Leah Howard rummages through her closet looking for something to wear for school. She picks out a pair of her favorite blue jeans and the new yellow camisole that she just bought at Express. The jeans fit her petite, thin frame perfectly, while the transparent camisole hugs her torso in all the right places.

“I look kickass,” she says as she stares at herself in the mirror. Leah runs her fingers through her short dirty blond hair that stops right at the neckline. She bites the bottom of her lip and tilts her head. Something is not right.

She reaches around and quickly unhooks her bra and tosses it on the floor. A huge grin spreads across her face as her she gazes at herself in complete mesmerization. “It works,” she says aloud. She smoothes out the crinkles and prances around her room for a couple of minutes before darting downstairs.

After breakfast, Leah’s dad calls her name from inside the kitchen. He seems like he is in some kind of pain.

“I, I, um,” Leah’s dad says. Leah frowns in puzzlement. “What is he trying to say?” she thinks. Her dad lets out a deep breath. “I just think you need to put on a bra,” he says.

Leah’s mom shakes her head in exasperation. “Oh please, Wayne,” she says, “Leah, just wear whatever you want.”

Leah is a twenty-year-old woman who walks on the edge and goes braless. Some say it is a matter of propriety, while others say it is all about comfort. For the brave Leah, it is an issue of variety and what is available. The sad truth is that companies just don’t make bras for women with small chests unless they are thirteen and looking for those ever-so-tacky training bras.

Victoria’s Secret Bra Specialist Jennifer Imson says that the smallest size is 32 AA. At some stores women need to put in special orders to buy them.

“Only the large volume stores sell bras in that size. In smaller stores, there is not much demand for the 32 AA bra,” Imson says.

However, showing the “girls” can sometimes catch people off-guard. Leah can recall situations where she has heard people snicker “that is so inappropriate” or “can you believe her?” as she walks by. Is it really that obscene for a woman to go braless?

According to San Francisco State University freshman Amber Fuentes, the answer to that question is yes. “I just think it is weird when someone doesn’t wear a bra. At times it can be inappropriate to see someone’s stuff all loose and flopping,” she says.

“It doesn’t matter how many times I see Leah not wearing a bra. The thought that always goes in my head is ‘Leah is not wearing a bra,’” says a friend of Leah’s, Nathan Schwass.

Fuentes also figures if the more endowed women are forced to wear binding contraptions, then so should everyone else.

Unfortunately for Leah, even if she wants to, she can’t always wear a bra. “It is hard for me to find a bra in my size. Most of the AA cup sizes are bigger than my boobs, so it is just easier to go braless and it saves me money,” Leah says.

For those who are close to Leah, they do not see a woman who is slightly exposed, but a woman of high confidence and self-esteem.

“Leah has always been known as the girl in the yellow shirt,” says longtime friend Maggie Church.

“Whenever I see Leah, I don’t notice that she is not wearing a bra. I see her as a girl with great style, nice smile and is well kept.”

Later that afternoon, Leah walks down the path at school among the huge crowd of students. Along with the infamous yellow camisole, she now rocks a pair of sunglasses.

“I just think I am lucky. I may have to work harder to be sexy but for girls who have bigger chests, I think they have to work harder to not be sexy or seen as over-sexy,” Leah says.

She walks with the elegance and confidence of a model walking the runway for Christian Dior, completely oblivious to the attention she is attracting. Some snicker and muffle rude remarks as she struts down the path while others stop and admire Leah in all of her glory. She is wearing blue jeans, a cami, and, of course, no bra.