I am Amy

         I am Amy, and she is my Mother. At least, that’s what she tells me. She also tells me that I am twelve years old, with blonde hair and pale, pale blue eyes. What she means, is that my eyes are white, and I am blind. I’m not even sure if I am Amy. She tells me I wasn’t always blind. So I ask her, if I wasn’t always blind, have I always been Amy? And every time I ask, she tells me a story about Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind. It’s always the same story. She tells me I am Amy, and if I hear the story about Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind enough, maybe I will be Amy, remember Amy.
         Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind was swinging on her favorite swing at recess, blonde hair streaming behind her, pink sandals kicking powerful kicks to keep the swing pumping, back and forth and back and forth. She kept a good rhythm, probably the best in the whole school. As she swung, she kept watch over the whole playground. Billy and Johnnie were playing Wally ball by the jungle gym, where Anne and Nicole hung upside down, showing off their new Barbie underwear. She saw Ms. Thesing chatting with Mrs. Goole by the slide, waving her arms to emphasize a point. Her skinny arms with the twenty skinny bracelets sliding around on her skinny wrists were fascinating to Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind, so she jumped off the swing mid-kick, and landed running, eyes wide, to ask Ms. Thesing where she got her skinny bracelets for her skinny wrists. Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind loved the way they slid and clinked together whenever Ms. Thesing moved her arms, which she did often enough. Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind let her eyes flutter between Ms. Thesing’s face, and skinny wrists while she asked where they came from.
         She tells me that Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind begged and begged for those bracelets, because Ms. Thesing had told her she bought them at George’s, in town. She tells me that Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind was so excited to get those skinny bracelets so her skinny wrists could match Ms. Thesing’s skinny wrists, with her skinny bracelets sliding up and down her skinny arms. She tells me that Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind was so excited that she skipped ahead without looking to cross the edge of the parking lot, she tells me Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind skipped, watching her pink sandals slap the black, hot pavement, her eyes never leaving for fear of stepping outside of the painted white lines. The white lines that raced across the dark pavement to show Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind where to walk. The Stop-sign-painted-on-the-pavement white lines that told the delivery trucks to stop and let Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind cross the street. She tells me the delivery truck didn’t see Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind, and Amy-Who-Wasn’t-Blind didn’t see the delivery truck. Only she saw the truck, and only she saw Amy. And then Amy wasn’t there anymore, because the truck was in front of her. No, the truck was on top of me. I was underneath the delivery truck’s wheels, and I was shrinking, and I saw the pavement. I saw the pavement and how dark it was, with the dark white lines painted where I was walking. I saw the pavement, I see the pavement. I am Amy, and I still see the pavement, black, with black lines and black polka dots, and black everything. I am Amy and I am blind.