TWO

 

"If that's all you're getting from what I told you," Audra said, her voice rising to a near shout in frustration, "You are missing the point, Ma--"

"I ain't missing nothing, Audra," Audra's mother, Edith Marks snapped, her words lilting with the tobacco fields of North Carolina, as though she hadn't lived in New York City since she was eighteen.  "The point is you ripped your pants and showed your butt—literally—to this man—"

"Art Bradshaw—"

"This Art Bradshaw," Audra's mother repeated, more loudly than before, hammering home her point by volume alone. "What must he think of you?"

What did Art Bradshaw think, Audra wondered, thinking back over the way his eyes had locked on hers, liquid and glowing with warmth. His words betrayed that he'd been listening to her conversation with the kid, Carter. Audra wondered how many other times he'd watched her, as surreptitiously as she'd watched him.

"I think…" Audra began slowly, determined to say the words aloud in spite of the patter of her heart. "I think he thinks what I think. That we're soul mates—"

"Soul mates! Soul mates, my eye." Edith scoffed. "You humiliate yourself in front of him and now, you're talking some mess 'bout him bein' your soul mate?" She rolled a pair of shrewd, bright eyes carefully lined with black pencil and batted her mascara-ed lashes in Audra's direction. "Honestly, Audra. If you think that man's interested in you because you can crack a joke after humiliatin' yourself, you musta bumped your head—"

"Will you forget about the pants for just a second, Ma?" Audra folded her arms over her chest like a defiant teenager and lifted her head in protest. "I think he's interested in me because we both know the movies—"

"Movies!" The older woman tossed this week's hairdo, making the strands of a sleek black bob dance. Audra knew for a fact most of the hair was fake, purchased wholesale from the inventory of her mother's salon, Goldilocks, and sewn in on a Monday or Tuesday morning when there weren't many paying customers.  It looked good, too, on her mother's still pretty fifty-something head, but then most styles did. It was yet another way they were different: opposite as night is from day. "So he likes movies.  Everybody likes movies. What's that got to do with the price of beans in China?" her mother concluded, as if the question were completely logical.

Audra sighed. Talking to her mother was always like this. So many questions, so little listening.  They were as combative as the mother-daughter relationship in Mildred Pierce.  Joan Crawford played the long-suffering, giving mother to Ann Blyth's selfish, greedy, mean-spirited daughter.  Only in their case, Audra was certain, it was the daughter who was suffering one.

"It's tea, Ma," she corrected, infusing a touch of the movie's drama into the moment to make it more bearable. "The price of tea in China. And I'm telling you, that stuff with the pants, it won't matter. He knows the old movies—the classic movies-- and he knows I know them, too. Did you hear what I told you what he said about confusing Casablanca and Double Indemnity?" Her chest lifted in a sigh of longing.  "It's like we were meant for each other—"

"Oh, Audra, please," Edith Marks muttered dismissively. "Stop talkin' foolishness and get real. I can't think of anything much more of a turn-off than a woman who's let her butt get so round she rips her pants in front of a bunch of men!"

Audra rolled her eyes. Leave it to Edith to reduce things to their lowest, crudest denominator.

"They ripped," she said loftily, wishing her mother would let her forget the awful  mortification that had accompanied that moment, but the woman seemed determined to make it breathe again, "because I was breaking up a fight—"

"No, Miss Queen of De-Nial," her mother drawled. "They ripped 'cause you need to lose some weight!" She sniffed sanctimoniously. "I know that sounds mean, but it's the truth and you need to hear it. A little weight is one thing, but you're getting too fat, Audra." 

"I just need to cut back a little—" Audra began.

"A little?" Edith interjected. She reached behind her, opening one of the old kitchen's cabinets to reveal its contents: a solid of wall of junk foods piled on its shelves, cookies, crackers, candies and chips jumbled atop each other. "You just bought all this stuff last night and it'll be gone by the end of the weekend--"

Audra frowned. "I'm not the only one who eats that stuff. Kiana likes it—"

"Kiana's a child," Edith reminded her, jerking her head toward the other room where Audra's niece watched animated girls cartwheeling around, solving some kind of mystery through their daring-do. Either because she was transfixed by the images, or because she was used to Grandma and Auntie A's noise, she didn't even turn toward their raised voices. "And she doesn't need this stuff anymore than you do."

