Worried she was getting in too deep with someone else’s child, Marie took a few seconds to gather her thoughts. “I think some things are pretty hard to forgive, but I can tell you that when you do forgive someone for something, even if it’s one of those hard things, you always feel better.”
Rachael stared out the side window for the next few miles before she spoke again. “Your parents weren’t married when you were born either…like mine. Is that something you can forgive?”
“Yes. I can forgive them for that.”
“Well, I think it stinks.”
“It’s not ideal, hon, but so many things in life aren’t. In fact, most things in life aren’t. You just have to learn how to make the most of any situation you happen to be in.” Look at who’s giving advice on this subject. I’ve struggled with this practically my whole adult life.
“I guess I get it.”
“Did you ask because you want to understand your own situation better?”
“Yeah.”
“These are complicated things we’re talking about. There are no easy answers.”
“I know.”
“Well, here’s the store. Got the heebie-jeebies?” Marie teased.
“Just so you know, that’s not ‘in’ anymore.”
“Oh. So are you nervous?”
“Hell, no.”
“Rachael…”
“Sorry.”
The jewelry store clerk directed them to the back room. “Have a seat, honey,” he said to Rachael. He pulled out a very long needle.
Rachael took a step back. “Whoa. Spread out! What are you going to do with that thing?”
“Don’t be afraid, Rachael. It will only hurt for a second. Do you have your earrings?”
Rachael handed the clerk her earrings.
“Now just relax,” he told her. Rachael took in a deep breath and scrunched up her face until he was done. He held up a mirror for her.
“Cool.”
“How do they feel?” Marie asked once they were outside the store.
“Weird.”
“Well, don’t fiddle with them too much. Just give them a gentle turn two or three times a day and you’ll be fine. C’mon, let’s do a little shopping before we head home.”
Marie took Rachael to a whimsical boutique she’d noticed across the street. Marie and Karen scanned the silk scarves while Rachael looked at earrings.
“You haven’t said much all day. Are you okay?” Marie asked Karen.
“I’m just taking it all in.”
Marie shot her a glance.
“How the two of you interact with each other. It’s all very…”
“What do you think of these, Marie?” Rachael asked, holding up a pair of earrings.
Marie scrutinized the long, dangly red earrings Rachael held and gave her a disapproving look. Rachael rolled her eyes and put them down. “These?” Marie glanced at the next pair, more flamboyant than the first. She didn’t have to say anything. Rachael put them down and kept looking while Marie paid for a scarf.
“If you’re going to buy a second pair of earrings, I suggest something solid gold—and conservative. Solid gold because you don’t know how your ears will react to something impure, and conservative because you don’t want your father to…shall we say, go ape?”
“Okay, I get it.”
CHAPTER 9
Outsiders
Marie and Karen spent the following week talking about their Christmas visit. While Marie had accepted her new role as a member of the Brooks family as normal, Karen was still at the “I can’t believe this is happening to you” stage.
“How can you be so calm about it?” Karen asked her.
“Well, I wasn’t all that calm at Thanksgiving, believe me, but Christmas was different. I think it happened when we were opening presents. All of a sudden, it all felt so, I don’t know, legitimate maybe.”
“The album?”
Marie focused on the album prominently displayed on her coffee table and nodded.
“Was that a pivotal moment for her, do you think?” Karen asked, referring to Claire.
“I think so, but maybe even more so for me.”
“How so?”
“I spent the whole two weeks at Thanksgiving, and weeks afterward really, trying to read Claire. I mean, there were times I didn’t like her much, and I was sure she totally resented me. But when I opened that album and realized she had been the one who put it together, I knew that was her core. Not any of the negative stuff like I’d feared.”
“Marie, how do you think that Christmas image looked to an outsider?”
“What do you mean?”
“I was thinking if someone off the street peeked in the window, what would they have thought?”
Marie laughed. “We were quite the diverse group, weren’t we?”
“That’s one way to put it.”
Marie shot her a curious glance.
“C’mon, Marie. You mean to tell me you don’t feel the least bit out of place there? Don’t get me wrong, I think they’re great people, and I’m very happy for you and all, but…”
“But what?”
“But they’re…”
“They’re what?”
“Marie, they’re different from you. You know what I mean.”
Pretty sure the wine they were drinking was causing both of them to say things they might not otherwise say, Marie didn’t let it go like she knew she should have. “No, tell me.” As soon as she said it, she wished she hadn’t.
“Now, don’t go ape on me, like Rachael would say.”
“I’m interested in what you meant.”
“You have to admit you had to change just in order to fit in with them. C’mon. Otherwise, you would have felt as uncomfortable as I did.”
“I didn’t realize you were that uncomfortable. I guess it was a bad idea to invite you.”
“Now c’mon. Don’t go there. I went because of you. As a favor to you.”
“So what exactly made you so uncomfortable?”
Karen rolled her eyes. “You know darn well what I mean.”
“No, I don’t.”
