The scratch was small, maybe half an inch long. Hard to even see unless you knew where to look. But once you knew, it was the only thing you could see. It was all I could see, anyway. I had only had the car for two weeks when the scratch appeared. I'd gassed up just once by the time I saw it, right there on the hood. How could it have happened? A mishap at the car wash? A passerby I'd wronged? Some kind of deranged animal? It wasn't from another car or falling debris, that was for sure.

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