"Okay, so I like a little something sweet from time to time." Audra shrugged. "I know in your world of high fashion and glamour, that's some kind of crime, but to the rest of us mere mortals, it's no big deal."

Edith sighed.  "I don't understand you, Audra. Seems like you don't care about what you look like. Not at all," Edith continued. Audra was pretty sure she didn't do it on purpose, but her mother punctuated the words by striking one her little poses, slewing out a foot and propping her hand with her waist, emphasizing her trim figure. She nodded toward a snapshot of Petra, Audra's older sister, looking like Tyra Banks doing a photo shoot for Army fatigues taped to the refrigerator. "Even soldiering in that awful Baghdad, your sister takes some time to put herself together. It's just a matter of pride—"

"I'm looking for a man who sees deeper than outward appearances.  Someone who'll love me no matter what I look like," Audra muttered, tossing the dish towel on the counter and snatching at the open bag of Oreos protruding from the cabinet like a chocolate tongue.

"Men are visual, Audra," Edith grabbed the bag from her hands and tossing it into the garbage can. She dipped her hands into the sink for the next of their dinner dishes. They were a leathery brown—almost an entire shade darker than her cinnamon colored face thanks to the harsh chemicals of her three decades working as a hair stylist.  Still, dark as the hands had become, they were still three shades lighter than the lightest part of Audra's body. Audra frowned, staring at those hands.

  "You want to catch one, you don't gotta be no beauty queen, but you sure as hell better work what you got," her mother continued, enjoying the sound of her own wisdom. "Why do you think Goldilocks Salon is packed from morning to night? Sisters in there pressing and curling and straightening and weaving--" the hands came up out of the water as Edith snapped a couple of soapy fingers. "Working it, that's what they doing. Working it!"  She shook her head, folding her full lips in disapproval. "You keep that hair cut short as a man—and I run a beauty salon, for God's sake! How do you think it makes me look in the neighborhood, my own daughter wandering around with her hair looking like this?" She reached toward Audra's short naps, but Audra danced backwards out of her way.

"You know I like my hair short, Ma," she said defiantly.

"I don't know any such thing—"

"Well, you ought to know it. We've tried every other style and none of them work any better, you've said so yourself."

Edith paused, blinking while she remembered the countless hours she and Audra had spent trying to get the thick bristles of her hair to behave. But it was no use: unlike Petra's locks, which lay down perfectly under straightening comb or relaxer—and unlike Edith's own—Audra's hair seemed to have a mind of its own.

"Well," Edith said slowly, since there was no argument to refute this, she wagged her swingy new hairdo again. "The short look doesn't do a thing for you with your face that full. I don't understand why you can't Pretty Up—like they say on the Beautify! Network—"

"Stupid makeover shows," Audra grumbled.

"Not as stupid as your classic movie fantasyland," her mother shot back, a tinge of anger in her voice. "From where I'm standing, it seems like you're going out of your way to look fat and ugly-- and both of those things are completely within your control!"

Fat and ugly… fat and ugly… fat, black and ugly….

The words danced in her ears, chanted by inmates and now uttered her own mother. 

Fat, black…black… black…

Something angry slithered and squirmed deep in Audra's soul and before she could stop herself she snapped, "What about black, Ma. Is that under my control, too?"

Her mother turned to her in surprise, hands pausing over the sink. "Black?" she shrugged. "Of course not. We're all black, Audra—"

"No, Ma. You're not black, you're brown. Even tan. You and Petra and Daddy— you're all tan." Audra stretched out her own arm, rolling the sleeve up to the elbow. "See this? This is black."

Edith blinked at her, her mouth working silently, then she pushed Audra's outstretched arm away from her. An instant later, she thrust her hands back in the soapy water, fished up another plate, and began scrubbing as if her little sponge could clean up this turn in their conversation.

"So what?” Edith told her sponge in a careful, low voice. "I'm brown-skinned, Petra's light-skinned. But there are darker people in the family—"

"Name one," Audra demanded.

