The Bully

By Lauren Chapman

This essay won third place in our Circle of Trust writing contest—exclusively open to Exhale members. Learn more here.

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They say a mother carries her child’s cells inside her long after birth.
Fetal microchimerism: cells from the heart, liver, blood—lodging quietly in the mother’s brain, lung, bone.

My son outgrows shoes, jackets, and the need to hold my hand.
But somewhere inside me, his cells remain. The scaffolding of his making, hiding in the dark corners of my marrow.

I read once they found fetal cells in a mother’s broken heart.
I couldn’t finish the article.

At eighteen months I kept a running list in my notes app—his new words unfurling like petals: “Up!” “Ball!” “Mama, look!”
Each one a small declaration of his place in the world.

There was no need for sign language or baby talk.
He said yessss like a grown man settling into a chair.

Now you are seven, and the season’s first cold snap sends us burrowing under the covers before sleep.
You lie beside me, night-light pooling on the wall, brother breathing deeply across the room.

Then—

“Mommy? Some kids at school use inappropriate words.”

You won’t say them, of course. You’ve always followed the rules—no feet on the table, no ball playing indoors, no interrupting.
More than that, you carry a moral compass in your tiny chest, heavy as a brick.

I fetch a whiteboard and marker.
You hesitate, worried you’ll misspell something.

“Lovey, it’s okay.” I coax. “You can tell me.”

The first letter squeaks slowly in the dark and then the words keep coming.