“My wife?”
Rachel looked up from her cake, knife in hand, about to take the first cut. Her father had his brand-new camera poised to capture the event. He handed the camera to Sister Aline, who had no idea how to use it and so asked Esperanza to take the picture. She managed to press the button as Rachel’s eyes shut. The flash lit up the table while Esperanza glanced over in Mr. M.’s direction. She appeared uncomfortable, unsure of where she now belonged in the party. And Mr. M. didn’t offer any indication of how he was going to handle the situation. Esperanza kept taking pictures, Rachel holding up her knife in a mock gesture of action. Mr M. adjusted the knot of his red-and-white striped tie, a gesture he performed while in thought or when taken off guard. He smoothed his other hand over his hair and began to follow Mother Superior. For once, she was leading him.
“I just don’t have enough money for her cab,” Mother Superior apologized. “As you know, we do our banking on Mondays.”
“That’s fine. Fine,” Mr. M. replied, although his voice betrayed a touch of anger, directed towards the stairs he was about to climb to reach the entrance lobby of the school, the cafeteria being on the ground floor.
Esperanza took another couple of pictures as Rachel cut the cake and handed slices to Sister Aline, who accepted them on paper plates. Rachel seemed grateful the party wasn’t halted and she directed Esperanza on how to adjust the focus for a broader picture of the room. I, however, felt anxious. I wanted Mr. M. to be the leader of the party at all times. And only the girls ought to have been there. Not Esperanza. I hoped that once Mr. M. returned, Sister Aline would ask her to leave. Notwithstanding, I helped Esperanza by distributing the plates, starting at the back of the cafeteria, then making my way to the front. Francine also helped, her body shaking from sugar intake.
“I didn’t know Mrs. M. was going to be here,” she said. “I haven’t seen her in two years.” Her words came faster than usual, her tongue sliding in and out of her mouth, trying to catch a smear of purple sugar on her lower lip.
“No?” I placed a few slices of cake on the table for the youngest girls in the school, who instantly started to devour the ice cream before it melted. Allowed to serve the food, like a waitress in a dessert shop, I suddenly felt a smug equality with Esperanza. If she could take the pictures, then I could pass out cake; Mr. M. would be pleased with both of us. Maybe I could even impress Mrs. M. by how well I performed on her daughter’s behalf. I was sure Mrs. M. had never met Esperanza, and might dismiss her once she discovered she was hired help and not one of her daughter’s friends.
“Well, we don’t live on the same street any more.”
“I’ve never met her,” I said. Francine knew this, of course, but I felt I should say it anyway. I didn’t know what else to say.
“Rachel won’t like this,” Francine added, turning with me to go back to the head table to retrieve more cake from Sister Aline. The nun was at ease in her motherly role, gasping merrily at the size of the slices, gazing at the top of Rachel’s blonde head with pride, while the cafeteria staff stood back politely waiting for instructions. They made an effort to speak mostly in English, in short and blunt phrases they had memorized, but periodically slipped into Chinese when the new words escaped them. The two women behind me were repeating “ice cream cake” to commit the item to memory. Another one was shrugging. “Mrs. M.?” she asked, scanning the room as if the woman would materialize out of thin air.
Mr. M. returned fifteen minutes later with his wife. Most of the girls took little notice, content with their feasting, wearing party hats and blowing occasionally on a whistle or party favour, then bursting into laughter, cake dripping from their mouths. Several of the nuns rose from their table to welcome Mrs. M., who held onto the crook of Mother Superior’s arm, not her husband’s. Mrs. M. wore a white blouse with a ruffled collar and a tartan skirt of green, blue, and yellow down to her ankles. She shuffled, her left foot dragging behind her, and her free arm moved jaggedly, up and down. Her mouth was crunched into a bow, and a pink lipstick puffed out her lips, a slightly darker pencil stencilled around them. She was not a large woman, but held herself as if she were, dragging her body over to a seat near Rachel. Her big eyes were framed with blue eye shadow and her skin, although sagging around her neck, was tight on her cheeks and around her eyelids. Her hair was brown, which suggested to me for the first time that with age Rachel might lose the stunning blonde curls of her youth. It also struck me that Mrs. M. was holding in her breath, her posture rehearsed, as if it took all her concentration to walk.
