I am not like other girls. 

Not in the way that rejects femininity, or sameness, or pop culture, or the sisterhood of womanness, but in the way where … I think I may be weird. Like, really fucking weird. 

Some could call it “mental illness,” but I don’t subscribe to the idea that weirdness is a sickness we must  rid ourselves of. 

I am not like other girls. I am weird. I have always suspected this. 

It was confirmed for the first time when I was eight, bare-legged on the schoolyard blacktop, bony baby knees nestled within the circle of my peers. Me and Franny and Mary, we did what any gaggle of girls would do at recess: giggle and gossip, plait each other’s hair, blush and squeal about them, glorious, beautiful them—our crushes. 

Franny would squeak—Tommy! He pulled my hair during math. Oh, what I would do to hold his strong hands!—and we would clap and cheer. 

Katie, her hair smells like strawberries! Mary would swoon, and we would sigh, dramatically clutch our chests and collapse to the pavement as we imitated Mary, lovesick off the scent of berries. 

Each of us had our fantasies. I, of course, had one, but I am not like other girls. I am weird. Always have been. 

Johnny was my crush. It was carnal. I craved him like I craved chocolate milk in the mornings, I needed him the way I needed my pillow in the evenings, shoved between my thighs as I’d erratically and nonsensically hump its corner. 

I told the girls this. Johnny had blackberries and broccoli for lunch today. There were seeds all in this mouth. I yelped emphatically, I wanted to suck them out of his teeth! 

There was no giggling or swooning or squeaking at this revelation. This was weird. I am weird. 

After a bewildered exchange of glances, Franny and Mary ran away, leaving me to cook on the hot asphalt on my lonesome—before I could even tell them the rest! 

There were only so many seeds I could lick from the crevices of Johnny’s enamel, the grooves of his tongue. Logically, he had to have swallowed some. 

I longed to see them again, the seeds that had graced his lips, passed through his throat and bowels. I got hotter at the thought, my crotch ached as I rocked against the seam of my shorts, the rough of the pavement. 

I am not like other girls. I am weird. 

I wanted to dissect his waste, search for the seeds in his excrement, for my hands to get sticky and fingernails browned as I dug through his shit, like the pellets of owl dung we dissected in our science class. I was desperate for it. I wanted to collect the seeds in my reusable Ziploc, put them on my nightstand. I wouldn’t wash my hands. 

I called after them, Franny and Mary, as they scurried away—Imagine how many seeds are in Johnny’s poop!