I was 12 years old and it sucked.  All the books and the health teacher talked about how it was such a difficult time and our bodies were changing.  Blah blah blah.  All that crap is the least of my worries.  If only all I had on my mind was growing tits and a bit of hair in weird places, and wondering what periods would be like, life would be pretty easy.

But I was taller than most of the girls at school.  Tall and skinny.  My dad said if I drank tomato juice and turned sideways, I’d look like a thermometer.   And to top it off, my body wasn’t changing like everyone else’s.   And it sure didn’t escape the boys’ notice.  

“You’re a carpenter’s dream!  Flat as a board and never been nailed.”  Or “You’re a pirate’s dream.  A sunken chest!”   

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’ve heard ‘em all.  Drop dead, you losers.  You probably have tiny little dicks in your underwear but that defect isn’t so obvious and believe me, if it WAS, I’m sure you’d keep your pissy little mouths shut.  Stupid little pukes.

It didn’t escape Paul’s notice either, and my mother delighted in taunting me right along with him.

“You’re never gonna grow any tits, Flatty!” teased Paul one night at dinner with my mother and me.   “You’re so flat, you’re concave!”  

“Stop it!  Stop!” I demanded.  

“Flatty, Flatty, Flatty!  Itty bitty titties!” he taunted.

My mother cracked up, laughing out loud at my embarrassment. My humiliation.  It was easy for her to think it was funny.  Hardy Swedish/Belgian farm-stock, she was shorter than I was, thickly-built but at least she had actual tits.  She had no idea what it was like to be skinny - especially there.  I was fed up with people insulting me for things I couldn’t help.

“Boys won’t want anything to do with you,” Paul said.

“I don’t care!  I don’t want anything to do with them!” I shot back.  The girls at school were all talking and giggling about boys and kissing  them, but I thought it would be disgusting.  I was painfully shy with boys; in fact, I was terrified of them.

Besides, I had a massive crush on one of my teachers.  No one would have expected it, not in a million years, which was just about as long as it would take for me to let anyone in on my secret.  It was no one else’s business if I had flirty, romantic, infatuated feelings for the very tall, dark-haired Texan beauty called Miss Schultz.  I couldn’t help myself; it felt perfectly normal for me.  Yet somehow, I knew I mustn’t tell a soul that my heart beat a little faster when she’d smile at me with those gorgeous chocolate brown eyes.

Always eager to offer unsolicited opinions about my many inadequacies, my mother was on a roll that evening.   “Your chin is too small,” she decided, the creepy, hangy-downy, bullfrog thing under her own chin jiggling as she spoke.  “And your nose is too big!” Apparently, she was unaware that her own was large and not particularly attractive as it was wide across the bottom and sort of flat.  She glanced over at me, tilting her head sideways, studying me from under her heavy, drooping eyelids as an artist studies a work in progress.

I couldn’t let them see the tears welling up in my eyes.  That would only add fuel to their fire; they always sneered and laughed at me for crying, and told me to quit being such a baby.

Paul added, “You’re so ugly, you make people barf.  You should go live under a rock!”  You’d expect this from an idiot older brother of 15 years old.   But you wouldn’t expect a mother to howl right along with him, telling him how funny he was and laughing so hard, she snorted.  

Fed up, I got up from the table and stormed down the hall to my room.  But not before she got in a few parting shots.

“You have hips like a cow,” she said as she watched me walking away from her.  “And your legs are skinny and ugly!”  Laughing, she turned to Paul.  “Oh, have you seen them - and those knobby knees?” she continued, with Paul chuckling right along with her.

I couldn’t close my bedroom door fast enough.  I leaned against it and let the tears flow silently while I listened to the two of them giggle about my ugliness until they grew bored and moved on.

* * *

Every summer, I visited the farm - the one where I had so heartlessly violated my young cousin, Jennifer, when I was nine years old.

Fortunately, as children, with the passage of time and being 600 miles apart, it had been forgotten - at least, in terms of our summer playtime.  During those visits, we had loads of fun together.  Her two older brothers were around my age.  I was a total tomboy and hated all Things Girlie.  I loved to go and do farm things with the boys, hanging off the back of a tractor, being in a truck full of grain, or sanding a rusty old combine and preparing it for a fresh coat of paint.  I loved to walk through the pasture with my cousins and bring the cow home in the evenings, hanging out in the barn with those wonderful barn smells and talk to my cousins while they did the milking or other chores.

