It is my first morning of high school. I have seven new notebooks, a skirt I hate, and a stomachache.

It doesn't hurt. Nothing hurts except the small smiles and blushes that flash across the room like tiny sparrows.

IT happened. There is no avoiding it, no forgetting. No running away, or flying, or burying, or hiding.

Do I want to die from the inside out or the outside in?

Picasso.” He whispers like a priest. “Picasso. Who saw the truth. Who painted the truth, molded it, ripped from the earth with two angry hands.

So, she tells me, the words dribbling out with the cranberry muffin crumbs, commas dunked in her coffee.

I won the wintergirl trip over the border into dangerland.