Belladonna

by Anbara Salam

  “Would you like some hairspray?” Sophie said, catching my eye in the mirror. Even as I was shaking my head, I knew I should have said yes.

  “It smells heavenly. It’s Oriental Pearl.”

  Meredith nudged Alison in the ribs, then giggled, covering her teeth. They both looked at me.

  Heat prickled over my breastbone. Were they laughing because I didn’t use hairspray? Because I didn’t smell heavenly? Rhona had let me use her Youth-Dew; maybe that was the wrong kind of perfume?

  “Oriental Pearl. Like you,” Meredith said eventually.

  I looked to Sophie for help, but she dropped her eyes to the carpet.

  “I’ve never been to the Orient,” I said stiffly.

  Alison wrinkled her nose, like I was spoiling their fun. “The other one, then,” she said, shrugging.

  Meredith giggled again. “Maybe the spray would make half of you invisible.”

  I opened my mouth and closed it. I had the sense the insult was moving too fast for me to catch hold of it. My stomach lurched as if I were jumping down a playground slide.

  “You know”—I put my face against the window—“I think Matty just lit up a cigar,” I said. Although I wasn’t sure that Matty was even there. Or which one he would be. Through the condensation all I could see of the boys was a hazy prep school rubric: pasty faces floating above piped jackets.

  “No,” Sophie gasped. “Did my mom see?”

  “She’s sharing it,” I said.

  Isabella burst out laughing.

  Sophie looked from me to Isabella. “Bridge. You monster.”

  Isabella squeezed my arm. I smiled at her, though my face was tight.

  “What a shame about the weather,” I said, trying to approximate the right tone of mature refinement.

  Sophie sighed and, nudging Alison out of the way, took a seat on the edge of her bed. “This whole party was my mom’s idea. I told her we should have rented the club. Whoever heard of a sweet seventeen anyway?”

  “Your cotillion party is all that matters, right, Soph?” Isabella said. She tapped her ring finger meaningfully.

  Sophie smiled at her with performative bashfulness. “Don’t jinx it, Izzy. Just because your mom wants to lock you away ’til you’re twenty-one.”

  Isabella chewed her fingernail. “Let her try.”

  “Is your mom here?” Alison said to me.

  I nodded.

  Alison and Meredith exchanged a glance. “Can we see her?”

  I licked my lips. “I don’t think she could stay long.” I crossed my fingers under my skirt, hoping against every last hope that Mama had already left.

  “Ignore her, Bridge.” Sophie leaned over and squeezed my hand. The move was so fluid, so assured, I suddenly realized they must have been talking about me before I came in.

  Sophie was still holding my wrist. “Anyway, I swear you couldn’t tell.” She gave me an exaggerated wink.

  “Tell?”

  Sophie licked her lips. “You know—” She started to laugh and then stopped. The room was poised with the hush of deliberate listening. A fizzy sort of anticipation bubbled in my gut.

  “You know,” Sophie said again. “Your mom. It’s not like she’s . . .” Sophie mouthed, “Obvious.” She gave me a winning smile. “Not like Ali Baba or anything.” And she picked up the laugh from where she had abandoned it before.

  Isabella stretched out her foot and kicked Sophie’s shin. “You are such a dunce—Maria Montez is Dominican,” she said.

  I was so filled with gratitude I could have floated out of my seat.

  Sophie waved her hand. “Come on—you know what I mean about Bridge. Like, if you didn’t know, you wouldn’t know, you know?”

  Eleanor rooted around in her velvet purse. “I have some new lipstick,” she said loudly. “Bridge, you want to try?”

  Isabella let out such a gruesome groan we all turned to look at her. She slumped against the window. “Jeez, you are such a pill. I’m sick of messing around with makeup. Let’s play a game. Or are we just going to be stuck inside all afternoon being bored to death?”

