Knowing

by Rosalyn McMillan

  Carmen rested her hands on her narrow hips. “I was just kidding about the cognac, girl.” She chuckled. “I could have sworn you’d say no, knowing how much those bottles mean to you.”

  Spice exhaled and felt her body relax. Truly, she would have given Carmen one of the bottles, or anything else that she wanted, but she was thankful her friend didn’t feel the need to test her like that. She hugged Carmen’s tiny body, then said seriously, “If you change your mind . . .”

  “Spice, I know I’m family, but today should be just kin, your brother-in-law and your daughters. Anyway, it’s been a while —”

  “ — since I’ve seen Mink and Sterling. I know,” she said softly. “You’ve mentioned that before. I’ve just been so busy with this new project.”

  Spice removed her apron and sat down at the kitchen table to fill Carmen in on the progress of her latest entrepreneurial adventure. Though few people knew it, Spice was opening a second Southern Spice in downtown Royal Oak. But the proj-ect was bigger than the restaurant. The new restaurant was launching Spice into the rough and tumble world of business development. To prevail, Spice had often expressed the idea that she had to appear as creative as a woman yet with a man’s strength.

  Foxphasia, the $38-million hotel, restaurant and office center, was located on the northeast corner of the triple intersection of I-696 and Woodward and Washington in Royal Oak on a 6.8-acre site. Spice and two other investors had formed Foxphasia Corporation, which encompassed three office buildings of three, five, and fifteen stories respectively, a five-story condominium and a three-story children’s museum. A bridge for pedestrians would be built between the existing Detroit Zoo on the corner of I-696, and the 154-bed hotel that housed Southern Spice’s sister restaurant on the first level. The five-phase complex, due to open in the spring of 1998, was thirty percent near completion. When Spice finished telling Carmen of the plans, she clapped her hands like a child and exclaimed, “It’s getting exciting, I can tell you that, girl!”

  “I’d like to see it one day.”

  “Why wouldn’t you? Anytime, kiddo.” Then Spice added, “Even though my daughter is talented, I made a mistake in commissioning her to design the children’s museum — she screwed up again.”

  “Sterling?”

  “Yes. It took all of Otis’ and my pull to get her hired temporarily at Zuller Architectural Firm. She has to work in partnership with another architect because she’s not licensed yet. She seemed so excited about it last summer. Now she’s a month behind the bank’s deadline for approval of the plans. And the cold shoulder I’ve received lately from Zuller might never thaw.”

  “Don’t worry, she’ll come through.” Reaching across the table, Carmen touched Spice’s hand. “You need someone to help you with all this.”

  “Otis has offered many times to help me. But I don’t want him involved. He may be my brother-in-law, but I see him enough already. He eats dinner here every Thursday night. Daily contact would be too much.” She leaned back in her chair and turned to gaze outside. “I’m hoping to talk to the girls today about the development. It would be nice if they saw the possible benefits of building a family empire. Otherwise, it just doesn’t make any sense to work so hard for much longer.”

  “Marriage is still an option.”

  “One more time: I’m still not ready,” Spice said, turning to face her friend. “So it’s not. If I could only convince Sterling how important — If only Sterling would get fired up over something — anything. You know how much talent she showed while she was growing up — those sketches she’d just whip up from designing hotels to log cabins.”

  “Yeah, but once she reached womanhood — Maybe she caught it from us — huh, Spice?”

  “No. I don’t think so. Sterling had so much more than me — more brains, more talent, help, schooling — Oh let’s face it, it’s hopeless.”

  “Sterling knows how to get to you, Spice. But she’ll come through.”

  “I’m not so sure anymore about anything. I’d like to know that one of my daughters is being groomed to take over.”

  “You can still have another child, Spice. You’re still a very young woman. I don’t think you’re being fair to yourself or the girls by trying to figure out their future.”

  “I’ll tell you what. I won’t discuss anything serious today. We’ll just eat and have fun.” Spice forced a smile that faded quickly.

