Dolma keeps talking, “I hear Gloria not even let Ma Tay take she for a weekend or during the holidays. Not once since she swoop that baby up has she come home. She sends Ma money every so often in the mail.”
I can’t help think Dolma is a damn hypocrite. Expecting us to visit like she’s the Queen and we her loyal patrons. And that’s what I have in my nine-year-old mind. I was just there for a visit, soon to be returned the same way I arrived, with the pretty flight attendant walking me back onto the plane, me with my earphones tapping different TV shows just like the woman next to me showed me. And then Mikey and Thompson outside the arrival gate in the rust-covered car waiting to drive me back to Ma Tay. Instead, Dolma enrolls me in school and pretends like everything’s the way it’s supposed to be.
I remember associating Dolma with the hypocritical ways of the ladies down by the river. The ladies who made fun of Thompson behind his back and then told me I needed to behave better for my father. They said me and him were similar ’cause, “He born black too.” They said, “Your daddy’s mother make pretty red children but your daddy come out black and fierce and well he wasn’t what your grandmother expected.” They talked about him getting a blow to the ear by his mother, “She box him so hard he fall down and didn’t get up for a minute or so.” The ladies down by the river found me there often, sitting with the rocks, the stones with the ancient faces. They never did notice those ancient guardians. They were too busy, too preoccupied with their buckets of dirty clothes, their square blue soap and their fast talk. All they noticed was a child with a scowl, the same child they heard rumours about, rumours about a Mr. Robbie, rumours about that same child visiting this man’s house regularly, sneaking up and behind the old quarry road. Rumours these same women never bothered to verify, never bothered to investigate, never bothered to rectify.
The rain transports me back to the present. Large swollen drops soak the top of my head. I run to take cover at a bus stand close to the apartment. Judith is probably warm and dry, eating popcorn while watching a movie. And me, wet and cold, rocking back and forth on the insides of my soles, hands squeezed under arms, mind swatting memories untethered, unwanted.
JUDITH
MONDAY MORNING. SOLA LEAVING for school tomorrow. Summer coming to an end. I have one more week before community college start. I tell she to meet me in the park. Giant willow trees leaning over the river. The heat turn crisp cool. People biking, running, walking, throwing Frisbees. Last weekend before school begin. September. It’s not something you feel like on Small Island. Not like each house have children getting ready for school, plaiting hair, ironing clothes, cleaning shoes, organizing school bags — everything out in the open. Everybody side by side moving through similar routines. Big Island too big for that. A holiday Monday before school feel more like another day with a slight urgency behind it.
“Wish I had the grades to go where you’re going,” I say while crouching on my heels gazing at ducks in the water at the park.
“That’d be cool,” Sola say. “You can come visit on a weekend. It’s only a two-hour bus ride. You’d like my roommates. Katrina and Greg. Kat’s cool. I don’t see her much. She is in fourth year too, plays rugby and is meticulous about her grades.”
I love the words Sola puts down. Meticulous.
“There are guys tripping themselves to be around her. Seems like every weekend Kat’s talking about a different man. Non-attachment, she calls it.”
“She couldn’t try that on Small Island.”
“Couldn’t try what?”
“Having different men every weekend. She’d be shamed, put in her place for thinking she can have more than one man. My friend Melina used to joke about different man she with, but thing is, she never with any man. She don’t even like man.”
“Who’s Melina?”
“A friend back home. She used to give the older boys talk, tell them all kinds of things she do already with man and how they still little boy. They hold Melina down in the boy’s bathroom after school one day and had a go with her. Three of them.”
“What happened to the boys?” Sola ask.
“Nothing.”
“What do you mean nothing?”
“They went to court. I think they pay the Magistrate $600 each. But they never get jail. One of the boys from the Village and I walk by him every fucking day. I want to say something to him, something that reach into his little brain, make him atone for the shit he do Melina.”
“That’s a different situation than Kat. Kat doesn’t provoke She just like to date different men.”
