by Lacey Legend
Diamond laughed. Her mother always had the power to make her laugh, both before and after she was gone.
“Well, I’m just looking out for you, that’s all.”
“All you need to be doin’ is looking after yo self. I be doing that too,” Bernice replied, taking another bite of her cheesy sandwich.
“I am looking after myself mama. Can’t you see that?”
“Course I can see that. I got eyes, you know,” Bernice said, really packing the sandwich in. Diamond could barely make out what her mama was saying.
“Malik keeps callin’ me, and I don’t know what to do,” Diamond said, wishing to gain a bit of advice while her mom was around.
“Mm hm,” Bernice replied. “I know that.”
“So what should I do?” Diamond asked.
“Well, you gotta answer that damn phone and tell that fool what’s what.”
“Mama, it’s not as easy as that. You know how he be. I can’t get him off my back.”
“Child, if you don’t stand up for yourself ain’t nobody else gonna do it. That crazy friend of yours ain’t going to do it, that fancy French boyfriend ain’t going to do it . . .”
“Mama, he ain’t my boyfriend,” Diamond protested.
“Child, I might be dead but I ain’t blind!” Bernice said. “He done got a hankering for ya.”
“A hankering?”
“Yes, that man be hankering and hankering,” Bernice went on. Diamond stifled a laugh.
“I think you be crazy. I don’t understand a word you say.”
“Ooooooh, he be hankering. And you doing the same. Now, don’t tell me I be blind.”
Finally Diamond gave into her laughter and Bernice did the same. Mother and daughter sat and giggled, enjoying the sunshine, and the deliciousness of their sandwiches.
“You know, had I a chance to do it all again, I’d live in this town,” Bernice said, looking around the park.
“I think you would have been happy here, mama,” Diamond replied. It broke her heart to think of it; how her mother was truly gone from this world, and her life could have been carried out much more happily somewhere else.
“Well den, I’m just gonna savor this for the time being and pretend like I am alive.” Bernice leaned back into the bench and turned her face up towards the sunshine.
“You wearing sunscreen?” Diamond asked.
“Child, you be crazy? Not only am I dead, but I’m black. You know I ain’t getting no freckles!” Bernice protested.
“I know, I just. . .” Diamond’s voice became a little strangled, and she realized how silly it was that in her own imagination, she was still protective of her mother. It seemed so odd. As soon as she realized this, Bernice had vanished. The magic had ceased. Funny how she could just appear and disappear like that. Diamond continued to eat her sandwich, enjoying the peace and quiet of the park. Although the presence of her mother had passed, the magic of Veules-les-Roses seemed to be very real indeed.
Chapter7
“You seem tense,” Emmanuelle said, warming the kettle on her stove.
“I got a lot of things on my mind,” Diamond replied, looking about Emmanuelle’s home. “It was so nice of you to invite me.”
“There have been many renovations over the years, but for the most part, the home has looked this way for centuries.”
“It’s so charming,” Diamond said, noting the beautiful paintings on the wall. Most of them were scenic landscapes, of the French countryside, and some were done in paint while others were stitched. “I see that you like to cross stitch.”
“Yes, I have done many of these myself, but some were done by my mother,” Emmanuelle explained. “She was an avid stitcher, and I became one as well. Stitch and Bitch, as you Americans say.”
“Ha!” Diamond laughed. “We do say that, I guess.”
“There’s something calming about stitching and occasionally looking up towards the sea,” Emmanuelle said, pouring the tea into two china cups.
“I gotta take me up some stitching.”
“I can show you how. It’s not very hard. But you must get all your colors in order before you begin, and take great pains to make sure that you’re following the chart with expert care.”
“I’m not sure I have the patience for it. I’d be thinking of a hundred million things, getting up all the time to do something else, you know.”
“I don’t think that’s true,” Emmanuelle said, bringing the tea over to where Diamond sat. “Your mind would turn off, and you would relax. I’m sure of it.”
