Londyn Bridges

I may not be a mother, but I think all of us females can agree that childbirth is not an enjoyable experience. Worth it in the end? Maybe. I'm joking. Of course it's worth it in the end. Honestly, it's an amazing phenomenon and I can’t even begin to imagine the sheer pain of forcing an eight-pound.... well you get the point. On the day that I was born, my mom truly thought that was the most pain she would ever experience in her life. That was, unless she became pregnant again, she became physically injured, or she became terrified of her own daughter. Coincidentally, one of her nightmares came true, but that’s a story that we’ll come back to later. First, it’s important to understand the events leading up to the present day.

January 15th, 1994:

My first glimpse of the world happened to be in the downstairs bathroom of the two story picket-fenced suburban New Mexican home. It was early in the morning, before the birds had begun to chirp and my mom had been dealing with contractions. In the weeks leading up to my birth, she had gone to the hospital twice only to be told that she was not experiencing real contractions, so she was not convinced of her pain. Not to mention that she wasn't due for another week and had a scheduled Cesarean at the local hospital. Therefore, she didn’t even think twice.

Apparently my dad convinced her to leave for the hospital, but she refused. Her water broke and she still wasn't convinced. Then, it was too late. My head had begun to protrude. My mom was in denial that she was giving birth in the house and had no other option but to deliver me right then and there. As a result, I was deemed a miracle baby when I came into the world. I was perfectly healthy and she was deemed a strong woman for persevering through the pains of childbirth without medication. Since that day, my dad always told me to be strong like my mother and pave my own way in life because I was the miracle baby. That’s a lot to live up to, don’t you think?

After I was born, things began to wind down. I was your average baby, I cried when I was hungry and cooed when I was loved. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary for months, that is until I said my first words. It wasn’t what I said per say, but it was when I said it. At ten months old, I said my first word which just so happened to be mama. Of course this left my mom reeling at the honor of being my first word, but then it got her thinking.

She did a lot of reading, an author herself. She knew that nearly all children said their first word around one year old. There was a specific timeline for all of these milestones to happen. When I said my first word at ten months, alarm bells went off in her mind and my dad took to her bells like a mouse attracted to peanut butter. They thought they had a child genius on their hands and while they were right, they didn’t realize what I’d actually become.

I was reading by age four, writing by age five, and a published author (highly influenced by my mom) by age seven. I was always the top of my class and the star student every teacher dreamed of having. Literally, I could do no wrong and that’s what everyone seemed to believe. When I entered high school at the age of 12 (skipped seventh and eighth grade), I was tired, oh so tired of being the world's favorite child. Therefore, I began to experiment to see how far I could go before I got in trouble and let me tell you, it was pretty far.

Freshman year, Jessica Figwater became my best friend. Honestly, it was hard leaving my old friends behind, but freshman year everyone was new to high school, not just me. It was a perfect time to rebrand myself as the not-so-perfect Londyn. When school began, I made it a point to conceal my age. Even when I first met Jessica that blistering August day in Mr. Shultz' biology class, I lied to her about my identity.

“Hi my name is Londyn and I’m from Albuquerque, New Mexico. I just moved here with my parents… it’s nice to meet you!".

So the lies started from the beginning, but that’s what built our friendship. Now, I didn’t lie about everything. I told her how I was the "special" child and I told her all about my interests in animals. She was an animal lover too, so we would spend hours dreaming of one day opening our own animal hospital to care for just about anything. “Lions, tigers and bears, oh my!”

We were inseparable, or so I thought. But then junior year came and everything changed.

Jessica started hooking up with Jack Jordan otherwise known as JJ. He was your everyday baseball jock who thinks that he’s the best thing to walk the planet. Like, look at me in my tight, grass-stained pants with my sweaty baseball cap, I’m the best kind of attitude. Ugh, I hated him. No, I loathed him. Also, ever since she began hooking up with him, she had forgotten about me. So that’s when I decided to test my not-so-perfect Londyn out.

It began with little things. I remember putting these awful notes in Jessica’s locker about how ugly, stupid, and manipulative she was. When she didn’t respond to my notes in the way I wanted, I started to get a little more, well let’s just say, mischievous. I began spreading rumors of how her and Jack had hooked up in the principal's office. I convinced other girls in my grade that she was now pregnant carrying JJ’s baby. And it got better. I even went as far as taking her clothes while she was showering in the locker room and tying them to her locker in the hallway. So, I guess you could say I was a high school bitch. And yet, it took until Jessica was screaming my name and looking for her clothes in the locker room for anyone to suspect that the perfect little Londyn was finally not-so-perfect after all.

Fast forward after my 3 week suspension from school, and I decided I was never going to talk to Jessica again. The next few years flew by and by the time I knew it, I was back in my hometown, working for the veterinary clinic on Main. This time around though, things were different. I was different. A lot had happened since I was suspended from school, but it’s too soon to tell what those were. Which brings us to today. Sitting in my room underneath the garage watching. Just watching.