The protagonist, who remains unnamed, meets her future husband at a party when she is 17. She identifies in him a willingness to meet her most perverted sexual desires. The couple unabashedly meets each other’s fantasies with only two conditions: He will not ejaculate inside of her, and he agrees not to touch her green ribbon, which she wears around her throat. The first rule is broken moments before they walk down the aisle to be married.

Over time, the protagonist’s husband allows his curiosity about her ribbon to grow, violently touching it from time to time. Less than a year after they are married, the protagonist bears a son. During the first years of his life, the son is sweet and gentle. However, after seeing the protagonist’s husband attempt to touch the ribbon, the little boy tries to do the same. The protagonist forbids her son to touch her ribbon, and her son becomes upset. After this incident, the protagonist notes, “Something is lost between us, and I never find it again” (21).

While her son is at school and her husband is at work, the protagonist enrolls in an art class. She meets other women who have ribbons, but in different places on their bodies.