Jennifer had a horse and I loved to ride.  There was a lake nearby and my cousins and I spent lots of time there, too, and we also made lots of tree forts and played in the woods.  I loved the farm so much; I ached to be there the rest of the year and those few precious weeks in the summer were all I lived for. 

It was the only place in the world where I was safe.  I never woke up shaking and terrified at night on the farm.  It was so peaceful; a little taste of heaven.  

That summer, when I was 12, I was back home and unpacking after my wonderful time on the farm.  But there was a problem.

“How can you lose a pair of jeans?” my mother barked, hands on hips, leaning toward me, intimidating, accusing, with squinty eyes and pursed lips.  Although she always kind of looked like that anyway, it was just a little worse then.

My whole head went hot and I felt guilty and ashamed, even though I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong. 

“I -- I don’t know.  I thought I packed everything.  I checked the dresser and looked everywhere before I left,” I replied.

“Well, what were you doing that you could lose your jeans?” she snapped.  Her eyes became two little evil, accusatory slits as she dropped her voice about an octave.  “Were you doing things with those boys that you shouldn’t have done?  Have you left your jeans out in the middle of a field or something??  Were you rolling around in the barn with the boys??”   

“NO!  They’re my cousins!!”  I protested.  “That is so gross!  Plus I’m only 12!”

“I don’t believe you!  You can’t just lose a pair of jeans!”  

“I can’t believe you’d think something like that!”  My eyes were wide, my jaw nearly on the floor.

“It wouldn’t surprise me if you were being slutty with those boys!” she spat.  Horrified by the images that sprang to mind, I thought I would be sick.

Aside from the obvious issues with them being my cousins, my mother had no idea how little interest I had in any boys.  She had no idea about my massive crush on Miss Schultz.  She didn’t know that I hadn’t even been kissed.  And I really didn’t want to be.  At least, not by a boy.

All the girls at school were talking about boys and wondering about that First Kiss.  I was simply dreading it.  The idea of some drooling, zit-faced kid with a mini-hard-on and his knuckles dragging on the ground, wanting to pucker up like a bloody blowfish and jam his mouth against mine (and oh, God, force his tongue down my throat??) was enough to make me want to throw up.  I was too busy riding bikes and catching frogs with those zit-faced knuckle-draggers to be bothered with that stuff. 

I just figured I was the world’s biggest tomboy.  

But then something else happened.  I’d taken Bobbie, a friend from school, across the street to the Martins’ house with me one night while I was babysitting.  The two little boys had gone to bed when I heard Bobbie gasp from the dining room where she sat at the table.  I looked over and saw her eyebrows just about hitting the ceiling.

“Oh, my gawd!  Look at this!” she exclaimed, pointing at a magazine she’d pulled out of a huge stack of books and papers.

I sat down next to her and my mouth fell open in shock.  I’d never seen naked adults before and especially not in such graphic - and pornographic - poses.   I was astonished by how much I loved the women’s bodies and how I wanted to run my hands along those gorgeous curves and touch those exquisite breasts.  

Almost instantly, I noticed a delightfully pleasant, warm, tingling feeling between my legs.  It was the Dark Ages.  No one talked about that stuff.  I didn’t understand what that feeling was but it was as wonderful as it was confusing - and it was also just a little bit scary.  I knew only two things about it:  If looking at women made me feel like that, I knew enough not to tell anyone.  Not even Bobbie.   I don’t know how I knew it ‘cause no one talked about that stuff but I was certain it was just wrong.  And I knew when I looked at the men, and especially those godawful ugly stiff cocks, the only feeling I had was one of revulsion.

It was around that time that I got cornered one night by my pal, Terry, one of my bike-riding, frog-catching, guy-friends who lived a couple of doors down.  We were out one warm summer night playing Kick the Can with about a dozen other neighbourhood kids, as usual.  Everyone was hiding while the guy who was ‘It’ protected the can and tried to spot the rest of us moving through the shadows.  “Aw, c’mon, ple-e-e-ease?” Terry begged while we were out behind his father’s garage that night.  “It’s just a kiss.  Just one little kiss.  Please?” 

I was so terrified and so flustered, I don’t even remember what lame excuses I attempted to use but he was persistent.  The last bloody thing on my mind was kissing anyone.  Well, kissing a boy anyway!   After seeing those magazines, I’d have loved to kiss a girl but there was no way in hell that was gonna happen.  I was already enough of a social outcast, thank you very much, and my family hated me as I was.  I couldn’t let anyone know my secret.  I’d rather have thrown myself under a bus.  

