trauma

I want to briefly document some trauma. 

Three years ago, I had a best friend. I mean she was my busom buddy. I told her things I had never told anyone. We spent an inordinate amount of time together, as did our children. We behaved as though we intended to be very close for a very long time - sending the littles to the same preschools, spending every weekend at each others' houses.

For two years we were best friends and for two years I ignored red flags that at the time, I could convince myself were evidence of our friendship.

She had a problem with her son's best friend. Generally she was quite judgy about other children, like she referred to a kid my son was friends with as "creepy" because he was a small child. But in my mind, we were friends - these were just stray, random thoughts that maybe some people have, but they don't have anything to do with me or my children because we are close, we are friends. We would love each others' children.

She had a really big problem with her son's best friend. And I humoured her, I guess. I trusted her, that their friendship was a problem. She was convinced the other child was responsible for the fact that her child didn't yet know how to read, that his love for her son was somehow suffocating or problematic. The children were 7 years old at the time.

One day after dropping off my son, I saw this other boy being dropped off by his dad. I didn't know him very well yet (our kids would eventually become closer friends and we would socialise) and I watched as his dad, playing, ran away after dropping him off. The boy, chasing his dad, slipped on a pair of scissors someone had left on the ground, and smashed his face into the concrete. 

I will never, ever forget the sound his teeth made as his face hit the concrete. I heard it along with a teacher aide standing nearby. We both were speechless and horrified, terrified with anticipation of what would happen next.

The dad came back running and helped his son up, and his face was pouring blood. Thank goodness he didn't do any serious damage to his teeth. I was convinced the impact would have broken his new adult teeth.

The boy had blood pouring out of his mouth as he raised his head and said, "Dad! I'm ok, I'm not crying!"

The dad took his son to the doctor and I checked in on the teacher aide before heading to my own car, where I found my friend. I was in shock, and I said to her, "oh my God you will not believe what just happened. I just watched [boy] fall," and she said, in a dark voice without skipping a beat,

"good. I hate that kid."

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