Dear Ms. Feverfew –

My new neighbor has a daughter who is a junior this year in high school, just like you. I watch her coming home from school every day and wonder what it would be like to have you coming home to our house every day after piano/volleyball/English/math/science/life.

I watch Rachel interacting with her mom and wonder…would we be like that? What would our relationship have been like? Would you give me a hurried kiss on the cheek as you run upstairs to change before heading off to Young Women’s for the evening? Would I have to holler for you to come back downstairs and finish dinner before you left and ask you to please pick up your socks in the bathroom on your way back down?

So many what ifs, you know? Sometimes if feels so strange watching other girls your age. I have always done it and wondered…how much are you like others your same age? I would like to believe that you are brilliant, articulate, sociable, breathtakingly beautiful, ambitious, well-read, and most of all kind.

So tell me, what are you like at 16 years, three months, and one week old?

M.