Into Something Beautiful

by Caurie Anne Miner

I thought of him yesterday
When I walked into the hard oak table
(that I should have moved last week)
The hurt brought him back
Sharply and with unwelcome force

Instinctively my hand reached for the pain
And covered the spot quickly ripening from flesh tone to crimson
I couldn’t look, didn’t want to see
So I closed my eyes
And forgot about it

But I thought of him again today
When I awoke from the darkness of sleep
And found my leg painted a familiar shade of black and blue
A tangible reminder of yesterday’s pain, yesterday’s life
—yesterday’s man

“How did you get that bruise?” my fiance9 asked with concern
It was a question I had heard so many times in my life—but never from him
Instinctively my hand reached for the flannel comforter
(a pretty shade of denial)
“How did you get that bruise?” he asked again.
“I just walked into something” I answered in a scripted voice. “It’s no big deal.”

But then I realized I had walked into something
—it wasn’t a lie
There had been an oak table and it had caused the bruise
I knew then that it was finally time to forgive the oak table of my past
And, more importantly, forgive myself for not moving it sooner

“I walked into something yesterday,” I repeated.
“And I got hurt”
The story took a long time to tell, but he listened
And with each bruise I relived I walked away from something hard—
and into something beautiful.

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