."
Then, with precision, I sliced open her artery. Blood sprayed across the floor.
My mother and father stared at me, their eyes wide with terror.
1
The moment Clara Blackwood saw me, she bolted to the kitchen and came back with a fruit knife.
She pressed the tip against her wrist, her face a mask of tragic tears.
"If she sets one foot inside, I'll die right here!" she wailed. "I've lived in this house for fifteen years! Why does she get to come back and steal your love?"
My mother panicked. "Clara, don't be rash! We can talk about this."
"She's a monster! Look at her eyes! They're terrifying!"
Clara pressed down, dragging the knife across her skin. It was a superficial cut, producing only a few beads of blood. She howled, "It hurts! I'm bleeding!"
As I watched her performance, a single directive formed in my mind: Die.
She said she wanted to die.
I moved robotically toward her and took the knife from her hand.
"What are you doing?!" Claras eyes widened.
I didn't speak. I found the artery in her wrist and drew the blade across it. "Let me help you with that, sister."
Blood gushed out, ten times more than before.
Clara let out a bloodcurdling scream and collapsed, convulsing on the floor.
My mother's face went white. "Oh god! Call 911!"
My father lunged, snatching the bloody knife from my hand. His voice trembled. "Tessa, what are you doing?"
I looked at them calmly. "It was a directive."
"What directive?"
"My sister said she wanted to die. I was helping her execute it."
Just then, my brother, Jerry, came running down the stairs. He saw Clara in a pool of blood, then looked at me. His eyes filled with a mixture of horror and rage.
"You monster!" he screamed, pointing at me.
The wail of an ambulance grew closer.
I stood silently beside the spreading puddle of blood, my own hands stained crimson.
My mothers voice shook. "Tessa, why would you do this?"
"It was a directive," I repeated.
I didn't know how else to explain.
At the hospital, Clara was rushed into emergency surgery.
I was left alone in the hallway of the ER. I clutched an old, battered music boxmy only possession. It was broken. The winding key was loose, and it could only produce a few stuttering, off-key notes. Still, I wound it again and again, listening to its fractured melody.
Three hours later, the surgeon emerged. "The patient is out of danger, but she lost a lot of blood. She'll need to be admitted for observation."
My mother let out a shaky breath of relief before walking over to me. She looked at my blood-spattered clothes, her expression a battle between pity and fear.
"Tessa, let's go home."
Back at the Blackwood estate, the bloodstains in the living room hadn't been fully cleaned. My mother asked the housekeeper to finish up while she sat across from me. "Tessa, tell me, why did you hurt your sister?"
I stared at her and mechanically repeated the words. "It was a directive."
"What directive? Who gave it to you?"
I couldn't answer. I just looked down, fiddling with the music box in my hands.
Tears welled in my mother's eyes and spilled down her cheeks. "Tessa, what on earth happened to you?"
2
The next afternoon, Clara was discharged from the hospital.
Her left wrist was wrapped in a thick bandage. She was pale, but her eyes burned with malice. The second she saw me, she lunged, snatching the music box from my hands. "Monsters only deserve to play with trash!"
She raised it high and slammed it onto the marble floor.
With a sickening crack, the box shattered into a dozen pieces. The winding mechanism sprang out, rolling far under a sofa. The delicate ballerina inside snapped in two.
I stared at the wreckage on the floor. I didn't cry or scream. I simply knelt.
Piece by piece, I began to gather the fragments.
The sharp edges of the broken wood sliced into my fingertips, and drops of blood fell onto the floor. I didn't flinch. I just kept picking them up.
"She's insane! She's lost her mind!" Clara shrieked.
My mother tried to pull me away, but then she saw the blood streaming from my fingers. As she tugged at my arm, my sleeve rode up, revealing the horrifying tapestry of scars beneath.
Knife wounds, bite marks, and the circular patterns of cigarette burns. They covered my thin arm in a dense, shocking lattice.
My mother gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "What are these?"
My father saw them too. "Get her to the hospital! Now!"
The doctors findings stunned everyone into silence.
"The patient is experiencing complete congenital analgesiathe inability to feel pain. Her emotional center has also suffered severe damage."
