Read by T.R. Hummer
I knew it made me prized, helpless; that losing it would make me bleed. Because the desires of boys angered my father, so did I — though desire seemed unconnected to the way they would, in a pack, stand in a driveway and call out invitations. If I could pass and seem unshaken, they would shout at my back, You bitch! This long afternoon on the mountain in Winslow Ellen and I drink tea, look out her back window, and wait for a purebred colt to be born. The Arabian mare has lost her mucus plug, and there will be no other sign: prey animals have their babies fast, to walk away before the blood attracts a predator. I could not have known my father wanted to deliver me unharmed; I would not have trusted anyone to see that something growing inside me wanted out, wanted to be shaking and raw, wet and new.