But kissing a boy?  Oh, gross!  Because of my upbringing, I had no idea that I could just say “NO!”  And certainly, I had no idea how to be firm, much less angry or indignant.  I just stood there like a wet noodle, nervous as hell, throat dry, feeling like a trapped animal, wishing I could just melt and disappear into the gravel beneath my feet.

“You’re gonna have to do it sometime!  It might as well be now!” he coaxed.

Oh, God, I hadn’t thought of that!  I would have to do this sometime.  It never occurred to me that I’d have a choice about that.  I believed there was no way I was going to be able to get through my entire life without ever having to kiss a boy, not unless I was willing to expose my secret.  But of course, that was out of the question.  I had to stuff every last one of those feelings for girls somewhere deep inside me.  Especially if I expected to have my Happily Ever After in a loving home filled with children.  

Trying to put aside being grossed out for a minute, I did my best to look at Terry like I knew a 12-year-old girl ought to do.  Sizing him up from that perspective, I noticed he was lean but muscular.  With his wild brown curls and pale blue eyes, he was probably not such a bad specimen - for a boy.  But ew, there was the rub.  He was a boy.  And I was gonna have to kiss him!   Oh, GAWD!  Reality slammed into me like a bag of bricks.  My eyes bugged out as I stared at him in terror.  All I could see was a blowfish.  And it was coming in for the kill.

My heart was pounding and my head was spinning as I forced myself to pucker up for a taste of poison.  The blowfish came closer and closer, then it parted its lips and licked them a bit.  I couldn’t take any more.  “Ewww!”  I screwed up my face.  “I don’t wanna look!  Can I close my eyes?” 

“You idiot!  You’re supposed to close ‘em!”  What girl in her right mind could resist such romance?

Well, the blowfish planted a sloppy kiss on my tight and terrified lips and I really thought I might die but I didn’t.  And because I wasn’t allowed to say “NO!”, I tolerated an awful lot more kisses from Terry the Blowfish in the following months.    In time, I guess I was desensitised to them.  I accepted that I had no choice, that I was going to have to get used to this stuff, whether I liked it or not.  Besides,  I didn’t want to be the only girl at school who wasn’t engaging in these extracurricular activities.  Already being something of a social reject, I didn’t need to give anyone any more reason to ridicule me.

By the time we were 13, Terry had progressed to fumbling and pawing at my body.  I was unaware that I had a right to insist he must stop.  My wishy-washy objections were met with increasing annoyance and I dared not say any more.  From the terrifying displays of temper I had seen in my father and my brother, I knew males had all the power and if I wanted to stay safe, I had better not arouse their anger.

When Terry and I parted company, there were other boys who pushed and pressured me into allowing them the same thrill.  Frightened and unable to stand up to them, my feeble attempts at saying ‘no’ were ignored by the raging testosterone that flooded through these scrawny, zit-faced horn-dogs and rushed to enlarge the little cocktail sausages which they ground into my thigh.  If I hadn’t been so petrified on every one of those mortifying occasions, I’d have probably collapsed in a heap with laughter.

It was bad enough when they forced their wet and sloppy blowfish kisses on my tight and unwilling lips, or when they squeezed at my dear-God-too-small breasts like little old ladies checking for ripe fruit.  But it was positively terrifying when their eager hands slid south and began undoing the button on my jeans and then the zipper, cajoling, pleading, begging me to allow their fingers between my legs.  The scenario was always the same from one knuckle-dragger to another.  They tugged at my jeans, pulling them down an inch or two in an effort to fit their St. Bernard paws inside my knickers.

“C’mon, spread your legs for me!  I can’t get my hand in there!”  

“I can’t!  You’ve got my jeans down a little and that makes it hard!” (Pardon the expression)  It was a good excuse and fortunately, it was even true.  And usually, these incidents occurred in darkened rooms at parties, with giggles and whispers barely heard above the tinny music from scratched records as other couples groped in corners under coats just as we did, with no one brave enough to actually remove trousers.

It was a tight fit, not a lot of room for their hands with my jeans on but the knuckle-draggers were always persistent, tugging a little more and still a little more at my trousers while their breath came almost as fast as they probably did.  I couldn’t help but wonder if their mothers ever checked their sons’ underwear on laundry day.  I thought about many things to get through these awful groping sessions, none of which seemed to make them any more bearable, none of which ever made me feel like I had any choice in the matter.  

Until one time when some scrawny, chicken-skinned, zit-faced knuckle-dragger had his hand in my crotch and I thought about Alice, a girl in my class who I rather fancied.  Only 5’1” she was, with big, brown doe-eyes, rosy pink cheeks and the most luscious heart-shaped mouth that was just screaming to be kissed.  For a petite young girl, she had extremely large breasts that had me salivating at the very idea of caressing them.

