Let’s see.

(See isn't with me, by the way. I’m talking about the beagle here, not the indefinite article. He’s a good boy. I hope he's safe back at home.) 

I am, as you must have a fair idea already, by nature studious. Inquisitive. Curious. I like gathering facts.

For instance, did you know that the planet Jupiter has the largest moon in the solar system, which is nearly half the size of Earth?

But let’s not talk of moons. Marra won’t like it if he were here.

Because, you know.

(The moon's called Ganymede, just for your info.)

Second instance of my fact-memorization: did you know Aar has a mole on his lower back and he’s highly embarrassed of it?

Well, he does.

His mother let it slip when my family was over for Thanksgiving last to last year. What’s even better is that he doesn’t know I know. Shush, don’t tell him, either. Might use it as leverage if we ever meet again and I need to extort something from him.

No harm hoping, is there?

I like to think that generally I’m a rather rational person. At least when I’m not busy being stupid.

As for my looks, my most distinctive feature is, I would say, my hair. I hope Mar and Aar didn’t mess with you on that front, too.

I have copper-red hair. They’re always kind of messy and draggled, no matter what conditioner I apply.

Just to be clear, my hair used to be fan-tas-tic when I was a toddler. As you probably know, me and Aar have been friends for as far back as my memory goes. And I have a strong memory. I remember when baby Aar first saw baby me, he tentatively touched my fan-tas-tic hair with his baby hand and then pretended his baby hand had been scorched by flames.

Get it? Because my hair is flaming red. So it looks like my head is on fire, twenty-four-seven.

It kind of became a running joke, even, in prep school. Aar was the ringleader, of course, ever the class clown. Every tiny classmate started pretending like I was a walking, talking skyscraper with the top floor on fire. The joke got so out of hand at one point that I hurled my hardback Mother Goose nursery rhyme-book at him, hitting him square on the nose (Bull’s-eye!) and making him fall flat on his back in front of the entire class. Then I stood over him, one leg on either side of his stomach, picked up the book, opened it up like an alligator’s jaw, and made him promise he wouldn’t make fun of my hair ever again or the book-jaws will clamp down on his comically red nose.

Don’t look at me like that, we were so wee!

I got into trouble with the teachers later for this, however much trouble kids like me can get into. Took me a while to get back into their good books.

Totally worth it.

Baby Aar apologized, and persuaded others to stop the gag as well. I have a lucid memory of him holding both his ears and going 'I'm sowwy'.

I swear, he used to be such an adorable dinky. Where, oh, where did that child vanish? I’d go back in time to pinch his cheeks if I could.

That was when I think we truly became friends.

What can I say? I like peeps who can apologize and set things right.

Even though it's because I threatened to chop their noses off.

I wish I could show you some photographs of me and Aar in primary school, but, alas, they’re in an album, and the album is at home, and home is far. Life was so good back then, all about rock-paper-scissors and peek-a-boo, and we didn’t even know we were living the golden days of our life. I guess one never does.

But little did my little self know that my mother had been using this weird local shampoo on my scalp continuously for years, which had parabens in it, can you believe it?

Parabens are basically organic chemicals that are present in every other cosmetic product out there, in case you don’t know, and I'm allergic to them. Even in the form of pharmaceuticals I can’t take parabens, or I throw up. And trust me when I say, the vomit is not of a good shade.

So yes, eventually my hair became the way it is. Rough and gross. Thanks for that, Mom.

(That's sarcasm, just so you know. Pfft, and Aar says I have no sense of humor.)

Fortunately, it never lost its true color, not a driblet. Once a redhead, always a redhead. Unless you use dye, of course. Which I don’t. And won’t.

Natural is best. Period.

(Did Aar mention I’m interested in anthropology and botany? Did Mar? Didn’t think so.)

There’s this one nasty incident relating to my hair that occurred in middle-school, which I think you’ll find quite amusing. Honestly, I could have skipped so many grades, even my teachers believed that. But my parents were like ‘No, Bee, school life doesn’t happen twice.’

Yeah, right. As if I’d want it to happen twice.

Anyway, so the synopsis of the 'amusing' incident is basically this: there was a test. GABA (I’m presuming you've heard praises of the Great And Big Abomination; he’s basically one of those mindless bullies you can find anywhere on the internet if you stay on it for long enough) wanted to cheat from me. Naturally. He tsk-ed me, nudged me, called me names. I ignored him, and when it got out of hand, I complained to the arbiter teacher. I topped the exam. Gaba got an F. F for “Forgetful Ferret”.

Notice the alliteration? And Mar says he can write poetry.

Later that week, when I was walking home from school, Gaba and a few of his jocks upended a bucket of icy-chill water over my head. One of the Gabocks (Gaba plus jocks) said, sniggering: ‘Oops. Apologies from the fire department. Mistook your hair for a house fire.’

Then they ran away, proud and smug in their stride as though they had received the Nobel Prize.

I guess you must know that particular jock. He’s the big, fat one. (They’re all big, but you know.) He was there when Aar first saw Marra die in that alleyway. I'm glad I wasn't there. He was also there when we scared the Gabocks to death using “borrowed” school theatre props, courtesy of Aar. Uff, that had been fun.

The jock's name is, let’s say, Arbo.

Some incidents just stick with you. You can take my word for that, because you obviously know the crazy things I’ve seen.

I don’t mind admitting I laughed like a hyena walking the plank when Arbo bounced around on his blubber-belly, thinking Mar's ghost had come for revenge.

Gosh. Bullying others can make you so vulnerable.

I mean, why else would any twelve-year-old actually believe a vengeful he-was-my-classmate specter had come to get them?

Unless you’re watching the Blaire Witch Project. Or the Babadook. Then you believe in the supernatural. Then you believe in anything.

Anyway, so there I stood in the middle of the street, feeling damp and cold and small. On the verge of tears, but I held them in. In fact, the only time I’ve ever truly cried other than when I was a toddler is when I accidentally "killed" Marra's Dad and when I was locked in that cage back at the Witches' fort in Lakoswanion with Aar and See.

Another long story. You should know if you’re here.

Thankfully, a neighborhood family of good Samaritans gave me a ride home in their car. The next day my parents filed a complaint against Gaba and Arbo and the other jocks and they served a loose detention, claiming it had all been an “innocent misunderstanding”.

If you’re listening/reading, Arbo (if you can read, that is) . . . I don’t like you very much.

Then again, it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m going to break once again now, cry for the fourth-ish time in my life, not counting infancy or the time I broke my arm on a swing. There’s no way I’m getting out of this jam alive.

I just hope my friends, wherever they are, do.