Once I dressed up in my mother’s clothing: a beautiful, off-white gown

made of silk material with creamy-colored buttons, and one of her costume hats with a feather, red lipstick, pearl earrings and high-heel shoes that gave me the ability to see the sink hiding over the kitchen countertop. I walked out in front of her and she looked at me and said,” Who are you?” It’s me, I said, Abigail. She did not even recognize me.

I was dressed up like a woman, a famous nightclub singer that my mother often imitated. Even though that famous singer was black, Momma idolized her.

She had always wanted to be a famous actress and a singer but her voice was not strong enough to get people’s attention. In fact, she was invisible. The more I dressed up, the more she began to dress down. Her clothes became mine; I cut them to shreds until they fit.

Don’t I look pretty, I said. Momma replied and said I should not be out in the sun and then she said it was a privilege to be able to move out of Detroit. She said that a lot. She also said that I looked like the man that left her and not to make her too angry by talking too damn much. I am quiet after that. Real quiet sometimes. I am a good girl.

I took a bath next. The water surrounding my body rippled like waves of dry ice that find me missing. I was still flat chested but that doesn’t mean that I was in a hurry to escape from my strange and foreign body that longed for comfort. As my body slinked beneath the water, I held my breath and waited. I pulled back up and looked at my hands. They floated on top of the water but there was not enough space for me to do the same. I was still the same. Water was not

magic; nothing changed.

I put my clothes back on, and grabbed my knapsack with the only belongings I was allowed to take out of the house: a diary with a lock, a pair of keys, and the map of the city neatly tucked inside. I whispered goodbye to the silky voice Momma fell asleep to; the silky voice that felt tired like heavy stones

on my ears. I whispered to the old record player, “I’m going to be famous someday too.”