And suddenly, a delightful, warm, tingling wave erupted in my belly and flowed downward in a rush, making me be the one tugging at my jeans.  I was only too happy to make a little more room and spread my legs so I could enjoy the knuckle-dragger’s eager exploration of my nether regions while I imagined that he was sweet Alice.

* * *

There came a truly horrible day at Mrs. Jorgenson’s.  I was getting ready to leave after my Saturday music lesson.   She’d been unusually quiet that day with a far-away look in her eyes.  It was the first time her mouth smiled but her eyes didn’t.  I couldn’t ask but I feared she was angry with me.

She had no criticism for me during my lesson; only praise so I hadn’t disappointed her.  What is it then?  What have I done?  Why aren’t your eyes smiling at me today? 

But she wasn’t telling.

I knelt by the door and put my shoes on before standing up and grabbing my jacket off the hook.  That’s when she dropped the bomb.

“Well...”  She hesitated.  Uh-oh, here it comes.  You’re mad at me, I just knew it!  

“I hate to tell you this,” she went on, “but there’s nothing more you can learn from me.  You need to take lessons from my teacher.  She’s the best in the city,” she said, with an ‘I hope you understand’ look in her eyes.

But I didn’t.  I didn’t, and I wouldn’t, not at all.  “No!  Please don’t make me go to someone else!” I begged.  “I only want to see you!”

“But you can’t learn any more from me.  You’ve got an incredible amount of talent.   You’re capable of great things with keyboards and I would only hold you back.”

No!  Never seeing you again would hold me back!  Please don’t send me away!

“I can’t, in good conscience, keep taking your parents’ money when I’m not actually teaching you anything.”

I don’t care about the lessons!  You’re teaching me what it is to feel a little bit special!  Maybe even a little bit loved!

But of course, I couldn’t say any of that.  “Please!  You don’t understand!” I begged.  Because she really didn’t.

“I know, change is always scary.  But you’ll be fine.  Honest.  You need this.”

No, I won’t be fine.  I’ll never be fine again!  And you can’t imagine what I need!

“I’m sorry, honey.”

You had to call me that, didn’t you?   

I choked on waves of sobs as somehow, I said goodbye as she gave me the warmest, most wonderful hug I’d ever had in my entire life.  It was also the worst one I ever had because I knew I would never again have another one from her.  I tore myself away from her embrace and shot out the front door, bounding down the steps without looking back.  Hot, angry tears streamed down my face as I ran to the bus stop where I stood, my heart in pieces, feeling about as alone in the world as I could possibly imagine.  I just couldn’t believe I would never see Mrs. Jorgenson or have another happy half-hour with her ever again.

The bus was packed as always on a Saturday as people were busy tearing around with their weekend shopping and playing.   I managed to get a seat by the window and plastered myself up against the side of the bus, staring outside but not seeing anything for the full hour it took to get home and hoping no one would see my tears.

And there was a fresh wave of them when I realised that to her, I had been just another student.

Mrs. Barber was nothing like Mrs. Jorgenson.  She was a serious businesswoman who had made quite a name for herself in the city.  My dad called her ambitious but he said it like it was a bad thing and he didn’t like her for it.  Maybe he was jealous, feeling deflated and defeated because his life hadn’t turned out at all as he’d hoped.  He was a loser.  A has-been.  More like, a never-was.  And he knew it and he hated it.

Mrs. Barber’s hair was pulled back in a severe style which matched her crisp words, and her thin lips, her whole manner perfectly.  “You’ve got a television appearance coming up, along with a few other public performances I’ve lined up for you.  There’s also the Kiwanis Festival, and I’ve found something really complicated so you’re sure to win again.  You’re going to have to practice several hours a day for the next couple of months,” she said, adjusting the stiff, high collar of the shirt she wore under her dark suit jacket.  Her trousers had such a sharp crease down the front of each leg, I was sure they could carve a roast.

My heart sank.  She reached for a file and started thumbing through sheet music, not noticing - or caring about - the expression on my face.

“Do I really have to do all of those performances and competitions?” I asked.  

“Why?  What’s the problem?” she asked in staccato, stern and glaring at me from her chair, right next to the organ bench.

Instinctively, I recoiled, feeling the blast.  “I hate those things!!  Please don’t make me do them any more!” I begged.

“Don’t be silly!” she snapped.  “They’re good for you!”  Her words always came out like rapid machine-gun fire.

