hassie arranged it so that she stood in line directly behind Craig Wagner. This meant that when they got to music class she'd probably end up sitting next to him. And possibly Mr. Schaefer would make them sing that song where they had to hold hands.

Jackie Connell, the shortest and smallest kid in the class, came up and stood behind her. He liked to imitate Johnny Carson and tell jokes out of the corner of his mouth.

"Hey, Chassie," he said, "got a question for you."

Before she could turn around he reached out to her back and plucked her shirt away from her skin.

"Hey!" In front of her, she saw Craig's shoulders shake with laughter. Chassie spun around.

Jackie smiled at her and clasped his hands. "Well, this is a question on behalf of a few of us."

It seemed like every single person in the classroom was staring at her. "Well, what already?"

"We want to know," Jackie said, smirking, "why you don't wear a bra." He looked at her and smiled crookedly with his mouth closed, head cocked to the side.

All around her, boys were laughing and holding their sides. Craig gave Jackie a high five.

Billy Sansome was practically in hysterics. "Oh, that was funny. God, that was so funny. Did you see her face? Oh my God, I don't think I've ever seen anything so funny."

Then he looked at her. "You do need one, you know. Everyone else knows it."

Chassie stood still. Her face hot and her feet suddenly cold. Craig's braces gleamed as he laughed. Chassie walked slowly over to the corner of the room where the teacher was and asked if she could go to the bathroom for a female emergency. They were allowed three each year.

On the playground with her coat wrapped tightly over her chest, Chassie walked up to the group of popular girls.

"What do I need to do to join your club?" she asked.

She'd never approached them before. Chassie was sort of a second-tier elementary school student. She wasn't especially sought after, but neither was she avoided like the kids who smelled or were retarded. These girls would talk to her if they had to, but would never walk home from school with her, or choose her for a partner.

In the bathroom, though, Chassie had decided that this particular female emergency called for drastic action. A definite change.

The four girls exchanged looks. One held her hand up to her face and whispered something to another behind the hand-barrier.

"Come to Tara's house today at 4:00," she said sternly. "You'll see then."

At nine, Chassie knew she was too big for a babysitter. Her mother insisted, on account of the baby, and also because this was the sort of thing that could be used in court when the divorce case got to the custody part. Chassie said she didn't care who she lived with, which was completely untrue, but it was an answer that made everyone shut up.

"Shut doesn't go up," Kate would say.

"Good one, Kate."

Their babysitter, Shelly, was in high school, a cheerleader. She snuck out of the house to go to parties on the weekends, crawled back in the bedroom window she'd left open a crack.

"What else?" Chassie asked her. "What happens at these parties?"

"Well, there was this one party last week," Shelly said, drawing on a cigarette and blowing the smoke in a stream through the open window. A cold wind blew the smoke right back in.

"It relaxes me," Shelly said about the smoking.

Chassie tried to be casual about everything Shelly said and did. When she wasn't looking, Chassie went through her purse and memorized what was in there. Lip gloss, Virginia Slims, lighter, a candy bar, gum, a hairbrush with a couple of rubber bands looped on the handle, a wallet with three dollars, sixty-five cents, a student ID from the Catholic high school, driver's permit, social security card, and school pictures of six girls and three boys. On the backs of the pictures, the girls called Shelly a really sweet girl, their best friend. The boys wrote "see ya this summer"and "stay sweet!"

"We were supposed to be making those Kleenex flowers to decorate the gym for the dance on Friday. Cheerleaders always have to do that kind of stuff," Shelly said.

Chassie nodded in sisterhood.

"So, this guy Rob is there and he's really, really cute." Shelly closed her eyes and put her hand over her chest. "To die for."

Kate walked in from the other room singing, "Found a peanut, found a—Hey! You're not supposed to smoke in the house!"

"Shut up, Kate," Chassie said. "She's blowing the smoke outside."

"I'm telling."

Shelly rolled her eyes at Chassie, then winked. "You know," she said, "Kate's probably right. Blowing it out the window doesn't count for actually smoking outside."