"This condition is incredibly rare," the doctor continued, his face grim as he studied my X-rays. "It's usually the result of extreme, prolonged trauma. Her nervous system was deliberately damaged. Someone intentionally severed the nerves that transmit pain signals."
My mother fainted before he could finish.
My fathers voice was a choked whisper. "Who would do something like this to a child?"
The doctor shook his head. "In my thirty years of practice, I have never seen such a cruel and methodical act. Its a miracle this child is alive at all."
I sat on the examination table, listening quietly. The cuts on my fingers had been bandaged. I felt nothing.
That night, back home, I placed the broken pieces of the music box into a small cardboard box.
Clara saw me and smirked. "Still trying to fix that thing? Dream on. That piece of junk should have been thrown out years ago."
I didn't respond, just continued to arrange the fragments.
The next morning, news of Clara's "accident" had spread through her school. My brother, Jerry, came home with a dark look on his face. He cornered me in the hallway. "It's all your fault," he seethed. "Clara almost died because of you!"
He was holding a mug of freshly brewed coffee, his eyes like ice. "Do you really feel nothing?" He didn't believe the doctors. "I don't believe you're a monster. You're acting!"
He tipped the mug, pouring the scalding liquid over the back of my hand.
The near-boiling coffee instantly turned my skin an angry red. Blisters rose immediately, and the top layer of skin began to peel away.
I just looked down at it. I didn't react. I didn't even pull my hand back.
The look on Jerry's face shifted from fury to shock, and then to raw fear.
"You you really can't feel it?"
I met his terrified gaze. "No."
That single word seemed to shatter him more than a scream ever could. He lost control, shoving me hard. "What are you?! No normal person is like this! You're not my sister!"
I stumbled backward and fell, my head cracking against the sharp corner of the coffee table. Blood trickled down my cheek.
I didn't cry. I didn't make a sound. I just silently pushed myself back up, wiped the blood from my face with the back of my other hand, and continued to look at him.
The sight of my silent suffering broke him completely. He grabbed a heavy glass ashtray from the table and raised it, ready to bring it down on my head.
3
"Stop!" My father, coming down the stairs, saw the scene and roared with fury.
He lunged forward, wrenching the ashtray from Jerry's hand, and delivered a powerful backhand slap across his face.
Crack!
Jerry's cheek swelled instantly.
"That is your sister! Your own flesh and blood! Are you trying to kill her?!" my father bellowed. "Look at her hand! Look at her head! Look at all the scars she already has!"
"She has suffered enough! How much more are you going to torture her?!"
Jerry stood frozen, staring at my scalded hand and the gash on my forehead. I still wasn't crying, just watching them with my empty eyes.
My mother ran down, drawn by the shouting. When she saw me, her eyes filled with tears. "Tessa, honey, you're hurt again?"
She reached out to hug me. I didn't pull away, but I didn't respond either. I was just a beautiful, broken porcelain doll.
"Jerry, on your knees!" my father commanded, pointing at the floor. "Apologize to your sister!"
Jerry looked at me, his eyes a mix of guilt and terror. "I'm I'm sorry, Tessa"
I looked back at him and said softly, "It's okay."
Those two words made tears spring to his eyes. He was beginning to realize that I wasn't the monster.
My mother carefully tended to my wounds. "Tessa, tell Mommy, does it hurt a lot?"
I shook my head. "It doesn't hurt."
"Are you scared?"
I thought for a moment. "I don't know what scared is."
My mother's tears fell faster. She pulled me into a tight embrace. "Mommy will never let anyone hurt you again. Not even your brother."
I rested in her arms, feeling nothing.
To make up for what had happened, my mother bought me an expensive white cashmere sweater. She gently helped me put it on. "Tessa, how does it feel? Is it comfortable?"
I ran my hand over the fabric and nodded. "It's nice."
I couldn't feel its softness, but I knew it was something good.
I sat quietly on the sofa in my new clothes. But when Clara came home, her eyes immediately locked onto the sweater.
"Why does she get to wear something so nice?! You've never bought me anything this expensive!"
"Clara, your closet is full of beautiful clothes," my mother reasoned.
"Those are old! Now that she's back, you don't love me anymore!" Clara grew more and more hysterical, snot and tears mixing on her face. "Fifteen years in this family means less than one day with her!"
