I nodded.

She started writing on another scrap of paper. It took her most of the class to write a few short lines. Five minutes before the bell rang she handed me one more note:

The sun is a star, we know

but there are too-bright days

days when someone you love leaves you for good

days when the tiniest bodies have the biggest hurt

when the sun shines full

and you want to ask

how dare you.

It wasn’t until Talia handed me a crumpled paper towel from her backpack that I realized I was crying.

My Body Versus Me

Sometimes I wonder if I would be a different person if my body were different. Sometimes I’m not sure what is my body and what is really, truly me. I mean, when you’re missing a chromosome, does that only change your body, or does it change who you really are? If I had a complete set of chromosomes, I know I would look a little different. Less odd, maybe. (No more FrankenChin.) I’d likely be able to have kids of my own one day. Would I still get obsessed about contests I’m not ready for? Probably. Would it be easier for me to talk to a friend whose grandma died, and would I be better at doing math homework in the hospital? Probably not.

I don’t really know. I don’t have all my chromosomes. All I have is me.

Home Is Where the Heart Is

During class on a gray-blue day my mom texted me a picture.

Usually I was a good student, and kept my phone off and put away like I was supposed to. But somehow, the week after baby Cecilia’s heart surgery, that didn’t seem to really matter.

The picture mattered.

It was a picture of Nonny, and she was holding the baby.

For the first time.

When I got to the hospital after school that day, she was still holding her. She was sitting in a chair by the window, the tiny little body pressed up against her shoulder, head resting against her neck. Exactly like the picture. Like she hadn’t moved.

I came into the room, and everyone was talking softly and moving slowly, like we were at church. I sat on the edge of the bed and looked at the baby.

It was stunning how different she looked outside of that glass box.

We sat there for a second, all of us looking down at that tiny person. She really was so tiny. Her fingers made tiny fists, and she kept scraping her nails along Nonny’s shoulder, but Nonny didn’t flinch. Normally baby Cecilia had little mittens over her hands so she wouldn’t scratch herself inside that box, but at the moment she was wrapped in a blanket, pressed close against her mom.

Nonny looked at me, and said, “Would you like to hold her?”

For a second I couldn’t answer. Should I hold her? I’d messed things up already. Who was to say I wouldn’t mess them up again, and even worse?