Everything I knew about life as a first-grader could be summed up with the words “first” and “grade”. I’d been near schools before, sure, turning boys into men with a wiggle and a smile while staking out a target, usually one of the teachers, but I don’t think I’d ever been inside a classroom full of kids too young to be interested in playing hide-the-sausage, and definitely not as one of those kids.

What did they do in there all day? And how? I was pretty sure things were still pretty structured in this era, with a strict hierarchy that I was going to be at the bottom of, but what about between kids in the same class? I didn’t have a clue, and my Power-provided memories didn’t supply one. I was going into the jungle, and I needed a native guide.

Shit. I needed a friend. I needed to make friends with a little girl, right away. Damn, this life was going to be elephants all the way down.

After my own quick smoke-removal session in the shower, it was time to gear up.

Sturdy black leather shoes, check. White socks, check. Navy blue wool skirt well below the knee, check. Crisp white cotton blouse, buttoned all the way up, check. Matching wool blazer, check. Jaunty little uniform cap and row of medals, missing in action. Did they give out medals in grade school, or would I have to make my own to complete the effect?

Yes, I was a girl in uniform, and I hated everything about it. Well, I could do some damage with the shoes, and the skirt and blazer had actual pockets big enough to hide some useful contraband, which was a huge change from my usual barely-there fashions. It just seemed a bit too dark and formal to me; didn’t little girls usually wear colorful dresses? I definitely owned some. Hell, Sally was rocking a floral-print number that showed enough leg to stop traffic, while my getup made me feel like I should be directing traffic, or handing out parking tickets or something. Give me a whistle and a badge, and I could be the shortest policewoman in town.

Instead, I was accessorizing with a cherry-red plastic coin purse, a large plaid lunchbox, and three brand-new pencils. Oh, yeah, bring it on, world! Virgin V. White, reporting for duty!

After discovering that I actually could put away a multi-thousand-calorie breakfast, I had another chance for recon. I was going to need some leverage with Dear Aunt Sally, so when she went in to take a shower, I quickly tossed her bedroom.

An unlabeled box shoved way under the bed looked promising, and whoa Nellie, look at the size of this thing! For fuck’s sake, did it run on steam? This was the state of the art in 1950s lonely-woman satisfaction-makers? Damn, if I were old enough to take it for a spin, I’d be scared it’d spin me. I put it back and retreated.

I’d struck gold. All Work And No Sex Makes Sally V-v-v-v-v-v-vibrate.

Getting her laid would take a bit of work, but I was sure it would pay off. The thing people in more libertine eras don’t get is that they didn’t invent sex, they just got to show off more. Great-great-grandma could work her tongue like you wouldn’t believe, but only maybe two men and four women ever found out about it, because people would talk. Sally couldn’t pick up a nice junior executive in a bar and bring him home for the night, because what would the neighbors say?

Hell, she’d be scared that I’d tell on her, and I couldn’t possibly explain that I’d fucked more men than she had brain cells.

Wait, how could she stay thin eating like this every day? Was “Aunt” Sally a plant, part of the setup for whatever game the Old Man was running on me? Was she one of us, a different model of Muse for a different kind of job? Was her just-in-time arrival to save the day part of their plan? Was I being given enough rope to hang myself out to dry or however that goes?

Or was she just a cheerfully hyperactive over-achiever who couldn’t stay still for more than two minutes at a time, who’d woken up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and raring to go on this Most Important Day? It was possible I was over-thinking this. I had a long history of not trusting other women, after all, even if I was usually the one engaged in pre-emptive back-stabbing.

I tentatively gave my new Cooking Mama the benefit of the doubt and focused on the good news: setting myself on fire had completely ruined my PJs, and I was determined that our after-school shopping trip would include finding a replacement without feet and a back-flap. Baby steps.

Aunt Sally’s idea of breakfast put more calories on my plate than I had in my left arm. I mean, whipped cream and butter and jam and waffles and bacon and eggs and toast and she looked like she was waiting for me to order seconds. She probably wouldn’t even recognize tofu as a fucking word, and if she’d ever made a green salad in her life, I was willing to bet she’d used bacon grease for the dressing.

I tried not to look disgusted as I took my first bite.

(!!!!!)