Rachel did no more to acknowledge her mother than hand her a piece of cake, which was refused, Mrs. M.’s hand held against her mouth to indicate she did not want any, a girlish smile breaking through underneath. She marvelled at the balloons and streamers as Sister Marguerite brought her a cup of coffee with milk. She pointed to the colours surrounding her with glee.
When Mrs. M. finally spoke, she slurred. “My daughter’s having quite the day,” she said to no one in particular. The nuns agreed, told her a bit about the games that had been played and the girls who had won the prizes. I presented my pink bracelet to Mrs. M., waving my arm like an exotic fan. Mrs. M. smiled admiringly at the token and proceeded to list off the names of the girls, pronouncing each slowly as her eyes flashed around the room.
“Drink your coffee, Louise,” Mr. M. told his wife flatly from where he stood behind her.
Caroline and I were excited to sit with the adults, eating our cake and trying to please Mrs. M. for the simple reason that she was Rachel’s mother and we had never met her before. Francine, now also at the table, took a certain pride in the fact that she had. Mrs. M. looked like she had two different hairstyles, one on top brushed flat and another frizzy underneath. I wondered if she was wearing a wig, like my mother did. She appeared ill by the way her face was drawn, the manner in which she walked and spoke, and it occurred to me then that Rachel’s mother might be suffering like mine. Tenderness welled up in me for her, and I wanted to share it with Rachel to show her I understood. But Rachel kept her elbows around her plate, her back arched in the opposite direction of her mother. She sucked in the sides of her cheeks each time her mother spoke.
“What did you get?” Mrs. M. asked her, holding her plastic cup to her lips. “Ouch!” she exclaimed, glaring at her husband.
“The coffee’s lukewarm, Louise,” he said loudly when one of the Chinese women heard and ran quickly over to check if she had hurt herself. Mr. M. waved her off, asking her to make more tea for the table. “Don’t you dare ruin this for your daughter,” he said quietly but not out of my earshot as he bent down and placed his palms squarely on his wife’s shoulders.
“I haven’t opened anything yet,” Rachel said, indicating the table piled with gift boxes and bags. “Can’t you see?”
Mrs. M. clapped her hands. “Gordon,” she roared. “The girl hasn’t opened any presents yet? It’s her birthday!”
“It’s a party,” he replied. “We open the gifts after everyone has finished the cake.” He pointed to my dessert, which I had barely touched. I smiled sheepishly and scooped another spoonful into my mouth. I too wanted to see Rachel open her presents. But Mrs. M. didn’t seem to care about my unfinished cake.
“Says who?” Mrs. M. retorted, attempting to brush her hand across Rachel’s hair, who in turn offered her a repellent curl of her lip.
“I say so, Mother,” Rachel replied. “This is the way we do things here.”
Mother Superior raised her finger. This gesture generally meant a warning of some sort. If a girl had overstepped her place, the risen finger would indicate it was time to retreat before she caused any real damage requiring punishment. Rachel wiped her mouth with a napkin and rose abruptly from the table.
“Where are you going, dear? I just got here,” Mrs. M. pleaded, straightening the rose pin on her collar and flattening out her skirt with jittery hands.
“The washroom. And I don’t need you to come with me.”
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Rachel left, and Caroline followed, bowing down politely in front of Mrs. M. before excusing herself. “It’s nice to meet you,” she said.
“Likewise,” returned Mrs. M., apparently pleased with Caroline’s manners. She tried to swivel out of Mr. M.’s grip. “See how kind the girls are to me,” she said to him. “You see, they like me.”
“Oh yes,” he agreed, still holding her shoulders and rubbing them absently. “They are good girls.” He winked at me as he said this and I returned his gesture with a smile, happy he had singled me out. I also realized Esperanza had disappeared, and I was glad.
