Start at the beginning

When I was 9, my neighbor Daniel kissed me. It was like everything else related to childhood -- awkward, sloppy, and completely innocent.

At least that's what I thought, until the next time, when he made me go down on him.

Daniel was four years older than me. I'd recently started playing with him more than my other friends, because Daniel and his buddies didn't mind a blossoming tomboy playing football with them. But I'd heard my parents arguing about it -- my mom didn't think it was such a good idea for her little girl to be playing with a bunch of 13-year-old boys, and my dad didn't see anything wrong with it.

None of this went through my head as Daniel pushed me to my knees. I nervously did what he told me to do. After an eternity, when he finally pulled me to my feet, he was smiling.

"So you are a girl, after all," he said. And then I threw up all over him.

I didn't play football with Daniel and his friends after that. Instead, I went back to playing dolls with Jessie and Katie. And Mom and Dad no longer argued, but hypothesized in hushed voices about what could have happened to produce my sudden change of heart.