“So, does this mean you’re going to judge who you like and associate with by how it’s going to affect you parents’ marriage? You know we didn’t raise you that way. In spite of whatever your father and I are, you still have to be you, have to have your own likes and dislikes. Oh sure, we’ve tried to influence them. That’s our job. But ultimately, you make your own decisions about your life. If you’ve heard anything we’ve been ‘preaching’ to you over these many years, I hope you heard that in there somewhere. Oh and, by the way, it’s nice to know that you actually heard some of the ‘sermons’ we’ve given you. Judging by the look on your face sometimes, I wasn’t quite sure that you did.”
Felice giggled. “You mean this look?” Felice’s mouth dropping slightly open and her eyes glazing over into opaqueness.
“That’s the one. I half expected you to roll your eyes a couple of times. If you had, I would have slapped you silly.”
“I’ll remember that.” Felice grew serious again. “Dad has always told me the same thing about making my own decisions. But sometimes it seems that he doesn’t really believe what he’s telling me.”
“He does. It’s just that it’s hard for him. It’s hard for him to realize that his sweet little girl isn’t a little girl anymore. Now when you make certain decisions, one’s that he doesn’t like, he realizes that, unlike before, there’s little that he can do about it. It scares him.”
“Doesn’t it scare you?”
“Yes it does, a little, but not in quite the same way. There’s a gulf of perception between men and women and it’s never as wide as it is between a father and his daughter. Your dad told me that your grandpa Jean used to tell him that a man hadn’t really been a father until he had fathered a girl.”
“Yeah, well, he would know. But why is it so difficult for a guy to have a daughter? Why is the gulf so wide?”
“A father, a good one like yours anyway, wants to give his daughter the world and wants to protect her, like any woman that he loves, from all pain and suffering. He wants to slay dragons for her. Oh sure, your dad would slay a dragon or two for me, but he’d slay a whole army of them for you, kiddo.
“At the same time, he realizes that he can’t protect his daughter from everything and everyone, so, if he’s a good father, he tries to give his daughter the tools to protect herself.
“The biggest frustration for a father like yours, however, is this: even if he slays all of his daughter’s dragons and gives her all the tools to slay a few of her own, there will always be one more out there. And sooner or later, neither he nor his daughter will be able to prevent that dragon from breathing fire on her. The daughter will have to take it like a woman.
“Then there’s that other gulf; his daughter is a woman and what comes with that fact are all the connotations that a man carries in his head of being a woman.
“Even if a father and a daughter have the absolute best relationship in history, the father knows that there’s a gap in their communication, simply because he’s a man and she’s a woman. There’s a place in her life, a place that a girl’s mother understands (hopefully), that he can never comprehend, simply because he’s not a woman. Look at you and me. Until recently, you and I were like cats and dogs. Now, I find out you’re more like me than I ever even imagined.” Her mother smiled. “What a scary thought.”
“I get this feeling sometimes that there are certain things that you get that Dad doesn’t,” said Felice. “Not because he doesn’t want to, but just because he doesn’t understand.”
“That’s what I’m talking about exactly. Simply put, he has no idea, of course, what it’s like to be a woman. So, when he watches what women go through and thinks of his daughter, he can’t help but think of all of the other women that he’s known; the good ones and the bad ones. He then starts to think of all the ways that a woman can be hurt by a man. After that, he starts to think of all the women that he’s hurt and says to himself, ‘not my daughter, no sir.’ That’s why most men look at any potential suitor of their daughter as the enemy.”
“Figuratively speaking.”
“Hopefully.” Vetra paused. “Maybe it’s better that he won’t be here when Kevin picks you up tonight.”
Now, as Felice got ready, she thought that her mother had been wrong about that. She wanted her father there when Kevin came, even if he didn’t behave (and she doubted that he would be totally rude). She had hidden so much of her life from her parents for so long, and she now wanted to stop hiding from the two people she loved most in the world, especially her father. If Kevin was going to be a part of her life, she didn’t want to slink around and hide it from Dad. She would fight her father over it, if need be, but she would be honest about it. No more secrets.