  The danger of Isabella’s boredom was palpable, and we looked between each other in an agitation of despair. Meredith shot me a terrified, collusive grimace, and my stomach relaxed. I forgave her jibe in a rush. Perhaps it was quite funny? Perhaps being compared to an Oriental Pearl was flattering? I bunched my hands into fists. Maybe Sophie was trying to be nice to me. To point out no one could tell. Why did I have to take everything so seriously?

  “Izzy’s right,” Sophie said. “Let’s go down. I think we kept the boys waiting long enough.” And she raised her eyebrows at Isabella.

  There was a twinge in my gut. Was Ralph downstairs? Would I have to speak to him? To be nice to him? I steeled myself. I’d have to summon my most enthusiastic laugh for the inevitable, rowdy teasing boys always employed when trying to prove to themselves that girls were entertained by them.

  The lamps in the room flickered twice and went out. We all shrieked although we weren’t afraid. It was almost blue in the room. The clouds had darkened outside and the heavy sound of rain was clattering against the windows. With the air conditioner off, the room grew syrupy with the smell of vanilla hand lotion.

  “Miss Sophie?” a woman’s voice called up the stairs.

  “Sarah?” Sophie groped for the door handle.

  “The power’s gone out, miss. Just stay put. I’ll bring up some candles.”

  We whispered and clutched each other—the unexpected drama was a thrilling disaster. Sophie’s maid brought up two lit candles and passed one to Sophie. “Mind you don’t trip on the way down the stairs,” she said, gesturing for us to follow her.

  Giggling and shushing one another, we fell behind Sarah, and every few steps she called out, “Mind the edge of the carpet,” or “Railing on the left,” even though we could just about see anyway. Sophie was holding her candle low next to her bodice, and an apricot loop of light glowed around her. Isabella ran to her side and pushed her arm through Sophie’s. I followed at the back, behind Eleanor. The bottom of Mrs. LeBaron’s portrait came into view, and the vases; then the beady eyes of the taxidermied bear cub loomed out of the shadows, and when Eleanor crashed into its ashtray we all yelped.

  Downstairs was now filled with guests. It was muggy and close with damp silk as women filed through the corridor. Gold candlesticks had been placed on the sideboards, and through the murky light I took nervous, shallow glances for Mama but couldn’t spot her. I lingered at the bottom of the staircase. Through the windowpane on the front door I could see that our car was gone from the driveway. So that was one thing to be grateful for. There were more guests than I’d realized, maybe thirty adults. Mrs. Quincy was checking her reflection in the hallway mirror, adjusting an oddly whimsical pair of earrings shaped like mallards. Mr. Robinson, the fire chief, was humoring Father Brennan as he delivered a long, monotone speech about the renovation at St. Christopher’s. The sideboard was now stacked with a tasteful display of arthritic, formal gifts: a rosary, a silver carriage clock, a bottle of wine to be set aside. It was clear that Sophie’s birthday was merely the excuse and not the occasion. It was noisy in the crowded space, and people began filing into the ballroom, where I could hear Mrs. LeBaron calling for Sophie. The girls were nowhere to be seen. My belly was heavy. I turned and went back into the kitchen so I could pretend to search for a drink. Somehow, it would be much lonelier to be standing on the edge of the crowd. In the kitchen, pails of ice were being loaded onto the counters by hassled-looking men in white waistcoats making dashes into the rain to retrieve platters of sodden fairy cakes. The kitchen floor was streaked with grass and crushed ice. I stood by a table of punch and took a glass, watching the orange slice bobbing dolefully in the liquid.

  Isabella tapped me on the elbow. “Briddie, there you are. Come, we’re playing s
ardines.”

  “What?”

  “Come on.” She looked over her shoulder and motioned for Alison and Meredith. “I got Briddie.”

  “Where’s Eleanor?” Alison said.

  “Reading?” I offered.

  Isabella snorted. “Briddie, you’re awful.”

  “What about Sophie?” Alison said.

  “The president of the Rotary Club is giving a speech.” Isabella stuck out her tongue and crossed her eyes. “It’ll be ages—I’ll go out of my mind. Come on, we did it last year at my sweet sixteen.”

