The Other Side of Paradise: A Memoir Page 21

  From behind the fence at school I watch him playing soccer with the other boys. His skinny frame moves as quick as lightning as he makes a beeline for the goal. And he is one of the fastest boys on the Cornwall College track team. I wonder if he knows Delano. Troy likes to laugh and make jokes all the time. Being with him makes me feel like I am like everyone else. I write little notes to him and I hurry to Sunday school so I can see him before the service begins. I can’t talk to him during Wednesday-night prayer meetings, but I still go with Auntie so I can look at him from my pew.

  Nellie says I should start coming to young people’s meeting on Saturdays. “Our group leader, James, is here on Saturday and he is not very strict, so you can really get to talk to Troy.”

  Auntie is pleased to see me take an interest in church. “Yes, of course you can go to youth meeting. You can always go to anything, as long as it have to do with the Lord.”

  The elders do not come to youth meetings, so the young people get there early to sit around and talk. And after the meeting we sit on the wall surrounding the church. Troy sits beside me. I don’t know how I know, but the way he is sitting on the wall and not saying anything to me makes me feel like he wants me to keep sitting beside him. We sit there until it is time to go home.

  On Monday I inform Sandy that I have a boyfriend.

  At first she is shocked and delighted. “What? Him cute? You can’t have a boyfriend that is not cute!” Then she is worried. “Well, you better be careful with them boys. I hear them always want you to have sex with them.”

  I tell her that she doesn’t have to worry about that. Troy is a good Christian boy who would never think of asking me such a thing. I do not tell Natalia my news at school. I want to be able to tell her everything in private without any interruption. I wait until we are finished with homework and dinner. When the plates are in the sink, I usher Natalia into her bedroom. “Talia, I think I have a boyfriend.”

  “Stacey, what you mean, you think? Is either you have one or you don’t!”

  “Okay, okay. I have a boyfriend.”

  “Is he cute? Like Carl?”

  I don’t want to talk about Carl, but I don’t know how to say that to Natalia. “No, he’s just okay-looking.”

  “Oh, okay. Did I tell you that Carl called three times yesterday and two times on Saturday?”

  I really wish she would just shut up about Carl. I can’t see what she sees in him. His grades are bad and he uses words incorrectly.

  She places her hand over her heart and sighs. “And then he came over here last night and I kissed him. You kiss your boyfriend yet?”

  Something turns in my stomach. “Yes, man! I kiss him all the time!” I decide that I have to kiss Troy. I am disappointed that Natalia does not ask more questions about him.

  The next week at youth meeting I tell Nellie to tell Troy that he can kiss me. All during the program I wonder what I am going to do during the kiss. I wish I had asked Natalia to tell me exactly what she did when Carl kissed her. Then I would know what to do. Thinking about Carl and Natalia makes me angry, so I walk over to the wall and sit with my legs very close to Troy’s. He smiles nervously and clears his throat. “Well, Stacey, you know that we have been girlfriend and boyfriend for one week now. I think it’s time we make something serious of it.”

  He scoots closer and takes me by the arm. He is a little rough, and I really do not want him to kiss me, but I don’t know what to say to stop him. And I feel bad that he doesn’t know that I am pretending to be in love with him. His face moves closer and closer to mine until his eyes are so close they look like two big bug-eyes. He puckers his lips and I do the same. Suddenly he opens his mouth and almost swallows my nose. He sucks on my lower face for what feels like a million years. While I wait for him to finish, I think of ways to make the kiss sound more exciting when I tell Natalia about it. His lips make a smacking noise when he finally pulls them off mine.

  The whole event is so wet and cold I wonder why everybody makes such a fuss. Troy chews on a blade of grass as he tells me that he is willing to kiss me anytime I want. All I have to do is let him know when. The way he says it lets me know that he has not even considered that I may not want him to. I wish I could just tell him how I really feel about kissing him. I wish I could tell Natalia how I feel about Carl. I wish I could just tell everybody how I feel about everything. I am tired of pretending. But I am too afraid that no one will like me without the parts of me I have worked so hard to make up.

