My father always tried his best to cover his scars—thick bands of welts that

spiraled up his body like vines of angry skin. He was able to conceal most of it under his

clothes, always wearing long sleeves and full-length pants, but he could never hide the

one that wrapped around his neck, swopped under his chin, and jutted across his face.

He hated it but as a child, I thought it was cool.

He never told me much about the scars, just that they were the result of bravery.

I liked to imagine him as some kind of hero or warrior, but he assured me that he was

never a fighter, that it was a much more humble form of bravery. Occasionally, another

kid would make a remark or somebody would stare at him too long in the grocery store,

and I could tell it bothered him, but he walked in public with confidence anyways. I

always admired that.

***

I noticed my first patch while I was still in middle school. Overnight, a small green

circle grew on my arm with short, stubby protrusions that felt almost like a carpet. I knew

about moles and pimples, but this was different. Not yet used to such sudden changes

in my body, I ran to my dad in a panic and showed him the patch. With a sigh, he

grabbed my arm and examined it closely.

“Follow me,” he said and brought me back into his office. He rummaged through

his desk before pulling out a little pouch full of metal stick-like things. “This is called a

biopsy punch,” he explained, holding up a stick with a large round circle at the end. My

eyes widened in fear. “It’s going to take out a chunk of your skin, but it will get rid of the

patch. Do you understand?”

“Is it going to hurt?” I trembled before him. I knew it would hurt but still, I had to

ask.

“Yes, it will hurt a little bit.” He rubbed my shoulder. “But it will be real quick. It will

be like getting a shot at the doctor or ripping off a bandage. It will be over before you

even have time to say ‘Ouch’. Besides, you may end up with a little scar of your own.

Now, can you be brave for me?”

“Okay,” I couldn’t help but smile. I puffed out my chest and held my breath as he

gouged the patch off my skin in one quick motion.

It hurt.

***

I was a sickly kid, not entirely antisocial, but I mostly stayed indoors, never

having the energy to run and play like the others. My parents never liked to leave the

house, but something about nature always intrigued me so when I had the opportunity

to visit the forest on a field trip, I was ecstatic. My parents almost didn’t let me go, but I

cried and begged for hours until they signed the permission slip.

The forest wasn’t far, just on the other side of town. I couldn't believe something

so beautiful was only a bus ride away, right next to the beiges and greys that consumed

our city. We didn’t even have any plants in our home and now, I was surrounded by a

luscious landscape. Instantly enamored, I examined every leaf and twig. I found flowers

and wild onions, bees floating between the blooms, and leaves falling through beams of

light. I was having so much fun galumphing through the trees until I saw one that made

me stop dead in my tracks.

The trunk was covered in a band of fuzzy, green carpet-like material. A pit

formed in my stomach as I walked up to the tree. A closer look confirmed my

suspicions. The green stuff looked exactly like what was on my arm. I ran my fingers

across it, and it was soft. It felt nice.

My heart thumped in my chest. The other kids ran and played through the woods

around me, but I was frozen, embarrassed. I felt vulnerable. My father told me to never

tell anyone about the patch. I started sweating, afraid that someone would discover my

secret at any moment.

Like a timid little mouse, I walked up to my teacher and asked her quietly what

the green stuff was. She told me it was moss, explained how it grew on trees, rocks,

and logs in patches, that it doesn’t have roots and can grow almost anywhere. I asked if

it could grow on people, and she laughed. To her, it was a silly question.

***

Over the years, more and more patches of moss popped up sporadically over my

skin. After the first few times, the removal process stopped bothering me. It still hurt, but

I no longer flinched when my dad gouged circles from my skin. It was embarrassing if a

patch popped up in a sensitive area, but most of the time it didn’t feel like a big deal at

all. It became as routine as brushing my teeth or clipping my nails and soon, I was

covered in polka dots of pink scar tissue.

My parents never talked about it. It was like an open secret, and it filled me with

shame. Even when I was patch-free, I would still opt to wear long sleeves and baggy

clothes, always anxious that I missed a patch or that somebody would comment on my

scars. Every once in a while someone would ask about them, and I would come up with

an excuse or fabricate some story, always worried they could tell I was lying.