“So you mean Melina deserve what she get?”
“Did I say that? I’m just saying she should know better. She should know some men don’t even know what is a joke and what is not a joke. She should know the more she provokes the more men think they can have their way.”
“Really Sola? That’s what you saying? You sound like people back home. They say she too fast. They say she deserve what she get. But provoke or not, no one has the right to violate someone like that. If you see her now. She not she self. It’s like they mash up she soul.” Sola grab a stone and pelt it sideways into the water, scattering the ducks. “How many more years you have at school anyways?” I ask.
“Last one.”
“Then what?”
“Then I don’t know.”
“You think you’ll go back to Small Island?”
“To live?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“Well I going back. I know for sure. I only here ’cause everyone pressuring me to pull up my marks, to take advantage of opportunity. I wish they leave me alone and let me live my life,” I say, surprised at the tremble in my words.
“What’s there for you on Small Island?”
“That’s where my home is.”
“Well you haven’t even given it a chance here.” Sola heading to the road, walking away.
“Where you going? Why you always walking away?”
“I need to get home.”
“I thought we were spending the day together.”
“Maybe later.”
“Sola come back. Where you going? What did I say? Damn you’re not easy. Can we meet later? I have something for you.”
“I’ll phone you,” she say.
Then she gone. Gone again, reminding me of the time she walk then run away after we spend the night dancing. The night I kiss she and she kiss me back. I don’t want Sola to go. I don’t want Sola to leave for school. I don’t want to be alone.
A few hours later she at the door saying, “Let’s go swimming.”
And half-hour later I walking into the YWCA behind she. Sola flash she membership card. I come next asking where’s the washroom. The lady look at me strange. She ask me for my card. I ask if I can use the washroom. She watch me strange again. She tell me there’s a coffee shop next door. I say “give me a break nah. My belly going to bust.” The girl watch me again then she point with her eyes to the door where Sola just walk through.
A swoosh of warm air hits me as soon as I step in. I think of Ms. Catwell who mop the floors of St. Charles Secondary School every day at 4:00 pm. Ms. Catwell with her hot-pepper-sauce gaze. The slap of she mop indicating what kind of mood she in. Ms. Catwell’s mop traded for the slap of bare feet on dirty yellow tiles. The room cut into rows of lockers. I look for Sola down each. Different size ladies putting on, pulling off shirts, hooking and unhooking bras, wiping down their skin with towels. I see one woman with silver crosses dangling from nipples as she struggles to pull up she one piece. She look up to see me watching. My eyes bawling pain. “Cool hat,” she say. My hand fly up to see if I truly wearing a hat. She smile, grab she towel and head for the pool.
The moist bleached air climb up my clothes while I look down so as not to meet other people’s eyes. Two children wearing matching blue suits with purple caps. Their
mother telling them they have to wait another ten minutes before family swim begin. I feel strange in my long-sleeve jersey, jeans, hiking boots and my locks tuck up into my rainbow knit hat. Sola nowhere in the warm sticky antiseptic air. I follow the lady with the piercings and find myself looking out a glass door. A pool stretch into lengths partitioned by red and white striped ropes. Each row have one or two swimmers. I see Sola. She the only brown in the cobalt blue. She move differently from the others. It’s the first time I experience that kind of strength, sliding up, back and shoulders, grace cutting through water effortlessly, head moving side to side. Sola a black fish curving through water. I slip through the glass door and lean against the blue wall. My eyes stuck to Sola’s body. I pull my hat off. Bubbles of sweat gather on top my forehead and below my nose. I don’t hear the lifeguard come up. I’m not allowed there; he say I can watch up from above. But by the time I reach the top of the stairs and look down, people pulling themselves up and out of the pool. The candy-striped ropes rolled, leaving a long blue rectangle.
“Where you learn to swim?” I ask while we walk out of the building.
