“She always tried to hold my hand – until I saw that it had a scar just like mine.”
Clara had to avoid a homeless woman every day who kept trying to hold Clara’s hand and saying:
“You have to go with your mother. It’s not safe here.”
Clara was scared, thinking she was mentally ill.
One day, Clara fell off her bike and the woman ran to help her. When her hand touched Clara’s, Clara panicked:
They both had the same rare V-shaped scar on their wrists.
The November wind from Lake Michigan was razor-sharp, whipping through Chicago’s skyscrapers, smacking people in the faces. I pulled up my coat collar and walked briskly down the cobblestone sidewalks of the bustling Wicker Park neighborhood.
And there she was, waiting, as always. At the corner of Milwaukee and Damen.
A homeless woman with ashen-gray hair, her dirty face half hidden by a tattered woolen cap. She wore three layers of old coats piled on top of each other, and she smelled sour and desperate.
When she saw me, her eyes lit up—a wild light that made my stomach twist.
“Clara!” She lunged forward, her black hand reaching out, trying to grab mine. “Come with me! It’s not safe here! You have to go!”
I jerked back, bumping into a passerby. “Get away! Don’t touch me!”
“Please, Clara! He’s watching… He’ll do it again…” she pleaded, her voice as hoarse as sandpaper on wood.
“Stay away from my daughter, you crazy woman!”
A firm hand landed on my shoulder, yanking me back. It was my father, Dr. Andrew Sterling. He stood in front of me, his neat Armani suit a stark contrast to the woman’s ragged appearance. His eyes were cold and commanding—eyes that had struck fear into the hearts of many at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.
The woman flinched when she saw my father. She backed away, muttering nonsense, her eyes flashing with terror, and quickly disappeared into the dark alley.
“Are you okay, Clara?” My father turned, gently stroking my hair. His voice was deep and gentle, the voice of a perfect father who had been a single father for the past 15 years.
“I’m fine, Dad,” I sighed, my heart still racing. “It’s just… she’s getting more aggressive. How did she know my name?”
“Drugs are always eavesdropping,” my father assured me, opening the door of the shiny black Tesla. “Don’t worry. I’ve got a restraining order from the court. The police will have her out of the neighborhood soon.”
I nodded and got in. But through the tinted window, I kept looking back at that dark alley. There was something in the woman’s eyes… that didn’t sound like madness. It sounded like pleading.
And her words haunted me: “He’ll do it again.”
The story of my life was a tragedy that had been celebrated in the Chicago press for years. Fifteen years earlier, a terrible fire had destroyed the Sterling family’s suburban mansion. My mother, Elena, had burned to death in her bedroom, shielding me from the flames. I miraculously survived, but I was left with a strange V-shaped burn scar on my right wrist—the remnants of a hot wooden beam that had fallen on me.
My father, who was on duty at the hospital, returned and collapsed in the ashes. He had become a symbol of resilience: a talented neurosurgeon, a devoted father raising his only daughter scarred by his past.
But lately, that perfection had begun to show cracks.
My father had become increasingly controlling. He had installed GPS tracking on my phone, my bike, even my laptop. He had banned me from summer camp, from going out after 8 p.m. “I can’t lose you like I lost your mother,” he would say with tears in his eyes, and I relented.
Until that fateful Thursday afternoon.
It was pouring rain. I cycled home from the library, trying to take a shortcut through the deserted park to avoid traffic. The road was slippery, and my mind was busy thinking about my college essay.
Squeak… Boom!
A squirrel dashed across the road. I braked hard. The wheels skidded on the wet leaves. My whole body and bike were thrown hard onto the sidewalk. My knees hit the ground painfully, my right hand was on the road, scratched and bleeding.
“Clara!”
A figure rushed out from the bushes by the roadside. It was her. The homeless woman.
She ignored the wind and rain, kneeling down beside me. “Are you okay? Do you have any broken bones?”
I wanted to scream, push her away, but the pain in my wrist paralyzed me. She gently lifted my right arm, examining the wound. The rain washed away the dirt on her hand, and also washed away the mud on my wrist.
In that moment, time seemed to stop.
She rolled up the sleeve of her tattered coat to wipe away my blood. And I saw it.
On her thin right wrist, stark against her cold, pale skin, was a pale pink scar.
V-shaped.
It was exactly like mine. Same place. Same size. Same crooked curve.
I held my breath. My blood froze.
“How…” I stammered, my voice shaking in the rain. “How did you get it?”
The woman looked up at me. This time, there was no distance of madness. Her eyes, washed by the rain, were emerald green. The color of my eyes.
She shakily placed her scarred hand against mine. The two Vs fit together like two pieces of a broken puzzle.
“Because I held you,” she whispered, tears mingling with the rain running down her cheeks. “That night… the beam fell. Mom used her hands
I caught it so it wouldn’t hit you in the head. It burned your skin, and went through your hand as you clung to me.”
I was stunned. My father always said that my mother was dead before the firefighters arrived. That she was trapped in a locked room.
“But… she was dead. The police found a body…”
“There was no body, Clara,” she said quickly, her voice urgent, her eyes darting around in fear. “He bought a body from the hospital morgue where he worked. He burned the house down to cover it up. It wasn’t an accident. He sold her.”
“Sold?” I screamed, my mind spinning. “What the hell are you talking about? My father was a doctor!”
“He’s a gambling monster, Clara! He owes the Chicago mob $5 million. He can’t pay. But he has a beautiful young wife and a daughter… He sold her to a human trafficking ring in Eastern Europe to pay off his debt. He kept you because you were too young, and because he needed to play the grieving father to get the fire insurance money.”