Shelly put out her cigarette on the crust of snow at the window sill and slipped the butt into her pack. She closed the window and turned around. "There!"

Kate softened.

Chassie glared at her. "You are such a baby."

"I am not!"

"Baby!"

"I'm rubber and you're glue," Kate sang. "Whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you."

"I'm great!" Chassie said, and this really got Kate mad.

"No, I'm great, and you're a baby."

Chassie widened her eyes. "Whatever you say."

Kate stomped on the ground. "I hate you! You always win!"

Chassie felt quite proud of herself, until she looked over at Shelly who was applying magic mood lipstick that came out green, but then turned colors on your lips depending on your mood.

"So do you want to hear the rest of my story?" Shelly asked, after rubbing her lips together and removing a bit of excess lipstick from the corner of her mouth with the tip of her pinky finger.

They sat on the floor of the family room with the TV on down low behind them so they could hear when Carol Burnett came on.

"So, this guy Rob comes up to me and he goes, 'I want to show you something outside.' My heart was like-" Shelly put her hand inside her shirt and fluttered it. "We went outside and I was looking all over for what he wanted to show me. Nothing there but some bushes and the cars in the driveway."

Chassie felt her stomach go tight.

"He pulls me out of the porch light and then, right up close to my face, he goes, 'will you go with me?'"

Chassie sucked in her cheeks.

"Go where?" Kate whispered.

"You are so stupid," Chassie said. "Go together, you know? Like be boyfriend and girlfriend."

"Oh, yeah, right."

Chassie glared at her.

"Well, duh, I'm sorry," Kate said. "So sue me."

"What did you say?" Chassie asked Shelly.

"I said yes, of course. I mean, I've only been looking at this guy for two straight years and salivating. He's incredibly cute, plus he dresses well and he's got lots of friends, so you know he's got to be nice too."

"Wow," Chassie said. "You are such a lucky duck."

"And then," Shelly said, putting her face closer to theirs, "we kissed."

Kate sucked in her breath.

"And we French kissed!" Shelly sat back and crossed her arms.

Chassie stared at her with wide eyes. She knew it meant something. She thought she remembered a song about France that had to do with something dirty.

Kate started singing: "I see London, I see France. I see Chassie's underpants."

"Shut up," Chassie said. And then she remembered. "There's a place called France where the naked ladies dance. There's a hole in the wall so the men can see it all."

Kate started giggling. "I forgot that one."

Chassie laughed too at the thought of those naked women dancing around not knowing that there was a hole in the wall and men were staring at them.

Shelly leaned forward. "You guys don't know what French kissing is, do you?"

"Well, sort of—"

Shelly stuck her tongue out. "It's when you stick your tongues into each other's mouths and swish 'em around."

"G—r—oss!" Kate jumped up and ran to the doorway. "Gross, gross, gross." She held her hands out away from her as if they were contaminated.

Shelly laughed. Chassie stared at her, expressionless.

"So—" she tried to figure out exactly what it was she wanted to say. "So, he puts his tongue in your mouth?"

"Well mostly you just touch your tongues together, but once he did sort of stick his whole tongue in my mouth."

Kate squealed. "I am so grossed out!"

Chassie rolled her tongue around in her own mouth, trying to get used to the idea.

"Believe me," Shelly said. "someday you'll think it's a really great idea."

Kate ran out of the room.

There's a place called France.

When the rest of the class was still at Music, Chassis slipped into the empty room. From her desk, she took a piece of paper and pencil. She wrote: "I think you're cute. Do you know who I am?" She folded up the note and wrote "Craig ONLY" on the outside, underlining "ONLY" three times.

In the dark she reached under her shirt, pressed the note against each breast, kissed it, and then slipped it into his desk.

At 4:00 that day, Chassie approached the front door of Tara's house. Tara had become popular because her mother died when they were in the first grade. She would sit at music class and cry because her mother had played guitar. She cried in art class when asked to draw a picture of her family. She wept openly and loudly at Brownie meetings when there was an event that called for mother participation.