She thought about some of the girls she had gone to school with in L.A. Some had fathers who were in prison or were on drugs or were alcoholics or were dead. Some had mothers who had had so many men in and out of the house that they didn’t even know who their father was. Some had abusive fathers or stepfathers or boyfriends of their mothers, who beat them and/or raped them. Then there was her own father, who kissed, loved, and hugged her in an absolutely fatherly way, who barely took a drink, who told her jokes, who had never spanked her, who had given her as much knowledge as he could conceive, and who always had time to
listen to what she had to say. He could be strict, but he was never mean.
Now, after her experience with the Taus, she understood his strictness, his protectiveness. He had tried to keep all the dragons away from her, but, as Mom had said, he couldn’t slay all of them. Especially not the ones he didn’t know about; the ones who Felice, herself, had let burn her.
Felice started as she heard the doorbell ring. She looked at herself in the bathroom mirror. Pretty ugly. In the last couple of years, she had grown pretty confident about her physical appearance after a seemingly endless period of teenaged gawkiness. In color-struck L.A., she had constantly been compared unfavorably against the lighter-skinned, fuller-figured black girls. And she had to admit, most of them were more attractive than she had been with her long, gangly, stick-like limbs and her ever-troublesome hair which had been broken off by too many harsh relaxers. Then, at sixteen, she had cut off her hair and stopped straightening it and at about the same time, her body had started to become, rounder and fuller, more womanly. She was still slender, but as she became more confident, she began to glide, rather than stomp on her long, narrow feet.
She had thought, like most women, that men preferred long hair, but as soon as she cut hers, suddenly she began to receive more and more compliments on her hair, mostly from her male schoolmates. No one had ever complimented her on her hair when she straightened it.
“Mom, would you get that, please?” she shouted.
“Of course, dear,” she heard her mother chuckle.
So, as a result, she now usually thought of herself as pretty hot stuff--except in situations like this one. It seemed that every blotch on her face had picked this day to turn up. And was that a new zit she saw trying to pop up on her forehead? She touched it. Great, she thought as she felt the familiar soreness. It’s gonna look like Vesuvius in a day or two.
She turned on the tap, ran her hands through it, and patted her hair. At least it was cooperating. He had seen her before, she finally decided with a shrug. If he threw up when he saw her, she’d know that she didn’t look so hot. Just as she started to shut off the light and make her entrance, she halted. Put some lotion on those hands you just wet, goofy.
She could hear her mother’s and Kevin’s voices in the living room as she walked down the hall. She suppressed a giggle at her mother’s bright getting-to-know-you tone. They were lightly laughing at some small joke just as she entered the living room.
Kevin found himself feeling uncharacteristically nervous as he turned his father’s two-year-old Volvo onto I-40. He had been out with many girls before and had met many parents before. Heck, he had been out with this girl before. But some part o
f him knew that Felice was more than just any girl. Some part of him felt happiness whenever he thought of her, some part of his heart leapt for joy whenever he saw her. Now, he was about to meet the very reasons for her being on the planet. For the first time in his life, he wondered whether he would measure up.
He considered the fact that he might be nervous because they were black, but then dismissed it. If Felice’s parents didn’t want her to date a white guy, surely she would have mentioned something about it. Surely, she would have warned him. She probably wouldn’t have even agreed to go out with him. Wait a minute! Maybe that’s why she had driven away almost without a word that day at the mall. Maybe that’s why she seemed so reluctant to give him her phone number!
Boy, you’re really slow sometimes, he thought as he reached up to thump himself in the head.
He got off the highway at the Lomas exit. What was he about to walk into? Would Felice’s father put a shotgun in his face as soon as he walked into the door? Did he really want to put himself in that type of situation? He remembered that Felice’s father had been born on the same day as his own father. If Mr. LeCroix and his father were anything alike, Mr. LeCroix would be totally civil with him, even laugh and joke with him. But, covertly, he would be watching him like a hawk, waiting for a weakness that he might be able to use. When he found that weakness, he would go for Kevin’s jugular. Kevin shuddered at the memory of seeing his father do the same type of thing.
