Crystal (Orphans 2)

"It's all right. I've got to learn how to deal with it," I said. "I'm just afraid, that's all, afraid of becoming her?'

"You won't," he assured me.

"I won't? What about your belief about genes?"

"You have your father's genes, too."

"He was worse," I said, without going into it. "Well, you have grandparents. There are lots of combinations and influences on who we are."

"When do we find out?" I asked him, my tears now bubbling at the lids.

"Find out what?"

"Who we are."

"We're always making discoveries about that," he said.

I opened the door.

"Hey," he said, stepping out alongside me. "What?"

"Thanks for coming over." He leaned in before I could react and kissed me quickly on the cheek. "Why did you do that?"

He shrugged. "My genes, I guess," he said, and laughed as he stepped back inside and closed the door.

I stood there for a moment with my hand on my cheek where he had kissed it. It had happened so fast, too fast. I was disappointed.

That's the first time a boy ever did that to me, I thought as I started for home. I tried to understand the excitement that made my heart thump and brought a heat to my face. There was a movement of feelings through my body, a current that rushed in waves from my legs, through my stomach, and up around my heart, sending trickles of electricity down to the very tips of my fingers. Was this love, my first love?

My eyes were filled with his green eyes. His smile fit like a glove over mine My brain of ten billion cells was a kaleidoscope of emotions. I felt sorry for him living like an orphan in that big, beautiful, expensive house. I wanted to go back and be with him. I wanted to hold him in my arms and tell him how to overcome the loneliness, a loneliness so strong that even all the money in the world, buying all the things he could fancy, wouldn't stop it from making his heart ache. I wanted to kiss his cheek, and then I wanted our lips to touch.

I wanted more, and what I wanted frightened me. I closed my eyes but quickened my steps. When I opened them, I was standing in front of my new home. I started to laugh.

It was funny. When I had left, Thelma had asked if I could see love under the microscope.

Maybe I had.

7 Seeing Stars

Falling asleep was harder than ever after I returned from Bernie's house. Thelma kept me busy with chatter about a new nighttime serial she had watched for the first time. She described the entire first episode in detail, including its settings and all its major characters. My mind wandered even as she spoke. I could hear her droning on, and I watched her animated face go through all the emotions, plucking a sigh from here, a laugh from there, and then loading up on smiles and tears before she finished with the declaration, "This is the best evening program I've seen?'

I promised to watch it with her next time and then went to my room to finish my homework and organize my notebook. My stomach felt as if it had a mad bumblebee buzzing around inside. I couldn't concentrate on anything and found myself gazing out the window at the stars. I was hypnotized by the glitter and twinkle of the jeweled sky, and when I did think, I realized I had rarely spent time looking at the night sky when I lived at an orphanage. I always felt shut up, contained, and chained by bureaucratic rules and paperwork that left me feeling small and alone, just another number in some official's logbook, just another problem for society. It was better to remain unnoticed, to fold up in some corner, swallow back my tears, hide my face in books, and close the shades on my windows. There was no place for stars or for dreams in that world.

But now, after just one day at my new school, meeting new people, feeling like someone, I saw myself as reborn. I unfolded like a flower that had been stuck between the pages of the child welfare system's books. I was free to grow, to feel, to cry, and to laugh. I had a home. I had a name. I had a right to be alive and to be heard.

I couldn't help feeling like a fish out of water, however. Expressing emotions, having an opinion, and being confident around other kids my age was so new it all made me anxious and even a little afraid. Now, more than ever, I didn't want to fail. I couldn't be a disappointment to people who had invested their faith in me. I would be the best possible student, I thought. Karl would be very proud. I would help Thelma forget the ugliness and disappointments in her past, and I would give her as well as myself a reason to face a new day.

And then I would permit myself to grow into a woman. This frightened me most of all. As long as I was still seen as a little girl, I was safe, even in the orphanage. I lived in some neutral place without sex, unnoticed and unremarkable, especially by boys.

Bernie's kiss had suddenly changed all that. I felt like Sleeping Beauty. Of course, I had thoughts about sex and romance before, but somehow I never thought of myself as potentially someone's lover. I was still an observer, the little girl who sits beside the older, far more sophisticated girls and listens with wide eyes and interest to the intimate stories describing events and experiences that were still more like fantasy or science fiction but never something that would happen to me.

Now it could happen to me. I touched the place on my cheek where Bernie had kissed me, and then I rose and gazed at myself in the mirror. Was my face more mature? Would anyone look at me now and think that's a pretty young woman?

I laid out my nightgown on the bed and then went to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, took off my clothes, and returned, but I didn't put on my nightgown. Naked, I stood before the mirror and studied my body, noting the shape of my blossoming breasts. When I turned on an angle, I saw how my body was taking shape, how the curves were softening and filling out.

My heart sanded as I looked at myself this way. I felt as if I had nudged some part of m

y inner self that had been hibernating. It lifted its head and smiled, welcoming my curiosity. Yes, I could hear it whisper from within, I am here, I am ready to take you on a new journey full of exciting feelings and emotions. The biological streams flowing inside will join and rush over every dry part of you. Anyone looking at your lips, your eyes, or touching your hand will see the heat and the hunger. I will make you a woman. My body was filled with the promise.