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For a moment I thought about cutting the buds off my chest. smothering Celeste before she could even think of opening her eyes inside me. I even took a knife to myself, but I couldn't do it. Instead. I did what Mommy hated. I sat down and I cried. She heard me as she was passing my room, and a moment later, she opened the door and looked at me.

I was on my bed, wearing only my underpants.

"What is it?" she asked. "What could be so terrible as to make a soon-to-be-strapping young man creep like some infant? Well?" she demanded when I didn't respond immediately.

I turned instead and thrust my chest into her view. She stared, her eyes widening.

What would this mean? Would she hate me? Would the spirits never speak to me?

She didn't yell. She nodded her head slowly instead.

"Grandma Jordan once told me about a relative of ours, a boy who was developing into a girl. I'll have to go back and study the remedies," Mommy said. "Until I find something. never take your shirt off outside."

It wasn't something I did anyway.

"And stop this baby bawling. We have a problem. We solve the problem. That's what we do and what we will always do. Noble. Nov get dressed, and let's start the day." she concluded and left me soon to understand that my sexuality had become my illness, my handicap, a burden to lift and toss aside.

She tried different remedies on me, concoctions of herbal drinks and even some salves. I thought the hair on my arms was growing darker and thicker, but other than that, nothing changed. In fact, my breasts continued to grow. Every morning I woke and stared at myself. One time. I didn't hear Mommy come to the door, and she watched me gently touch my nipples.

"Stop!" she screamed. "You must deny it. You must force it back or... or..." She couldn't get herself to voice what would be the result if I didn't. but I knew in my heart what she thought. The words, like mold on a bread, formed on my brain: "Or Noble would die again."

A little while later, she reappeared with a roll of gauze, and she wrapped it around my emerging breasts. She went around and around to be sure I couldn't see through it, and then she taped it and stood back.

"For a while I will be the one who changes that and unwraps it," she said. "I want you to put it out of your mind, forget it's there, understand?"

"Yes," I said.

It wasn't easy. Some days, especially on very hot and muggy ones. I would sweat, and it would itch terribly. I tried not to complain, but there were occasions when it was so uncomfortable for me. I couldn't help myself. She saw me scratching and pulled me inside, marching me back up to my room. There she unraveled the gauze, as she did from time to time. Lately, when she stepped back, she looked more unhappy. I knew it was because I was getting bigger, rounder.

She rubbed one of her salves roughly on and around my breasts and then wrapped me again, so tightly. I complained that I couldn't breathe.

"Just get used to it," she said. "You'll be all right." Eventually. I was able to ignore the feeling. The itching became less and less severe, and in time. Mommy was right. I was able to forget being strapped down. She continued to give me some of her herbal concoctions. Once in a while they made me sick to my stomach, and one time I threw up for a whole day and was unable to do any work at all.

She paced the house, mumbling to herself.

"Something evil has taken hold,'' she muttered to me, her eyes full of suspicions. She made me feel guilty. and I had to look away. That seemed to confirm something for her. She went out to talk to her spirits .

Then, one night, long after I had fallen asleep, the lights went on in my room. and I saw her standing there, her eyes wide.

"It's Celeste," she declared. "It was one thing to come around here and smile at me, and even come with your father and look sweet and lovable on your birthdays, but the truth is that no matter what I've told her and what she has been told by others, she is refusing to rest in peace. I must keep her away from us until she does."

"How can we do that. Mommy?" I asked, more intrigued than ever.

"She is not to return to the house. You must not think of her. You're giving her opportunities, providing a doorway from the other side, a portal through which she is crossing back int

o our world, not as a good spirit, but as an interfering one. It's happened before," she added. "My cousin Audrey so resisted entering the other world, she caused real stress and turmoil for my aunt Bella. Her son was driven to commit suicide," she added. "It was the only thing that satisfied Audrey. Only then did she rest in peace."

Suicide? Birds of panic fluttered in my chest. Would that happen to me?

She came farther into my room, reading my fear as if it was in big black-and-white letters on my forehead.

"Yes. suicide. Don't you see? Don't you get it. Noble?" she asked with a cold smile. "Celeste wants you with her. Noble. You must drive her away, drive every thought of her away. Don't let her get close to you. Do you understand?"

I nodded, so terrified. I could barely breathe.

"I'm going through the house tomorrow and removing every item, no matter how small or insignificant it might seem, that relates to her, belonged to her. It was obviously not enough to get rid of those rag dolls. I want you to start digging another grave in the cemetery. Dig it behind Infant Jordan's. Right after breakfast, go out there and start."

"Okay. Mommy," I said.