Ohmygod why didn’t anyone ever tell me about this stuff? Did little kids have completely different taste buds? Was this some kind of bizarro mirror universe where saturated fats were awesome or had my old body just been broken? I cleaned my plate and ordered seconds; I had no idea where I was going to put it, and I didn’t care.

I mean, I’d always loved eating, and I could navigate the menu of a five-star restaurant in 12 languages and 37 entirely different civilizations, but while I’d picked up plenty of men in diners, I’d never actually tried the food.

How could she eat like this and be so thin?!?

I did not set the kitchen on fire.

Okay, maybe a little, but running around in circles screaming at the top of my little lungs was better than a smoke alarm, and a freshly-awoken Aunt Sally was sufficiently coherent to put me out first, before rescuing the stovetop from permanent damage and the fruit basket from, no, that was a total loss.

I got my first look at my new Adult Supervision through tear-and-smoke-stained glasses, and she was pretty much what I’d expected: young, blonde, perky, responsible. Respectably hot, too, despite the unflattering nightgown, housecoat, and hair curlers. If my little kitchen mishap had gotten out of control, the firemen would have fought over the right to carry her to safety and check her out for injuries. I’d pulled that stunt a few times myself, without the curlers. Or the housecoat. Or the nightgown.

I didn’t even have to try to babble out an explanation. She automatically assumed that I was a complete darling who’d just been trying her very best to be helpful and loving and show how much she appreciated her new life with her new family and dear god I wanted to smack her. It was like she’d stepped right out of a glossy magazine article titled How To Be The Perfect Young Mother In Our Modern Age.

Fortunately I’d put everything back in her purse before my ill-advised attempt at cooking with gas. No point tipping her off too soon.

First up, money-money-money, where did Aunt Sally get her money? We’re living in the burbs, so she’s not rich or powerful enough to just break the rules, and if she had a sugar daddy, I’d have found some trace of him. Just because they don’t actually spray doesn’t mean human males don’t mark their territory. More to the point, unless he was a perv or had a death-wish, he wouldn’t want me around screwing up the screwing, so no, there was nobody paying for the privilege of being called “Daddy” by either of us.

Come on, Powers, throw me a bone here, and not the usual kind. “Sally Sanders Is A what?” Nurse, teacher, secretary, what? It couldn’t be something with weird hours or lots of travel, or something fun-but-disreputable like an actress, dancer, or model, because she’d managed to convince the local powers that she could be trusted to raise a kid on her own. She might have the only six-year-old in town who knew how to drive a truck, shoot a pistol, ride an elephant, and pull a train (eventually), but the law and the neighbors were going to expect her to wash me, feed me, dress me, kiss my boo-boos, and walk me to school. School?!

Aw, shit; today was my first day of school, and I was gonna be the Fucking New Kid. Thanks, new memories, that was just what I needed to learn right now. Well, I wasn’t showing up with a goddamn slice of toast in my mouth, so I set out to see what we had that I could turn into The Most Important Meal Of The Day.

No sign of a man, or any other house pets. Also no hint of cigarettes or booze, unless Aunt Sally had a clever hiding place a six-year-old couldn’t reach. Not that I wanted either; cigars had their suggestive uses and a good pipe tobacco was practically potpourri, but cigarettes were vile things useful only as props, and at my current size one drink would put me under the floor. Linoleum and wall-to-wall carpet, by the way, in patterns I didn’t want to see in daylight.

The jazzy-looking wall clock said it was just after 5 AM, so even if Sally was a morning person, I had plenty of time to go through her purse. My last visit to an America had been about sixty years down the road, so at first glance I thought we must be pretty broke, but then some of my new memories met up with my old ones. Everything was cheap these days, and the dollar was still almighty, and a suburban housewife couldn’t even get credit cards in her own name.

Hang on. All evidence pointed to it being just me and Sally in the house. No man’s coats in the closet, no pictures of an absent or dearly-departed hubby, no pictures of family at all, which was downright peculiar for the era. We had a nice house, a car in the driveway, a decent amount of cash, and no man; how did Sally support us in a way that didn’t shock the neighbors, and how did she manage to pull off a solo adoption of Yours Truly? What had the Old Man set me up with?

I needed more memories.