“Once we’re about two months away from the Festival, you’ll come here every day after school and practice your song for two hours,” she ordered, pulling several sheets out of the file and not paying any attention to how I felt about her orders.  She eyed the pages one at a time before gathering them in a pile which she rapped on the organ bench to put them together neatly.  “Ah, here it is!”  She seemed quite proud of herself as she shoved the stack of sheets at me.  “I want you to memorise this by next week.”

I sighed, utterly defeated.

What Paul hadn’t been able to take from me in music, Mrs. Barber certainly had.

* * *

By 13, I’d developed quite an attitude.  At home, I mouthed off plenty.  At school, I was always in trouble for talking and I’d become the class clown.  My jokes and saucy attitude were the perfect cover for my shame, guilt and humiliation.  I prayed no one would see how defective I was or how embarrassingly nuts my family was.

No longer appearing to be a timid little mouse at school, I’d begun to make a few friends, not that I dared bring them home.  Except for Patty.  Another social outcast, she understood how it was to be on the outside looking in.  She was aware of some of my ‘after school’ issues with my father and Paul, but she liked me anyway and would never tell anyone my Family Secrets.

After school one day, Patty and I were in my room, which I’d inherited from Paul - complete with his chain lock - when he’d built a bedroom for himself in the basement.  I heard him coming in the back door.  

“Uh-oh, he’s gonna see your shoes,” I said as I walked across the room and put the chain lock on.  Just in time.

Thunk!  The door opened until the chain stopped it going any further.  “Open the door.  Open the door!” he yelled, his angry, scowling, face peering through the gap.  

“Drop dead!” I yelled back, smug and feeling kind of tough with that lock between us.  I wanted him to STAY OUT!  THIS MEANS YOU! and finally, I could make it happen.   He stopped arguing and pulled the door closed.   Whew.  I won.  I won!  

Beaming, I turned away from the door but seconds later, it burst open and the chain flew across the room, just missing Patty’s face as it sailed past and hit the wall behind her.  Paul stormed in, grabbed my friend by the arm, dragged her through the house and shoved her outside.  Then he chucked her jacket, boots and books out into the snow and slammed the door.   

Between my drunken, nearly-naked father and my obnoxious, bullying brother, it had always been risky to bring people into my home.  But a young girl with a penchant for sniffing nail polish remover appeared out of nowhere, and inadvertently stumbled upon a way for a large group of kids from our school to forge strong friendships and build our own little community.  

A troubled foster child, Candy sought refuge one lunch time at the church down the alley from my house and making a long story short, the minister, John, began letting an increasingly large group of kids hang out there at noon and after school.  He left the door open for us so we had somewhere to go, somewhere to be safe.  We had bottle drives, raising money to buy a record player.  We pooled our resources and worked together to buy drinks and snacks from time to time so we could have chaperoned parties there on a Friday night.

John was totally cool.  We met with him every Tuesday night and we’d all pile into his little office, talking his ears off about anything and everything.  It was great for all of us as young teens, 13 to 15.  And I had a safe, happy place to actually make some friends without anyone seeing my dad in his underwear, my mother being a shrew, and my brother being a pinhead.  

We’d started a teen folk group, too.  A few kids played guitar, one played drums, a couple played piano but mostly I was the one who got that job when we performed for the congregation, even doing songs from Jesus Christ Superstar.  It was a pretty cool place for a church. 

For a few years, that church was a life-and-soul-saver for me and for some of the other kids.  We were safe, we were close and we had lots of happy times together.  And for as long as I lived, I would be very grateful to John, because for those of us who needed it, he saved our lives.  And  he was saving our souls, too, in a way that had nothing whatsoever to do with religion.

Shortly after I began attending the occasional Sunday morning service with the folk choir, something in me was stirring.  I didn’t have words to put on it but a desire, a need was beginning to bubble up from deep within my soul.  My family had stopped going to church on moving to Calgary.  I needed it.  I needed that church, the Sunday morning services. I found myself contemplating the notion of God, of a Higher Power, and whatever the hell the point was in being here at all.  My questioning had begun.  It would be the beginning of a very long, winding and colourful journey, leading me down paths I would never have imagined.

  I was sitting on the living room floor watching television after school while Dad was in his armchair, sifting through the “important papers” accordion file.  “Have you ever seen these?” he asked.  I looked in his direction to see him holding out some papers for me, which I took before he continued digging through his file.

Puzzled, I opened up the folded documents and was shocked. 

The first was a Court order which stated that the child formerly known as Brenda Lynn SomeCrazyGermanName would now be known as -- wait a minute.  I was Brenda Lynn?  I had another name?   