“Then, maybe I’ll take you up on a lesson.”
The suggestion was timely, because just then Diamond’s phone went off again, and this time, she was going to answer it.
“I’m just gonna take this for a second,” Diamond said.
“Please do,” Emmanuelle replied.
Diamond walked out onto the patio that overlooked the sea and took a deep breath. Her phone was insistent, ringing off the hook, and finally, she was prepared to respond.
“What do you want, Malik? You callin’ me every day,” Diamond said.
“Why you not answerin’ your phone?” Malik could be heard saying. His voice was dark and stormy.
“Cause I don’t want to talk to you, that’s why.”
“What the fuck is wrong with your ass, Diamond? Why you runnin’ away? You know I can find you.”
“Malik, I’m about to hang up this phone any second if you don’t talk sense,” Diamond said, her voice raising in volume. She looked inside Emmanuelle’s home and could see concern on her face. Diamond looked away and tried to calm herself yet again.
“Bitch, I am talking sense but you deaf. We’re meant to be together. You know that. But instead you go escaping to France like I’m not able to find you or some shit. You know that I can find you.”
“I don’t care whether you find me or not, Malik. This is over. I’ll tell you one hundred times if I have to, in order to get it into your head.”
“Yah, you say that again in a week when you realize you the only sista in a country of white folks that don’t want you there. Then you be coming back and knocking on my door. Ain’t nobody want you but me, Diamond.”
“I swear, if I ever hear you say something like that to me again . . .”
“What? What you going to do, Diamond? You can’t run from the truth.”
“Malik, there is only one truth that I know.” Diamond looked out towards the sea and clutched the phone so hard that her hand was shaking. “My life is not yours. Never was. My life is my own, and I kindly ask you to never speak to me again. This is over Malik.”
“Bitch, if you hang up that phone—”
Diamond clicked her phone off and put it in her pocket. She was out of breath, shaking, and felt faint. Within moments the phone rang again, but Diamond did not pick it up. She walked over to the banister and put her hands on it to steady herself. She looked down towards the ground and willed herself to take breaths, in and out, in and out.
“Is everything alright?” she heard Emmanuelle say from behind her back.
“I’m not sure. I . . . I don’t feel so well,” Diamond replied.
“Come here, child, and sit on this chair,” Emmanuelle said, fetching an iron chair off in the corner of the patio. “And drink some more of this tea.”
“Thank you, Emmanuelle.”
“Who was that you were speaking with?”
“I’m afraid that it was my ex-boyfriend. He ain’t so happy with me.”
“Might I ask why? You don’t need to explain if you don’t choose to.” Emmanuelle sat herself down as well.
“Well, I don’t mind. Might be good to get things off my chest.”
“Yes, that seems like a good idea,” Emmanuelle said. “Oh, wait!” she cried, and rushed back into the house. She reappeared within moments, holding a white cake and two plates. “I baked a vanilla cake, and I have a feeling that this situation calls for it.”
“You serious?” Diamond
said, a smile finally coming to her face. “You done baked a cake that just magically shows up when I need to spill my guts?”
“Last night I could not sleep and I had this terrible urge to bake a vanilla cake with raspberry cream filling. I knew not why, but now I know what it was meant for,” Emmanuelle said with a smile, slicing into the cake and putting a generous portion on each plate. The cake was perfectly white and creamy on the outside; as white as snow, and the raspberry filling was a startling magenta. “There you are then,” Emmanuelle said, handing the plate to Diamond.
“Thanks,” she replied, accepting it gladly.
“Now, then. Start from the beginning,” Emmanuelle said.
“Well, it ain’t all that complicated of a story. I met Malik in high school. My mama hated him, cause he was selling drugs on the street, getting into all kinds of trouble, but I liked that bad boy sorta thing.”
“Ah, yes,” Emmanuelle said with understanding, taking a bite of her cake.
“And you know, I was all rebellious cause I didn’t have no daddy around, and Malik was very protective of me. Kinda fatherly in a way.”
