ABCD, LGBT

"A, B, C, D," the teacher said to her group of kids. Their necks bent back, faces up, jaws open. "Let's start with A." She pointed to an apple.

"A," the young students repeated—all except one.

Jamie's brows furrowed. She didn't understand. How could everyone look at a picture of an apple and think, "A"? Apple didn't mean "A." It meant apple.

The teacher was wrong.

Jamie thrust her hand into the air. Five pink, little digits waved above a sea scruffy heads.

"Mrs. Max," Jamie said. "'Apple' doesn't mean 'A.' It means apple."

Mrs. Max kept her pointer on the red fruit.

"You're right." she said to Jamie. "That's exactly what we're looking at. An apple."

Jamie pursed her lips in satisfaction.

"But let's say you were to spell 'apple,'" Mrs. Max continued. "How would you start?"

"I don't know how to spell 'apple.' I'm just in kindergarten."

The brave ones laughed.

"I know," Mrs. Max chuckled. "I'm not asking for the whole word. Just the first letter. What would that be?"

Jamie mouthed the word to herself, her lip hanging down. "A," she eked out.

Mrs. Max nodded. "Very good."

Jamie completed the exercise, but she wasn't convinced. There was more to "A" than apple. She was sure of it. She just had to find a way to prove it.

That opportunity didn't come until 10 years later. When Jamie learned that A could mean Anna. Yes, A could definitely mean Anna. The way she tapped her nose with her finger when she was thinking. The way she smelled like the pavement she hit with her skateboard. If A was apple, then A was Anna, too. A was all of that.

But what was Jamie?

She searched the only place in the world with all of the answers—right, wrong, and in-between. The Internet.

She was presented with a new alphabet. This was one they definitely didn't teach in school.

"L, G, B, T," the website told her. Jamie's neck was bent back, face lit up by the screen, jaw open.

Here was an alphabet she understood off the bat. L, G, B, T, Q, A... and on. Still being developed. Open for questioning. Able to be applied as you felt fit for yourself.

How much simpler life could've been if she'd known this alphabet back when she learned her first one.

"A" would mean much more than apple. It would be asexual. And always. And Anna.

"Always Anna," Jamie thought, mouthing the letters to herself, her lip hanging down.

"Let's start with L," the website said. "Lesbian."