  With her hand still extended on the kitchen counter, Carmen touched her friend’s arm. “Is there something you’re not telling me?” she asked.

  Spice looked Carmen squarely in the eye and held it before saying, “No.”

  “You’ve been acting funny since your birthday two months ago.” Carmen turned her head to the side. “Personally, I partied through most of that year. So I really can’t remember how I felt. But I’ve heard that turning forty-one is worse than turning forty.”

  “I’m not an advocate of that myth,” Spice said, turning away and hearing, but not seeing Carmen take another sip from the flask.

  In eight months Carmen would be forty-five. Her small body, with tiny breasts and hips, and even her full head of naturally curly hair, cut in a 60s shag, resembled a child’s. To most, Carmen appeared undernourished, and the bones of her gentle hands looked like trembling branches. It hurt Spice to see her friend’s frailty.

  “It’s never the physical that concerns me most. It’s my mental attitude; staying on top of things, being in control. Life has been good to me, but I don’t want the girls to make the same mistakes that I made.”

  “Mistakes teach us about life, Spice.”

  “David and I worked hard to build this business, and we assumed they would want to keep it.” Spice removed the bread pudding from the oven and placed it on the butcher block to cool. “Mink’s got her own career —” Spice added quickly, “Of course I’m happy for her. But Sterling . . . Sterling.” She shook her head. “What am I going to do with her?”

  “She’ll learn.”

  “When? Sterling doesn’t care about anything but shopping.” Spice sighed. “I keep making excuses for her not delivering the plans at the bank, but I’m running out of lies. I didn’t raise her to be an underachiever. I know I made some mistakes early on, but —”

  “You did what you had to do, Spice.”

  Their eyes locked. A shared understanding was enough right now.

  * * *

  Sterling arrived first. Using her key to Spice’s private-access elevator and residence, she entered the duplex and hung her coat up in the front closet.

  “Spice?” she called out to her mother. “Spice!” she said louder, “it’s me, Sterling.”

  “Hi, baby. I’ll be down in a few minutes,” Spice yelled from upstairs. “Open a bottle of champagne while you wait.”

  First, Sterling checked out the spread of food and sampled a piece of toffee before removing one of three chilled bottles of champagne on ice and moving upstairs to the library. Just as she settled down with a glass of champagne, she heard the elevator stop, followed by the sound of a key unlocking the door. In an instant Mink came into the library.

  “Hello, Sterling,” she said, giving her a hug. Mink stood five foot nine, Sterling, five foot one. Sterling wore her hair long, in waves of autumn gold; Mink wore a perfectly shaped half-inch afro. Sterling’s complexion was ivory, like a delicate lily; Mink’s flawless skin was chocolate-brown. Sterling’s eyes resembled the goddess Athena’s, a striking gray that at first glance appeared blue; Mink’s eyes were a deep sepia, that mirrored the stars in midnight waters. The stunning high arch of Mink’s sculpted cheekbones, broad nose and full lips called attention to her exotic appeal; Sterling’s high forehead, sleek brows, aristocratic nose and narrow lips gave her a classical 1930’s kind of beauty.

  After setting her purse down on a lower shelf of one of the bookcases, Mink asked her sister, “Where is everybody?”

  “Spice is still dressing, and Otis hasn’t arrived yet.”

  S
terling rose, smoothing and adjusting her cuffed sleeves just so. She felt euphoric because she knew she positively shimmered in her stunning ivory Christian Lacroix pantsuit. Three rows of lustrous gumball-sized pearls hung from her neck. Her nylons, pumps and softly painted mouth were all in muted opalescent tones. She didn’t need anyone to tell her that she looked terrific. Also, the heroin high didn’t hurt.

  “Join me in a glass of champagne,” she said, reaching inside the library liquor cabinet for another crystal flute. Sterling poured a drink for her sister, then toasted her. “Congratulations on your promotion.”

  * * *

  Leaning over her dressing table, Spice reapplied her make-up for the third time. She’d underestimated how nervous she’d be and couldn’t get her hands to stop shaking. Consequently, at 1:20 P.M. she wasn’t dressed.