  I had the strange sense I was rolling backward. Of course Isabella had birthdays before she moved to St. Cyrus. She had friends even before Sophie. I pictured a row of girls in peach silk dresses marching in a procession along Main Street.

  Isabella ushered us past the table of punch and through a swinging door into a deep pantry. A chink of light through the hinge shone on rows of canned tomatoes. It smelled like sawdust, and there was a baited mousetrap in the corner. “Count to fifty,” Isabella said. “That way we can all have a chance before the power comes back.” Isabella slipped out the door and it squeaked shut behind her.

  Meredith cleared her throat. “Do you think she’s really hiding?”

  “What?”

  “Last time we played sardines, Izzy was in Ralph’s car all along.”

  The sides of my face tingled. “Why?”

  Alison and Meredith giggled. “Bridge!” Alison squeezed my arm. “You’re so bad.”

  I didn’t understand what was so controversial about that, but at least they were laughing with me now instead of just in my direction.

  “Do you think it’s been fifty counts already?” Meredith said.

  “Let’s wait twenty more.”

  There was a pointed silence, so I assumed my customary role and counted Mississippis. Then we swung the door open. Whispering, the twins turned right and slunk between two waiters carrying trays of highball glasses.

  I was unexpectedly nervous. I started toward the big oak staircase and then stopped. Isabella only wanted fifty counts, so she couldn’t have gone too far. Instead, I crossed the kitchen and approached the basement stairs. I felt out for the steps with one foot and slowly descended, my heartbeat tinny in my ears. On the left was a utility room, with a narrow window that peeped over the top of the lawn, allowing gloomy light to mark out the shape of a washer and an old bathtub. The room was stuffy, the air damp. It was harder to hear the rain down there, although the gutters on the side of the building gurgled with water.

  “Isabella?” I whispered. I waited and listened. A woven wicker mat lay across the top of the bathtub, and two folded sweaters had been moved from the mat onto the floor. I rolled the mat back from the edge of the tub. And there she was!

  Isabella grinned. “Quickly,” she said, shuffling over.

  I climbed into the bathtub. We just about fit, although we had to nestle down under pleats of her mint green silk. Isabella shook out the mat and shifted it about until it covered us. It was utterly black and unbearably hot inside the tub. Our breath stewed in the confined space. Beads of sweat pearled on my skin. The heat of Isabella’s body pressed all along the right side of my own. As my eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, I saw her face was painted with darts of faint light through the weave of the wicker.

  Footsteps clattered down the stairs and the staircase jogged about. I hoped it hadn’t shaken so heavily when I came down it.

  “Izzy?” Alison’s voice.

  Slowly, Isabella’s fingers crept to the bodice of my dress. She started tickling. I squirmed but clamped my mouth shut. I would not cry out and lose the game. She tickled harder, scrabbling beneath my underarm. I buckled against her once, twice, snorted out my nose. I put my left hand on her shoulder to push her away. The glint of her smile was visible even through the gloom. She grabbed hold of my hand.

  “Izzy?” Alison came into the utility room and flicked the light switch, but the power was still out. My heart was beating wildly. I could feel the drum of Isabella’s pulse against my shoulder. She took hold of my ring finger and brought it to her mouth. I felt the dampness of her breath against my fingers, and then the hot softness of her tongue against the tip of the one she held. She closed her teeth and bit it gently. A squirm went through my body, like a guitar string. It caught under the curl of my toes and traveled through my core and into my throat. My pulse surged so rapidly, my temples grew tight. I said nothing. I willed myself not to make a sound. It would lose us the game. She would not make me a loser. But I was concentrating so fiercely my whole body trembled.

  The staircase thumped again. Now I heard Eleanor’s voice. “Did you check the kitchen?”

  “Yes,” said Meredith and Alison at the same time.

  “Where’s Bridget?”

  “I haven’t seen her.”

  “I’m getting creeped out now.”

  “Ugh! Is that a spiderweb?”

  “Do you think she’s in the washer?”

