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Red, blue, yellow, green. Never brown. Never enough. Four wax stubs in a paper sleeve and a placemat with a maze you could solve in eight seconds.

The cursor would stop moving sideways. Or up. It would only go diagonal. You'd flip the mouse over, twist the little ring, and a small rubber-coated ball would fall out onto your palm, slightly warm, slightly sticky, exactly as expected.

Folded out of notebook paper by the only kid in class who could fold one. Eight fortunes written in blue ballpoint pen. You picked a color, you picked a number, you picked a number, you learned you were going to marry Brian.

You pulled the cap off, pointed the nozzle at a Ritz, and pulled the trigger. What came out was the color of a highway sign and the texture of toothpaste, and you ate it without ever once asking how cheese got into an aerosol can.

A whole house, a swimming pool, a piano, four rooms and a swing, all sealed inside a heart that snapped shut with a click. The Polly herself was the size of an aspirin and gone within a week.

Six cookies, a thumb-sized puddle of frosting, and the daily lunchroom test of whether you could pace yourself or not.