In her own way, she always wanted attention. Perhaps it’s because she was the middle child of her family. Her mother would take her out shopping when she was younger and every time her mother became distracted she would run away and hide in the clothing racks. She remembered watching her mother begin to panic and frantically search for her little girl, becoming more alarmed with each passing minute and eventually calling for help from the store employees. She would hide until her mother was on the brink of tears and only then would she emerge, smiling and innocent looking, having the pride of winning another hide and seek game her mother never knew about.



Vanity liked winning. Her definition of winning, however, was much different from that of many of her teammates. Although there were other girls who played sports, many weren’t as aggressive or skilled. The boys would often acknowledge Vanity’s gender and openly criticize her skill for it. She hated sexism—introduced to it at a young age, it took all of her energy to maintain her polite demeanor and “be the better person.” She knew, by doing this, she was betraying herself and accepting her environment.



Vanity, even at five years old, felt accomplished if she kicked the opposing team’s best player hard enough in the shins to send them out of the game. She felt especially proud when they had to be carried off the field by their coach and were crying. Vanity was not an angry little girl though; this was just how she played. When it came to competition, she fought hard. She wanted to be the best. She often played football or tag with her old brother and his friends and she felt special as the only female.



Occasionally some boy from the neighborhood would, like her teammates, criticize her for being a girl and tease her for not being able to keep up. There was one specific occasion, when she was six years old, and a boy, Justin, decided he didn’t liked her playing with the boys. He would purposely shove her and knock her over to demonstrate her physical weakness, and in so he would laugh. Vanity felt hurt that the other boys wouldn’t help her. It was only then, she learned, that no matter how mean they were to a girl, boys would stick together instead of helping a girl out. Boys stuck together and girls stuck together.



Justin pushed Vanity over one last time, hard, and once she fell to the ground and watched him laugh as he started at her brushing the dirt off herself she tried hard not to cry. Instead she rose and ran over and tackled him. Once he was on the ground she climbed on top of him and started punching his face over and over again, and only once his nose start to bleed did she alternate between scratching and punching. All the boys watched her fight and she didn’t stop hitting him until the front door opened and Justin’s mother called out too see what the raucous was.



Vanity ran home and hid under her bed until her mother found her about an hour after. While hiding under her bed, Vanity felt both scared and excited for what she’d just done. At six years old, she knew what she’d done was wrong but she felt such a rush. She justified her actions with the misogyny, however, and she felt proud that she and only she had so well defended herself. The boy deserved it. Justin was in no way better than she, and the fact that he was nine and had a ***** did not justify the way he treated her. Vanity liked to fight. She liked to keep up with the boys and beat them at their games. She couldn’t always run faster, but she could hit and tackle and was not afraid of body contact.