Baptism by Fire

We were baking a chocolate cake when it happened.  We made that cake a lot, my sister and I.  Two layered cake, mocha icing.   She was a teenager and I wasn’t yet nine.

We used to bake all the time.  Cakes and cookies and brownies.  I don’t think she liked to bake alone, so she suspended her pinching and taunting and name-calling routine long enough to mix and pour and cook and eat.

She was hovering over the stove, her long blonde Lindsay Wagner hair entirely blocking my view of her shirt and the saucepan of coffee she was boiling.  The coffee would be the base of the icing.  Though coffee wasn’t, and still isn’t, my thing, I still find myself fantasizing about that icing nearly 30 years later.  It was that good.

She said nothing as she turned, then stumbled.  The pot of boiling coffee catapulted from her hands to my chest.  In a flash.  Fast.  I probably screamed, but I don’t remember.  Mom and dad came running, so there must have been some noise.  I imagine mom saying something like, “Don’t get blood on the floor” as she ran (she said that a lot), but I’m betting she didn’t.

“She poured the coffee on me!”  I yelled. The pain was profound.  My entire chest, neck to stomach, felt like it was on fire.   I wanted to dive into ice.  Or die.  Or dive into ice then die.

“You shouldn’t have been in the way!” My sister screamed.  “It’s not my fault!” 

“Let’s go!” Dad said, pulling on his coat as mom helped me out of my shirt. 

My chest was a dangerous shade of red.  Mom covered me in a cold towel and I remember being horribly embarrassed to run around town in nothing more.  As if my non-existent breasts might offend the emergency room onlookers whose arms had fallen off or whose children had fevers of 105.

A second degree burn.  The doctor said it wouldn’t leave a scar.  Or maybe a small one.

When we got home, my sister was busy complaining about my underfoot-ness.  “She was standing right behind me!” She defended her un-accused self. “I didn’t even know she was there!  What kind of idiot stands right behind a person boiling coffee?!”

“She’s just a little kid.” Mom said. 

“She’s an idiot!”  My sister was scared, I now realize.  Scared that she had damaged me beyond repair.  Scared of the scars.  Or, perhaps, scared of the blame.

Mom looked at me.  “You shouldn’t have been standing behind her.  It’s your fault, too.  Make sure you don’t do that again when someone is working over a hot stove.  And you,” she eyed my sister, “be more careful next time.”

That was thirty years ago.  There are no scars on my chest.