If there's one thing on the planet that can ruin a teenager's day, it's a zit. It can masquerade as other names: pimples, blackheads, whiteheads, acne. But at the end of the day, a zit is a zit, and it is never a fun thing to experience. Still, they're common. Almost everyone gets them, regardless of diet or how often you wash your face. Ugly as they are, they're perfectly normal parts of life. If you ignore them, maybe adding a bit of pimple cream and leave them alone, they go away. Don't they?
That's what I assumed when I woke up early one Monday morning and saw the whitish-red bump in the middle of my forehead. Just a garden variety zit. I groaned and tried for a bit to pop it before school, but the skin refused to break and only inflamed, so I dabbed some concealer on it to bring down the redness and hoped for the best. After all, what else could I do? It was only a zit. Not the end of the world.
The day after, the zit was bigger. It had grown from the size of maybe a couple of millimeters to maybe covering the size of a dime. That's how much was red anyway. I looked disparagingly at the spot and dabbed on more concealer before school. I asked my friend to recommend an acne cream and I got some at the pharmacy on the way home. I put it on before I went to bed.
When I looked the next morning, I nearly choked. The zit was now the size of a dollar coin, still in the center of my forehead and redder than ever. I touched it, and was horrified to find it felt hard, and almost scaley to the touch. I went to my mom. She examined it a moment and told me it was just dried out. She gave me some moisturizer to try and sent me away. That night I used it, hoping for success.
When I looked in the mirror the next day, I admit I started to panic. The red spot wasn't any wider, but it had still swollen outwards. It protruded out from my head. Still, when I touched it, it wasn't as hard as before. I tried to pop it again, but when I tried to squeeze it, I felt intense pain and had to stop. Concealer wasn't going to help this. Still, I assumed the moisturizer did something to help since it wasn't dry and crusty anymore. I decided to put some more on before school. I had some comments from friends during lunch, one suggested I see a doctor about it. I laughed that off. Yes it was huge and gross, but it was just a zit. What was a doctor going to do about it, other than tell me to use the creams I was already using?
When I woke up on Friday and checked the mirror, I felt some relief. The swelling seemed to have gone down a bit, at the very least it hadn't grown worse. I poked it and winced. It was very tender, and squished under my finger, but it also hurt like a bitch. I decided that I would try more of that moisturizer that my mom had given me. I told her that it was working well. She smiled at me and told me that she knew it would.
Then came Saturday. I woke up, blinking blearily. The sun was streaming in around my blinds. I closed my eyes tight to block out the light and turned over to bury my face into the pillow. However, I suddenly felt a sharp stinging on my forehead and jolted back from the pillow, my vision blurred as if I was tearing up. I swung my legs over the side of my bed and stumbled off down the hall to the bathroom. I looked into the bathroom mirror, rubbing at my eyes when I realized; my eyes were closed. But I was still looking at myself. A scream rose to my lips as my hands fell away and my eyes opened. Three eyes stared back at me from the mirror; the two I'd known all my life, and one in the middle of my forehead, as big as a dollar coin. I couldn't blink it, or move it like my others, it stared straight ahead as I screamed and screamed, my fingernails clawing through my cheeks in horror.
Not all zits go away.