…most
Sundays, pretending to put offering in the wooden plate by crumpling my fist
and then swiftly pressing my hand flat onto the other bills.
…sitting
by the popular blonde boy on the school bus as he cried into his forearm.
…being
downstairs at the dance studio, pointe shoes squeaking on the basement floor,
the rosin leaving powdery imprints.
...being
downstairs at the dance studio, hoping I wasn't getting my period.
...babysitting
the little girl who wrote on her face with permanent marker and pooped on the
carpet during naptime.
…sitting
across from Kate in her apartment downstairs from mine, her fiery red hair
rivaling her burgundy fishnets.
…Seattle
rain on the slicker Kate lent me, the same one she wanted back later that school
year.
…the
looks they gave me for wearing my platform heels and short skirt and deciding to
stand up straighter and sway my hips.
…when
I believed that meat originated from white packages in the deep freeze.
…the alarming
revelation of my first French Kiss.
…hearing
my brother whispering with his girlfriend and wondering if they French kiss.
…for
the first time in a dozen years, my doctor recalling I’m adopted when we got to
the part about family medical history.
…when
going to Grandma’s house meant crayons and comic books and TV dinners with
corner compartments sticky with cherry cobbler.
…when
going to Grandma’s house meant awkwardly hugging her in her wheelchair and
yelling to be heard and wishing to be anywhere but there, surrounded by the
smell of loneliness.
…sitting
backstage, waiting for my entrance, hoping somehow I would return a different
person.
