Rita’s got a birthmark on the inside of her thigh the size of a penny and the color of repressed pleasure. She don’t know if it’s been there always or if it’d grown with her like the mole on her Lita’s chin, or the rage in her old man’s jaw, or the virginity in her mama’s wistful gaze. She hadn’t been the one to notice. 

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Sana presses her thumb to Rita’s birthmark while they sit cold-backed ’gainst the porcelain bathtub, shoulders steeped in the steam of their school uniforms and the hot running sink a few feet over. Sana ashes one of her daddy’s Marlboros on the bathmat and tosses the untouched bit in the toilet, flicks it with the same thumb Rita watches reach for her birthmark. 

Sana stretches without having to look. Like she already knew where it was, been eyeing it this whole time. Pushes it like a button, tip of her unpainted nail trying to prick it like the thin silver film over something unopened. Sana touches her like breaking in a thing brand new. She spreads her legs apart. You got a birthmark. Rita’s made self-conscious, hips tucked, gut a fever. Their unshaved legs brush. Looks like a stain. Like something’s been here. Like a hickey. 

Sana laughs, making a game of their closeness. No laugh from Rita though, she don’t get the joke. Never been stained by that kind of longing. How d’you mean? How? Rita don’t realize what she’s asking, the way she incites. It gets real quiet, the sink still running, bubbling at the drain, Sana’s hand under her skirt. 

Then Sana starts with the laughing again, making Rita shy. Reaches for Rita’s arm and clasps onto her wrist. Looks at her the whole time her neck kneels to the spot. When Sana sucks the soft skin over her veins, Rita tries to focus on the tub spout puncturing her middle-back. Rita has her mama’s gaze, something like it, but Sana stays eyeing her birthmark like it’s gonna get up or fade away. See it now? She asks, lips puffed pink. But Rita don’t get no chance to check. Something knocks at the door. Sana flushes the toilet, ass slung over the tub before crawling out. Rita gets up slower, feels her knees buckle, the sink handle hot to the touch. 

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Later when she’s alone, prepping for bed, Rita lets the tub fill. She wants to see if what Sana said is true, that the brown bruise of Sana’s lips could exist somewhere on her thigh. Tub filling, wet and warm. She prods at the mark, plays with the skin, trying to feel for it, looking for that same sensation. But she can’t find the spot that feels tender. Everything feels tender; everything feels lush. Tub filling, wet and warm. Water hitting her knees. 

When she finally looks, leaning into herself, her birthmark’s no longer the size of a thumbprint. It’s spreading ‘cross her whole leg like a rash, like blood leaking from the inside. A spillage. Rita’s chest flexes and she claws at the mark, tries to cut through the skin to set it free, tries to blend the stain with her palms. The door thumps and she fears her Lita might notice, or her mama, or her pops, this hickey on her thigh the size of her thigh and sprouting. In a feral plea to hide it, she turns the water all the way left, wet and warm ‘til it’s wet and roasting, ‘til her skin burns, ‘til her whole body’s got that birthmark shade of shame. Something finally coming up from under the surface. She’s scrubbing and screaming in a drowned panic ‘til she sees it. Finally, blurred through tears and steam. Her birthmark’s barely identifiable on her inflamed flesh, but Sana’s all over.