Excerpt

As Maria walked through the town, she noticed the clock on the steeple of the church. It was six-ten, and soon the town would rise to begin work before the terrible sun of the afternoon made labor impossible. Maria walked along the dusty streets, her back stiff and straight, skipping with ease over the stones despite her bare feet. The sun was rising, and the day would be hot.

There had been no rain in weeks, and the dust puffed up at each step she took. At the time of the elections in the town, the old faces promised they would pave the streets, but they never did. When there were heavy rains, the streets were muddy and the air was filled with mosquitoes. When there was no rain, the streets were dry and the air was filled with flies. Life was difficult, but the people were strong.

Maria reached the edge of the town where the mountains began to lift out of the earth, and she climbed a short distance until she reached a small stream. She put the bag of meat on a branch of a tree, and then she drew her dress over her head, slipped out of her pants, and lay down in the shallow water, the gentle current flowing over her body. The water was cold, but Maria did not mind.

She laid her head on a rock and watched as the water caressed her swelling breasts and swirled through the hair that was freshly grown about her passage. It was exciting to watch herself mature and to wonder each day when the warm blood would come to proclaim she was a woman. Only then, her mama had told her, would she be able to make within herself a baby. She was a virgin, her mama had said, but she had not known what it meant to be a virgin.

A virgin is a young girl who has never been with a man, her mama told her.

I have been with a man, Maria said. I have been at papas stall each day now that school is out for the summer. Does than mean I am not a virgin?

That is not what it means, her mama said. When a woman is married, she sleeps each night with her husband and they make love. Then she is no longer a virgin.

They kiss each other? Maria asked.

Yes.

If I kiss a boy, will I be no longer a virgin?

Just kissing is not enough. The man must come into your body with such a thing as you have seen in your brothers and your papas nakedness when they go to shower, her mama answered. Then you are no longer a virgin when this happens between you and your husband.

Is it good? Maria asked.

Yes, her mother said. It is a sign of love, and it is the way your papa and I made you.

I will be even more happy than I am, Maria said, when I have a baby.

It is the sign that a woman is a full woman, her mama said. It is a sign of the blessing of God. Your papa has read to me many stories from the Bible where a woman who had no children was a person of shame. Elizabeth, the mother of John who baptized, was old and full of shame until God gave her the blessing of a child.

Papa said John was a great saint who told people that Jesus was soon to come. Wouldnt it be wonderful if my baby was a saint? Maria smiled and then laughed at the pleasure of such a thought. Then I would be famous through the whole world for I would be the mama of a saint.

Such a crazy girl, her mama said as she hugged her. Then she grew anxious. You sound so much like your papa with your wild ideas you frighten me. You must promise me, Maria, that you will not begin to think like him.

Maria reached out and caught a piece of a green bush that was floating by, a long, slender piece that resembled seaweed. Sitting up, she fashioned it into a garland and placed it like a crown on her head. Then she stood full naked in the middle of the stream, stretching her brown body in a beam of sunlight that had found an opening through the trees. With her arms extended, her black hair reaching down to her buttocks, her hips fulfilling their efforts to round themselves, she lifted up her eyes to heaven. She prayed for her mama and her papa that God would keep them in the palm of His hand, as the priest said, and for her brother, Antonio.