  You Shall Have Treasure

  The daffodil-printed one-piece bathing suit is a little baggy in the crotch, but my body looks good in it. It is hard to believe the girl in the mirror is me. I wish I had long straight hair so I could let it all out and shake it like the women on TV. I settle for adjusting the yellow straps and tucking in the stray pubic hairs poking out from the sides.

  “How me look, Elisha? It make me skin look darker, don’t it?”

  “Lawd, Stacey, it look sooo nice. Me can’t believe is you that look so boasty in a French-cut bath-suit!”

  “Elisha, I know it look nice, but it make me skin look any darker too, eh?”

  “Not really. You still look white to me. But what you want to look Black for? You don’t know that Black people don’t really get ahead in life.”

  “Elisha, stop that old naygar talk! I think all that Black people and white people foolishness is just mouth talk! And Natasha say it is good for you to look like you have a tan. Rich people go to the beach to get a tan.”

  “You can think anything you want think, Stacey. Me don’t know nutten ’bout no tan. But me know what me know. Why you think Auntie don’t like you?”

  “Because me back-talk her too much. And because me mother not sending no money come from Canada.”

  “No, I don’t think is just that! I think is because she and the rest of we not white like you and your friends and your brother!”

  “Elisha, how much time I must tell you? I am not white! I am half-Chinese!”

  “White, Chinese, Syrian—is the same thing! You not Black like we. You can get ahead in life. The rest of we just have to stay right here till we dead.”

  I look away to avoid Elisha’s gaze. From the small wood frame the loops glow golden against my naked shoulders. I untie the bows and make them tighter. I can see my nipples pushing at the stretchy fabric.

  “Elisha, the bosom part good, eh? Not too loose, not too tight, like them did measure me for it.”

  The bath-suit is truly the prettiest thing I have ever owned. I carefully retie the strings in long loopy bows on top of my shoulders.

  The body is a cool dark blue. Bright yellow daffodils hold hands in a ring around my waist. Matching yellow piping traces the scooped neckline to become the straps. The legs are cut higher than anything I have ever worn before.

  “So, you don’t think it make my breast them look funny?”

  “No, man, you look just like a model in a magazine. Like you rich and have nuff white people friend. Everybody go think you look good at Porto Seco Beach.”

  “Yes. Is true. My breast them look smooth and sexy fi true. You think Troy will like it?”

  “Yes, man. Him will really like it, especially how the breast part look nice and smooth!”

  I usually dislike the feel of the fleshy stones of my bosoms brushing up against my loose T-shirt, but in the vise of the spandex glove, both of them sit upright and immobile. I feel like the bath-suit is holding every part of me together.

  But the biggest problem with breasts is men. Men liked to pinch breasts. And it seems like every man in Paradise wants to pinch mine: Andy, Shappy, Pastor Gentles—no matter how I cover them, no matter how I position my body, some man finds a way to pinch a nipple when I walk by. And having breasts this big makes me feel bigger than thirteen years old. But in this bath-suit, in this mirror, the breasts on my chest look sort of normal. Not like breasts that everybody feels they have the right to touch.

  I can only see the top half of m
e in the dresser mirror. To see my lower half I have to climb up on the bed and then stoop down. Cross-eyed and crouching, I can barely see the tops of my thighs, but my stomach is flat and my bottom looks nice and round.

  “So when you going to tell Mama that you get a new bath-suit?”

  “Elisha, the bath-suit isn’t really new. It used to belong to Natalia. She was very sad to part with it too. It was her favorite one. But she say it would be wrong to keep it when it don’t even cover her breasts anymore. Personally, I think she shame that I was swimming in her pool in my PE shorts every week. She was very nice about it, though. She says she won’t tell anybody that is she who give it to me.”

  I know Auntie would not like it if she knew I was taking things from other people like I was in the almshouse. I was just going to use it at Natalia’s, but the youth group at church is going to Porto Seco Beach next Saturday, and all the young people have real bath-suits—not sports shorts or cut-off pants or dresses tied up around the waist.