At last he found Las Palmas Southwest. What was that number? He looked at the strip of paper he had scribbled the address on. 1435. There it was; a nice, medium-sized house typical of Albuquerque, modeled after the pueblos that Indians had created thousands of years ago. Was its peaceful appearance a cover? Should he park and go on in, or should he turn around and go home and save himself from having to look down the business end of a firearm?
If he did that, if he just turned around and went home, if he called Felice and made up some excuse, what would happen? He knew, didn’t he? He’d never be able to look Felice in her beautiful face again. He’d never be able to look at himself in the mirror again.
He parked and got out, pulling his jacket from the back seat. He knew he looked good in his dark suit, especially made for his hard-to-fit frame. His hair had been freshly cut that afternoon and freshly moussed that evening. At least they couldn’t say he looked like Charles Manson. But what if they thought he looked like Ted Bundy?
With that disturbing thought swirling in his head, he rang the doorbell. When the door opened, he found himself looking down into the smiling face of a shorter, slightly older-looking, very beautiful version of Felice.
“Uh, hello...I’m Kevin Hart.”
“Hi, Kevin. I’m Vetra LeCroix, Felice’s mother.” She extended her hand. “Come on in, dear. Felice will be out in a minute.”
He shook her hand. Then he stepped in and briefly looked around; a nice, warm, comfortable-looking living room and not a rifle case in sight. He turned back to her. “I’m sorry, Mrs. LeCroix. I was a little surprised when I came
in. You look like Felice’s sister, not her mother. But I remembered she told me that she only had a brother, so I was confused.”
Vetra laughed. “First brownie points are successful. Let’s sit down and see if you can make some more. And please, call me Vetra. Mrs. LeCroix is my mother-in-law. Come. Sit down.”
“You don’t still call your mother-in-law that, do you?” Kevin said as Vetra led him to a spacious couch.
“When I first met her, of course I called her ‘Mrs. LeCroix.’” She sat down next to him. “For years, even when Felice was of a good size, she never asked me to call her anything else. Then, when I gave birth to my first and only boy-child, my son Joey, she asked me to call her ‘Martine.’ Go figure.”
“You’re kidding.” Kevin was astounded.
“No, I’m not. My husband’s mother is a traditionalist. To her, a woman isn’t a real woman unless she’s married and has given her husband a son.”
Kevin had no idea how to respond. So he looked around. “Nice house,” he said. The decor was simple, with plants as the main motif. Real ones, not ones depicted in the upholstery. Even in winter, Vetra managed to keep everything green.
“The plants give the room a sense of...life,” he continued. “Like they want to reach out and grab you.”
“Don’t say that within earshot of my son. That kid has just too vivid an imagination. He’ll be waking up later tonight, saying, ‘Mommy, the rhododendron’s coming to get me!’”
It was during their laughter that Felice chose that moment to make her entrance.
“Well there she is,” Vetra said with an approving smile. Kevin turned toward Felice and stood up, uncharacteristically speechless. She was the most beautiful thing that he’d ever seen.
“Hi...,” he ventured.
“Hi, Kevin. You look nice, like one of those guys in a Calvin Klein ad.”
“Um, thanks, I think...you look, you look...”
“I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure that Kevin likes the way you look,” said Vetra. “Too bad your dad’s not here to see you.”
“Is your husband still at work? Felice’s told me a little bit about him. I was looking forward to meeting him.”
“He’ll probably work late tonight,” Vetra said cryptically. “Maybe next time.”
They all then turned toward the door as they heard the rattling of keys. Kevin, who was still standing, straightened his back and smoothed his suit. Who knew? He might have to be buried in it.
The lock gave way and in stepped a tall, handsome, broad-shouldered black man, nearly of a height with Kevin. His nearly-black eyes swept the room at lightning speed and came to rest momentarily on Kevin’s blue ones.