Her grief was fascinating and rare. It was almost like she was from another country. Everyone wanted to touch her. By second grade, she was the most popular girl in school. It was hard not to be jealous, even if you almost never wanted your mother to go away.

The door opened before Chassie reached it. The girls looked out at her with squinted stares.

"Come in," Tara said, sweeping her hand toward the hallway like someone in a movie.

"Hi," Chassie said and decided at the last minute that smiling was the wrong thing to do. They were serious.

"We'll be in the basement," Tara yelled to her babysitter.

Almost silently, they filed down the stairs, Tara in front. She stopped at the end of the stairs and they all nearly bumped into each other.

"Like this," Tara said. She reached out from the bottom step to the metal pole a few feet away, leaped up, and swung herself onto the carpet beyond the pole.

"We don't step on the floor," she said, as if it needed no further explanation. The other girls swung over to the carpet. Then Chassie. It was like trying to get the Presidential Achievement Award in gym. She wondered if she'd have to do the 600 yard dash next.

The three girls sat in a row on the carpet in front of Chassie. "First," Tara said, "tell us what you carry in your purse."

"I don't have it with me today," Chassie said. "I didn't think I'd need it."

Tara looked at the other girls significantly. "Tell us what would be in it if it were here."

"Lipgloss, a brush and rubber bands, my wallet," Chassie thought desperately of everything Shelly carried. She couldn't mention cigarettes. "And some gum," she added. "For after lunch."

They just looked at her. Chassie had no idea if that was adequate. She was trying to think of a way to produce a purse tomorrow at school.

"Oh!" Chassie added. "And a pad, in case it's one of, you know, those days."

The girls smiled.

"Laura," Tara said to one of the other girls, "turn on the music."

Laura walked across the room to a small record player. She moved the needle delicately onto the record. The Beatles came on, singing "I want to hold your hand."

"We need to see if you can dance," Laura said.

"Right now?"

"No, yesterday," Tara said, and the others snickered.

Chassie began to sort of shake side to side. She thought of Craig and got a soulful look on her face. Then she could really feel it. She closed her eyes, raised her arms out to the side and began to hop a little. She didn't want to look, but she was pretty sure she was doing a good job. Until there was a loud squeal.

Chassie stopped and opened her eyes. Tara jumped up and grabbed a ball of white fluff. "Ooh," she cooed to it. "Poor baby."

If Tara cried, Chassie thought, that was the end of it right there.

"Oh," Chassie said. "I'm sorry. Did I step on your cat?"

"It's okay, Pumpkin," Tara said to the cat.

Chassie, figuring that she'd blown it, picked up her coat and headed for the stairs.

"So what can you specifically bring to this club?" Tara asked.

Chassie stopped. She turned. She thought about the cigarettes in Shelly's purse. She thought about the Playboys under the bathroom sink. Then she remembered the samples Kim kept in the closet from when she was going to go into a career of selling make-up.

"Lipstick," Chassie said. "Rouge, eye shadow, and lipstick."

"Why don't you wait on the porch for a minute, okay?" Tara said.

It was cold on the porch, but Chassie stood there with her hands in her armpits and her shoulders hunched up close to her ears. She paced. She blew smoke in the cold air and tried to walk through it before it went away.

Then the door opened and Tara stuck her head toward the screen. She looked a lot like the guy at the door for the Emerald City, Chassie thought.

"Okay," Tara said. "You're in for now. Just don't do anything stupid. Meet us on the playground tomorrow, near the 4-square."

Chassie turned to walk away.

"And get a bra!" Tara yelled after her. All four girls laughed and the door swung closed.

"I need a bra," Chassie told her mother.

Her mother sighed, "Oh, honey, you don't want to get into all that already, do you? I mean, you've got all your life to be strapping yourself into bras and nylons, wearing make-up."

"I didn't say anything about make-up," Chassie said. "And I didn't say I wanted to wear a bra, I said I need one." She stuck her chest out.