“They’re Negroes, for Pete’s sake. They’re not like us. You had to feel just a little uncomfortable being the only white person in the room…besides me, that is.”
“No, you were the only white person in the room.” Marie got up from her chair, walked over to the window, and peered out.
“Look, it was all sugar and spice and everything nice while you were there, but now you’re back in the real world.”
“Back in the real world where there’s bigotry, racial prejudice, and nowhere for me to fit in. You mean that real world?”
“Well…yes. Marie, that’s reality. Negroes aren’t accepted by whites. Don’t get mad at me. I didn’t create it.”
“I think I’ve heard about enough of your narrow-mindedness, Karen. You’re not talking about just some other people here. They’re my family, and I don’t appreciate your ignorant judgments about them.”
Karen got up and headed toward Marie’s apartment door. She turned around to face Marie. “And don’t think for a minute they weren’t judging you. That was obvious!” With that, she left.
Karen was halfway down the stairs when Marie shouted at her, “Jonathan is my father, Karen. That man could have two heads, polka-dot skin, and a bushy tail, and it wouldn’t change anything. He’d still be my father!”
Marie slammed the door shut, poured herself another glass of wine, and retreated to the living room. She sat still, staring out the window for a full minute before the tears came.
Karen didn’t get it, and if her best friend didn’t get it, who would? That is, if she was still her best friend.
Tired the next morning from a fitful night’s sleep, Marie’s thoughts went back to her argument with Karen. They had known each other a year and a half, and while Marie was very aware of Karen’s prejudices, admitted or not, they had never fought over it, or over anything for that matte
r. She wavered between calling her now and waiting for things to cool down.
She thought about the way Karen became so emotional in the Brookses’ home when Marie had opened the Christmas present from Claire, and then again when Jonathan opened his from Marie, and yet again when she opened her own present from Claire. If she was that detached from the Brookses, or more specifically Negroes in general, why all the emotion? Marie didn’t get it.
She hoped the fight with Karen would have positive consequences. Now that Karen knew how strongly Marie felt about accepting people for who they are instead of for their skin color or cultural background, she would give it more serious consideration, or at the very least be more sensitive to Marie’s beliefs. One thing was for sure, the last thing Marie wanted was to lose Karen as a friend.
The phone interrupted her thoughts.
“I called to say I’m sorry.” Karen’s voice was soft and contrite.
“I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have lost my temper yesterday. Maybe it was the wine.”
“Look, I did a lot of thinking after I left, and I’m not sure I’ll ever see things like you do. But there is one thing I am sure of, and that’s you’re my best friend, and I never want that to change.” She paused. “Can we just agree that we don’t see eye-to-eye on this and go back to being best friends?”
Marie swiped the tears off her cheeks. It was less than what she had hoped for, but heartfelt. She had to accept Karen’s apology. “Of course. I’d like that.”
“Good, because I can’t go another night with no sleep. I’m a walking zombie today. Do you want to come over for dinner tonight? I’ll make fried chicken.”
“You’re on.”
Later that day, when Marie arrived at Karen’s house, the two women hugged, their fight behind them.
“When does Maurice get back, by the way?” Marie asked.
Karen tried to stifle a smile. “Tomorrow.”
Marie shot her a teasing look.
“Stop it.”
“How’s it going with you two these days? You haven’t said two words about him since we’ve been back.”
“Everything’s good.”
“That’s all? Just good?”
“Yeah.”
Marie smiled. “You’re hiding something.”
“Am not.” Karen reached for her purse.
“What are you getting?”
Karen put her purse back down. “Nothing.”
“You’ve got chocolate in there, don’t you?”
“Maybe.”
“Every time we talk about Maurice, you start eating chocolate!”
“No, I don’t.”
“There’s more going on between you two than you’re letting on, isn’t there?”
“Well, I wasn’t going to say anything, because I don’t know if he would even appreciate my saying anything…but, well, I met his mother.”
“And?”
“Well…”
“What’s wrong?”
“She’s…well, she’s the worst hypochondriac on the face of the earth. Maurice didn’t even want for us to meet, ever, but when we came back to his house one day after dinner, she was sitting on his front porch, crying.”
“Why was she crying?”
“I forget exactly. Something about a pimple on her cheek that she was convinced was going to eat all the flesh off her face.”
“Really.”
“It gets worse. After Maurice calmed her down, which took all evening I might add, she talked nonstop about all her illnesses. He put her to bed in his spare room, and she spent the night, but not before doing his laundry.”
“She does his laundry?”
“Not all the time, only when she comes over. And only when it’s her time of the month.”
“You’re making this up.”
“Do I look like I could make this up? And wait, there’s more. When he was young, she had such huge fears about what she fed him, because she thought she was going to kill him, that he ended up losing all his teeth because of bad nutrition.”
“What?”
“I’m not kidding. All his teeth are false. The man wears dentures, which he probably puts in a glass next to his bed each night.” Karen made a face, like she had just bitten into a sour grape.
