I was born with a splinter inside my left index finger: it's a condition that runs in the family.

No use trying to pluck it out, my mother says. Better just forget it's there.

But the splinter throbs sometimes. I have never seen it, but I know it's about two inches long, delicate as a wisp of hair. My sister says that can't be. If it's that thin, you won't even feel it. My other sister swears hers is chunky, at least the size of a penciltip eraser.

My mother stops discussing the splinter with me after I get my first period. You are a woman now, she says, pregnancy can happen to you, don't waste time fantasizing about small problems. A wisp, an eraser, whatever, it's there, it will always be there. Don't touch boys. Study and you will go somewhere. Not like your mother, toiling until the day I die.

How can you tell me to be quiet about it? I ask. This is a life threatening condition! My mother's sister fell dead when she was sixteen. Her splinter freed itself, traveled through her bloodstream, and pierced her heart.

Your uncle made that up, she says.

Then, she laughs. Actually, it's true, the splinter can travel. It's how I got pregnant with you. My splinter traveled to my belly and became you. Then she cups my cheeks with her splinter-free hands. You are my little splinter, always by my side.

It takes Jett about five weeks to notice I only use my right hand on her. She kisses my fingertips, all ten. We are in bed, overcome by each other's heat. I hide my left hand behind my back.

I tell her, my left hand is weak; my right hand can open jars and make you come.

Yes, of course, she kisses my collarbone. I wake up that night to find her pressing into the soft pad of my left index finger with a strange urgency.

It's here, right? I don't feel anything. Are you sure?

My splinter trills under my skin and I nod. Let's go back to sleep, OK?

A week later, we hold hands in the mall. Jett caresses my splinter finger again. She does this all day long. In the darkness of a movie theater. In between striking pins at the bowling alley. As we stroll through all six floors of the megamall. When we share a burger and fries, she reaches over to stroke my greasy finger, like a habit she is beginning to develop.

That night, she comes to bed with a fresh blade. Let's cut it out and get it over with, she says. Her hair, in a top knot, is kept away from her face by a headband. She wears a sheet mask over her face, smelling like milk and strawberries.

Have mercy, serial killer, I say.

Give it to me, she beckons.

I sit up. Drop the weapon, I say, serious this time.

Fine. To accept this part of me, Jett tells me she has to name the splinter. Acknowledge its presence. She calls it Rex: a bit vexing, a bit ossified, basically a dinosaur.

When Jett begins talking to Rex, we have been married for just under a year.

Rex, she says, what do you know about my wife that I do not. Rex, is pizza okay for dinner. Rex, do you like this color of my dress. Rex, will our children inherit you too.

We toss a coin to decide who carries our first baby: heads and it's me. Jett cries quietly. Now there will be two splinters in the family, and then her. I smooth down her hair until my hands cup the base of her skull, holding her still.

In the morning, when I cut the breakfast strawberries, I let the knife slip. The fruits bleed red. After I rinse them under the faucet, I see it, upright, pierced through a strawberry. No longer confined to me, the splinter glints anew. Hello, I say. Then I push it all the way down and put the fruit in Jett's bowl. When I bring the breakfast tray into our bedroom, Jett emerges from under the covers, eyes puffy. I brush her face with all ten fingers. She reaches for her bowl.

Wait, I say. I want to tell you the story of how my mother conceived me.


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