Edith's dishwashing hands paused, the plate slipping out of them to splash audibly in the bubbly water. Her whole body grew very still, as though some kind of spell had been cast on her, making her as motionless as Snow White after she ate the apple. She did not look at Audra or speak.

"I've seen the pictures," Audra pressed on. "I've been with you back to North Carolina. Almost all of us have the same eyes and same shape of face…" Audra hesitated then pushed the words out with sudden determination. "Your people aren't this dark, Mama. Even Gran said she couldn't figure out where my coloring came from—"

When Edith finally faced her, her lips were folded tight and there was a funny auburn flush creeping up from the skin of her neck up to her ears.

"Really, Audra," she said, in a voice that struggled for light, bright and breezy, but ended up sounding strangled and tight. "There's some darker kin on your father's side—"

"No, Ma." Audra interrupted, shaking her head. "Remember that reunion we went to? All of his people have fair skin. Next to them, you and Petra are dark!" Audra stared hard at her mother.  "No one either side of the family is as dark as I am, Ma." She swallowed hard, forcing herself to continue. "Is--is there something you want to tell me?"

Edith's eyes slid from Audra back to the plate, back to the sink. "Like what?" she asked the dish in the same constricted voice.

Audra shrugged. "Like I'm adopted… or… something else," she murmured.

Now, Edith's head snapped toward Audra in surprise. For a long moment, mother and daughter stared at each other in a game of visual chicken, each daring the other to blink first. Audra's heart pounded in her chest, banging so hard against her ribs she wondered if her mother could see it, wondering if it looked like the animated heart of an old-time cartoon character. She put a hand to her chest, pressing, hoping to still the frantic beat.

Just tell me the truth, just tell me the truth, she thought over and over in her mind, knowing that Edith could read the words in her eyes. For once, just--

When her mother finally spoke, her voice was hard as a slap.

"What's this supposed to be? Some big dramatic scene out of one of your old movies? The climactic scene where all the secrets are revealed? Well, I'm sorry, but you weren't adopted… or anything else," she said brusquely. "I don't know why you'd want to say something like that," she grumbled. "You and Petra got the same father… and he's been dead two years now and you know it. Didn't leave anybody anything but bad debts and worse memories, so you're better off without him. Not that you ever needed a thing from him anyway."

"No, not a thing," Audra agreed, an ugly sarcasm taking over her tone. "After all, we always had you."

From her mother's silence, Audra suspected the woman understood fully the implications of that comment, that she could feel Audra's resentments, long standing and desperate, flowing toward her in the silence between them.

"You need to lose some weight. Do something with yourself," her mother said in a nasty, hasty voice, giving back as good as she was getting.  "Then you'll stop focusing on this crazy mess." She dried the sparkling plate herself, pulled the plug and released the water from the sink with an air of rushed finality. "Make yourself useful and go put your sister's child to bed," she told Audra abruptly. "We promised to take care of my baby's baby until she comes home from the War, and I ain't lettin' this trash you're talking keep you from doing your part," then with a swish of her new hairdo, she fled the room and Audra heard her bedroom door slam closed, locking Audra, and further conversation, out.

           

 

            "This one."

Six-year old Kiana handed Audra a thin story book, its paper cover vividly illustrated, then climbed into her lap with a proprietary certainty that only a niece who'd enjoyed a young lifetime of considerable doting and spoiling could manage.  "Read it with the voices, Auntie A. Can you do it with the voices?"

''You bet I can do it with the voices," Audra told her, letting the little girl snuggle tight against her ample chest. Kiana didn't seem to mind how tight her sweatshirt was or how her thighs spread across the surface of the old rocking chair. Audra breathed deeply, letting the girl-smell of bubbles from the bath she'd just taken erase the day, snuggling her chin into the child's freshly braided hair. Kiana held Mugsy, the stuffed rabbit she'd slept with since she was a mere baby. "You read, too, though," Audra told her. "You're getting to be a big girl. Pretty soon, you'll be reading the whole book to me."

            Kiana nodded solemnly, showing the smoky brown eyes that were the signature characteristic all the women in Audra's family—even Audra had the eyes.

            You ain't adopted… or anything else.

