Scab
Ruby Davis
she/her
Ruby Davis is a Naarm based writer and artist. She graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in 2019 with a BFA (Screenwriting).
Ruby was the 2019 recipient of the Australian Writers’ Guild Mentorship Award.
CW : BLOOD, RAZOR, GORE.
I’d had the opening in my skin for almost a year. Each week I would wait for the red crust to form on my knee, yellowing edges curling over. Then, just as the flesh underneath was about to heal, I would peel it off.
The night I made the first incision I had accidentally cut myself while shaving in the shower. As the blood diluted with water then trickled down the drain I continued to shave the broken skin, making the wound larger. When I got out of the shower I held toilet paper on my knee until it dried out.
The following day, I wore shorts to work. My coworkers were fascinated by the sore on my leg and I spent all day entertaining them with Scab anecdotes.
After that it seemed like everyone wanted to know how I injured my knee. I told them “I fell off in a freak windsurfing accident”, “I tumbled down ten flights of stairs then fell off the roof of a building”, “I was attacked by a pack of feral dogs”. Each time a new answer. And they were always intrigued - the Scab sucked them in like a black hole.
Picking at the gash was the highlight of my week. Every Sunday I would wait until the evening, pour a glass of red wine, then sit on a black towel in the bathroom. Slowly and precisely I would dig at the sore until blood gushed out the same colour as the dregs in the wine glass next to me.
It didn’t hurt at all. Knowing that someone would be sure to mention it took away any discomfort.
The Scab had become the most interesting thing about me. The thing that should’ve been the nauseating, eye-sore of my body was attractive to everyone. People find satisfaction in off-putting things, like watching the pus burst out of a pimple. They hold their breath, then after they’ve watched the pimple drain, exhale. Release.
When I told people about my knee I would watch them inhale sharply and when I finished I felt their release as if it were my own.
Now I sit on a doctor's bed. The doctor, who has clear, milky skin, tells me my Scab is infected. It’s bad, down to the joint. I have to see a specialist. They’ll have to cut it off.
Until then, he says, keep it covered. I gulp. No one will be able to see it.
I bite my blood-caked fingernails anxiously and watch as he wraps my knee in a long, cream bandage. It smells like iodine and vodka and feels like cheap linen.
When he’s done I catch my reflection in the mirror. The bandage is the same colour as my complexion and I can’t make out where the bandage ends and my skin begins.
It’s almost as if the Scab was never there.