  I wish I could just hide it and wear it on the trip, but Auntie might hear that I was in a fancy bath-suit and kill me for wearing it without her permission. If I show it to her she might make me throw it away. I can’t lose this bath-suit. It is the nicest piece of clothing I own.

  “Elisha, can you check to make sure me bottom cover up good?”

  “Yes, man, everything look good. All of your bottom is inside it. Just go on and show it to her. It fit you so good, she must bound fi like it!”

  “Okay. All right, then.” I take a deep breath and step out onto the veranda.

  “Auntie, look at me!”

  “But Jesus Chr—is what that you have on?”

  “Is a bath-suit, Auntie! You don’t like it?”

  “That color don’t fit your complexion. You skin too white fi wear flowers. And why the bottom so tight-up under you crotches?”

  “Is so the style go, Auntie! But I can fix it.”

  I hook my fingers under the elastic and pull hard until the tops of my thighs are covered. The straps bite into my shoulders and my breasts strain against the blue spandex.

  “That suit look like the dressmaker run out of cloth before them finish. You too big for it and your breast pushing out like you is a old Jezebel whore! Is where you get it from, poorhouse?”

  “No, ma’am, is Natalia give it to me. It cannot fit her anymore.”

  Auntie’s face hardens into an unreadable mask. She pushes her right foot back and forth across the shiny red floor.

  Without expression, she asks, “Stacey, is beg you go up to Mango Walk to beg that girl for her clothes?”

  “No, ma’am, is she just give it to me. I never ask her anything.”

  Auntie finishes her cup of fever-grass tea and puts the cup on the rail. “Uh-huh. Go inside and get the belt.”

  “But, Auntie, I swear to God in heaven that I never ask her—”

  “Stacey, stop taking the Lord’s name in vain and go get the belt.”

  “Auntie, you never listen to anything I tell you. Is better if I did tell you a lie! No matter what I tell you, you always think is a lie!”

  “Stacey, stop the talking and go and get the belt. Because not even God above can hold me responsible fi anything that happen to you if I have to go get it meself.”

  I bite my lips and fold my arms across my chest.

  “You hear what I just say to you, little girl?”

  “Yes, Auntie. Can I go take off this first?”

  “No! Is you did want to wear it. Keep it on. Just bring the belt and come.”

  I enter the darkness of Auntie’s room and wait for my eyes to adjust. The sheets on the bed are the same color as the bath-suit. I walk around the barrel of canned food and move Auntie’s black handbag out of the way. The coins in the bottom jingle. The belt hangs ominously from a nail by the window. I reach up, unhook it, rub the smooth length with my thumb, and inhale the slightly greasy sheen.

  I walk back to the veranda. Auntie takes the leather strap and wraps one end like a bandage around her palm.

  Leather and skin meet and my skin tightens around my whole body.

  Whack!

  “How many times I must tell you?”

  Whack!

  “Little girls should not beg anybody for anything!”

  I tell myself, I will not cry. Whack! But the tears come anyway. Whack!

  “You is not a leggo beast in a pasture!”

  Whack!

  “You are not living inside no poorhouse!”

  Whack!

  “We are not beggars under this roof!”

  Whack!

  I will not give her the satisfaction of screaming. Whack!

  “What is wrong with you, eh, Stacey? Why you so bloody stubborn?”

  A rumble begins in my belly.

  Whack! Whack! Whack!

  “Why when you leave here you must go and beg people things?”

  It pushes up from my insides and toward my throat.

  “You want me tie you up like that dirty dog under the house?”

  Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack!

  “No! Please. No! Jesus Christ! Help me, God! Murder! Help! Father God! Jesus, no!”

  I am not aware that the sounds are coming out of me. I only start to make sense of them when I hear them circling above me.

  “Stop, Auntie! Stop now! I’m going to give her back the bath-suit! Just stop now. Please, I beg you, stop hitting me now.”

  Whack! Whack! Whack!

