Thirteen Read Online Free

making a big deal out of it would only egg her on. I picked up the photo she’d given me in exchange for the one of me as a babe. It was one of the goofy ones, with Cinnamon mugging for the camera and Dinah stretching her mouth out with her fingers. I lurched at an angle behind them, making a deranged, hairy-eyeball face.
    I imagined Cinnamon giving Lars this one and snort-giggled.
    â€œWhat?” Cinnamon said.
    â€œNothing,” I said.
    â€œSeriously. What ?” Cinnamon hated being left out of a joke.
    I shrugged. No way was I planting the idea in her head. It did make me realize, though, how thankful I should be that we had traded. It was a nugget of unexpected good.
    â€œJust…you know,” I said. “Thinking about oysters.”
    â€œ Oysters ?” Cinnamon repeated.
    Dinah abruptly sat up. “Winnie, please tell me you don’t have an oyster hidden somewhere.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” Cinnamon demanded. “Did anyone bring up oysters? No, I don’t think so. Oysters are not a part of this conversation!”
    I laughed.
    â€œOysters, be gone!” she cried.
    â€œTell me right now there are no oysters lurking about,” Dinah said. “I mean it.”
    â€œNo oysters, I promise. Only symbolic oysters.”
    â€œ Symbolic oysters?” Cinnamon said.
    â€œYep,” I said grandly. I rolled onto my back and gazed at the ceiling. “And in every symbolic oyster is a symbolic pearl.”
    Cinnamon groaned, which only added to my pleasure. The carpet was nubbly against my skin, and I realized that the lingering sadness I’d felt at the mall was no longer present. Instead I felt expansive and happy.
    Yes, there is both good and bad in the world, and more often than not, they’re mixed together. At least, that’s how it seems to me. But it’s the oyster thing again, because maybe the trick is to find the good part and pull it out and say, “There! See?”
    I could do that. I could do anything.
    I was thirteen.

April
    I WANTED LARS. I did. I wanted him. Not in a hot-and-heavy “let’s make out” sort of way, because that was not within the realm of possibility at this juncture of my life. (“Juncture.” I loved it. I loved finding words like that and tossing them about, even if just in my own mind. “Flotsam and jetsam.” “Indubitably.” “Segue,” with that lovely “ way ” sound at the end, despite the deceptive spelling.)
    No, I didn’t want to make out with Lars—yet. I just wanted to own him, to have him be mine. I wanted him the way I wanted a new bike when I was younger, or the Easy-Bake Oven.
    I kept waiting for something to happen between us, for us to at least hold hands again, but somehow the world had yet to throw us into that perfect situation where hand-holding would be the only possible response.
    It made me feel desperate, how much I ached for him. I’d have daydreams about him, stupid stuff like him finding me at my locker and putting his hands over my eyes, then leaning close and murmuring “Hey there” into my ear. Or—and this one was kind of embarrassing—I had this one fantasy that I’d fall asleep on one of the benches out on the quad (because I did sometimes curl up on them for a quickie little snooze), and he’d find me and think how cute I looked. Or not cute , but pretty. And maybe I’d be wearing a miniskirt, and I wouldn’t be indecent or anything, but he’d notice that I had nice legs. He’d say, “Wake up, sleepyhead,” and I would. I’d be all flustered and drowsy-eyed, and he’d grin like he found me so incredibly charming.
    My daydreams made me feel lame, though, because I was sure he didn’t think about me as much as I thought about him. Well, fairly sure. I hoped he did, but I also knew that boys were different creatures than girls, as evidenced by my dear,