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with the instruction booklet and her computer. By the time I emerged, my mom was in the kitchen preparing her broccoli casserole to bring over to Grandma’s. Dad hated green beans.
    She smiled at me when I sat down at our breakfast table, which looked like a restaurant booth, tucked away in an alcove near the back door. She was happy when I was happy. I adjusted my headphones and listened to the ten or so songs I’d downloaded. Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears mostly, and watched as my brother ran in and out of the kitchen showing Mom different drawings of frogs that he’d been working on while she was cooking. From where I was sitting, each frog looked like a misshapen green circle, but she reacted like he worked for Pixar, sending him running with glee back to his waterproof markers to work on his next creation.
    “Why doesn’t Nana Lynne send anything for Patch?” I asked, then pulled one of the earphones out of my head and let it dangle on my shoulder.
    She answered, but kept to her casserole. “You know why honey.”
    “Tell me again.”
    “She sends him a card on his birthday sometimes,” she said, reminding me of his consolation prize.
    “Why nothing at Christmas?”
    “I don’t know, she’s not related to Patch, honey,” she said quietly. “Just you.”
    I got a similar answer every time I asked, and each year I hoped for a few more details on the matter…but they never came, and I never pressed the issue. I was only ten years old, and not well-versed enough in the art of interrogation. I popped the earphone back into my head and easily fell back into my musical euphoria.
    It was a year later, when I was in the fifth grade, that I learned my height and my gifts from Nana Lynne weren’t the only things that made me different.

CHAPTER FIVE

     
    T wo days before my fifth grade class was set to study sex education, a note was sent home to our parents. We were instructed not to open the sealed envelope that it was housed in, but since no other notes from school came home in a sealed envelope, I tossed the envelope and read the note on the walk home.
     
Dear Pleasant View fifth grade parents:
Next week we begin our studies in Human Sexuality. As you may have already heard from your child, we will be doing some of the lessons in a unisex group, but most will be taught in segregated boy or girl clusters. With this sensitive subject, there are typically many topics that can be intimidating and confusing to our children. Because of this, we want you to know that we are here for you if you should need any assistance in answering questions at home, or simply need someone to talk to yourself.
We have set up a hotline that will be available to you from the hours of 11:30am – 1:00pm. Thank you for your cooperation.
Best Regards,
The Pleasant View Staff
    “Are they serious?” I asked myself aloud. The infinitesimal group of kids in my grade who didn’t know what sex was could be narrowed down to Deborah Zernagen, Miles Hurphman and Cletus Marberg. And quite honestly, I could’ve sworn I saw Cletus dry humping his backpack once.
    I tossed the note and continued walking. I remember laughing to myself, thinking how smart I already was, and how hilarious it would be to watch my teachers try and teach us things about sex that we already knew. I mean, I was eleven years old, what more was there to know?
    Later that week, I sat through two jaw-dropping, cringe-worthy days of sexual anatomy and sexual intercourse. In which I counted penis was said seventeen times, testicles eleven, vagina fifteen, uterus ten and ovaries nine.
    But when day three ended, and our lesson on sexual reproduction was complete…I realized I wasn’t laughing or feeling full of myself anymore. No, I was struck with a reality baseball bat, and realized I still had a lot to learn about exactly how I came into this world…and the answers were not at school.
    From what I’d just been told, the only way to create a life was for the sperm