The world was not a safe place for a Christian woman, not even one as beautiful and pure as Agatha—perhaps especially not for a young woman such as she. One day, the Roman prefect Quintianus saw the virgin Agatha—her braids, her downturned eyes, the swell of her breasts beneath her gown—and he became mad with his desire for her.
Quintianus attempted to woo sweet Agatha, using all the guile he had, compliments and favors at first, but when these failed to earn her smile, his persuasion turned to dark threats and persecution. He trapped her and sent her to a brothel with the intent of shaming her into becoming his bride, and there Agatha was encouraged to partake in debaucheries of all kinds—banquets and feasts, alcoholic excesses, orgies galore.
Agatha cried to her Lord in heaven, “Jesus Christ, Lord of all things, you see my heart, you know my desire . . . possess alone all that I am. I am your sheep. Make me worthy to overcome the devil.”
And Agatha remained steadfast in her virginity and her devotion to Christ, and after a month of pressure and coercion, the brothel keeper gave up on Agatha as intractable and returned her to Quintianus’s authority.
Quintianus was brutal in his inquisition, his passion for Agatha having morphed into anger, resentment, and embarrassment at her continued refusal of him, even in front of his comrades, even in the face of torture and death.
He ordered that she be stretched on the rack, and his men tied her limbs fast and began the torture, stretching her apart, pulling and breaking her joints and tendons. They tore at her sides with iron hooks. They burned and mortified her flesh. And when still she remained steadfast in her love of Jesus Christ, Quintianus ordered a fate even worse—that her breasts, the very part of Agatha’s flesh for which he most lusted—be severed from her body.
Agatha’s laugh was pure. “Cruel tyrant!” she said, “Do you not blush to torture this part of my body, you that sucked the breasts of a woman yourself?”
Quintianus was not to be refused the bloodlust he desired, and he watched with heart-deep satisfaction, even ecstasy, as the knife entered her flesh, as her breasts were sawed away from Agatha’s body and placed, one and then the other, on a platter.
Thus disfigured, Agatha was thrown into a dungeon and was denied salves and food and even water. But God Himself did not forsake His most loyal servant, and by morning each of Agatha’s wounds were healed.
Still Quintianus refused to be moved by the power and grace of Agatha’s god and ordered that she be tortured once again, this time causing her to be rolled naked over burning coals mixed with shards of broken pottery. And at last she called out to the heavens, “Lord, my Creator, you have ever protected me from the cradle; you have taken me from the love of the world, and given me patience to suffer: receive now my soul.”
And the Creator did answer this last of her prayers, loosening her soul from its mortified flesh, and Agatha was free at last, and in heaven she lived with Jesus Christ, happily ever after.
The worst thing about Louise’s house was her older brother Michael. Most of the time he ignored us, but when he did bother to talk to us, it was always to say something awful, like when we were twelve and we were just hanging out in Louise’s front yard, eating popsicles, and Michael rode up on his BMX bike, practically crashing into us before he swerved to the side.
“Getting in some practice, huh, girls?” he said, smirking. “The real thing is bigger than that.”
Or when, on a different day that same year, when we were doing gymnastics in the backyard, spotting each other doing backbends and trying to kick over. Michael came out to the patio with a sandwich and sat down, watching us.
“Come on, Nina, let’s go inside,” Louise said, almost as soon as Michael sat down, but I refused. I didn’t want to change what we were doing just because her jerky big brother was there. So I did another backbend, and the adrenaline or something of being watched gave me the energy to actually kick all the way over, on my own without a spot.
“Hey!” said Louise, all happy. “That was a real back walkover!”
I grinned, kind of blown away that I’d actually done it, but then Michael said, mouth full of half-chewed sandwich, “When are you girls going to start shaving? Your legs are fucking disgusting.”
???
Later that day, we stole a razor out of Louise’s mom’s medicine cabinet and we shaved our legs for the first time. With each pass of the lavender-handled blade, I felt prettier and prettier. The skin of my calves, free of hair, looked shiny and sexy and almost plastic, like a Barbie doll’s. That night, tucked into Louise’s trundle bed, I rubbed my legs against each other and against the sheets, reveling in the smoothness of them.
The next morning, I woke up first. Louise was a deep sleeper, and there was no reason to try waking her up before she was ready because she’d just mumble and roll over and pull the covers over her head, but I was hungry. Louise’s bedroom was next door to Michael’s. Usually his door was closed tight, but that morning it wasn’t. Music was playing, lots of guitar and drums, no words. I tried not to look inside but I did anyway. There was a boy in Michael’s room sitting on the floor. His hair parted around his face as he looked down at something in his hands.
He must have felt me staring at him because he looked up. “Hey,” he said.
“Hey,” I answered, blushing and crossing my arms over my chest, suddenly mortified by my pajamas—shorts and a tank top, printed all over with kitten heads.
“Did the music wake you up?” The boy smiled, slow and handsome like someone from a movie. He had dark blond hair, almost brown, and brown eyes, and straight white teeth, and skin without any zits at all.
“Get out of here, Nina,” Michael said, behind me, and I turned to see him at the top of the stairs holding a bag of chips and a six-pack of soda.
“Naw, it’s okay if she stays,” said the boy, and I smiled at him.
“She’s a fucking pest,” Michael said, shoving past me into his room.
“How old are you?” the boy asked me.
“Twelve.”
“And your name’s Nina?”
I nod.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m Wade. Do you want a soda?”
It wasn’t even ten in the morning. “Sure,” I said, and I went into the room.
Michael tossed me one of the sodas, so I guessed it was okay with him that I was there, but I didn’t want to risk making him mad, so I just sank down onto the beanbag in the corner and arranged my freshly shaven legs in a way I hoped was pretty.
Wade gave me another smile, the kind of smile that made my insides twist into knots, the kind of smile no one had ever given me before. But then he turned to Michael and gestured for the chips, and when Michael tossed them over, Wade ripped open the bag, grabbed a handful, and then I might as well have been invisible.