2005. Seven-year-old me

It was so quiet in the playroom that you could hear Lemonade the hamster chewing on his cabbage. You could hear the leaves tapping against the window pane outside. You could hear the candy I had tucked inside my cheek knocking against my teeth. I froze in the middle of the room when I noticed something that hadn't been there yesterday. A box. A big, cardboard box, tied up with a yellow bow, the kind you only see in our house at Christmas, or my birthday, or when Granny comes to visit. And those boxes always have presents in them!

I ran to the box and looked inside it...

As long as I can remember, I've always loved animals. I already had a hamster, and two rabbits in a cage outside. I kept a bright-blue betta fish in a fishbowl in my bedroom, and a giant snail, named Lollipop, lived in a big transparent container in the kitchen.

But I'd never had a little bear cub!

It was so soft and round, with chubby little paws, and brown fur, and a white patch on its chest, and tiny ears... yes, a bear cub, that's what it was! It sat there in the box, sniffing the cardboard walls and looking at me with its big, brown eyes.

I wasn't allowed to leave the playroom, but a wave of joy welled up inside me, higher and higher, until it filled me completely. My legs straightened on their own and carried me to the door, my hands grabbed the doorknob and flung the door open, my mouth opened and shouted, "Mummy! Daddy!"

I dashed upstairs to my parents' bedroom, so quickly my nanny couldn't catch me. And Miss Rosie could run really, really fast!

"Dolores, no! Stop!" she shouted, rushing after me. The steps shook under my pounding feet.

I ran into my parents' room and straight for their bed. I wanted to hug my mum and dad so hard, as tight as my arms could hold them. I wanted to let all my joy and gratitude spill out over them. They'd given me a bear cub! They'd found it in the forest and brought it home, it was them! I smiled and laughed, loud and clear as a bell, but none of my happiness was reflected in my mother's sleepy face.

"Dolores, no! Stop!" she shouted, holding her hands in front of her.

My father, who had been sleeping next to her, sat up quickly in bed, but he'd woken up too late to stop me. A whole instant too late.

I'd heard them shout those things before— "No! Stop! No touching!" —and I'd always frozen in place, because that's what I'd been trained to do. It had almost become a reflex. But not this time. I was just much too happy, and that happiness filled me with strength, and made me fast. I flew onto the bed, threw my arms around my mother's neck super tight, and pressed my lips to her cheek.

Mummy didn't want to be kissed. She shrank away, I lost my balance, and we both tumbled onto the bed, onto the sheets that smelled of lavender. The mattress bounced under us and tossed us back into the air.

"There's a bear cub! In a box! Downstairs!" I yelled, delighted. "A real one!"

But Mummy didn't seem to hear me. She wriggled out of my grasp and put me down quickly on the floor, white with fear.

"Amy, call an ambulance," my father told her, and he wrapped a towel around me and lifted me up. I kicked and squealed happily. This all seemed like a fun new game to me, or it would have seemed that way, if not for Miss Rosie, crying in the doorway, and my parents, who did not look they were having any fun at all.

My father yanked open the bathroom door so quickly that I was frightened. The tile floor was so cold! The room smelled like soap and moisture.

"I don't want to take a bath!" I protested. "I want to play with the little bear!"

"Oh, Dolores," my father moaned, unwrapping the towel. By then, my nanny was there to help. Her hands shook as she unbuttoned my pajamas.

The water hadn't gotten warm, but the grownups refused to wait. Stream after icy stream splashed over me, and I howled in terror.

Mummy rushed into the bathroom, her hair a mess, her face ashen and bloodless, her hands clutching a first aid kit. She took one look at my face, distorted with fear, and started crying herself.

"I'm cold!" I cried.

"Hang in there, Lori. The water will get warmer..."

