What You Don't Know Will Kill You

It started when I was just ten years old. My mother had been diagnosed with late stage breast cancer and her time on earth was quickly drawing to a close. At the time I didn't understand what cancer was. All I knew was that I was going to lose my mother and it tore me apart. My father tried to keep our family routine as normal as possible, and in so doing that, I was forced to go to school and pretend that my heart wasn't in a million pieces.

When you live in a small town, word gets around and pretty soon everyone knew of my mother's prognosis. Rather than gain any sympathy, it seemed to fuel the fire of my long-term bully – Sally McIntyre. She began to tease me about losing my mother and how it was my ugliness that brought on her cancer. At first, I ignored it, determined not to let her get the better of me. But as time went on, as my mother grew weaker, my anger intensified. It all came to a head one Friday morning during yard time. I was pretending to enjoy a game of hopscotch with my friends when Sally approached me, a look of spite etched across her face.

'I hear your mother looks like a zombie now,' she sneered. Her cronies giggled behind her. 'I bet she's still prettier than you, though.'

It wasn't any worse than the other things she had thrown at me over the years, but something in me just snapped. Not violently. Instead, I looked at her, my whole body filled with hate and I said in a very calm tone.

'It should be you dying, not my mother.' And I meant it. Why should someone as horrible as Sally get to live, while my innocent mother faded away?

Sally snorted and promised to tell the teacher. Whether she did or not, I never knew. My teacher was sympathetic to my situation and might've chosen to let my words go just this once.

Over the weekend, what I considered at the time to be a miracle, my mother grew stronger. She was able to hold down her food and subsequently the colour returned to her once glowing cheeks. She could get up and walk around. My father was so stunned that he called the doctor, worried that this was simply the calm before the storm. The doctor was as shocked as the rest of us. He brought my mother straight to the hospital on Sunday afternoon and test after test revealed that my mother's cancer had vanished. As people of science they didn't believe it was a miracle, but a medical anomaly. Either way, my family was beyond elated. We went out that evening to celebrate. We cried with joy over our food as we toasted my mother's recovery, to the amazement of the rest of the town.

On Monday morning, I went to school with the biggest smile on my face, determined that not even Sally could wipe it from my face. All eyes were on me when I entered the schoolyard. I figured they were all in awe of my mother's recovery but as I reached my classmates I realised that I was being regarded with fear and suspicion. My smile disappeared and I waited for my best friend Farrah to arrive and asked her what was going on.

'Sally's dead,' she said bluntly, giving me the same suspicious look as the others.

Farrah knew no more than that. It suddenly clicked that my classmates had put two and two together and decided that my wish that Sally would die instead of my mother had come true. Everyone bar my friends, albeit reluctantly, avoided me like the plague. Some even cried to the teacher that they didn't want to be in the same room as me. I felt like a pariah. My parents were called and they came to pick me up just before lunch, spilling out phrases like 'don't mind them' and 'they're just being kids'. But I couldn't help but wonder if I had in fact done this. I may have been a child but I knew that people don't just come back from the brink of death as quickly as my mother had.

As I said before, my town was small and word got around quickly. Soon even the adults were avoiding me, going quiet whenever I was near. And it wasn't just me, my whole family became the subject of whispers and accusations. Before I knew it, our house was put on the market and we left that town behind us forever.

It was only years later that I learned what happened to Sally. She had been going to the shop to get milk for her mother. To get to the shop, she had to cut across the small river that ran through our town. There was no bridge until you reached the town so, like everyone else, she used the river rocks as a makeshift bridge. She slipped and cracked her head on one of them, landing face down in the water. She died of drowning. An accident, my parents told me constantly. Accident or not, it felt like too much of a coincidence.

I tried to move on. I completed my primary and secondary school education without incident and went on to study in university. To my dismay, I learned that one of Sally's cronies – Esther – was studying in the same university. I came across her by accident in the library, recognising her straight away. It seemed to take her a moment to recognise me but I saw it click with her when she finally did. I ignored her and went about my business.

Suddenly I started to see her everywhere, despite the enormity of the university campus. She was whisper conspiratorially to her friends whenever I was near and they would giggle. It was just like primary school all over again. Then the leaflets began to circulate. No sooner had I stepped onto campus one Tuesday morning when all eyes seemed to turn to me. It wasn't until I reached my classroom that I came across it. An A5 piece of white card with my face on it, with the word 'murderer' written above it. I was devastated and wound up running home almost immediately.

Naturally, the university intervened. I was called to the Dean's office and I was quick to name and shame the person I knew was behind this. Esther was hauled up and simply given a warning, much to my horror. She had branded me a murderer to the whole university. Once again I became a pariah, walking around with my head down as the whispers got louder and louder.

I was angry, more than I had been at Sally all those years ago. I fantasised about Esther suffering like she had made me suffer. University was supposed to be the best time of my life and she was making it my living hell. At the peak of my anger, I called to whatever divine intervention that saved my mother in exchange for Sally and asked them to take Esther. I'm not proud of my wish, but I was too far gone to be rational.

The next week, Esther was found in her apartment hanging in her wardrobe. It was ruled a suicide and thankfully no one seemed to think I had something to do with it. Only her friends avoided me but that was it. Life returned to normal and everyone forgot about Esther and her accusations against me. I graduated and got a good job, eventually settling down with a husband and children.

I haven't experienced that murderous anger since, but I know it brews just below the surface. Am I responsible for the deaths of Sally and Esther? Maybe, maybe not, but I don't think you want to find out.