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Cleófilas begs Juan Pedro to take her to the doctor for a prenatal checkup. The couple are expecting their second child. At first, Juan Pedro refuses, worrying that the doctors will discover evidence of his abuse. Cleófilas promises to lie to the doctor, saying that she has fallen down the front steps or slipped in the backyard. Juan Pedro argues that they do not have the money needed to see the doctor. But when Cleófilas suggests writing to her father to ask for money, he threatens her. Despite the tension, she insists on going to the doctor, feeling nervous as she waits for her husband’s decision and concerned about the baby's health. Cleófilas finally convinces Juan Pedro to take her, the next Tuesday, after he comes home from work.
At the doctor’s office, Cleófilas listens as the clinician, Graciela, calls her friend Felice. Graciela speaks quietly because she does not want Juan Pedro to overhear her from the waiting room. When preparing Cleófilas for a sonogram, Graciela sees bruises covering her body. Rather than offer excuses, Cleófilas breaks down in tears. Graciela has seen this type of abuse before on other “brides from across the border” and tells Felice that Cleófilas’s family is all in Mexico. Juan Pedro has not allowed Cleófilas to call or write home to them. Graciela asks Felice to give Cleófilas a ride to the bus station in San Antonio so she can escape to her family. Felice agrees and plans to pick up Cleófilas on Thursday at noon at a Cash N Carry store near the interstate highway. Before hanging up, Graciela refers to Cleófilas’s life as “[a] regular soap opera” before exclaiming in Spanish, “Qué vida, comadre,” or what a life, friend.
On Thursday morning, as Cleófilas and Juan Pedrito wait at the Cash N Carry, she feels a mixture of fear and doubt. She worries that Juan Pedro will find her and hurt her, or that her escape will fail somehow. However, Felice arrives, and they begin their journey. Driving on the bridge over Woman Hollering Creek, Felice “let[s] out a yell as loud as any mariachi,” which startles both Cleófilas and Juan Pedrito. She apologizes and explains that she always hollers when she drives over the Woman Hollering Creek. Felice laughs and remarks how the creek is the only thing she knows of that is named after a woman, aside from the Virgin Mary, Jesus’s mother. She laughs again at the thought that only virgins can be famous. She says that the name Woman Hollering Creek just makes her want to holler.
Cleófilas feels amazed by Felice, a woman who is unmarried and owns her own pickup truck. She is surprised to hear the crude words that Felice speaks. Felice is unlike any other woman she has ever met. Cleófilas imagines her future self telling her father and brothers about Felice and her holler, which comes from joy rather than pain or rage. Finally, Cleófilas thinks she hears Felice laughing, only to realize it's her own laughter.