They carefully soaped me up and rinsed me off, then began spritzing my arms and face with a spray that smelled terrible. My eyes began tearing up, both in anger and from the pungent chemical smell, but... something inside my body started to feel even scarier than the freezing water and the stink of medicine. My hands. They were starting to burn. My cheek. It felt like I'd been slapped. My lips. They were going numb and starting to bleed. I could taste blood.

"Ralph, go see if the ambulance is here! Lori, sweetheart, we're going to the hospital."

"But I want to play with the bear!" I shouted again, as something warm trickled down my chin.

"Soon you will, very soon, all right?"

"Tomorrow? Promise me!" I sobbed, choking.

Suddenly there was not nearly enough air, and something was pressing on my chest, so heavy it felt like my lungs were full of sand.

"Tomorrow," Mummy said, and her eyes were wide open, framed by lashes gummy with tears.

She told me a lie. I didn't see the bear cub again for almost a month, after the severe burns on my hands and face had healed. My lips were hurt the worst. They had to operate to restore the skin... That was the price I paid for a kiss.

***

My nanny, whom I adored, quit. My parents tried to talk her into staying, but the experience had been too much for her. I think she was the fifth nanny who'd surrendered under the heavy burden of caring for such an unusual child. Another lady came to replace her, one who was chubby, round, and pink-cheeked. She reminded me of a big inflatable toy. If you pricked her with a needle, she'd deflate and fly away. Mummy spent hours instructing the new lady about how to take care of me, as if I were a magical beast who needed special, magical care.

"We're very much counting on you, Melissa. The next mistake could be much too costly. It's a question of life and death. For her, touching another person is worse than letting a child touch a hot fireplace screen."

"I'll take the responsibility very seriously, Mrs. McBride," said the lady, paging through the papers in a thick file that Mummy had put down before her.

"Last time, Dolores simply ran out of the playroom and into our bedroom, and I hadn't locked the door. I never thought she'd burst in like that. She never had before. I wasn't fully dressed, but Dolores had found a present from her grandmother that morning, and she was so excited that she forgot the rules. Of course, she knows she mustn't touch other people. Not unless they're wearing several layers of clothing and gloves, and have no bare skin showing."

"We've put locks on all the interior doors in the house now, so you should always lock the room where she's playing," my father said. He was standing there, too, looking glumly out the window.

I was listening, just barely, to the adult conversation, but it wasn't too interesting to me. The bear cub had most of my attention. It wasn't actually a bear, because it barked! And it had a curly little tail. I just hadn't noticed last time.

"Mummy, it's a puppy!" I called out, delighted.

"Wonderful, dear. Come here, please."

I ran to Mummy and the puppy came, too. It was big and heavy and made funny wheezing noises with every step. Mummy hugged me tight, pressing me to her chest. This time, she was wearing a jacket with a high collar, buttoned all the way up to her chin. And, as usual, she was wearing latex gloves, which made her hands look like they were made of plastic, smooth as some of my dolls.

"Have you thought of a name for it?"

"Yes! I'm going to call her Hazelnut! Daddy said she's a girl."

"Why Hazelnut?"

"Because she has eyes like brown nuts, and she's so sweet, like cookies, and she smells like Nutella."

"There's something that looks like a big gloopy pile of Nutella in the hallway. It doesn't smell all that good," somebody commented.

"John!"

I hadn't seen him since I'd returned from the hospital. He had been at school, but now he'd finally come home.

"John!" I threw myself at the boy with the straw-colored hair and gray eyes. He opened his arms wide for a hug. He wasn't wearing gloves, and his shirt was unbuttoned low on his chest. He'd flung his striped school uniform tie over his shoulder, where it hung like a snake.

"Lori!" he grinned, picking me up and spinning me in the air. "You're home!"

John gave me a kiss right on the nose, and a burst of good feelings made me laugh—the nicest, brightest types of feelings a child can ever experience. John was already twelve, and he was the most handsome boy in the whole world, although I had to admit I hadn't seen all that many boys. And he never, ever pulled away if I suddenly wanted to hug him. And he kissed me whenever he wanted to, which Mummy and Daddy never did. He was the only person on Earth whose touch didn't mark me with burns, didn't cause me pain.

