ORIGINS OF UNC

The smallest glasses in the house belonged to the adults.

They were too short for water and too narrow for milk. Angela had seen her mother pour amber-colored liquid into them whenever company came over. The adults lifted the glasses, touched their rims together and swallowed everything at once.

Sometimes they laughed afterward.

Sometimes they closed their eyes.

Sometimes they made the same face Angela made when cough medicine reached the back of her throat.

One Saturday morning, while her parents were still asleep, Angela pulled a chair against the kitchen counter and climbed onto it. She removed one of the little glasses from the cabinet and filled it with apple juice.

She held it toward the window.

The sunlight made the juice look almost like what the adults drank.

Angela raised the glass.

“To company,” she whispered.

She swallowed the juice in one gulp.

It tasted the same as it did from an ordinary cup, but the little glass made her feel older.

She returned it to the cabinet before anyone woke.

From the outside, Angela’s family looked like the kind people trusted.