“Yes, men do that on purpose,” Emmanuelle said with recognition in her voice.
“Mama threatened to kick me out of the house if I stayed with Malik, but I just couldn’t imagine my life without him, so I went and lived with him.” Diamond took a first bite of her cake and her eyes lit up in wonder. “Damn! This is good.”
“Yes, I’m quite proud of it,” Emmanuelle said with a warm smile.
“Anyways, so . . . Malik and I stayed together for so many years. All the while he was tellin’ me that ain’t nobody going to love me as much as he does. That if I ever left I’d never find love again and whatnot. But still, he was being very protective of me, watching out for me on the streets—he had connections on the streets—and was tellin’ me that as long as I was with him nobody was going to hurt me.”
“That must have been very compelling, especially if you were living in a dangerous town.”
“Chicago is one of the most dangerous. And yes, with Malik, I felt safe. That is . . . until he started to be violent.”
The expression on Emmanuelle’s face changed, and she placed her cake plate down on a table.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Well, Malik started hitting me, grabbing onto me, not letting me go.” Diamond put her own plate down and looked towards the floor. “It took many years before the violence started, so I didn’t even know that Malik was capable of it. Strange that it came out of nowhere.”
“Maybe he sensed that you were growing up. Seeing the world from a new perspective.”
“I suppose that was it. I don’t know. But the more he punished me, the more I wanted to run away. It got to the point where, one night, Malik came home drunk off his ass. I was already in bed cause I had to get up early for work the next morning. Well, he come into bed and he be cursing and screaming like a crazy man. I put my hands over my ears and tried to ignore it. I was hoping that he’d just pass out and fall asleep, so that I could do the same. He certainly didn’t fall asleep cause he just lay there screaming to himself and I finally turned to him to try to calm him down, rubbing my hand on his back. Well, that night I got a beating that I didn’t even know was possible.”
“No,” Emmanuelle said with a hushed tone.
“Yep. He started by forcefully kicking me out of the bed, then, when I tried to leave the room, he locked the door and just started beating on me. Pulling me by the hair and throwing me around the room. Crashing my face into a mirror.”
“Diamond,” Emmanuelle said, putting her hand out and placing it on top of Diamond’s. “I don’t think that I can hear much more.”
“That’s the end of the story, anyhow.” Diamond picked up her plate and took another bite of the delicious cake, tasting the sweetness of the raspberries in her mouth. “I packed up and left a few days later and decided that I’d never go back.”
“To Chicago?”
“Well, I might go back to Chicago, but I certainly ain’t going back to Malik. To be honest with you, I don’t know where I’m meant to be.”
“In this moment; Veules-les-Roses,” Emmanuelle said with a warm smile.
“Yah, that’s how I feel too. It’s so great to be here. Something just feels right about it.”
Diamond looked off in the distance and spotted Baptiste’s estate. She felt butterflies in her stomach instantly. Emmanuelle could see where Diamond was looking, and a large smile came to her face.
“There are many reasons why you were meant to be here,” she said, sipping her tea. Diamond laughed with embarrassment.
“Would you believe that he invited me to dinner tonight? To meet some extended family or something?”
“I find that very easy to believe. You’re a charming breath of fresh air. I’m sure that Baptiste would like to show you off.”
“But, like, family? Don’t that seem a little soon?”
“When Baptiste sees something that he wants he goes directly for it. It’s why he’s such a good businessman.”
“I think I’m nervous,” Diamond replied, holding her fork in her mouth and allowing the flavors of the cake to linger there on her tongue.
“Don’t be. They’re going to love you.”
“I don’t know what the hell to wear,” Diamond said.
“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” Emmanuelle said with a twinkle in her eye.
*******
“You gotta be kiddin’ me,” Diamond said to the delivery boy who carried a garment bag.
“No, Mademoiselle. I was given express orders,” he explained, having Diamond sign for it.
“But, it just doesn’t make sense,” Diamond replied. She inspected the pink dress that she had tried on in Angelique’s store the day before. How the hell could Baptiste have known?
