“Who is responsible for and to this woman, her safety, her body, her memory?”
I was offered the chance to erase the most visible sign of my poverty.
“There was no doubt in my mind that he was working up his nerve to do something unwelcome.”
“Women’s bodies, I was taught, must be a special kind of strong. Women’s bodies must quietly endure.”
My mother, sister, and I thought we’d fit in at the Japanese spa. Then we found out what “bathing suit optional” actually means.
“I felt like I was a piece of clockwork waiting to be fixed.”