As I got older, I began to dread the removals more and more. It wasn’t because

of the pain. It was just such an uncomfortable process, baring my skin and clenching my

teeth through it all. My father always referred to the patches as my “corrupted” skin and

it made my stomach twist into knots. I felt disgusting. I felt like some kind of monster

that sulks in the shadows, never to see light. Most days, I felt ill, lethargic. Even when

my body looked normal, something always felt wrong.

One day, towards the end of high school, I woke up to see a patch had popped

up on my chest. I groaned and kicked the blankets off of me. My mood already ruined, I

threw my feet off the bed. On autopilot, I began to walk to the kitchen to inform my dad,

but something stopped me. I didn’t want to cut it off. I was tired. I felt like shit. I didn’t

want to deal with all of it, so I slipped on a t-shirt and went about my day, telling no one.

For the first day, I was so full of anxiety, I felt like I could puke at any moment. I

walked through the hallways with my arms crossed in front of my chest, paranoid that

somebody would notice the slight protrusion under my hoodie. Every time somebody

spoke to me, the patch on my chest burned, reminding me of its existence. Nobody

noticed.

The patch grew slowly, little by little each day. At first, it bothered me. It felt like I

was letting a wound expand and fester across my chest, but there was no pain. It never

hurt. If anything, I actually felt better.

Overtime, I grew to enjoy the little patch. It was like a little garden on my chest. I

liked to run my fingers through it. With my bedroom door locked, I would lay on the floor

with my shirt off, basking in the sunlight that seeped in through my window. It felt

wondrous. The warmth from the sun glowed bright in my chest and flowed through the

rest of my body. I stopped feeling so lethargic. It filled me with a kind of energy I didn’t

even know existed and for a while. I was happy.

***

Maybe I was naive, but I thought the patch would stop growing, eventually. I

thought it would cover my chest like the band of moss around the tree, that I would be

able to hide it forever. The moss had other plans.

The growth-rate picked up in pace as time went on, but panic only truly began to

set in once the borders grew past my chest to my stomach and started creeping down

my arms. Even though it was summer, I exclusively wore hoodies and baggy long-

sleeves, hiding the moss as it inched towards my waist. At some point I gave up hope

that it would stop growing and accepted that my parents would eventually find out. I was

afraid they’d be angry. I pushed everyone away and isolated myself in my room in an

attempt to delay the inevitable.

Everyone could tell something was wrong. When I ate dinner with my parents, I

was quiet. I felt like I had to absorb all of the fleeting happiness I could before my

actions ripped away everything. I wanted to tell them but every time I tried, a lump

formed in my throat and blocked the words. I couldn't even bring myself to tell the truth

when they sat me down to have “a talk.”

“Is everything okay?” My mom asked. I could see the hurt and worry in her eyes,

but I just nodded. I was sitting on my bed, holding my sleeves down against my wrists,

hoping it wasn’t too obvious.

“We’re just a little worried about you, bud. You know you can tell us anything,”

My dad patted my knee and smiled. The guilt boiled in my stomach.

“I’m fine, really. I’ve just not been feeling well.” I’m not sure if they could tell I was

lying but either way, they stopped pressing the issue and left me alone.

***

A few weeks later, I woke up covered head to toe in the moss. The panic jolted

me out of bed, but I just stood there. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t hide it anymore.

My legs felt like stilts as I trembled my way into the kitchen, the pit in my stomach

growing larger with each step. I didn’t say a word, but my mom screamed.

My dad yelled at me while my mom cried at the kitchen table. I didn’t know what

to say so I just stood there, hyperventilating, apologizing over and over again. My dad

eventually collected himself and sent me upstairs to my room. I collapsed on my bed

and sobbed into my pillow until my parents knocked on my door about twenty minutes

later.

“We need to talk about some things,” my dad said as he sat down next to me on

the mattress and my mom sat on the other side.

“We always planned on telling you, but the time never felt right.” My mom’s voice

sounded hollow, broken. She handed me a photo of two people. The person on the left

was covered in moss just like me. The person on the right was enveloped in large,

billowing, pink petals that wrapped around their entire body and rose up to cover their

face like a fan. “This was us, before we had you.”