Sola say she cousin Mikey love to fish and she love to swim. At first she stay close to the shore where the water reach she waist while Mikey swim out into deeper waters with mask, snorkel and flippers. She say she almost drown once. A wave from a fishing boat cause she to lose balance and sweep she out where she no longer touch bottom. She arms and legs beat up the water trying to regain balance. Thank God Mikey not far she say. He swimming toward she with a huge sea cat in one hand and mask and snorkel in the next.
“It didn’t take him long to see me in a chaotic dance,” she say.
Mikey with flippers gliding through water until he under Sola pulling she up and toward where she could touch bottom. A whack of water funnel from she lungs. She say she never see she cousin look so frighten. Sola smile when she tell me this. Smile like she discover something new about she cousin and it taste sweet and nice.
“His fear of me drowning disappeared when he set eyes back on that monster of a sea cat,” she say laughing. “I remember coughing till air passed through my lungs. Then I asked Mikey if I could hold that sea cat.” Sola imitating Mikey, “‘You mad gyal this thing bigger than you.’” After that day she say she wasn’t fraid of deep waters. She say she teach she self to swim like the professional swimmers on TV. She say Mikey fish almost every weekend after he catch the sea cat. And he let Sola follow him. Later she say swimming a meditation, a piece of solitude, a slip into forgetting Those pretty words again. Slip into forgetting. Solitude. Meditation.
“Forgetting what?” I ask.
“Whatever needs forgetting.”
When Sola talk about Mikey she voice move fast like she want to say more but then more turn to silence.
I want to say something. I want to tell she how lonely for home she make me feel. But instead I ask when she last talk to Mikey. She shrug, then ask, “When you last talk to Drey?”
“Drey?”
“When was the last time you called Drey?” she say.
“I don’t know. Maybe a few days ago.”
Not sure why out of no where she asking me about Drey. I don’t want to talk about him. I want to talk more about she life before Big Island. But then she have this funny way of changing the topic, making me believe I stepping over boundaries. Too many questions and Sola go quiet or change the subject or say she got to go. Usually I keep asking until she watch me like I too fast to know she business.
The corner before we reach the bus stand she say she better get home to finish packing. I want to invite myself over but I fraid after the irritation my last visit cause. Instead we hug and I feel she body hug me back. Then she let go fast. I can’t help wonder how the kiss play on she mind still. Does she think I want more? I want to say, “I love you. I love you like a dear friend, like a sister.” Just simple like that. But I don’t. Instead I give she a small gift of a CD and write those words on the cover
SOLA
JUDITH SAYS SHE IS going to miss me. Says her gift was a gift of appreciation for our friendship. She hugs me. I tell her she is too damn sentimental and that she can get on a bus and visit any time. She gives me a CD called Throw Down Your Arms by an Irish woman singing old-time reggae. I never heard of a bald-headed white Rasta before. The first time I hear her voice I lay down on my bed, spread my arms and legs like I am balancing on water, like I am floating to the thunder of her tender, angry voice. The power I feel in my bones is a power unfamiliar and yet it spreads through my body like it belongs there, like it is there even before I was born. I inhale deep the woman’s voice and the words Judith wrote on the CD case, “i love you,” words like scattered leaves on an old country road. I feel a soft warm ache from my toes, moving to my knees, up through my spine to each shoulder and swimming the length of my neck into my head, a swoosh of pleasure that makes me smile.
That night, the night before I leave for school, I dream Judith is asking all kinds of questions. She is asking them so fast they are swirling above my head and I don’t have time to answer before she’s asking another. I can hear myself answering, “Worthless. A worthless bad-minded child,” before lying down on a piece of roof heaved from the back of Ma Tay’s house. And I am swirling backwards down a steep slope on a thin tin sheet ripping up ice with my hands trying to stop, I am wearing white tights with black triangles, hands over my head first laughing then screaming because I can’t stop and there is no one to grab me, no one to tell me to stop going to the man’s house. Because in my dream I am now in Mr. Robbie’s house.
