I used to place Ken’s hand right on the mound of Barbie’s breast. It fit, almost precisely, as if the rounded palm was created for this small act of intimacy. Of course, further south it was merely a place where two legs connected, a smooth sweep of plastic that neither confirmed nor betrayed pleasure. But that didn’t stop me from imagining. I used to sit on the floor between the two twin beds in the upstairs bedroom at my grandmother’s house.

I.

It wasn’t cool to like the Backstreet Boys while attending high school in the late 1990s, and this may still be true today.

But I wasn’t cool. I didn’t care to get jiggy with it or weep to “Candle in the Wind.” The odes to drugs from Third Eye Blind and Marcy Playground were boring. I didn’t give any real shits about Lilith Fair’s tepid lineup, though I still went, quietly rolling my eyes through “Adia” by Sarah McLaughlin.

One of the fascinating things to me about human sexuality is how it is pretty much imprinted on us at birth. Our choices that define the spectrum of our sexuality are set long before we have any idea of what sex or sexuality mean.