Do you ever just look at something or hear something or sensually experience something and you’re just confused? How even though your motor neurons electrochemically transmitted those things into your brain, you can’t entirely comprehend its meaning? That’s how I felt seven years ago when this strange thing just…appeared. I understood what happened, but I didn’t know how.

     This particular debacle started off as a scenic May afternoon. The sun smiled at us from above while concurrently wanting to kill us with its ultraviolet rays. The grass was a fluorescent green, the frail birds were joyfully chirping on tree branches, the imaginary voices inside my head had finally shut up for once, and most of all, school was over. My fellow companions and I were executing the time of our existences, cheerfully frolicing on the K-2 playground at Westmere Elementary like little puppies at a dog park. We were staying long after dismissal for a program called Y-Time (made by the YMCA) that was essentially an after-school special daycare for students whose parental figures were still hard at work.

     There was also Tender Care, which was an entirely separate thing. Tender Care was basically a glorified Y-time, like if Y-time was a crumpled up origami sailboat some eight-year-old made and Tendercare was a colossal yacht made out of pure gold. Even if it took place in a small, isolated hut in front of WES, sitting on a flattened hill in the parking lot, all the cool kids went to Tender Care. The building had colorful tinted windows, a miniature playground, and a basketball hoop attached to one of the walls. I remember Tender Care was only held on Fridays, while Y-Time was there as long as we had school.

     We Y-Time losers were enclosed in the cafeteria walls playing Just Dance 2017 on the Wii set that connected to an ancient TV. Occasionally, we would show off our heart-pattern denim shorts playing Gaga Ball, eating graham crackers, and making arts and crafts when we were miraculously allowed outside after doing all our (nonexistent for me) homework. 

     In first grade, there wasn’t a social hierarchy—it was more of a best-friend-enemy, potential boyfriend-girlfriend system. My best friend, Darshana, and I both had enemies. She, an extremely annoying, high-pitched-voice boy named Samar, who always had the coolest high-tech-looking fidget spinners, and me, Samar’s untrusty sidekick who would eventually become a tall, NY Jets fan.

     Samar and Jets Boy were (gracefully) nowhere to be seen, so Darshana, Owen, and I were playing some sort of corrupt version of tag on the K-2 playground. We had a friend in second grade, Lulu, and she was allowed to use the 3-5 playground at Y-Time because she was almost—“almost” being the key word—a third grader. We always envied her prized privilege of being a year older than and a grade above us.

     In this particular instance, I was descending a neon orange slide face-first into the rubbery tire chips spread out on the ground. I always thought the tire chips were there for safety padding, but they didn’t do that much except making the many falls from the red Arch, a murder machine disguised as playground equipment, harder,  getting wedged in between the treads of kids’ trending Light-Up Sketchers™. 

     After I rose from hitting the dirt, I did an amateur pirouette and noticed something on my knee. It wasn’t a bug, or even a stray tire chip—it was dried blood that at one point had been dripping down my leg. It looked fairly brown, similar to my skin, so that’s probably why I didn’t see it earlier. My friends noticed it too and started asking questions, but I couldn’t give them any explanations. All I could do was just stare blankly into time and space, replaying the day in my head. How the heck did this happen? Did I scrape my knee on something? No,  any rough objects kept their distance from my fragile joints. Did something poke me? No, there weren't any thorns growing out of the tire chips, let alone roses; there weren’t any needles lying around Mrs. Phealan’s first grade classroom earlier in the day, and all of the tips of the pencils I used in school were dull, just the way I liked them.

     I soon came to the uncertain conclusion that my gash was mystically created by black magic or some other equally reasonable force. Darshana, Owen, and I sauntered through the dewy grass to the blacktop bench, seeking aid. For some reason, all of the counselors looked like siblings, or even duodecaplets, with their brown hair and brown eyes. Paxton, one of the average hair-eye-combination counselors, sat me down on top of the table while another counselor, Mary, went back inside to get me a band-aid.

     All the other kids at Y-Time eventually gathered on the rough blacktop to look at the dried blood on my knee, which was weird (and creepy) because when somebody gets into an accident, random strangers don’t usually come to their recovery room in the hospital to observe the damage, but I liked all the special attention and fame I was getting. The treacherous thugs came over, too. Samar made a smart-aleck crack about how nobody needed to pity me and that I was just faking being injured, and Jets Boy just stood there with a smug smile on his face.

     Mary, after eight eons, returned with a band-aid box in her hand. She selected the biggest one for me and spritzed my knee with that nostalgic stinging antibacterial spray. The band-aids she was holding weren’t even kiddie band-aids, like Disney ones; they were just plain beige. As an artist, I appreciated some color, you know? I didn’t think a band-aid (or even a multicolored one) would help; nothing was even hurting. Blood’s not supposed to hurt, correct? I still put it on anyway—it’s not like I had a choice or say in the matter. I was but a stupid six-year-old whose opinions were of lesser relevance. I guess the band-aid shielded harmful bacteria, but still. Paxton assured me and the crowd that everything was going to be a-okay, like they actually thought I was going to die.

     Shortly after that, the counselors brought out popsicles, and we all enjoyed them while simultaneously trying not to let the juice drip onto our clothes. I didn’t eat a popsicle; I had a graham cracker instead because, one, I didn’t like popsicles, and two, I had more important things to think about than artificial orange flavoring getting on my favorite striped skirt. How this whole thing happened, what I would tell my mom, and where I’d find a YouTube tutorial for getting solidified blood off of knees were still on my “To Be Pondered” list.

     We went back inside and stayed there until the time was five-o-clock and time for everyone to depart. Gently shoving the stuffed animals I’d brought to school in my polka-dot backpack and slinging the pink straps over my shoulder, I attempted to use my small, feeble, undeveloped six-year-old brain to figure out how this whole dry-blood-on-knee thing happened. Unfortunately, I couldn’t; I was too confused.

     I never figured out how dried blood appeared on my knee that day. I still wonder about it to this day. I even wrote another narrative about it, too, in second grade. It was extremely hyperbolic, and I drew more pictures than I wrote words, but it still counts, right?  But seriously, if you’re ever just sitting there thinking, “Huh?” at one point in your life, that’s okay. Being confused gives us a new perspective in life, therefore the more you’re confused, the more outlook in life you’ll receive. If you sit and think about something for a long time, it starts to make sense after a while. Then you think about other things and how they also impact your life. Some are big impacts, and some are small, but all still matter.

-Francisca S.