I couldn’t take my eyes off it, trying to digest the fact that that’s who I used to be.  Or who I really was and until that moment, I’d just been playing ‘let’s pretend’.  I realised that there were other people out there with that last name and they were part of my family.  And I was a part of theirs.  They might even be wondering - or even asking each other from time to time - about what Brenda Lynn might be doing.  

I moved on to the next document, simply entitled “Background Information”.  It was a few paragraphs of sketchy information about my mother and her family.  As for my father, he was said to be blond and athletic but that was about it.  

I’d never had a sense of history or roots before.  I had always felt completely alone in the world, as though there was nothing and no one before me, no history, no ancestors, not one other person biologically connected to me.  It was a terribly lost and lonely place to live. 

But in a matter of moments, I wasn’t lost any more; I wasn’t alone.  I had a family tree, complete with roots.  I did belong somewhere.  With real, actual people.  In an instant, something deep within me had changed.  It was as though I’d stepped into someone else’s life, someone else’s skin, like I was a completely different person.  After all, I was a completely different person.  I was Brenda Lynn.  And for the very first time in my life, a little piece of myself had found a home.  Goosebumps raced up and down my body.  My throat ached as I fought back a wave of tears.

The seeds had been planted.  I knew that someday, I would search for these people.  But I could not possibly have imagined the horrifying secret that I would uncover.  I could not have coped with it, either, if I’d learned it then; it would be hard enough when I discovered it as a grown woman and mother.

* * *

I’d gone to the farm in Saskatchewan for my yearly summer holiday.  Jennifer, her family and I were at a wedding dance in the village hall the first time I saw him.  He was standing with a group of his friends, looking at me from across the room.  He was not terribly tall for a man, my height, about 5’8” and very lean, with super thick and curly brown hair.  He had a moustache and an obviously shy but warm smile.  And he wouldn’t stop looking at me.  

Jennifer and I were seated on a bench that ran along the length of the wall.

“Who’s that?” I asked Jennifer, trying to indicate with my eyes and a subtle nod of my head in his direction.

“Oh, that’s Richard Hardy from the farm next to ours,” Jennifer answered.  “Looks as though he likes you!” she teased.

My face became very hot.

“No, he doesn’t!  I’m only 15!  He’s a lot older than I am,” I stated, wishing I could hide my glaring self-consciousness.

“Yeah, he’s probably about 19 or 20,” came Jennifer’s reply.

I tried not to look at him that evening but I could feel him staring at me over the next hour or two.  Being so much younger than he was, I was certain he wasn’t really going to bother with me anyway.  I thought I was safe.

But with one simple request for a dance, he changed both our lives forever.  

* * *

The breeze coming off the lake drifted in through the open car window.  Reaching past the burger and chips on the dashboard, Richard grabbed his pack of cigarettes and then turned up the radio as Seals and Crofts began to sing.  

“Diamond Girl, you sure do shine, glad I found you, glad you’re mine...”

“That’s what you are to me, you know,” he said.  “My Diamond Girl.” 

I felt myself blushing as I looked down, self-consciously flicking the filter of my cigarette over and over again.

Putting a finger under my chin, he tilted my face upward and gazed lovingly into my face.  Stroking my hair and my cheek, Richard said, “I worship you.  I adore you.  I need you, my Diamond Girl.”  And as he laid the gentlest of sweet kisses on my lips, I knew he meant every word.  “You’re so beautiful; those eyes...I can’t forget those incredible blue eyes, cat’s eyes - and your perfect smile.  I see them all the time when we’re apart.  You’re all I think about when I’m not with you.  I’ve never been in love like this before and I want to be with you for the rest of my life.”

I could have sworn I heard a loud slurping sound as my skin soaked up every word like a bone-dry sponge, taking each one of them deep inside me, nourishing my love-starved soul.   And at night, I would drift off, still hearing his soft and soothing voice, feeling his quiet, gentle presence as I remembered every desperately welcome syllable.

Oh, how I needed them!   How I’d been longing for someone - anyone - to utter such precious words of love, and speak to me as though I might actually be special and important.   But hearing those treasured words was like wearing tight new shoes, the ones you’ve been dreaming about and staring at in the shop window for 100 years, the ones for which you saved up every penny for as long as you can remember but every time you almost had enough money, the price went up.  

And then someone hands you a big, beautiful package with a sparkling ribbon and bow, and the shoes are inside, a half-size too small and dreadfully uncomfortable, but they are there, handed to you on a silver platter.  And you try to convince yourself that you can make them fit, even thought they’re tight and uncomfortable, pinching and downright painful.

