Marisol

She was smacked on the face only once as a child, for calling her brother a name.  "You little shit!" she cried when Ruben during one of his games smeared mud on the pink moire silk of which her quinciñera dress was made.  Her mother knew enough English to get dark in the face and bent out of shape.  Tears of anger cascaded down Marisol's face.  She ran away that night, but by the next day graced the backseat of a cruiser that had been on the make for truants.  What could he say, her father who worked til sundown for so little pay?  He was meek in the police station, his gray boots streaked with dirt, his shirt flecked with hay.  "Your mother forgives you and loves you, and God will never let you stray."  What a jolt into womanhood, that sixteenth birthday.