Twelve

Table of Contents

 

Graduation night

On graduation night, I wore my beautiful white dress, and I
felt
beautiful, even with the knowledge of my nude-colored bra pressing into my shoulder blades. Mom had finally gotten around to hemming the one loose thready part, and she'd bought me a pair of white sandals with teeny blue dragonflies where the straps crossed over my toes. I wore my blue flower earrings and felt exquisite from head to toe.

“You look like a fairy,” Dinah whispered as we lined up to the right of the stage.

“Don't I?” I replied. I grinned and sashayed my hips. Then I leaned in and said, “You look good, too. I really like your necklace.”

“Thanks,” she said, blushing. It was so easy to make her happy. It made me happy, making her happy. Tonight was all about being happy.

When the ceremony was over, we were sixth graders no more. We were soon-to-be seventh graders. Soon-to-be-junior highers. We shrieked with the weirdness of it while our parents chatted in the parking lot, and we ran like crazy around the playground. One last glorious free-for-all, like those funny square hats thrown into the sky. Only we were the ones flung topsy-turvy, not knowing where we would land.

OTHER BOOKS YOU MAY ENJOY

To all the girls who cheered for Winnie
the first time around: this one's for you!

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First published in the United States of America by Dutton Children's Books,
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Published by Puffin Books, a division of Penguin Young Readers Group, 2008

Copyright © Lauren Myracle, 2007

All rights reserved
CIP DATA IS AVAILABLE.

eISBN : 978-0-142-41091-2

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Trinity and Westminster for being such terrific schools;

March

THE THING ABOUT BIRTHDAYS, especially if you just that very day turned twelve, is that you should make a point of trying to look good. Because twelve is almost thirteen, and thirteen is a teenager, and teenagers don't strut around with holes in their jeans and ketchup on their shirts.

Well. They did if they were my sister, Sandra, who was fifteen-about-to-turn-sixteen. Her birthday comes next month, which meant that for a delightful three-and-a-half-week period beginning today, she was only three years older than me, instead of four.
Yes!

Sandra made a show of not caring about her appearance, although it was clear she secretly did. She stayed in the bathroom far longer than any human needed to, and I knew she was in there staring and staring and staring at herself in the mirror: putting on eyeliner and then wiping all but the barest trace of it off; dabbing on the tiniest smidge of Sun Kissed Cheek Stain from the Body Shop; making eyes at herself and dreaming about Bo, her boyfriend, who told her he liked her just the way she was—natural. So ha ha, the trick was on Bo, but I've learned from Sandra that boys were often like that: clueless, but not necessarily in a bad way. When I am fifteen, I'll probably have a boyfriend, and I'll probably be just like Sandra. I'll want to look pretty, but not like I'm trying.

But today was my birthday, not Sandra's, and I felt like pulling out all the stops. Dressing up usually felt dumb to me—I left that to snooty Gail Grayson and the other sixth-grade go-go girls—but I had a tingly special-day feeling inside. Plus, we were leaving in half an hour for my fancy birthday dinner at Benihana's. Bo was going to meet us there, and so was Dinah, my new best friend. Although it still felt weird calling her that.

I tugged my lemon yellow ballerina skirt from the clippy things on the hanger and wrapped it around my waist. I threaded one tie through the hole at the side, then swooped it around and knotted it in place. When Mom bought this skirt for me six months ago, she had to show me how to make it work, and I'd found it impossibly complicated. Not anymore.

A full-length mirror hung on the inside of my closet door, and I twirled in front of it and watched the fabric swish around my knees. I had scabs from Rollerblading and a scrape from exploring a sewage pipe, but who cared? I could be beautiful
and
tough. I refused to buff away the calluses on my feet, too. Mom said a girl's feet should be soft, but I said, “Uh, no.” I was proud of my calluses. I'd worked hard for them. Summer was right around the corner, and I wasn't about to wince my way across the hot concrete when I went to the neighborhood pool. Flip-flops were for wimps. For me, it's barefoot all the way.

I rifled through my clothes until I found my black tank top. Sleek and sophisticated—yeah. People would think I was from New York instead of Atlanta. But when I wiggled into it, I realized something was wrong. It was tight—as in,
really
tight. I flexed my shoulder blades forward and then backward, trying to loosen things up. Then forward and backward again. But what I saw in the mirror was bad. With my herky-jerky shoulders, I looked like a chicken. With breasts.

“Mo-o-om!” I called. “We've got a problem!”

“What?” Mom called back.

“We've got a
problem
!” I yelled.

“Winnie, I can't hear you. If you need me, you're going to have to come here!”

I skittered down the long hall to Mom and Dad's bedroom. My skirt fluttered against my legs.

“Look,” I said. Mom was in her bra and underwear, picking out her own outfit, and she was so much curvier than I was. Than I would ever be, I was pretty sure. And that was okay. I didn't want to be curvy. I didn't even want to be . . . bumpy.

Mom turned and took me in. “Winnie, you look
adorable,
” she said. And then, “Oh.” And then, “My goodness, Winnie. You're
developing
.”

I turned bright red. I could feel it. I crossed my arms high over my chest and said, “What am I supposed to do?”

“Well, you're going to need to pick another top,” she said. She put her arm around me and rubbed my bare shoulder. “And I guess we need to go bra shopping, don't we?”

“No no no no no,” I said. “Let's not overreact here, all right?” Bras were for go-go girls. Bras were for Gail Grayson, who just last week made a huge stinking deal out of how cool she was because she wore one, while not everyone else in the sixth grade did. Like me and Dinah, to be specific. No way was I going to slink to school with telltale strap lines under my shirt, making Gail believe I actually cared what she thought.

“Sweetie, there's nothing wrong with wearing a bra,” Mom said. “It's life. It's the way the world works. It means you're on the brink of womanhood.”

"Whoa,” I said. I held up my hand, palm out. "Enough, okay?”

She smiled like she thought I was being funny. But I did not want my mother telling me I was on the brink of womanhood. What next? Orthopedic shoes with squishy soles? Dentures?

“You'll probably be getting your period soon, too,” Mom said.

“
Beep, beep, beep!
Alert! Alert!” I wiggled out of her grasp and backed toward the door.

“Winnie . . .”

“Got to run. See you!”

I dashed to my room and ducked into my closet, pulling the door shut behind me. I pulled off the tank top, scrunched it into a ball, and dropped it out of sight behind my Little People Castle, which I had yet to pass on to my younger brother, Ty, who was five. I allowed Ty to play with it—together we'd drop Little People through the dungeon's trapdoor and go “
Ahhh!
”—but I wasn't ready to give up possession. Even though Mom said I was too old for it. Even though Sandra said, “Sheesh, Winnie. Grow up already, will you?”

Naked except for my skirt and underwear, I confronted myself in the mirror. It was true: I was no longer flat as a pancake. I had strong arms and a smooth, firm belly and . . .

Boobs.

I was with boob. I was boobful. I was boobed.

I, Winifred Perry, had boobs.

I sank down onto the floor, scrunching my knees up in front of me. How had this happened? I didn't want this. Boobs were for other people, not me. I didn't even like the word
boobs
, although
breasts
was a thousand times worse.