the hole in my chest had already stopped gushing blood. And when they did an ultrasound they couldn’t find any damage to my heart at all. The entrance wounds on my chest and back (both of them already starting to close up on their own by this time) indicated that the bullet would’ve passed directly through my heart. Except somehow it hadn’t.
It’s almost like I was bulletproof.
Actually, that’s exactly what it was.
The morning I left the house on my way to school, never once realizing I was moments away from being kidnapped, I stopped to say good-bye to my mom. Ever since my uncles told me everything she had done to keep me safe from my father, well, it’s changed our relationship. On my side at least. She’s still a distant basket case. But I know that somewhere deep down inside of her she must still love me. How else can I explain what happened on that morning? Instead of ignoring me and blowing smoke in my face, Mom shoved her Niagara Falls souvenir mug into my hands.
Usually that mug was her ashtray, but on that day it was filled to the brim with moonshine. Kinda grayish-looking shine. I don’t think Mom had done too great of a job cleaning the mug out. But anyway, she said, “Grant my wish.”
And I said, “Grant what wish?”
We went back and forth like that at least six times, before I was like, “Mom, stop!”
She took a moment to light a cigarette from the butt of her last one before finally nudging our conversation forward. “You get a chance to make a wish, Lennie. You ask to be bulletproof.”
“Oooo-kay. Good talk, Mom. I gotta get to school.” I handed her back the mug, but she refused to take it.
“Grant my wish.”
“Mom,” I said, sorta sighing and then feeling guilty for being annoyed. So I explained. “The uncs don’t want me granting any more wishes. I’ve already done one, and you know they don’t want me anywhere near to that third-wish threshold for at least another two years. So, I’m sorry, but I’m not gonna do it.”
I sorta patted her then, trying to comfort her. She pushed me away. “Bulletproof. You. That’s my wish.”
I probably should’ve walked away then, but the thing is, I’d been getting antsy with my uncles “don’t make any more wishes” rule for a while now. And let’s face it, when I get antsy, things can get a little hairy. Also, it probably wouldn’t hurt for me to be bulletproof, what with the whole antsiness leading to hairiness problem.
“Okay, Mom, but I really think you should wish to stop smoking.”
In response she grabbed the mug and glugged down half the moonshine.
“All right then,” I said. “To having a bulletproof daughter. May all your wishes come true, or at least just this one.”
As soon as I made the wish, I wished that I hadn’t. Of course, now I’m glad that I did, but at the time, not realizing a bullet was in my near future, I felt bad about disobeying my uncles’ rules. I sort of justified it by promising myself I wouldn’t make that third wish (the one that would transfer all of their wish-granting abilities over to the next generation, otherwise known as me) anytime soon. And if for some reason I did end up needing that third wish sooner than expected, well, I figured I’d break the news right after presenting each of my uncles with an extra-big bucket of KFC to soften the blow.
Obviously, that plan didn’t end up working out, so when I woke up from my coma, I was a little worried they were gonna be upset. And I didn’t even have a fried chicken distraction.
Imagine my relief, then, when I realized they were mostly critical of the wish because I hadn’t followed their rule of specificity. Broad wishes like being bulletproof left too many things open to interpretation by whatever being or greater power out there makes wishes come true. Also, they thought it might have been smarter if I’d been knife-proof along with bulletproof. That way I might still have had all my fingers.
I couldn’t really argue with that last point.
So I felt better about granting my third wish, but I was still worried about what my uncles would do for money, since they used the shine/wish granting as their livelihood, and I’d essentially put them out of business. They laughed about that, and then confessed that the swear jar that had always sat