don't lie.

The year I was twelve, I walked to school. When I was nine, I was scared of everything; when I was twelve, I was scared of nothing. Round the corner, take off the boots. I always preferred soggy jeans and frozen toes to being seen with boots on. Maybe I still do. My clothes were never cool. I didn't know it until then.

I walked to school that year. Even in the cold, I walked to school. Heather came after me one day. She was bigger, taller, eighth grade, big-mouthed, bossy. I looked over my shoulder and saw her barreling down the road on her bike. It was overcast and it was fall. When the sky feels sharp and gray and heavy and your eyes tear up in the electric air.

Very early in my life, I started to pray in the middle of the night when I woke in fear. The blankets were hot, but I couldn't peel them off of my face for fear of what would be revealed. The pounding in my chest echoed into my ears. I couldn't tell if it was the sound of strangers in the dark (kidnappers, murderers, ghosts) or the sounds of my own body. In those moments, I would close my eyes and recite a prayer, over and over. Sometimes the Lord's Prayer, sometimes something I made up. Those prayers were usually short and simple, something like: Please keep me safe please keep me safe please keep me safe thank you.

I was walking home and I can't tell you how I felt. It's someone else's life. All I remember is the cool air and loneliness and putting one foot in front of the other. Who knows the thoughts that occupy the mind of a 12-year-old on her ten minute walk home? Heather came after me on her bike. She was standing on the pedals, coasting, weaving back and forth across the abandoned street. She swung in front of me and cut a wide circle around me. I remember her eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses and thick, greasy bangs. Squinting, dark. Are you too cool for us now? She was yelling. I can't remember what I said. I can't remember if I said anything at all.

Especially when I was very young, I thought I could feel the embrace of protection in the dark, a wave of comfort washing over me. I always knew it was the presence of the divine answering my prayers.

The instinct is strong. In fear, distress, anger at the circumstances of this life and this world, I have an instinct to plead with some greater thing to keep me safe. I catch myself doing it sometimes still. Almost always, it is in fear. Please heal her. Maybe I still have the power to shake the cosmos with my own desperate thoughts.

So tell the truth. Don't lie. Or don't tell the truth. But don't lie.