Sobbing, she ran to the coffee table and snatched a box cutter. "You don't deserve to wear nice things!"
She rushed at me, intending to slice the sweater off my body.
I didn't move. I just watched her come.
The sharp blade slashed across the fabric. In the chaos, the tip of the cutter plunged into my shoulder.
Blood instantly bloomed, staining the white cashmere a brilliant red.
I looked down at the ruined sweater. "Directive was 'wear'," I said softly. "Clothing damaged. Directive failed."
"What failed directive?! You're a psycho!" Clara raised the cutter again.
My mother leaped forward, tore the weapon from her hand, and delivered a resounding slap across Clara's face.
Crack!
She used all her strength. Clara stumbled back several steps, stunned.
"Are you insane?! Do you want to go to jail?!" For the first time, my mother looked at Clara with pure ferocity. "She is your sister! Your real sister! How could you stab her?!"
Clara held her cheek, staring at our mother in disbelief. "Mom? You hit me? You hit me for her? For that monster?"
"Yes! I hit you for her!" my mother said without hesitation. "And if you ever dare to hurt Tessa again, I will send you to juvenile hall!"
4
In all her life, my mother had never spoken so harshly to Clara, let alone hit her.
"You don't love me anymore" Clara sobbed and ran upstairs.
My mother ignored her and turned to check my wound. "Tessa, does it hurt?"
I shook my head, my gaze fixed on the blood-soaked sweater. "The clothes are broken."
"It's okay, honey. Mommy will buy you a new one."
"But this one was special," I said, the first unsolicited emotion I had expressed.
My mother's tears started again. "Why was it special?"
"Because it was the first piece of clothing Mommy bought for me."
Her heart broke. She held me tight. "Mommy will buy you so, so many clothes," she whispered. "You will never lack for anything ever again."
But some things, once lost, can never be replaced.
My parents took me back to the hospital for my shoulder. The doctor said the blade had missed the bone, but I would need stitches. I sat through the entire procedure without making a sound.
"This child's tolerance for pain is incredible," the doctor remarked.
...
While we were out, Clara found the box with my music box fragments.
"Why is she still keeping this junk?"
She found a hammer, intending to smash the pieces into dust.
Jerry stood by and watched, saying nothing.
Clara swung the hammer again and again, pulverizing the wooden shards. Finally, all that was left on the coffee table was a small pile of white powder.
"There," she said, satisfied. "Now she has nothing to obsess over. A monster doesn't deserve anything beautiful."
Jerry looked at the dust and remained silent.
When we returned, Clara greeted us with an innocent smile. "You're back, little sister?"
I nodded and went to the drawer where I kept the box. It was empty. I checked other places, but it was gone.
Finally, I saw the pile of white powder on the coffee table.
I knew what it was. I reached out with my bandaged hand to cup the dust, but it was too fine, slipping through my fingers.
I made no sound, but a single tear escaped from my blank eyes and traced a path down my cheek.
It was the first time I had cried since coming home.
It was the only time.
My mother saw it and covered her mouth in shock. My father was speechless. Jerry stared at my single tear, and he looked as if the air had been punched from his lungs. That silent drop of water was a more powerful accusation than any scream.
"Tessa" my mother began, wanting to comfort me.
I shook my head, my expression returning to its usual emptiness. "It's okay. It was broken for a long time."
Clara saw everyone's reaction and scoffed. "What are you crying about? It was just a piece of trash. She's a monster. What does she need a music box for anyway?"
My mother glared at her. "Did you do this?"
"So what if I did? That junk should have been thrown out!"
My mother looked like she wanted to hit Clara again, but she restrained herself. She knew that no punishment could bring back what I had lost.
Jerry walked over to me, his voice trembling. "Tessa, I'm sorry."
I looked at him. "Why are you apologizing?"
"I I should have stopped her."
"It's okay. It was already broken."
My forgiveness seemed to wound him more than any accusation.
The next day, he cornered my mother, demanding to know about the music box. "What was that thing? Why was it so important to her?!"
My mother looked at his red, swollen eyes and knew he hadn't slept. "Jerry, do you really want to know the truth?"
"Yes! I need to know what happened to Tessa!"
Tears began to stream down her face. "Tessa wasn't just abducted, Jerry. She was thrown into hell."
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