"I think we can wait a little longer for that," her mother said, and went back to folding the laundry.

The next day, however, she changed her mind. Chassie, Kate, the baby, and their mother went to the Friend of the Court office for something about custody. Chassie wore a yellow polyester-knit turtleneck that snapped at the crotch so it was always tight. She kept her shoulders back.

At the building, she took off her jacket and stepped out of the car. Her mother hoisted the baby out of the car seat and looked over at Chassie, her breast buds pointing out in the cold, the pink nearly visible through the fabric.

"Whoah!" she said.

"What?" Chassie asked, twirling a silky piece of her long hair.

"You wait in the car," her mother told her. "After this appointment we're going to the K-Mart and get you a training bra."

Chassie walked Shelly to the corner like she did every night when her mother got home. This time, though, her tongue felt like a piece of fish in her mouth. Or maybe something grosser. When she and Kate were little, they used to touch the tips of their tongues together to seal a secret. The feeling was so weird, like touching someone's guts. It took a long time to get the taste out of her mouth.

Shelly grabbed her arm and stopped her. "Do you see something?"

Chassie looked down the street. "No."

"Oh," Shelly said, "I guess it was a cat. I thought there was a man out there."

"It's late. There's no one out here," Chassie said.

Shelly shook her head.

"What?"

Shelly was nearly whispering. "Sometimes men hide in the dark so they can jump out and get you."

"What? Are you kidding? Why would they do that?"

"So they can have their way with you."

They were silent for a while. Chassie looked all around. "But there's no one out here."

"Well, they'd be hiding. They wouldn't be out where you could see them. They'd be, like, behind that hedge, or behind a car or something. Waiting to rape you."

"Rape you! You mean—-"

Shelly nodded slowly. "That's right. Force you to go all the way."

"Geez, you could get pregnant," Chassie said. This was a girl who paid attention during that movie on human sexuality.

"Or you could get diseases," Shelly said. "Not to mention the fact of how much you'd disappoint your husband on your wedding night."

They approached the corner. "Wait a minute!" Chassie said. "You mean I'm walking you to the corner in the dark so that I can walk home alone? What if there's a man behind the hedge? Geez, Shelly."

Shelly laughed. "Don't be silly. They only want bigger girls. You have to be developed."

Suddenly Chassie felt her training bra itch her back

. "Watch until I go into the house," Shelly said. "See you later."

Chassie watched Shelly wave. Bye-bye. She turned around slowly and looked back down the street. The hedge was midway from the corner to her house. There were also four cars parked in driveways.

She stepped into the street and began walking. If she could get into the streetlight, she could see better. She brought her hands up into her shirt and pressed down on her breasts. They felt like they were in training to become something serious. It hurt to touch them. They were definitely not flat any more.

There was a movement. Probably just a cat, she told herself.

"Here kitty," she called weakly.

More movement. Chassie tried to stay calm, but then she dropped her hands and started running, crying out as loud as she could, "Here I come!" in case maybe she could scare him off, whoever he was.

Her mother opened the front door and flipped on the porch light. "What's going on?" she asked and Chassie threw herself at her mother, wrapping her arms around her waist and crying.

"I hate my body," she said. "I hate it!"

"Oh, baby. Because of these?" Her mother touched one of her breasts.

"Don't touch them!" Chassie screamed. "It hurts!"

"Okay, okay." Her mother took her into her own bedroom and laid her down on the queen-sized bed. She rubbed her arms and hands, told her not to breathe so fast, that everything was going to be all right.

Slowly, Chassie stopped crying and began hiccoughing. Her mother rubbed her shoulders and hummed to her, almost like when she was little.

"Whew!" her mother said. "I knew you were maturing early, but I didn't expect this."

"What?"

"Well this, I don't know, fit. It's the kind of thing that happens to teenagers."

Next day in school, Chassie swore all her new friends to secrecy and told them she had fits like the kind teenagers had. She didn't tell them about the rape thing though, since they weren't developed yet.

© Kristy Nielsen