Then, almost absently, the man stepped forward to kiss Vetra on the cheek. Then he turned to look at Felice. Felice looked back at the man.
“Hi, Daddy,” Kevin heard her say softly with just a touch of happiness, or so Kevin thought.
Kevin again looked into those dark eyes trying to see what was in them, to no avail. Then, suddenly, before Kevin knew what was happening, the man was right in front of him, offering him his hand.
“Hello, I’m Joseph LeCroix.”
“Hello, sir. I’m Kevin Hart,” said Kevin. Suddenly Kevin wanted to be somewhere else…anywhere else, like, say, on offense on his own one-yard line.
Joseph had an iron grip, as Kevin expected. Kevin could smell the aromas of countless spicy foods wafting from Joseph’s clothing, as Joseph inspected him.
“You were better last year.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Last year...before you broke your leg.”
“Oh. Yes, sir, I know,” said Kevin complacently.
“You’ve lost a little bit of mobility. But you’re young yet. You’ve got a lot more scrambling to do.”
“Felice tells me that you played defense for the Tigers twenty-five years ago.”
“Sure did. I flunked out though, and went in the Army. It was for the best. I needed to do a little growing up. Besides, if I’d have stayed here, I never would have met Felice’s mother. Have a seat,” Joseph gestured to the couch and set himself in his easy chair.
“That would have definitely been a tragedy.” Kevin said, glancing quickly at Felice. “My father went to NMU about the same time you did.”
“Really? What’s his name?”
“Herbert. He’s a lawyer here.”
“Yes, I’ve heard his name recently, but I don’t recall anyone by that name in school. Was he a jock?”
“Not hardly,” Kevin grinned. “He was in all the ‘geek’ clubs, like the Latin club and the Poli Sci club...” Kevin suddenly felt Felice’s eyes on the back of his head.
“Then I definitely didn’t know him,” grinned Joseph. “I didn’t exactly have education on my mind when I was there. I played football, partied, and chased girls. This was way before I met Mrs. LeCroix of course. I gather that you don’t belong to any of th
e type of clubs that your father belonged to.”
“No, sir.”
“Just into playing football, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And having a good time, too, right?” Joseph smiled benignly. He stood up and walked over the mantle of the fireplace.
“Well...sometimes, sir.”
“Just make sure you don’t have too good of a time with my daughter,” Joseph said evenly. His eyes shone with just the slightest hint of menace. His smile was gone.
“Oh, no sir,” Kevin said shakily, feeling as though his jugular had been punctured. As he stood up, he yelped as he slammed one of his knees into the coffee table. He looked to see that Joseph was suppressing a laugh.
He turned to look at Felice, but she and Vetra had retired to the kitchen. He could hear their identical-sounding laughter.
“No need to put yourself on the injured list,” said Joseph, still trying to keep a straight face. The menace had lessened somewhat, but was still there. “Just treat my daughter with respect and you have no need to worry about me.”
“Of course, sir. I never considered treating her otherwise,” said Kevin, resisting the urge to rub his left knee.
“Good.” Joseph went to the kitchen door and stuck his head in.
“Well, are you going out with the man or aren’t you?” Kevin heard him ask Felice. He couldn’t quite make out what Felice said, but he did pick out the words ‘scare’ and ‘shotgun.’
“No. He hasn’t given me a reason to...yet,” Joseph answered, matter-of-factly.
In a few seconds, there was Felice. His heart was doing that unfamiliar flippy-flop thing again, only now it was no longer so unfamiliar. For her, he could brave her father’s menace, maybe even his shotgun.
“Are you ready to go?” Kevin asked her.
“Sure.” She retrieved her winter coat and scarf from the coat rack that stood near the front door.
“Here,” he said as he took her coat from her and helped her put in on. He could see the LeCroixs out of the corner of his eye; Vetra with a slight smile, Joseph mostly expressionless except for the eyes, which narrowed like a cat. Kevin turned to face Vetra and Joseph.
Tale of the Tigers: Love is Not a Game Page 10