Meeting Mrs. M. was like meeting a rumour. Rachel did not speak of her often, but when she did, she did not speak kindly. She ridiculed her for never leaving the house and for the number of useless afghans she crocheted. “Your wife could open her own store,” Mother Superior said once when Mr. M. brought in an armful, a white one selected for my room. “Then I’d have two jobs, Mother,” Mr. M. replied. On one occasion, Rachel went so far as to claim she had no mother; she never got to see her and she didn’t speak to her, so how could Mrs. M. possibly be a mother? “She’s just a ghost,” she joked, “crocheting afghans in a rocking chair.” She made a good point. There were times when I felt it would be easier to say I had no mother instead of explaining she was ill with a disease the doctors hadn’t yet been able to identify. I often feared people thought my mother might simply have abandoned me. It wasn’t an outrageous leap; I had begun to wonder myself whether Mrs. M. actually lived with Mr. M. And unlike Mrs. M., my mother had not revealed herself in the flesh at St. X. School for Girls to put speculation to rest.
Although I was finished my cake and my belly ached from the amount of food I had already eaten, out of politeness I did not wish to leave my place at the table to walk off some of the discomfort and use the washroom. I crossed my legs and waited anxiously to learn more about Mrs. M. The nuns watched her with anticipation too, as they might watch a pot heating to boil. She was offered a plate of chicken and potato salad and nibbled at it, laying down her fork each time she took a bite in order to sip her coffee.
“More, please,” she asked Sister Aline, holding up her plate with only half the potato salad gone and none of the chicken, the skin stripped and shoved to the side. Had one of the girls asked for a second helping before finishing what they had already taken, this request would certainly have been refused. However, Sister Aline walked into the kitchen where the leftovers were being wrapped and piled up Mrs. M.’s plate accordingly.
The girls were getting restless now that the dinner portion of the evening was over. They wanted Rachel to open her presents. Many of the girls were hanging around the designated table, picking up boxes and shaking them, weighing them in their hands, pointing out the presents they had brought, whispering the contents into each other’s ears. A girl in one of the younger grades who I’d once seen counting out pennies to get a bag of chips from a vending machine hadn’t brought a present, and rushed upstairs to her room to find something of her own to give. She came back with a book wrapped in newspaper.
Mr. M. removed the knot from his tie and was about to sit back down when Rachel and Caroline returned. Caroline stood behind Rachel while Rachel whispered something to her father.
“I’ll do my best,” was Mr. M.’s response, but he didn’t exude confidence in his general way. He looked exhausted. He rolled up his tie into a ball and placed it in his suit jacket pocket.
“Are you feeling better?” he asked his wife, looking at his watch before placing his hands on her shoulders again. She turned and gazed up at her husband’s face with bewilderment.
“Of course I’m fine. What are you implying?”
He removed his hands from her shoulders as Rachel joined the girls at the presents table. She practically ran, while Mrs. M.’s attention remained on her husband and the group at our table, including me and Francine, Sister Aline and Mother Superior. Mrs. M. wiped her nose with a handkerchief she pulled from the pocket of her purse. Caroline and I exchanged glances, unsure of whether we should stay until Mrs. M. finished eating or whether we should join Rachel, who hadn’t waited for her mother. In fact, her mother hadn’t touched any of the food Sister Aline had brought back from the kitchen, and I was beginning to suspect she really was ill and couldn’t keep the food down.
“Do you think I don’t know what’s going on? What’s been going on?” Mrs. M. said.
She was beginning to raise her voice now, and though I desired to leave the table because my bladder was almost bursting, I did not. Francine’s kneecaps bumped nervously against the table underneath, creating a steady rhythm. She stared straight ahead, ignoring what was going on around her.
“Calm down, Louise. Don’t ruin this for your daughter,” Mr. M. told his wife, wagging his finger accusingly, then resuming his stance, smiling broadly but with difficulty. “She’ll be fine,” he told Mother Superior, who didn’t budge.
“Do you think I can’t hear you? That I don’t know?”
Mrs. M. tried to rise, but Mr. M.’s hands bore down upon her shoulders, pushing her back into her seat. I did not know if she was alluding to what had gone on with Mr. M. and Esperanza, but I was relieved that at least Esperanza wasn’t present. I tried not to look at Mr. M.’s rugged face, or his hair, or his hands now upon his wife, harsh and demanding in a way I’d never seen him touch a woman before. Not since being alone with him in my room, had I been afraid of him; I suspected he was in the wrong.
