Disclaimer: Firefly and all related elements, characters and indicia © Mutant Enemy Productions and 20th Century Fox Television, 2003. All Rights Reserved. All characters and situations—save those created by the authors for use solely on this website—are copyright Mutant Enemy Productions and 20th Century Fox Television.

Please do not archive or distribute without author's permission.

Author's Note: Thanks to Dangermom and LiquidEyes for betaing! Written for fic challenge #8.

Scars
by Tara LJC O'Shea

Simon had never noticed the scar before. He traced the long curved mark darker than the smooth white skin of her lower back. They were curled side by side in her bunk. It was a tight fit, but Kaylee certainly didn't seem to mind.

"What happened?" he asked, lips against her spine.

"Hmmm?" Her cheek rested on the pillow, light brown hair fanning out over her shoulderblades.

"Here." He traced it lightly with a fingertip.

"Oh." She giggled. "There was this boy."

"Hmmm.... Maybe I don't want to know."

"We got caught in the cloakroom at church—"

"Church?"

"Well, there was a social goin' on," she offered by way of explanation. "He was a bit younger than I thought. You'd never've known it, looking at him. I mean, he was..." she waggled her eyebrows, then laughed. "My daddy whupped me so hard."

His hand on her back stilled. "He beat you?"

"It was just a welt that didn't heal, is all," she said with a shrug, and Simon was horrified at Kaylee casually describing a beating.

"If my father ever laid a finger on River—"

"River most like ain't never got herself into half the trouble I did. I was a wild thing. Wild things need taming."

Simon could only stare at her, unable to wrap his mind around the concept. "By beating it out of you?"

She sat