Hour after hour, we sat  in that old Chev on those blistering summer days, uttering nothing but words of love and adoration for one another.   We were so nauseatingly sweet, you’d have got a mouthful of cavities just listening to us.  

Because I’d become socialised to kiss boys, I didn’t even mind that part.  In fact, I accepted every one of Richard’s kisses as a gift filled with love for my aching and lonely soul, lapping up every single word out of his mouth like a cat with so much cream.  

One hot August night, after he dropped me off back at the farm, I went into my aunt’s house, all dreamy and starry-eyed, 15 years old and babbling about being Mrs. Hardy someday.  My Really Big Dream, the one I’d had since I was a desperately lonely and unhappy little girl, was within reach.  I was sure I’d found my Happily Ever After.  

But as quick as greased lightning, my aunt had been on the horn with my mother and got me on a bus making the 600-mile journey back home, pronto, in an attempt to stop anything from developing between Richard and me.   But it was too late.  Richard had planted enormous yellow “Detour” signs all over my life path.  And there was no turning back.

He and I wrote an insane number of letters back and forth.  Big, fat ones, about three times a week, nothing but ImissyouIloveyouImissyouIloveyou and once in a while, maybe a bit of what we were actually doing other than missingyoulovingyou.  I couldn’t wait to get home after school every day and check the mail, my fingers fumbling with excitement as I tore open his letters.  He wrote romantic poetry, said things like “My dearest darling...”  I was over the moon, feeling loved and special for the first time in my life and getting my fix every day or two to keep me topped up and blissfully happy.

Of course, my parents weren’t too impressed with any of this, especially because of the age difference and the fact that this whole thing was obviously becoming pretty hot and heavy, not that I gave a rat’s ass what they thought.  In fact, it may have been part of the appeal.  And when Richard managed to come and see me for a couple of long weekends, I was thrilled, especially when I knew just how much it was driving my parents over the edge.  

But in December, I met Charlie, who was also 20 and my friend, Glen’s, cousin.  Charlie was great fun to be with.  Lots of laughs and really nice.  Kristie, a girl I met at school, really liked Glen so the four of us hung out a lot in his basement, playing records and drinking beer.  I was especially grateful for somewhere to go and have fun, hang out with my friends, and not be stuck at home putting up with the icy cold loneliness, the blistering rages, my father’s drunken rampages, my mother’s soul-destroying insults.

Charlie and I began taking long drives in the evening, just roaming through the city or occasionally a little way into the country, listening to music in his little sports car, maybe parking up and having a beer or two, or going into a diner for a milkshake.  Knowing that Richard was lurking in the background somewhere, Charlie was always a gentleman, never crossing the line of friendship.  I thought I detected a little spark between us, and I was sure he had stronger feelings for me, although he never said a word to that effect.

It didn’t take long for me to want to see him more and more often.  And he was only too happy to oblige.  Other than Richard, no one had ever been particularly interested in being with me, or had liked me so much.  Charlie and I really enjoyed each other’s company.  The more time we spent together, the closer we became. 

What I really loved was that I could actually see him, talk to him, go out with him, have fun laughing and goofing around with him.  I could feel how much he liked me, perhaps even had a crush on me.  I knew he thought I was special and interesting.  I was only to happy to soak up all the affection and attention that he was willing to give me.  

But Richard, who was 600 miles away, had become mostly just a guy on paper.   

It wasn’t long before thoughts of Richard and his letters began to dwindle.  I was too busy being a kid, finally having a little freedom to get out and enjoy a bit of my life and hang out with my friends.  And being with Charlie, whether we were alone or with Kristie and Glen, I was getting some of the attention that was the main reason I had got all wound up about Richard in the first place.

Of course, I didn’t know any of this at the time.  I just knew that Richard wasn’t there, and Charlie was.  And at 15 years old, absence makes the heart grow fungus.  I mean, really.  What can you expect at that age, other than ‘out of sight, out of mind’?  A teenager has the attention span of a gnat.

One night, I was getting ready to go out.  I was in the bathroom, brushing my hair when my mother appeared in the doorway.

“Going out?” she asked, squinty-eyed and suspicious as always.

“Yep,” I replied in as frosty a tone as I could muster, never too interested in giving her any more information than was absolutely necessary.  Over the previous couple of years, I’d developed quite a hostile attitude toward my family.

“Who with?” was her next question.  I contemplated correcting her grammar.  But knowing how she thought she and her English were so fucking perfect, I decided I liked it better when she sounded stupid.