“Monsieur Laurent ordered the shoes and handbag to accompany it,” the delivery boy went on to explain.
“This is crazy,” Diamond said, taking the items from the delivery boy’s hands.
“Enjoy,” he said plainly, and walked back down the stairs, returning to his truck.
Diamond closed the door behind him and went and laid the outfit on her bed. For a while she just looked at it in stunned silence, unable to put it on. It was an hour before Baptiste’s driver was meant to pick her up, and Diamond felt frozen in time. She thought about it for a while. Maybe he was friends with Angelique, and she had told him about the dress? Perhaps he had been watching her that day. What if she was being followed?
No, Diamond wasn’t going to get distrustful of Baptiste. He was no Malik, that much was for sure. There was a tenderness to him, and a trustworthiness that Diamond had never encountered before. The only man that she had really ever been with in a serious way was Malik, and Baptiste was changing her perspective on what a man could really be.
“Okay then. Here we go,” Diamond said to herself, taking the dress out of the garment bag and wrapping it around herself. She put on the shoes as well, and went to inspect herself in the mirror. “Ain’t half bad, I gotta say,” Diamond said, smiling to herself in the mirror.
“You look like a million bucks,” Bernice said, and Diamond jumped.
“Mama, you startled me.”
“That man got money, that much for sure.” Bernice was eating a large piece of the vanilla cake.
“Mama, where you get that cake?”
“Emmanuelle gave it to me. We friends now.”
“This is just getting too weird,” Diamond said.
“Life is damn weird, child. You know that.”
“Yes, I think you’re right.”
As Diamond continued to prepare herself for the night ahead, Bernice managed to plow through two pieces of the raspberry, creamy goodness, and Diamond didn’t scold her. Were her mama still alive she’d scold her for having two pieces, because of her diabetes, but since she was in the afterlife, she let her mother do as she pleased.
“Don’t be.”
“You know that family be judging me for being black.”
“Shoot, you can’t be afraid of that. Folks be judgin’ their whole lives. Ain’t nothing you can do about it. Not your fault you were born with that advantage!”
“Ha ha. You have a point.”
“Now, you wear these earrings I gave you. You can’t be no Diamond if you ain’t wearing some diamonds,” Bernice said, walking over to Diamond’s jewelry box and taking out her favorite diamond studs. She placed them in her daughter’s hand.
“Thanks, mama. These are just perfect.” Diamond looked in the mirror and placed the studs in her ears, inspecting herself again. “That’s just what I needed.”
“Now you ready and I’m all outta cake.”
“I can get you some more, if you like.”
“No, I’m about ready to explode. I’m just starting to realize that even though you dead, you still get indigestion,” Bernice said, walking to the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and taking out a bottle of Tums.
Just then there was a knock on the door. Diamond looked up at the clock and realized that it must be Baptiste’s driver.
“Mama, I gotta go,” Diamond said. But when she turned back, Bernice was already gone.
“Mademoiselle,” the voice on the other side of the door said.
“I’m coming.”
Diamond opened the door and found an unfamiliar face. It was a different driver from the last time, and she wondered just how many drivers Baptiste Laurent had.
“Bonsoir,” the driver said.
“Bonsoir,” Diamond replied.
“You are ready, yes?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Do I look okay?” Diamond asked.
“You look wonderful,” he replied with a warm smile.
The drive to the estate already seemed familiar to Diamond. She looked out towards the sea where the sun was beginning to set, turning the surface of the water into various shades of pink, orange, and green. Diamond clasped her hands in an effort to steady them. Yes, she was still nervous, for reasons that she couldn’t grasp. It all seemed so sudden, having dinner with Baptiste’s family. They had only shared one night together; one glorious night. Perhaps they were moving too fast? But Diamond knew that often there was very little rational thought involved in these kinds of things. She decided to just let go, allow the situation to be what it was, and see where the adventure would take her next.