Summary

Chapter 35 finds Maya struggling with her sexuality. She confuses lesbianism with hermaphrodites, and cannot understand, but does feel for their plight. She hears her low voice, sees her large hands and feet and her lack of breasts, and she begins to fear she is "becoming lesbian." Maya, painfully embarrassed, asks her mother about a "growth" on her vagina, only to have her mother calmly explain the female reproductive system, including the vulva. As Maya cries with relief, she explains her fears of "becoming lesbian," and her mother gently explains that she is not a lesbian. Two weeks later, however, Maya finds herself in awe of a friend's breasts as she changes clothes quickly in front of her. Maya is now able to explain she was awed by the sense of female beauty, and by envy, but at the time, her uncertainty of...