I woke up, turned over, and started screaming. There was blood between my legs. The bed and my boxers were stained red. I hopped out of bed to get away from the mess until I realized that the blood was coming from me.

I saw Mom peek in, and when she reappeared, she was carrying her raincoat.

She moved quickly and efficiently, barking orders to me like a drill sergeant. “Here, drop the shorts and put this on immediately. We’ve got to move.”

No face washing, no toothbrushing. She grabbed my hand and, before I could even ask what was happening, led me out the back door. It was still night, but as crazy as it sounds, I could see where we were going.

We went across our backyard, skirting my pitch-back baseball net and ignoring the soccer net and the pile of balls littering the ground. At the end of the yard, Mom pushed through some weeds and opened a gate that I never knew existed.

“Hey, where’d that gate come from. Was it always here?”

“Shh. No noise. This all has to be stealth.”

Thoughts were exploding in my head. ‘Was my mom a spy? Had I been tranquilized and slashed? Were we headed to the hospital? How come no ambulances or cops? Wasn’t I the victim here?’

Mom led me down an alley full of litter, garbage cans, and prowling cats. They were everywhere. I could sense their presence and occasionally see one swish out of sight. I was getting disoriented. I’d never seen the back gate, and I never knew there was an alley in the back of our yard. I always thought that it was a forest. And where did all these houses come from that put their trash cans out here?

I looked down and saw paper, trash, tin cans, and broken glass. Freaking out, I realized that I’d been walking on this with bare feet for a few minutes now. But I had no cuts, and felt no pain.

As we ran along, I realized all this was new. I didn’t recognize these houses or where we were. And it had only been a few minutes since I’d been dragged out of the house.

I sensed my Mom’s urgency and kept moving.

When we reached the end of the alley, a small yellow rental truck was idling right in front of us at the curb. A woman was standing there, and she and Mom exchanged words in a foreign language. They both helped me up into the back of the truck, and Mom got in next to me. The other woman pulled down the big door, and I heard it latch.

A minute later, we were on the move. Mom collected all the blankets that were used to wrap furniture and made us a seat. Then she wrapped me in a blanket. My nose was suddenly overwhelmed with the stale smell or unwashed blankets, and my own sweat and blood. Blood! As I sat on the blankets, Mom handed me a wet washcloth and a towel to clean myself up.

As I scrubbed myself clean, I started to scream again. That’s when I noticed that my genitals were gone! There was nothing between my legs! Seriously gone! All that was left was blood. Any fourteen-year-old boy will tell you how important those bits are, but discovering that they’d been cut off was too much.

“Mom, we need to go to the hospital. I’m bleeding to death. Someone cut everything off. Mom, do you hear me? I’m dying!”

Mom held me tightly. “Shh. It’s okay. You’re okay, and there’s nothing wrong. I’ll fill you in after we switch vehicles. But right now, I’m going to recite some words in Latin, and I need you to repeat them to me.

Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est

I did what I was told, and I kept repeating those words. “Mom, what am I saying?”

She nodded. “Everything is fine, and I need to relax.”

“But Mom, how can I relax when I’m bleeding and my junk is gone? Seriously, shouldn’t we be going to the hospital? Where’s the ambulance and the police?”

Mom hugged me. “Just keep repeating those words while I fill you in on what’s happening. Okay?”

I nodded as I kept saying those words. The weirdest thing was that I was getting pretty calm even though I was bleeding to death. ‘At least,’ I thought. ‘I’ll be calm a corpse.’

Mom looked at me and kissed my cheek. Then she rubbed the top of my head causing my hair to fall in my face. ‘Long hair! I never had long hair!’

“You’re not dying. For fourteen years, there’s been a mask over the real you. We’ve kept you hidden since you were born for fear that you’d be hunted out and killed.”

I was starting to lose it and began repeating my new mantra. “Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est.”

Mom watched me and held my hand. I looked down and realized that it wasn’t my hand. It was thin and delicate. My wrist and arm were bare of hair, and well, female.

She smiled and parted my raincoat to reveal more of my body.

Under my T-shirt, I had boobs pushing out through the material. I felt more of the long hair and realized that I was looking at a girl’s body. I was trying to calm down. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est.

Mom kept talking as I continued to freak out. “The best way to hide a baby girl is to wrap her in a cloaking spell as a baby boy. And it worked very well until you started your puberty with your first menstrual cycle. Oh, yeah. By the way. Welcome to womanhood.”

Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. ‘Fuck. You gotta be kidding,’ I thought! Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est.

“You see, the cloaking worked until you came into your powers. Right now, you’re shining like a beacon in the night all over Albany County.”

“Mom? What am I?”

She smiled. “You’re my daughter. You are very special. Because I’m a witch and so are you.”

Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est. Omnia bene sunt et mihi quiescere necesse est.