She had to return to school at the end of August, long before summer would surrender. She had outgrown her clothes and the nuns wouldn’t allow brassieres. The nuns gave Louise tape to hold her breasts, but the days were warm and soon the adhesive would slip off, and she would feel her breasts loose. She had spent a long summer away from school. She had drunk with men twice her age. She had been told she was beautiful. The swell of her breasts was admired. Here the nuns told her she was immodest. Cover yourself, they would say to her, crossing their arms over their own breasts. She had no defense, no underclothing. She had felt the changes in her body. The changes seemed to come sharp and fast. Overnight her clothing shrank. She could feel the groaning of her bones before sleep. A new longing settled in her by degree. It wasn’t just the blood of her growing that ached in her and stained her clothing. She had changed. She was a woman.

The boys began to recognize her womanhood, too, but at the Ursulines’ she was safe from the boys because of the constant threat of Baptiste Yellow Knife. She could count on Baptiste to rescue her. When Joseph Garlic had tried to kiss her Baptiste had saved her. He came out of nowhere, they said, and he had knocked Joseph down with such force he skidded a ways on the blacktop. When he got back up, Baptiste punched Joseph so hard his eyes purled white and his head rested for a time too long on the pavement, his arms splayed, palms up, his left cheek swelling. The rest of the boys stood back, looking away from Joseph, not wishing to take on Baptiste Yellow Knife. Louise had run back into the school, not stopping even to look at Baptiste. She wished they would have beaten up Baptiste, too, humiliated him, held his head to dust and bared his buttocks. She was afraid Baptiste was her constant, and yet she felt relieved knowing he had become her savior.