Coming home everyday to see your mother with dyed blonde hair and brown eyes, your cynical older sister whose a wavy redhead with brown eyes, and annoying little sister with red hair and brown eyes and freckles on her face, isn't something to be proud of. I'm the middle child with red head and blue eyes. Thanks to our mother's genes, we all look like Ariel, Anna from Frozen and Pippi Longstocking. What about our dad's genes, you ask? I inherited his height, being tall. It's one of the reasons why Lisa wears heels all the time.
I heard the sound of my little sister, Abigail, running up the stairs into my shared room with Lisa. "Mom said, you have to drop me off at school today." I sighed and nodded. Our relationship with Abigail is pretty much mutual. We don't argue as much as I do with Lisa perhaps it's because she never had a father figure in her life at all.
"Please don't embarrass me like Lisa does." She said as we walked down the stairs together. We walked down to the car. As I threw our stuff in the seat beside me, she got in the car herself.
Abigail asked, "Lisa's not driving with us?" as i backed out of the driveway. "She is." I replied, moving our stuff to the back where Abigail was. 5 minutes later, Lisa entered the car, talking on her cellphone and holding her things in the other hand.
We drove in silence until Abigail arrived at school. "Have a good day at school." I called out to her as I handed her backpack through the window. "You sound like mom!" She yelled back at me. I laughed.
It took us two minutes to get our high school from her elementary school. We both got out of the car at the same time to be greeted with a football bouncing past us. "It's the redhead twins!" a jock called out. Lisa and I rolled our eyes at the same time. I picked up and the football as my older sister muttered a shut up. She quickly stormed off as I followed her into the school. This is a total downfall of having you and your siblings inherit the same parent's genes.
Lisa disappeared by the time I reached to world I am known as Lisa the second. Being called a "redhead" isn't the main problem, but being mistaken for Lisa is. I walked up the flight of stairs that lead to my locker and the my least favorite class titled AP Biology. As I shut my locker, a dark haired boy whom I recognized from my first period class, leaned against the lockers and frantically asked, "Did you study for the test?" At first, I was confused what he meant by the test "The genetics test?" I groaned and banged my head against my now closed locker. "Judging by that reaction, I guess not." He replied walking away suddenly. I followed him into our class to see everyone studying as well. Some where quizzing each other, others were writing some answers on their hands, and some were even devising a plan to copy off each other. I sat down, hoping I paid attention during his class in the last few weeks. I prayed he would forget about the test.
"Good morning, class." My teacher, Mr. Simons said as he wrote Test Day. He remembered.
Turning around, he added, "Please put your study materials away, I gave you the weekend today and hopefully, some of you took advantage of it." I did not. I was busy studying for history, Biology slipped out of my mind. The teacher went ahead and passed out the test while others were "putting away" their notes and textbooks.
"Good luck, Lisa." He whispered to me as placed the test on my text. "I'm Rosemarie." I corrected him for the millionth time in being in his class. He apologized and left. Don't you hate it when teachers mistaken you for your siblings?
I read the first question, Describe the structure of DNA. I pondered, trying to remember what I was doing that moment in class. The answer was somewhere floating around in my mind almost similar to a car stuck in a cloud of fog. I fiddled with my jacket, messing with the end of the zipper. Zipper. Twisted. DNA. I know know the answer. I quickly grabbed my pencil and wrote down the answer. The basic structure of DNA is similar to a twisted ladder or zipper. I hope this test is not only free response questions.
I read the next question. Tell me an example of gene you inherited from your family. Can I give more than one example? I could think of a whole page on how we look the same. Lisa, Abigail, and I inherited our mother's red hair. Abigail and I got our freckles from our father. I got my blue eyes from my dad as well.
I wrote all those examples down, thinking Mr. Simons will give a couple of extra points.
After scanning through the rest of the test, it turns out there was no multiple choice questions. But instead there was a bonus question that was worth 7 points. What is an allele? This was an easy question. I only know this word because I find it extremely amusing to say. An allele is a variation of a gene. Each pair of alleles represents the genotype of a specific gene and helps to determine an organism's phenotype. I erased a couple of accidental scratch marks and moved onto the next question which again another definition question. What is phenotype? I knew answer forward and backwards. Phenotype is the reason why you look like your parents. In other words, it is the physical characteristics you see in an individual. Like how I have blue eyes and red hair. It's the traits you receive from your parents.
I completed the test in a breeze, but not hitting it out in the ball park. I had a few bumps in the road not knowing what was heterogeneous and homozygous. And for the extra credit question, I had a few moments where I sat and stare the question, hoping it would pop out say the answer, but instead it said, "Just try your best." And I did. The question was why do people sometimes mistaken for their siblings? I answered because of genetics.