“Some Habits are Hard to Break”

Her face turned red and she shrunk down at her desk in U.S. History II. The teacher had just called her name out and asked her how she could possibly still be biting her nails, a habit which eight year olds would have already given up. The girl pulled her brown hair in front of her face and mumbled a response about being sorry and nervous about something. It was the third day of junior year and she had thought she would be able to give up the habit, a gross one that her friends were forever making fun of her for. They called her the machine gun. They said was an affectionate nickname but everyone around could tell that it was embarrassing. After all, no one would want to be called that themselves. It was a vicious cycle: the more people noticed she chewed her nails down the more embarrassed she got and the worse she would bite and bite.

Once she got home she immediately googled how to stop biting your nails. The first site that came up was a health site and it’s first suggestion said to wear fake nails. She looked down at the ten ragged stumps she had at the tip of each finger. She imagined them with long beautiful, brightly colored nails and immediately felt a twinge of longing. She was determined.

After returning home from a quick trip to CVS, she had brightened up considerably. There had been rows and rows of beautifully colored nails, all different lengths, colors and patterns. After looking through each different set, she had finally decided on pale pink, average length nails with one single sparkle on the right ring finger. She tediously matched each real nail up to the perfect sized fake and then opened the glue and got down to business.

She couldn’t believe how beautiful her hands look. Such a simple solution, she couldn’t believe she’d never tried it before! Imagining that her real nails could look like that made her smile--she would keep these on for a week or two and then would take them off and watch her nails grow so beautifully. All of her girl friends would apologize for spreading around such a heinous nickname and would ask her secrets, ask her how she had turned around such a terrible habit into beautiful tips at the ends of her fingers. As she looked down and smiled, she then looked up at herself right in the eye. She dug through the bathroom drawer and then, for the first time in years, she reached up and pulled her hair back away from her face.