\u201cMy girls just light up the room,\u201d my mother used to say proudly.<\/p>\n
She wasn\u2019t wrong. Rooms did seem to glow around them. They glowed so brightly, in fact, that shadows like me disappeared entirely.<\/p>\n
I was the opposite of them\u2014quiet, observant, a girl who preferred reading case studies over attending slumber parties, who asked for library cards instead of hair curlers. My seriousness was treated as a flaw, something that disrupted the Monroe family\u2019s glossy image.<\/p>\n
\u201cAva is just\u2026 intense,\u201d my mother would say with a stiff smile, as though my existence required an apology.<\/p>\n
I learned early that in our house, brightness was currency, and I did not possess the right kind.<\/p>\n
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