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much better this way!”
    â€œOh yeah? How do you figure that?”
    â€œBecause it’s so funny. It’s one of a kind.” I had a brain-storm. “In fact, it’s a sign!”
    â€œA sign ? Of what?”
    â€œOf the fact that you’re going to be a very good driver, because the bad thing has already happened and it was this .” I tapped the license. “So that means no accidents or maiming or loss of life. Isn’t that good?”
    â€œ If you’re careful,” Mom interjected. She wagged her flour-covered spoon.
    â€œMo-o-om,” Sandra groaned.
    â€œSometimes bad things happen even when you are careful, ” she went on. “I’m sorry, but they do.”
    â€œBut sometimes they don’t,” I said. “Sometimes they get up and walk away and everything’s just fine!”
    â€œExsqueeze me?” Sandra said.
    I held her license out of reach. “I am very proud of you for facing your fears and taking your driver’s test, just like I am very proud of me for getting my ears pierced.”
    â€œAre you proud of me?” Ty asked, glancing up from his sparkly hearts.
    â€œYes,” I pronounced. “I am proud of you for lining your stickers up so neatly and symmetrically.” I cleared my throat. “Now. Sandra. If I give you this back, do you promise not to get a new one?”
    â€œGive it to me,” she said.
    â€œ Do you?”
    She nabbed it from my fingers and smiled victoriously.
    â€œMaybe I will and maybe I won’t,” she said. “You’ll just have to wait and see.”

May
    ON A THURSDAY EVENING near the end of May,
    Mom did the unthinkable. She announced, smack in the middle of dinner, that it was time to take me bra shopping.
    â€œMom!” I protested.
    â€œNope, no arguing,” Mom said, pointing at me with an asparagus spear. “You’re a growing girl. Your graduation ceremony is in two weeks. We’re getting you a bra tomorrow.”
    My cheeks could have lit a fire, that’s how hot they were. A Girl Scout could have roasted marshmallows on them. And it wasn’t just the fact of a bra, which was terrible enough on its own. It was that she was saying all this in front of Dad and Sandra and Ty, who now gazed at me with varying levels of interest.
    â€œA bra,” Dad said jovially. “That’s terrific. Get me one, too, will you?”
    Ty’s eyes widened as he absorbed this new idea, that maybe men did wear bras. “I want one, I want one!” he said.
    Mom frowned at Dad. “Bras are not for little boys,” she said. “ Or grown men.”
    â€œI can’t believe you don’t have one already,” Sandra said. She munched on her chicken tender, which Mom bought at Whole Foods and then pretended were made from scratch. “You’re such a throwback.”
    â€œWhat’s a throwback?” asked Ty.
    â€œSomeone who doesn’t get a bra until sixth grade,” Sandra said. “Kind of like an ape.”
    â€œSandra,” Mom scolded.
    I focused on my corn, which looked like teeth. Yellow kernels, then pale up at the top with a flimsy rim of skin. Like they’d been pulled from someone’s mouth and plopped in a pile on my plate.
    â€œWinnie?” Mom said, at long last realizing that I wasn’t joining in on the hilarity. “Are you okay?”
    I didn’t answer. I was too angry. Didn’t she know that my “growing body” should not be discussed at the dinner table?
    â€œYou don’t want to look different from everybody else,” she went on, softening her voice in a way that made things ten thousand times worse. “I know it’s hard, and it’s not necessarily something that’s good about the world. But, sweetie, it’s easier if you fit in.”
    â€œFine,” I said. My lips hardly moved.
    â€œWhat, honey?”
    I raised my eyes and sent her a look