I once again broke out into tears. A mixture of several emotions (grief,

understanding, anger, fear) coursed through my body as they told me their story. They

were test subjects at a research facility, manufactured plant-human hybrids that weren't

supposed to live past babies let alone have kids of their own. There were hundreds of

them, all infused with a different species of plant. My mom was a moss-hybrid. My dad

was a carnation.

They fell in love at the facility and vowed to spend their lives together. After the

facility shut down, some of the experiments escaped into the woods while the others

were offered a chance at normalcy. Surgeons could remove the plant-like growths from

their body and as long as they clipped away any new nodules that popped up, they

could live a relatively normal life.

My dad finally explained that his scars came from the removal of the petals,

however, it wasn’t as easy for my mom. The moss covered every inch of her skin. They

had to remove pieces at a time, scraping off chunks of skin over the course of months.

She said it was agonizing, but it gave them a chance to have a family, to have me, so it

was worth it.

I didn’t know what to say. By the end of it, I felt numb in a way, like there were so

many emotions happening at once that they canceled each other out. I was so lost

thinking about what it meant to be a hybrid, to be a test subject, how it made everything

that was weird in my life suddenly make sense, that I didn’t think about the implications

of the story until my mom squeezed my hand and kissed it gently.

“I’ll call the facility,” she said, a tear rolling down her cheek. “It will be hard, but I

know you’ll get through it.” Her words echoed through my head as the realization slowly

dawned on me. They were going to take me to have it removed.

***

They had me sit in the backseat while they packed my belongings. They

explained that they’d visit, but I would need to remain under constant medical

supervision until the removal process was complete. It could take anywhere from a few

months to over a year, depending on how fast my skin grew back.

The entire time, anxiety bubbled in my stomach, up into my lungs. Beyond the

fear of pain, the thought of hiding it again made me nauseous. I didn’t want to go back

to feeling tired and miserable all the time. The moss now felt like it was a part of me

instead of some growth that hung on my body. It was me. I couldn’t stop thinking about

the other hybrids in the woods. Were they still alive? How many were there? Did they

feel the same?

My parents went inside for a last-minute walkthrough, and panic surged through

my body. I yanked the handle and the next thing I knew, I was running through people’s

yards, away from my parents. I ran past a woman in her pool, and she screamed.

Catching the attention of everybody who was outside, I sprinted across town. They all

gawked and stared as I ran, some horrified, some confused. I knew my parents had to

be searching for me, but I didn’t stop. I ran until I reached the woods, looked around to

make sure no one could see me, and then stepped through the treeline.

I walked amongst the trees for hours, heading further and further into the heart of

the forest. It was hot. I was thirsty. I had a vague idea of the direction I’d been walking

but became more and more nervous that I’d never find my way out.

I walked until my legs became so tired that my knees buckled and I collapsed

into a carpet of dead leaves. I screamed for help, asking if anybody was there. I

imagined all the escaped test subjects succumbing to the elements, either dying from

hunger or the cold, whichever came first. I began to cry, burying my head in my knees

as I accepted my fate. I let the moss cover my skin, and this was my infernal

punishment, or so I thought.

I heard rustling and the snapping of branches underfoot. My head shot up in fear,

but it was them, the hybrids. One was wrapped in plumes of marigold petals. Another

was covered with long lemongrass. A few were covered in tiny little flowers that

peppered their leaves with dots of color. They all stood around me. I didn’t know

anything about them other than they were like me and for the first time in a long time, I

didn’t feel alone.

Odin Meadows is a first-generation graduate with a BA in English from Yale University currently living and working in Central Illinois with his husband and two dogs, not too far from the rural town where he grew up. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Dark Holme’s Ethereal Nightmares, SFWG's Nightmare Fuel Anthology, Litmora, Breath & Shadow, and more

Authors Notes: Sometimes when faced with oppressive systems, our parents, loved-ones, and those who we look to for care and guidance will pass down their tools for survival, not realizing that these “tools” are actually harmful forms of self oppression. We can recognize that these “tools” were important to their survival, while also recognizing how radical and healing it can be to embrace these aspects of ourselves and break the stigma of diverse minds, bodies, cultures, and needs.