  “Now you only have mouth fi bawl out, eh?”

  Whack!

  “Me tired fi tell you!” Whack! “You is not a big woman!” Whack! “You is a child!”

  Whack!

  “No! No, Auntie, no! Stop! Please, please, please don’t hit me anymore…”

  I am curled into myself on the floor. There is no other sound in the room but my sobbing. The shiny new bath-suit is covered with red floor polish and dust.

  Auntie winds the belt into a tight leather roll and hands it to me.

  “Get up from that floor and go put this back where you find it. And go and take off that thing. Girl children not supposed to wear bikini bath-suit.”

  “Auntie, is not a bikini!”

  “What you saying to me?”

  “A bikini has two parts. This bath-suit is a one-piece, so is not a bikini.”

  “That mouth of yours is what go lead you straight into hell. Mark this day as the day I tell you that! Now get out me sight before I change my mind and give you something to talk about! And make sure you put that thing in the garbage!”

  “But, Auntie, me don’t have another bath-suit and the beach trip is tomorrow.”

  “I couldn’t give a dyam ’bout that. Wear the pants that you get from Diana.”

  I replace the belt on its hook and brush past Auntie on my way back to our room. When I am well outside of her reach I mutter under my breath, “Well, I just won’t go, then.”

  “What you say? Don’t make me come in that room after you! If you know what is good for you, you would keep your stinking mouth shut!”

  I peel the spandex off my bruised skin, fold the bath-suit into the tightest ball I can manage, and stuff it back into my clothes bag.

  “Stacey, you throw away that thing yet?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I throw it in the garbage heap over the fence.”

  “Good. Now get up and go find something to do.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Elisha says, “Stacey, if you wear the bathing suit on at Porto Seco tomorrow, I won’t say anything to anybody.”

  “I know, Elisha. But is not you one will see me. And Auntie might do worse to me if she hear that me wear the thing anyway.”

  “So what you going to wear, then?”

  “I going wear what I always wear when me go to the beach. It don’t matter what other people say. If them don’t like me because of some stupid bath-suit, then them shouldn’t be me friend anyway.”

  “Stacey, me really sorry you not going get fi we
ar it tomorrow. It really did look nice ’pon you.”

  “Elisha, you don’t remember how it did make my breast look funny? As a matter of fact, I like the shorts better than that tight-up bath-suit. I probably woulda never wear it, make everybody see me on decent Porto Seco Beach looking like a Jezebel whore!”

  I go to close the chicken coops. It is night already and all the fowls are inside their cages. I shut each cage and wonder why the stupid chickens come back to the coops every night.

  The Sins of the Father

  I am fourteen years old and Auntie still spends every waking hour telling me what to do: when to sit, when to eat, when to read, when to speak. And even when I do as she says, it is never good enough to please her. I am tired of trying to stay out of her way. She is like a scratched record. And because my life at home is such a big secret, I have to pretend that I am not going crazy living under her roof.

  For the first project in the ninth grade, our English teacher, Miss Ritgard, gives us the choice between keeping a private journal and summarizing the journal of someone significant in history. I choose to write down my own thoughts. What appeals to me most about the journal is that no one is allowed to read what we write, and we won’t be penalized for anything we write, no matter how offensive or controversial. I use a brand-new notebook as my journal.

  In my first entry, I write just basic information, my mother’s name, my father’s name, and what I know about them. In the second, I scribble a two-page rant about Auntie. I write down how much I hate her and how much I hope she will die. Every day I write something. After a few days I begin to write down things I would never say out loud to anyone. I confess how much I hate kissing Troy. As soon as I get home in the evenings I reread the journal from cover to cover and add more.

  October 19, 1987

  Dear Diary,

  Today I went to visit Delano. He wasn’t there, but his father, who I call Uncle Charlie, was home. He gave me money and told me that I was very pretty and bright and he wouldn’t be surprised if I got very far in life. Sometimes I wonder why Uncle Charlie gives me all this money, but I never ask him and he never says anything.