How did she know our mother hadn’t, even though that was true? What I knew came from other girls and from what I had learned in school and had read myself.
I was going to say something, to tell her it really wasn’t necessary, I knew enough, but she looked away, and I thought retreat was much easier.
I always did.
Maybe that was why all that happened to me happened. Maybe I had no one to blame but myself.
The Talk
I LOOKED UP from my homework the moment I heard my door being opened. I was so full of nervous anticipation I had trouble concentrating on my assignments, anyway. I wasn’t comfortable with the idea of Cassie teaching me about sex, but I couldn’t help wondering if she knew something very important about it that I didn’t know. After all, she seemed to know about anything and everything adults were supposed to know. What good was it for me to have a sister like her if I didn’t appreciate her and take advantage of what she could offer me?
She slipped in as if she were sneaking into my room and closed the door very softly behind her.
“Did you go to see Mother?” she asked softly but not quite in a whisper.
“Yes. She kept closing her eyes, so I didn’t stay long. She didn’t eat all her dinner.”
“I’m not surprised,” she said, and sat on my bed. She gave me one of her small-eye studied looks as if I had already done something terrible. “Now I want you to be absolutely, completely truthful with me, Semantha. If you’re not, it will only come back to haunt you, and by then, I might not be able to help you at all.”
“Truthful about what?”
“What you’ve already done with boys, Kent Pearson in particular,” she replied.
“I haven’t done anything with boys. When could I have done anything?” I followed, because now she wore a skeptical expression.
“Don’t try that sort of an excuse, Semantha. I know how girls your age behave nowadays, and believe me, boys can find the time and the place when they’ve a mind to. I know most girls go along, either because they don’t want to be considered immature or because they let their own curiosity get the best of them. Do you know what willpower is?”
Girls my age? I thought. She’s only two years older than I am, but, just like always, she makes it sound like two decades.
“Willpower? I think so.”
“In this case, it means having the strength to resist not only the boy but yourself, Semantha.”
“Myself?” I shook my head. “How—”
“Don’t sit there and tell me you haven’t had sexual thoughts and haven’t touched yourself and discovered … pleasure.”
I felt the blood rush up my neck. Had she been spying on me?
She smiled. “It’s okay,” she said. “It’s natural to a point. If Mother had done her mother job, you’d know all this by now, but I can see you don’t. I’m not surprised. She never did her job with
me, either.”
“Then how did you learn all this, Cassie?” I asked.
“Never mind how I learned. It’s how you learn that matters now, so pay attention.” She stood up.
She paced for a moment silently, as if she had to be sure she used the right words. When she spoke, she didn’t look at me at first. It made me feel as if I were in a classroom.
“Our bodies are built to make and carry babies and then deliver them whole and healthy into this world. It’s natural to our female selves. Our bodies don’t care how young we are. When all of our hormones and development are aligned, it’s as if some switch were turned on. In fact, there are some girls who get so mature so early that they have big psychological problems.”
She paused and looked at me.
“Remember that girl I pointed out to you, Donna Wellington, the girl in the fourth grade with breasts as developed as a girl in eleventh or twelfth grade? Remember? We saw her on the playground, and she looked so out of place.”
“Yes.”
“Can you imagine what’s been happening to her? She’s probably terrified of herself. In a sense, we should all be a little terrified of ourselves, because, as I said, our bodies don’t think about consequences. We’re little baby-making machines, that’s all.”