“No wonder he never smiles. So does this change things between you two?”
“I’m trying not to think about it.”
Karen spent New Year’s Eve with Maurice. Marie spent it alone. But not having been a big fan of New Year’s Eve since being married, Marie wasn’t disappointed. She needed the alone time.
On New Year’s Day, Marie drove to the home of Doretha Scott, the woman she had met at the library. She parked her car and walked up the crumbling walk to her front door. Doretha was standing in the window with a somber look on her face, shaking her head. Marie knew she was advising her to leave. She held up the book she had bought for her. Doretha kept shaking her head. Marie made sure Doretha saw her put the book on the porch and then left.
As she drove away, people came out of their homes and onto their porches, giving her icy stares. Then, without warning, something hard hit her back windshield. She sped up until she reached the outskirts of the colored neighborhood and the beginning of more familiar territory, where she pulled off the road, put her car in park, and wept.
She was just trying to be a friend. And under different circumstances, but perhaps in some other world, she knew Doretha would have liked to have been a friend back.
Two weeks later, Marie received a phone call from attorney, Michael Cavanaugh.
“I’m afraid I don’t have great news for you, Marie.”
“Oh?”
“I consulted with my partner about the Indiana anti-miscegenation laws. He’s much more familiar with them than I am. Whether or not Richard would be found guilty of violating this law would likely depend on when he found out about your ethnicity, and even if he did know of it when the two of you were still together, it wouldn’t be a cut-and-dried case. There’s no case law in Indiana for a situation like yours, where you yourself didn’t know your ethnicity.”
“So where does that leave us?”
“Your options as I see them are to either file for divorce based on his felony conviction, wait out the seven-year statute of limitation for the involuntary dissolution of your marriage, or try to get the marriage voided under the anti-miscegenation law in Indiana.”
“What are you recommending?”
“The least amount of risk lies with the seven-year statute of limitation for estrangement. But, of course, that’s also the option with the greatest constraints; you would be legally married for another five and a half years. Trying to get the marriage voided under the anti-miscegenation law, in my opinion, comes with the greatest amount of risk, since there is no relevant case law.”
“So you’re recommending filing for divorce based on his felony conviction?”
“I’ll represent you under any of the three scenarios, but yes, I would say that’s the way to go. Keeping in mind, of course, that the conviction came after you left him. The judge will likely take that into consideration.”
Marie thought sending Richard to jail for marrying her would be unscrupulous and just plain wrong, no matter what he had done to her in the past. And while it appeared to be the easy way out, waiting five and a half more years to meet the statute of limitation requirement was too restricting. She called her father the next day to discuss it.
“I’m leaning toward divorcing him based on his felony conviction.”
“Whatever you decide, I’ll support you on it, Marie. But I have to tell you it would be quite satisfying to see…well, you know how I feel about him.”
“Yes, Dad. I know.”
She and Karen talked about it over dinner the next evening. “If you decide to go ahead with it, how do you think he’ll react when he finds out?” Karen asked.
“Well, let’s see. The last time I saw him was when he showed up at Lulu’s. He was still wea
ring his wedding band. He told me he still loved me. He begged me to come back to him, and when I didn’t acquiesce, he threatened to do something to Jonathan. So how do you think he’ll take it?”
“So maybe you’d rather wait the five and a half years and play it safe?”
Marie took in a deep breath. “I don’t know what I want to do. But I just remembered something else Richard said that day.”
“What’s that?”
“Somehow I got up enough nerve to tell him I wasn’t attracted to him anymore, and do you know what he said to me?”
Karen shook her head.
“He said as soon as any other man finds out who I really am, he’ll throw me away like a piece of moldy fruit.”
“Eewww!”
“He also told me I could move to another country and he’d find me.”
“Don’t know, hon. I’d let sleeping dogs lie if I were you.”
“Well, I don’t have to make a decision right away. Maybe I’ll think about it some more.”
CHAPTER 10
How Nice to See
You Again
For the next few weeks, Marie was unable to think about little other than what to do about her marriage to Richard, and what transpired on the trip she took to New York the following month delayed her decision even further.
The American Institute of Decorators had invited Marie to sit on their board the previous year, which meant she had to attend semi-annual three-day meetings in New York. She invited Karen to join her for the February meeting. They stayed at the Algonquin.
“Richard and I spent many nights here,” she told Karen through a sigh. She let her mind wander for a few seconds to the good times.
“Nice hotel. But of all the hotels you could have picked for this trip, why did you pick this one?”
“I don’t know. Maybe to show I’m not afraid of him anymore.”
“Show who?”
“Mostly me, I guess.”
The two women headed for Fifth Avenue after settling in. Too shocked over the prices to buy anything, Karen stuck to window shopping. Marie bought a silk scarf and bottle of French perfume not available in Atchison. “So this is the type of life you and Richard had?” Karen asked. “Trips to New York and spending lots of money?”
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