I wanted to cover my ears. I wanted to scream that she was a liar. But the scar. That damn V-shaped scar was undeniable proof. No one could fake a burn scar that deep.
“I lost 15 years,” she sobbed, squeezing my hand. “15 years of hell. I escaped six months ago. I walked, hitchhiked, begged to get back here. I was going to call the police, but he… he’s powerful. He’d kill us both if he knew I was alive. I just wanted to take you away. Go far away.”
Beep… Beep…
The familiar honk of a car horn sounded. The blinding LED headlights tore through the rain, shining directly at us.
A black Tesla.
The door opened. My father got out, holding a large black umbrella. He didn’t smile. His face in the headlights looked pale and expressionless like a wax mask.
“Clara,” he said, his voice eerily calm. “Stay away from that woman. I told you so.”
“He…” I stood up, stepped back, still holding the woman’s hand. “He knows we’re here.”
“Of course I do,” my father smiled, a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He held up his phone. “Your smartwatch reported a sudden increase in heart rate and a stop location. Dad was worried so he came to pick me up.”
He stepped closer, his other hand in his coat pocket.
“Andrew,” the woman – my mother – stood up, blocking my way. Her hunched back and fear gone. She stood straight, like the proud wife she once was. “Don’t you dare touch her.”
My father stopped. He tilted his head, looking at her with amusement and contempt.
“Elena. I was surprised. I thought you’d rotted in some brothel in Albania. The vitality of cockroaches is truly remarkable.”
His light confession hit me like a sledgehammer in the chest. My world collapsed. My idol, my hero… was a trafficker.
“Why?” I exclaimed, tears welling up.
“Why?” My father shrugged. “For money, my dear. And for fame. If it weren’t for the money from selling your mother and the insurance money, the creditors would have chopped off my hand. How could Dad become the Chief of Neurosurgery with his hands cut off? He did it all for our future.
“You’re a monster!” My mother screamed and rushed towards him.
Bang!
The sound of the silenced gun echoed dryly, drowned out by the sound of the rain.
My mother stopped. A crimson blood flower bloomed on the chest of her tattered coat. She fell backwards, her eyes still wide open, looking at me.
“MOM!” I screamed, rushing to catch her. Hot blood flowed through my fingers.
“Run… Clara… run…” She whispered, then fainted.
I looked up at my father. He was pointing the pistol at me, his face full of fake regret.
“I didn’t want to do this, Clara. I planned to raise you, marry you into a rich family to consolidate my position. But you listened to this crazy woman. You’re just like your mother. Too curious.”
He stepped forward, the black muzzle of the gun aimed at my forehead. “Don’t worry. I’ll create a fake scene. A homeless attack. I came to save you but couldn’t make it. Another tragedy for Dr. Sterling. The public will mourn me again.”
I looked at the gun, then at the V-shaped scar on my hand and my mother’s hand. The pain from the fall from the bike was gone. Instead, a rage exploded, hot as the fire of yesteryear.
“You’re forgetting something, Andrew,” I said, my voice cold, no longer calling him Dad.
“What?” He frowned.
“You always put a GPS on everything I own.”
I pulled my phone out of my pocket. The screen was on. The LIVE icon on Instagram was flashing red.
“I turned on livestream as soon as my mother showed me the scar. There were 15,000 people watching him confess and shoot his wife. And the GPS is leading the police here right now.”
My dad’s face paled. His composure shattered. He looked frantically at my phone, then around.
In the distance, police sirens wailed, tearing through the rain. Not one car, but a fleet.
“You bitch!” He roared, about to pull the trigger.
But I was faster. Taking advantage of his distraction, I swung the heavy steel U-lock I’d secretly
The shirt that had come off earlier slammed into his gun-wielding wrist.
Crack!
The sound of bones breaking. My father screamed in pain, the gun flying away, falling into the drain.
He held his broken wrist, stepping back, his face contorted in pain and anger.
“You… I raised you…”
“You raised me to be the next scapegoat,” I hissed, standing up, blocking my mother’s dying body. “But the game is over.”
Police lights filled the park. Officers rushed in, guns drawn.
“Put your hands down! Get on the ground now!”
My father was pinned to the wet pavement, mud all over his expensive suit. He screamed, cursed, blamed everyone, revealing his true form as a cornered animal.
I knelt down beside my mother. The paramedics were giving her first aid.
“Her pulse is weak, but it’s still there!” One shouted. “Get the stretcher ready! Hurry!”
They loaded Mom into the ambulance. Before the door closed, I took her cold hand.
“Mom…” I called.
Mom opened her eyes a little, weakly squeezing my hand. The two V-shaped scars met again. This time, it was no longer a mark of separation.
It was a symbol of rebirth.
Six months later.
I sat by the bedside of a private nursing home in the suburbs. My mom was sitting in a wheelchair, looking out at the sunflower garden outside. The bullet had damaged her lung, she could no longer speak loudly, but she was still alive.
Andrew Sterling was sentenced to life without parole for murder, human trafficking, and a series of other money laundering crimes. His sentence became the biggest scandal in Chicago medical history.
I took my mother’s hand, caressing the ugly scar on her wrist.
“What are you thinking about?” Mom whispered.
I looked at the scar on my hand, then looked at Mom and smiled softly.
“I think that sometimes scars are not for hiding. They are a map for us to find each other.”
Mom smiled, squeezing my hand. The afternoon sunlight filtered through the window, shining on our intertwined hands, blurring the old scars, leaving only the warmth of love that had been recovered from the ashes.
THE END
