Celeste (Gemini 1)

"Noble has to pee," I said. "What should we

do?"

"Go get an empty bottle in the pantry and let

him pee into it," she told me.

"What?"

"Do it. Its easy for a boy. You'll see," she said.

She tugged at the chain saw cord. She was so

determined. She had killed the tree, and she would cut

it up and get it away from us.

I stood there, stunned, for a moment, and then I

went back inside and looked for a bottle with a neck wide enough. I found an empty cranberry juice bottle. Still shocked by her orders. I went back upstairs.

Noble was moaning.

"Mommy wants you to pee into this." I said and

showed him.

He stopped moaning and looked at me with his

eye-brows scrunching just the way mine often did.

There really was so much about our faces that was

similar.

"I can't," he said.

"She says you can. She says its easy for boys to

do." He shook his head.

"That's what she says," I added and handed him

the bottle.

He looked at it, and then he brought it down

between his legs. I turned my back. but I could hear

the pee going into the bottle.

"I'm finished," he said and held it up. Ugh, was all I could think. I took it from him

and hurried into the bathroom to dump it into the

toilet.

"What happens when I have to do number