unpleasant expression on her
face, I thought there really was something wrong with me.
" 'Is it all right?' I asked her, my voice shaking with some panic.
"'No,' she said. 'It's far too soon. I don't like how it shows under your blouse either. I'll get something proper for you to wear tomorrow,' she promised, turned and left me standing there feeling hideous.
"The next day she bought me a sports bra, but my development continued at an accelerated pace. By the time the school year ended, I had a distinct bosom. I even had cleavage," I said.
"That's so unfair," Misty moaned. "My mother wants to buy me a Wonder Bra and here you had cleavage in the fifth grade!"
"Despite my development, my mother fought buying me a regular bra. I complained about the sports bra and she replaced it with a little bigger size, but it still pinched and squeezed. It was such a relief to get undressed every night.
"My mother wouldn't listen to any complaints. She told me to work on putting my mind off it. If I told her about a tingle or a feeling I could describe only as a tickle, she would turn crimson and scream at me for not keeping such thoughts buried in my mind. Once, she even slapped me because I mentioned it in front of my father. Then she pulled me aside and said, 'There are things decent women don't mention in front of men, ever. Hear?'
"Men? I thought. My father was a man, of course, but I didn't lump him in with other men. I remember feeling so strange about the way she had referred to him. Almost as if he were the enemy. We had to hide things from him, too, just because he was a man. What would happen if she knew my daddy's and my secret? I wondered. Daddy looked worried for a moment and then smiled when he realized I had kept it our little secret.
"Of course, I nodded after everything my mother told me and I tried to behave as she wanted me to behave, but I couldn't help overhearing classmates talking about sexual things from time to time. I had so many questions to ask, so many worries. I tried reading about it, but if my mother found any books or any pamphlets in the house, she would throw them in the garbage, even if they were library books and I had to pay for them. She declared they shouldn't be in a school library anyway, especially a parochial school.
"Once, I tried hiding a book from her. That was when I discovered my mother went through my room daily, searching everywhere for lascivious material, even under the mattress," I said.
"It sounds like you live in a prison, not a home," Jade said.
"I've felt that way, yes," I admitted.
"My room is my world. Neither of my parents would dare to invade it," she said. "We're people, too, despite our ages. It's stupid to think that just because we're under eighteen, we're some kind of lesser creature."
"Right," Misty said nodding.
"It bothered me along with so many other things. I was more emotional than ever. Sometimes, I would just lay in bed and cry. I had no specific reason for it. Tears would suddenly build and flow and I would shudder and sob. If my mother heard as she passed by my room, she ignored it. Intimate talk not only embarrassed her; it disgusted her. I felt so lost and confused. It made everything harder."
"What about your father?" Star asked. "After all, he told you that you were his special little girl, right?"
"My father was very busy at the time. He had moved to another brokerage house and was
establishing himself and the clients he had brought over with him.
"Everything about our lives was routine then. One day seemed no different from the next, even the weekends blended into the week. All my premature development did was make me feel lonelier than ever. I truly did think of myself as being freakish and I tried to stop thinking about it. I tried to do what my mother wanted, but I was like a rubber band being stretched and stretched until I was about to snap."
"Didn't you have any friends to talk with?" Misty asked.
"I was terrified of personal talk and the other girls knew it. Most of the time, they teased me. Every time one of them brought up a topic related to sex or boys, I felt my ears shut and my body tighten. I usually would find an excuse to leave. I guess by my own behavior I added to the image of being freakish and weird. No one really wanted me as a friend.
"Don't think I didn't feel terrible about it. Other girls went to each other's homes. There were parties, none of which I was invited to. I rarely went to the movies. I felt like I was standing on the other side of a wall, a glass wall, looking in at the rest of the world.
"One night I sat in my tub and sobbed so hard I created waves. Mother was downstairs doing needlepoint. I heard my bedroom door open and close and moments later, there was Daddy looking in at me. He smiled.
'What's all this? Why are you crying, Cathy?' he asked.
"I shook my head. I couldn't explain it to myself. How could I explain it to him or anyone else for that matter?
"He saw the redness around my bosom and under my arms and looked concerned.
"'What's this?' he asked. 'What is it, a rash?' He approached the tub and knelt down to look closer.
"'No,' I told him. 'It's from the sports bras Mother makes me wear.'
"'This isn't good,' he said with concern. 'My poor special little girl.'