Black Hair Dipped in White Snow, Mist Rising From the Path Behind

Where I'm from, in Savannah, Georgia, the year you turn fifteen is when the family throws your coming-of-age celebration. It's one of the biggest days of your life. But on the day of mine, my brother set a plate down in front of me with a beheaded rooster on it. The whole room went dead silent, because the most important part of a coming-of-age celebration is when the guest of honor bites the rooster's head, a blessing that they'll rise above the rest one day. Instead, because I hadn't stepped aside for our adopted sister and had gone ahead and scored first in my class, he carried out that beheaded rooster in front of everyone.