Outrageously Yours

“I’m not sensitive about it anymore,” she assured her friend. The word didn’t cause her pain. Maybe a pinch but that was all. “I know I’m not smart. I’ve taken enough tests to prove it.”

“That’s not true.” Kim’s tone was firm. “Those tests don’t tell the whole story.”

She still remembered the battery of tests she’d had to take as a teen at the neuropsychologist’s office. It had been exhausting, as if the tests had sucked out everything from her brain. It wasn’t at all like the standardized tests she had struggled with at school.

But what she remembered the most was the outrage her parents had displayed when they were given the results. Not only had it turned out that she had several learning disabilities, but she had also scored below average on the IQ test. Her parents refused to believe it.

“It takes smarts to overcome those obstacles,” Kim insisted. “It takes smarts to make something out of yourself. To be a business owner.”

“To hide my low IQ score,” Claire added. Her parents had insisted that the family hide the results. They didn’t tell the school, doctors and relatives about anything, even the learning disabilities. Claire had agreed. She didn’t want anyone to know that she was flawed and defective. Different.

Her parents had believed the tests were wrong and went to another expert and then another until they finally decided to abandon the pursuit for answers. They hadn’t liked what they had heard. In their opinion, Claire just needed to apply herself and work harder.

“They are your parents and I’m sure you love them, but they were wrong in how they handled the situation,” Kim said in a grumble.

“They thought it reflected badly on them.” That something was wrong with them and it had transferred to their child. They couldn’t have that. Her parents were considered geniuses in their field. Their computer programming careers and their identities were based entirely on their intelligence.