“Charlie.”  Not like it’s any of your business.

“What are you going to be doing?”  I did not appreciate the acidic interrogation.

“Just driving around listening to the radio,” I answered, which we did quite often.  She didn’t need to know that we might also be going to the bar.  

Hands on hips and squinting now.  Here we go again.  “What do you mean, just driving around?  Are you actually expecting me to believe that you’re going out in this weather and just spending time driving around in a car?  It’s 35 below out there!” she spewed in an accusatory manner.

“Believe what you want.  I don’t really give a shit.”  

“Don’t you talk to me like that!” she spat.  I shot her a look. She knew what it meant as well as I did.  I’ll talk to you any fucking way I please.

“And just what are you going to be doing in this car?  What is it that all these 20-year-olds see in you?  Are you giving them something more than you should be?”

I want to smack you, ya fucking miserable windbag!   I was indignant beyond description; it would have almost been worth it to tell her ‘yes, Mum, I’m dropping my jeans and fucking anything that moves,’ just to see the look on her ugly face.

But instead, I said nothing.  Suddenly leaning toward her, I squinted right back and pursed my lips while she backed away ever so slightly.  

Delighted to see which one of us had the upper hand, I retreated to my room and shut the door rather loudly in her face.

* * *

Arriving home from school one January day to find yet another big, fat letter from Richard under the letter box, I sighed heavily as I bent to pick it up off the floor, almost requiring a forklift due to its oppressive contents.   Oh, fuck!  More of the same old boring, tedious, lovesick shit. 

I tossed the unopened letter on my bed.  I’d get to it later.  That reminded me, I was overdue to write to him, too.   Yawn.

Until that moment, I’d been having so much fun with my three friends - and especially Charlie - I hadn’t really noticed the change in my feelings.  Fuck.  I guess I’m gonna have to deal with this sometime soon.

I thought I’d still been saying all the right IloveyouImiss you crap in my letters because that was how I felt.  Or at least, it was how I wanted to feel.  But although I was unaware of it, my letters spoke volumes for me.  It hadn’t occurred to me that they were more honest with Richard than I’d been with myself.  He was not a happy man.  And he was about to do something that would change my life forever. 

It was late January, a Thursday night, the phone rang at around 9.30 as I was getting ready for bed. 

“Hello?” 

“Hi.”

Oh, crap, it’s Richard, I thought, feeling slightly irritated by the sound of his voice.  

“Hi,” I said, surprised by my reaction and realising I’d not been thinking much about him lately.

“How are you?” he asked.

Bored and not really interested in talking to you right now.  “Fine”, I said, doing my best to force a little excitement into my voice.  After all, this was supposed to be a really big deal.  A really expensive big deal treat.  Yay, a phone call from Richard.  Sigh.

“How are you?” I asked in return, not really giving a shit.

“Great.  I was just wondering what you’re doing tomorrow night.”

My heart did a scary little leap into my throat and my tummy did a weird flip.  Oh, crap, you’re not coming for the weekend, are you?  Kristie, Charlie and I were going to Glen’s where we were having a private little party for four.  It was more like a double date but no one dared acknowledge it, especially not I.  Nor did I want to acknowledge that I didn’t really care to see Richard again.

“I’m going to a party.”  I waited for the dreadful news of his surprise weekend visit.  Fucking rude, aren’t you?  Springing it on me like this as if I’m just sitting here doing nothing but pining away for the ‘love of my life’?  Gag.

“Would it be okay if I went with you?”  So.  He was trying to be cute in how he delivered the news, expecting me to leap into the air and squeal like a girl and be all giddy with excitement like I would have been not so long before.  

But instead, I was just thinking, ‘Oh, shit!  Oh, shit, oh, shit, oh, shit!’  Not so much about the party, we could re-arrange it for the next weekend.  But at the fact that the bloom was off the proverbial rose, and I really didn’t want to see him any more.  I couldn’t hide from it any longer.  And that meant that I was going to have to tell him.

Well, it’s only for a weekend.  I’ll find a way to end this somehow after he goes back on Sunday night.  

But before I could really say much of anything else about Friday night, I got the real surprise.  He was already in Calgary.

But not just for the weekend.

He had quit his job and moved there.  For me.  Without a word.  Because he’d felt me slipping away, although he wouldn’t tell me that till much later.

If only I’d known that over the next couple of days, there would be a chain of events, with each of us making decisions which would alter the courses of our lives forever, steering each of us into our own private Hell.  And for me and many other people, it was also steering us into a life of truly unimaginable pain.