My eyes click open. Mr. Robbie’s house still on the periphery. I am out of my dream and bed, heading to the kitchen for a glass of water but instead I gulp down ginger beer and my eyes and throat catch fire. I close my eyes and let the ginger burn through my chest and I walk back to my room.
I lie down and turn to the photos of Ma Tay taped to my bedroom wall. Two different photos side by side. Ma Tay in the shadows of the street lamp in a blue dress with a neat woven straw hat; Ma Tay in the yard leaning on an old guava tree, cutlass in hand tilting into her black rubber boots. The photos went up a couple weeks ago, inspired by Judith’s collage of Small Island photos pinned to a cork board in her bedroom. I found the two pictures of Ma Tay stuck in the pages of Dolma’s Old Testament. I never searched for the others but I knew they were tucked into other books around the house. Photos slipped in there years ago. Photos of Small Island. I flipped through the Bible Ma Tay shoved into my suitcase before I left. It still rests on the bookshelf in the living room. I remember once trying to find comfort in those pages, sliding my hand over the soft feathery sheets then falling asleep to King James’ difficult rhythms unsatisfied with questions unanswered. I didn’t go back to sleep; instead I searched the Bible again and found another picture tucked away into the Psalms. Me holding a dead bird with a group of kids posing. All of us cross armed. All of us rebels in the sun. Fierce unsmiling faces. And me stretching a half-dead bird from wing to wing trying not to let the curves of my mouth float up. I am holding a trophy.
Who took the photo is a blur, but there I am with the bird smiling and there too is Mr. Robbie’s house, not in the photo but before the photo was taken, before the bird was carried home, before the kids ran to me like I was the cow-bird queen. Mr. Robbie’s gate hiding the veranda, the potted hibiscus climbing the stairs, the door opening and there I am walking out, walking away from Mr. Robbie’s house. Bare feet kicking sand, school shoes dangling by my side. A slap across the back of my head tripping me to the ground.
“How you clumsy so girl? Ah give you one little slap and you falling?” Elroy laughing.
“What the ass you do that for? You better run you coward,” I say.
Elroy sprinting down the beach whooping full speed and diving into the sea. My knees bubbling with sand. A white cow bird lying flat on its side, a wing awkwardly bent behind its small body. Th
e bird breathing fast. Eyes fluttering. Belly rising and falling like a small fan blowing from the inside out. I stop to study the bird closely. I want to carry it home and show Mikey and the other kids. I want to be the one with a possession no one else had. Like Mr. Robbie.
“Don’t go telling anyone you here; I don’t want other kids in my yard. You hear? You’re different.”
I walk home with the bird stretched between my arms like a Japanese fan.
First neighbour, “What you have there gyal?”
“It’s a cow bird!”
The kids farther up the road notice. Cricket game done. They gallop toward me. “What you have there Sola?” Trevor asks.
“So you don’t know what a bird looks like!” I say.
“Hold on. Stop nah. We want to see,” Elroy skating to a stop in front of us.
“See what? So you never see a cow bird before?” Shoulders flung back, chest out.
“Let me see nah,” Elroy says.
“Mikey come. I have something to show you!” I yell into Elroy’s face.
“Sola that you? Where you been? Ma Tay looking for you. Someone tell her they see you on the back road again.” Mikey’s voice from beneath the house.
The pride of my found treasure fades into the loosening of my knees, the shortening of my breath, the warmth of my face.
“Come. I have something to show you,” I say. I hand the bird over to Mikey.
“So that’s why you late ’cause you searching for birds to torment?” Mikey say with a softness I breathe in and hold beneath my tongue. Mikey lays the bird under the house to protect it from the dogs.
“I saw the bird on the back road. Where’s the spade? I will dig a grave for it,” I say.
“Sola is that you?” Ma Tay by the stand pipe washing clothes.
“Ma. I home. I found a bird that need help that’s why I late Ma.”
“A bird that needs help?”
“Come and see,” I say.
Big Island, Small Page 6