  Finally, make-up as good as it was going to get, Spice left her room with an air of forced relaxation and headed toward the familiar sound of her daughters’ voices. She hesitated for a moment and took a deep breath just outside the entrance to the library. Just as she was ready to go in, she heard the catty tone in Sterling’s voice as she spoke to her elder sister.

  “You might as well hear about it from me,” Sterling said loftily. “The dean’s wife caught us together.”

  “Did she catch you in his bed or yours?” Mink was clearly having trouble controlling her voice to a low roar. “Never mind, I don’t want to hear the vulgar details.”

  “Neither. It was in the back seat of his car in the school’s parking lot.”

  “Jesus!” Mink exploded, “how stupid can you get. How stupid could he get?”

  Sterling began detailing how their affair had begun. There was no remorse in her tone. The innocent meeting about her appointed advisor turned into a re-assignment to the dean himself. In this small school there wasn’t anyone left in the liberal arts college to mentor her besides Dean Harris. The rest of the seamy business was as natural for Sterling as a lizard eating spiders. Dean Timothy Harris was a name and a body to add to her list. And he was bait for hooking Bennie, the only man she cared about — or so she told herself.

  Cutting off Sterling’s melodramatic tale, Spice walked into the room. “Hello, girls,” Spice said, kissing Mink then Sterling on the cheek. As she stood back to appraise them, she said, “You both look stunning.”

  “So do you, Spice.” Mink poured her mother a glass of champagne.

  “Thank you,” she said, accepting the drink from Mink. Turning to Sterling, Spice said, “Finish your story,” then took a seat on the velvet ottoman in the middle of the room.

  Mink took a seat beside Spice and gently patted her on the knee.

  Even though Sterling had consistently won top grades in undergraduate school, her flagrant disregard of discipline policies was the core of all her problems. And the problem was getting worse. She’d been expelled from one architectural program after another. And the sad part was — soon she’d be out of options.

  “Anyway, somebody spotted us in the car and called security, they found us and a half-gram of cocaine. The assistant dean suspended me. Harris took a paid leave of absence.”

  Spice had learned long ago not to react to Sterling’s outlandish, self-destructive behavior. The more she showed she cared, the more her younger child rubbed her nose in her failure as a mother. When the telephone rang, Spice automatically jumped up, spilling her champagne onto her lap, staining her silk dress.

  “Hello,” Spice said, secretly glad for the intrusion. While reaching for a handful of tissues to dry her soiled dress, she listened to her head chef explain why he’d called. “What kind of emergency, Travis?” Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Sterling lighting a cigarette and listening to her every word. “I’ll be right down.” Spice put the receiver down.

  “I’ve got to go,” was all she said, before quickly leaving the room and her two stunned daughters behind in confused silence.

  * * *

  She knew that I’d been planning this for months, Spice thought, twisting her gold wedding band, which she wore on her middle finger, nervously back and forth. She was positive that Sterling had staged this whole school affair to draw attention to herself. They had played this game many times before. Getting suspended from another school! And drugs? Again? Spice was fed up with Sterling’s second-hand theatrics. She was so angry, she welcomed the excuse to escape — not an unfamiliar feeling, unfortunately.

  Spice had tried to teach her daughters that they could be more: more intelligent, more talented, more attractive — one better than anyone, just by being themselves. But somehow the message hadn’t gotten through to Sterling.

  When the elevator stopped on the main level, Spice stepped onto the pink and white checkerboard floor of Southern Spice’s kitchen.

  She waved to the employees as she made her way toward the head chef’s office.

  Just as she entered Travis Foxx’s office, Spice heard a rumbling, rolling noise, then the sound of a file cabinet drawer clicking shut, telling her that Travis was wearing his manager’s hat at the moment. Travis had filled some of the tasks left by David’s death. Lord knows he was no David.

  From the moment she sat down, Spice felt his eyes visually undressing her. “What’s the emergency?” she asked.

