Anamaria/Sea
Her mama tells her not to play down by the water, but Anamaria doesn't listen. Long as Mama can't see her and the master doesn't know, she figures it doesn't matter. She loves the color of the sea, the way it changes with sun and wind and depth. The surf washes over her toes and she feels clean inside.
Her brother Paul drowns when he's out getting an eel for the mistress's supper and that's when Mama screams, holds Anamaria's hair in both hands and cries that now she'll understand how the sea takes the ones you love. Anamaria lets her mother's tears soak her skin, but knows she's wrong. The sea didn't take Paul, it set him free - that's about the only thing she and the stiff-necked white pastor agree on.
And some day soon, she vows, she'll seek her freedom there too. One way or another.