Her mother's words echoed in her brain, stirring memories, questions and more questions, questions she wondered if she would ever get answered. But before she could get too lost in considering the matter, Kiana was prying Audra's distracted fingers off the book's glossy cover.  "The Ugly Duckling," she read, girlish and serious all at once.

            The Ugly Duckling.

            Great, Audra thought, a sinking feeling of dread pulling her heart down to her toes. Of all the stories, on all the bookshelves, in all the world…this book has to jump into my hands. 

But all she said was, "Very good," squeezed the girl tight, and started to read.

            Although it had been years since she'd given the story any serious thought, the plot hadn't changed. Separated from her own kind, a swan chick was raised by Mama Duck and her cute little ducklings, who teased and mistreated her for her ungainly awkwardness. Finally, ostracized from the duck family altogether, the ugly one went out into the world, where she met with similar treatment from other animals in both the wild and the barnyard until, after a long harsh winter of solitude, she discovered that she was never a duckling at all, but a beautiful creature of another kind.

"And, no longer an ugly duckling, the swan lived happily ever after," she read aloud to the little girl on her knee, closing the book.  "The end. Now, you'd better hop into this bed before your grandma finds out you're still awake. It's nearly 8:30." Audra frowned, dropping her voice to co-conspirators whisper. "You know how she gets when she's mad."

"Gramzilla," Kiana murmured in a voice of reverent respect and immediately hopped out of Audra's arms and into her bed, her face serious as a spanking.

"Gramzilla is right," Audra agreed. "When she sends your Mommy and Daddy their emails tonight, I want her to be able to give you a good report."

"Are Mommy and Daddy all right?"

Audra nodded. "Fine," and she added a prayer of thanksgiving in heart that it was still true.  "Mommy will probably be home soon.  Before you go to first grade in the Fall, we hope. We'll send them another package this weekend. Now, go to sleep."

Kiana nodded and immediately closed her eyes, feigning sleep.

"That's the way," Audra laughed. She smoothed the covers around the child, kissed her forehead and headed for the door. "Good night."

Kiana sighed the deep and grateful sigh of childhood rest. Before Audra had backed out of the room, Kiana was no longer pretending and was already half asleep.

 

            The lights were already out in the rest of three bedroom apartment they all shared. Clearly, her mother had emerged from her bedroom long enough to accomplish that mission, and, Audra assumed, double-check the locks on the door—all in the time it took for Audra to supervise Kiana's bath and read The Ugly Duckling.  Audra passed her mother's room on the way to the bathroom; the light was on and Audra knew she was in there watching one of those makeover shows she loved so much, typing out her daily message to her daughter and son-in-law at war so many thousands of miles away. Audra hesitated for a moment, staring at the shaft of light seeping from beneath the door, fighting down the urge to reconcile, to beg to be forgiven. 

            But I'm not sorry, she reminded herself. I'm not sorry, and I'm not wrong.  Art Bradshaw might very well be my soul mate… and if he is, it won't matter how much I weigh, or whether my hair is done. When people connect like we did—when the connection is beyond the superficial, looks don't matter. It doesn’t matter if you're fat, or ugly or—

            She pushed aside the last of it, not wanting to contemplate skin tone or her mother or the possibility that she might have more in common with the ugly duckling in the story than she ever could have imagined.

 But ultimately, it was her bladder that pulled her away from her mother's door. Audra hurried up the narrow hallway of the`old apartment toward the bathroom.  But when the urge was satisfied and she was giving her hands some needed attention, she looked up and into the mirror.

She could see the extra weight in the roundness of her cheeks, which these days seemed on the verge of becoming part of her neck—and her hair was a wiry, unnatural helmet of brittle black spikes.  Her ebony skin was pocked and marred by the after-effects of adolescent acne-- and as if to remind her that the bad old days were far from over, two new zits shined out on her chin and forehead. Audra's attention by-passed her lips and eyes—there was nothing wrong with them—to find her nose. It appeared to be a misshapen blob off-center in her face, like a lump of overused play dough crudely abandoned by bored child.

            "Please let him see beyond fat, black and ugly," she whispered toward the sky. "I'm counting on you, Art Bradshaw," she whispered,  Then she moved quietly through the house toward her own room, where the sweeping music and opening credits of another old black and white film were coloring the darkness in shades of gray.