"Don't worry. This is John, Dolores's brother. They're compatible," Mummy explained to the new nanny. "He's the only person here she isn't allergic to."

***

I didn't have any of the things ordinary children got to enjoy: school, interacting with my peers, field trips, traveling, games, hugs, holding hands, splitting a cookie.

Children are always touching each other, hugging, fighting, swapping clothing, sharing food. Any of that could cost me my life. So I was educated at home, under my parents' supervision. They hired tutors draped in clean lab coats and gloves. And the only people I talked to were my parents, John, my nanny, and grownups, who would never carelessly offer me their sandwich to finish or have me try on their clothes.

Everything around me was always spotlessly clean. Nothing I touched was allowed to have come into contact with the sweat or oils from another person's body. I always wore gloves and clothing that covered me completely. And when it came to preparing food for me—well, somebody could fill a textbook with those instructions. The dishes had to be perfectly clean, the chef had to wear a mask, and I always ate alone, so that I couldn't get mixed up and accidentally touch something that didn't belong to me. Sometimes John cooked for me, and then he and I could eat together, at the same table. Those meals with him were my favorite! My brother was the only one preventing me from leading a life like Rapunzel locked in her tower. We talked together, watched movies, played with Hazel, and basically belonged to one another.

But when his friends came over to play, I was seized by a terrible jealousy. Even worse if those friends were girls. I had no interest in other kids, and even if I did feel tiny crumbs of curiosity, my jealousy and rage quickly swept them away. They were trying to get a piece of my John! They touched him, slapped his shoulder, poked him in the ribs, traded toys, and ate snacks off the same plate!

"Come and join us, Lori!" John told me, more than once. "Nobody will touch you. I told them they can't."

But joining them would mean accepting their claims over what was mine. And I would never accept that. I frowned, stomped up the stairs, shut myself in my room, and broke my toys. I yanked out Barbie's hair and smashed my LEGO castles.

My parents thought my destructive behavior was due to a lack of interaction with my peers. With certain safety measures in place, they began asking their close friends to bring their children to visit. But I didn't want to play with anyone other than John. Other children scared me. They reached for my toys, they took up a lot of room, they spoke too loudly, and they smelled funny. On top of that, not being able to tackle them and push them away made me feel terribly helpless. It was like someone bringing a stranger into your house, and tying you to the radiator, and telling you to just be patient until they leave.

It got to the point where any time other children appeared in our house, I went into hysterics and had panic attacks, and finally my parents had no option but to halt their plan to socialize me.

"I suppose we'll have to wait until she's a bit older," my father said. "There's no hurry, after all."

"Or we could forget about socialization altogether," Mummy said sadly. "Who are we trying to fool? What are we trying to achieve for her, anyway? Make her take an interest in other people—with whom she'll never be able to have proper relationships? Whom she'll always envy, when she realizes how much they've been given, and how little she has? I'm terrified of the day when she sees she'll never be able to live a full life, get married, start a family..."

I listened to all this through the crack under the door. I'd come to the kitchen in the middle of the night for a drink of water, and to steal something tasty from the fridge. But my parents were in there, talking about problems I didn't understand again, arguing, crying... It was all so annoying!

I walked into the kitchen looking unconcerned, my bunny slippers flapping against the floor, and headed straight for the refrigerator. Mummy immediately stopped talking, and Daddy called out playfully,

"Who's this, up so late? A little bunny?"

I opened the fridge, picked out two big pieces of marzipan, took them to the table, and climbed on Daddy's lap.

"Why did you say I'll never get married? I will," I said, very seriously. "I'm going to marry John."

Mummy turned to the window, and her shouldersshook. I thought she was laughing. It was only many years later, remembering thatnight, that I realized she was silently weeping instead.