I wanted my purple-white uniform to simultaneously hide my feelings, swollen
throbs, and function as a beacon for people looking for a valuable
confidant who still can’t keep a secret.

I wanted this team to be our secret in science class mapping brief geologic time.

I wanted to know what Nonnie’s homelife was like. If a Spanish speaking house
had similar food-focused immigrants as a Yiddish speaking house.

I wanted Nonnie’s large rough edges to have the option of invisibility that girls
of average height clutch and puberty obliterates.

I wanted to be a grown up already, not finding my uniform’s socks while mother
waited in reverse in the driveway.

I wanted then to score points— or even a single point—in a game although I
now like being the only girl with a scoreless season.

I wanted to quit basketball at fourteen and I did.

I wanted our adult coaches, Herb and Julie, to like me and never wondered why
a childless couple would choose Wednesdays to run left-handed dribbling
drills.

I wanted to know about their homelife and the way her blond poodle hairstyle
looked mixed with his dark too-short-to-curl hair in the drain of their
bathtub.

I wanted fewer parental spectators and expectations from the bleachers but was
glad Meredith’s mom’s big gulp of booze joined another team and took the
minivan keys with it.

I wanted better hair and bigger hands and elegant hunches. We all did.

Truth

Untruth

We Don't Know and TheyWon't Tell Us

We Don't Know and They
Won't Tell Us