Her scars gleamed even in the dim moonlight. She traces a finger over the silvery imperfection. The vermiculate patterns are life-affirming reminders of times gone by, wrong routes that couldn’t be made right.

The deep-creased lines leave permanent wrinkles in the fabric of her soul — tales of collisions with the world, memories that poison her mind, some turbulent, convoluted, some tragic.

The passage of time doesn’t cause them to fade. Rather, they leave behind trails, evidence of a life inflicted with wounds too deep to heal. Like glowing lava, the flaming streams run along the edges of her bruised heart that sometimes oozes through, staining her life.