Mrs. M. hit her plate on the edge of the table with her arm and pieces of chicken and potato salad fell onto the floor. Bella walked by, on her way to get some punch, and with a swift gesture returned the plate to its position and bent down to pick up the food with a napkin.
Mrs. M. turned to touch Bella in thanks, but Mr. M. stood between them, creating a barrier with his broad-shouldered body. Bella stood demurely, the dirty napkin in her hands.
“Would you like me to get you anything?” Bella asked, acting as if she hadn’t noticed the anger between them. And it worked. Mr. M. was caught off guard by her good-natured grace. He let Bella approach his wife.
“No . . . no . . . thank you. I’m fine,” Mrs. M. replied.
Then Mr. M. laid his hand gently on Bella’s back and told her it would be helpful if she went to join the other girls with the presents. Bella immediately obeyed and left the table. I was amazed by how Bella knew exactly the best way to behave, but it didn’t surprise me. I inwardly chastised myself for being so slow and clumsy around the adults. I wished I could gain approval as easily as Bella could. “You too,” Mr. M. added to Francine and me. We took a couple of seconds to gather our cups and plates for the garbage. We had barely straightened up from our chairs when Mrs. M. began pleading.
“Don’t leave me!” she screeched, banging her hands in front of her, spilling her coffee on her tartan skirt.
Mrs. M. was crying, and the girls and the nuns alike could not help but stare. My mother cried often, but it was when the pills weren’t strong enough and her skin burned. She cried in small doses, the tears weaving slowly down her face, and her moans were private. She did not cry in front of strangers if she could help it, although once at a doctor’s office I did see her leave with a fistful of tissue. Mrs. M., however, was crying loudly and her tears gushed down her face, smearing her rouge and black mascara. Her face went red, and her chin, with a tiny extra layer of flesh underneath the cleft, pulsed with each sob. She clutched her handkerchief in her right hand, slamming her arms down into her lap, repeatedly stabbing at the coffee stain. Mr. M. said nothing, the way a parent might whose patience has been tried and who will simply wait for a tantrum to end. Mother Superior, her large frame now bent over Mrs. M. like an awning, tried to quiet her.
“Think of the children, Louise. Sister Marguerite will take you to lie down so you can collect your strength.”
But Mrs. M. ignored Mother Superior and lashed out at the decorations on the table. She batted her hands at the st
ars on the walls as if they were determined to harm her.
Rachel pretended not to notice. She was the only one still interested in the presents, and she stroked a large red ribbon in her hands as if it were a cat, keeping her back to us, watching out the window as the sun set on a new blanket of snow outside. She produced the camera Esperanza had been using before and took a picture of the window, the flash reflecting off the glass back into the room.
It took three nuns and Mr. M. to drag Mrs. M. upstairs to the nurse’s cot, where she would sleep for the next two hours. Although she did not strike out at any of the nuns, she tried to hold her ground, pleading with them to let her stay. She said she would be a good girl; they wouldn’t need to worry about her at all. The smeared makeup on her face almost made it seem as if she had just been playing dress-up and had gone too far, that now she would keep quiet and wouldn’t need to be punished. Mr. M. grabbed her by the waist and tried to direct her out with as much decorum as possible, but I could see his nails grinding into the flesh on her sides, his knuckles white with pressure.
“You see?” she screamed, turning her head violently in all directions to keep the attention that was hers. “You see? He’s turned my own daughter against me.”
“Please excuse my wife,” Mr. M. said between kicking as discreetly as he could against the back of her shoes. “She isn’t herself today.” His smile was stretched so tightly across his face it might have had a wire in it.
“This isn’t his party. It’s my party!” she cried and stomped on his shoes. Mr. M. grunted and clamped his arm securely around her waist.
“Louise!”
“It’s my father’s money that pays for all these things. So it’s my party! My balloons! My streamers! My cake! Mine!”
Mother Superior motioned to two of the nuns to come over. They looked like ravens picking up a piece of meat. They made a wall behind Mrs. M. as she tried to retrace the steps the nuns forced her to take, pushing her body weight against theirs. She nearly managed to overpower them.
The Divine Economy of Salvation Page 17