I was ecstatic. Sloane should have listened to me the whole time! I got dressed for school, had a bowl of Lucky Charms in celebration of my personal victory, and brushed my teeth.

My father said he'd be outside warming up the car. You never knew which car this was because we had about ten in our driveway. My father fancied himself a used car dealer, but as I understood it, "dealing" meant buying and then selling. Cars would pile up in our driveway for years at a time, and on most mornings my father would have to jump-start one or more to get us to school. Each car was more embarrassing than the next and none were made in the decade in which we lived.

I went outside and jumped into the car that was smoking, which was a fluorescent turquoise Plymouth something or other with vinyl interior. I was flying so high from my victory, I decided to compliment him on the car.

"I love this color, Dad."

My firm yet supple seven-year-old ass had hardly touched the vinyl when my own father sucker-slapped me. Right on my nose. I was in pure, titillated horror. I couldn't even respond with words. I thought for sure my nose was broken, but then the tingling sensation died-just when I was starting to enjoy it.

"You thought you were gonna get away without a smack, didn't you?" he said.

I instantly broke down and cried like a little girl. I knew, of course that I was a little girl, but I did not like acting like one. And I was both hurt and angry at having to drive to school with someone who just smacked me. I felt like such a moron for thinking I could outsmart my father with some lame compliment about his piece-of-shit car. This was definitely a feeling I didn't like then, or the hundreds of times I've felt it since.

I didn't say anything the whole ride. When we reached the school, I got out and slammed the door. He drove away with some sort of car part scraping the sidewalk, possibly the muffler.