As I was getting dressed, I could hear Dr. Kreushkin and my mother talking in the next room about whether it would be better to regulate my bleeding with patience rather than with some substance they simply referred to as “the pill”.

“Excuse me,” I fumbled to fasten my oversized sandals, “How am I to know when a baby will come out of me?”

My mother’s reply was imprecise, like when would I stop growing, or be allowed to listen to music when I wanted to without asking: “De time will come.” Such a reply was nonetheless reassuring, because the time had come for me to walk instead of crawl, to have knees clear of scabs, and to be able to sleep without checking under my bed to make sure no one was there; so time, though slow in coming, comes.

Dr. Kreushkin’s reply was vaguer than my mother’s, it hid the truth in just another cabbage patch: “The egg must be fertilized first, Kate, in order to grow …”

My mother opened the door and held her hand out to me.

Dr. Kreushkin kept hold of my shoulders, “Kate. You look troubled. Are there specific questions that are bothering you?”

It was now or never. Maybe something was wrong with me, and I should mention it to a doctor. How could I word it? I didn’t have the vocabulary for the symptoms.

“Well … actually there is something that’s bothering me … down there.”

“Where, exactly?”

I don’t know how I mastered the courage, but this time I pointed directly at the zone between my legs.

“… and it … itches. It itches. Not a little itch, no, a big big itch that scratching doesn’t help. An itch deep inside of me. An itch that wants relief, although in a way, it doesn’t.”

When I first heard myself use the word “itch”, I was disappointed with myself, a hopeless coward; but the more I went on, the more I found the way I put it was actually quite nice.

Dr. Kreushkin looked at my mother calmly. “Yeast infection.”

“A’ her age? So lil’?”

Yeast? I’d misheard.

“A wet bathing suit, that’s all it takes for yeast infection, Mrs. Lester.”

“Yeast, as in bread?”

“Yes, all women have yeast inside of them, there where it itches you inside, Kate.”

“The Bible says a man will leave his father and his mother and he must cleave to his wife and they must become one flesh. How do man and wife become one flesh?”

Dr. Kreushkin was going to tell me something, but my mother pleaded, “Don’ put any more ideas into de child’s brains, please, dat’s ’nough for today!”

I changed my tactic.

“How is the egg, hm-hm, ‘fertilized?’ ”

“Look at de child, how she’s all excit-ed, she’s sweatin’, look, her forehead, please, no more.”

Dr. Kreushkin lowered his eyes and the side of his mouth twitched; I would never know those words that tried to get out.