But it wasn’t the bullying from my peers or the fact that I was barely learning anything that got mom to pull me from school the next year and begin to homeschool me and my sister. Mom had thrown a massive fit at a reference to evolution in a worksheet I had been sent home with, something that got the blood boiling for my creationist, flat-earther mother. But the school district wasn’t going to budge on teaching science, so she decided that she was going to do the schooling for us all by herself.
“You have everything you need?” my uncle asked.
I nodded, and followed him out the door, feeling truly hopeful for the first time in my life.
About fifteen minutes into the car ride, I finally worked up the courage to ask the question I had been holding in ever since we had gotten in the car. We hadn’t spoken since we’d left the hospital. I really didn’t know what to say, and they had respected my silence. My uncle was driving, but my aunt had taken a seat in the back with me, rather than riding in the passenger seat.
“Did you bring a Gameboy?” I asked.
“No, but I’ve got something much better,” she replied, reaching into her backpack and pulling out a Nintendo Switch.
I hadn’t even dared to suspect that I might be given one of these to play with. I held the device gingerly in my hands, so scared that I might break or drop it. Time flew by so quick on the car trip. I remained engrossed in the game system the entire time. My aunt just watched me play without saying anything, while my uncle surfed between talk radio stations as several ones went in and out of range.