  She caught the snide smile on Travis’s face as he moved from behind the desk, and facing her, rested his buttocks against his desk and leaned forward. He was a carbon copy of Will Smith on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, especially the ears. Spice once had slipped and called him “Will,” which had pissed him off.

  “If you’d come downstairs with me a moment, I’ll show you.”

  They took the elevator to the basement. All the way down, Travis complained about the freezer, which was costing a fortune in repair bills. His immediate bugaboo was with the new compressor system that currently ran their freezer and refrigerator. He’d voiced his concern over the hassles caused by the system last year. The system took up too much room and used double the electricity that a more compact unit would cost. Now they had the bills to back him up.

  At Travis’ suggestion Spice peered at the overburdened circuits. She tried to make some sense of what she was looking at. She’d never been able to grasp the necessity for all the wire and tubing that extended off into a zillion directions.

  With a sudden movement, Travis was behind her, gently cupping her buttocks.

  “Don’t.” Spice checked each breaker inside the circuit box to see if any were in the OFF position. Travis, ignoring her, continued to massage her breasts from behind her.

  “Look,” she said, pulling from his embrace, “I made a mistake. It’s over. It can’t happen again.”

  She watched his sly smile as he released her.

  “You’ve got the most exquisite body that I’ve ever seen. Naked or clothed.”

  “I hope this isn’t why you called me away from Mink’s celebration.”

  “You don’t give a rat’s ass about that and you know it.”

  Travis’ words stung. Was this dump on Spice day?

  “Travis, how I love my daughters is none of your damn business. Now if you have no legitimate reason to need me now, I’m out of here.”

  After four years of celibacy, Spice had longed for sexual satisfaction without the emotional entanglements. She assumed that a young man could enjoy occasionally bedding an older woman without strings. But after one week of intoxication, she found that it just wasn’t possible; he was too demanding of her time. His lack of discretion as her employee hadn’t helped. Just like today, acting amorous while on the premises was typical of his immature behavior throughout their brief fling. And so she had ended it.

  At twenty-six, Travis was an asset to her business. He had the perfect ingredients of good chef management: culinary creativity, menu vision, manpower efficiency, discipline and grievance flair. Combine these attributes with reason and common sense, and Travis was the epitome of a professional chef.

  Spice silently cha
stised herself. She’d allowed Travis to take one too many trips around her mulberry bush. It was time to show him how pussy and power prevailed, and a mere set of balls had to step back when it came to running her business.

  Sterling was livid. She poured another glass of champagne and quickly gulped it down before asking Mink, “Can you believe that bitch left us here?”

  “Spice is our mother, Sterling. She’s not a bitch. I think you’ve got the two confused.”

  “Fuck that. What kind of mother would walk out on her daughters’ party and go to work.”

  “I’m sure it was important, Sterling. She’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  “Bullshit. She didn’t have to leave. Travis knows the business inside and out.”

  Mink was silent.

  “Tell me, Mink, is there anything more important to her than that fucking restaurant?”

  Each minute passed like a chrysalis of eternity as the women silently sipped champagne and picked at the buffet.

  “I’ve told Spice all along that I didn’t think I could make it at Crown.” Sterling paused to light a Salem, then blew out a thin veil of smoke between them. “She wouldn’t lis —”

  “Hold on, little sister,” Mink said, coughing. “You can’t make it. Period.” She fanned the smoke away from her face, and taking a step back, crossed her arms beneath her breasts. “Quit making these pitiful excuses. You’re just plain lazy. You’ve never worked a day in your life. All that’s expected from you is to get a degree and you can’t even do that.”

  Drugs and sex were Sterling’s passion; like fire and water, they were good servants, but ungodly masters. Yet, both had been key to Sterling’s escape from responsibility and reality since age sixteen.

  Like all addicts, Sterling felt she could handle drugs and was always in control. Still and all, she would not admit to herself nor anyone else that she was now hooked on Red Rum heroin, murder spelled backwards. For this and many other reasons, she kept repeating the same mistakes she’d been making for years.