  “I felt something on my neck for sure.”

  “Is there another room down here?”

  Isabella inched closer to me, and now her mouth was by the corner of mine. I could feel the humid exchange of our breath. The quake traveled into the tips of my fingers. My heartbeat must be so hard she would surely notice it.

  Isabella inched closer.

  The backs of my knees were shaking.

  And then she bit the corner of my mouth. I may have gasped, but I don’t think so. I would not give the game away.

  Then her tongue was liquid inside my bottom lip. And her mouth was moving for mine. Her pulse was beating through her lips and in the arc of her neck, where her heartbeat fluttered. I let my tongue curve up and meet the slightness of hers. And the guitar string was plucked again, harder, deeper, through the center of my body from the hollow of my throat right to the join between my legs. I felt I might be passing out. My brain unspooled. Her body tensed and then gave, a yielding, an accord. And Isabella made a noise, just a slight noise. And at that, I began to unwind.

  With a judder and a whir, the lights flicked back on. A record player stuttered back to life, and there was a cheer from upstairs, followed by the chime of clinking glasses.

  Laughing, Isabella sat up and pushed the mat aside. “Hurray! Come on, Briddie.” She clambered out of the tub and fluffed out her dress, combing down her hair with her fingers.

  I sat up, dazed, my lips swollen, prickling. Isabella began climbing up the staircase. The hairs on my arms were standing upright. Everything in my body was alert, listening. I climbed out and followed up the staircase, my ears ringing.

  In the kitchen, the waiters were blowing out candles and the air was tickly with smoke. My eyes stung. Mrs. Riordan was talking to Mrs. Quincy about the Catholic League; someone in another room was playing a violin. My brain felt full of bouncing putty. I leaned on the edge of the drinks table.

  “Bridge, where were you?” Sophie said, gripping me by the shoulder. Her cheeks were pink. “I was looking for all y’all.” She smiled, but her mouth was twitching. “My mom gave this toast.” She picked up a glass of champagne from the table.

  “Sorry,” I said. “Isabella—” I swallowed.

  “Ugh. Izzy. I should have known. Where is she?”

  I pointed to where Isabella was standing, behind the door of the ballroom. She was talking to a young man, presumably Ralph. His features were puffy, bland, given shape only by the bulb of a snub nose.

  “Sometimes, I swear—” Sophie shook her head. She let out a breath and sipped from her glass. “Well, you know what Izzy’s like. The thing is not to let her wind you up.”

  “OK,” I said.

  But I was unwound completely.

  II

  One Year Later

  Italy

  4.

  August 1957

>   I traveled to the academy a week before the start of term. It was my first Italian train journey and I pushed the window right down to the quick for my introduction to Europe. After leaving Milan we jostled between hills lined with crumbling stone walls, silver olive trees crouching in the scorched grass. We passed through fields of blazing sunflowers, women wearing faded head scarves yawning by the tracks. Somewhere outside Colonna, three boys on the roof of a shed waved to the train, then pelted the carriages with mulberries, shrieking. I closed the window after that.

  I was the only person leaving the train at La Pentola. It was two thirty p.m., and the station was empty, the ticket office shuttered. The ground was spotted with gummy tree sap, tiny flies squirming in the mastic. By the front entrance a wooden signpost that read ACCADEMIA pointed to the hills above. And true enough, high up over the lake, the bell tower of the academy was poking out from behind sunburnt leaves. I could have broken into a jig. My new home! I corrected myself: our new home. Isabella might even have arrived already.

  I stood under the awning at the front of the station, hoping for a taxi. But after twenty minutes of loitering and peering down the overgrown, rutted lane, I decided to walk. Clutching my suitcase and hatbox, I followed the lane between lines of fruit trees cast in nets. The fields were thrumming with cicadas in jouncing waves of noise, the air gritty with toasted grass. After half an hour, the path joined a hill alongside La Pentola Lake. I was squelchy and molten with afternoon heat—it was like being pressed in the center of a grilled cheese sandwich. At last, at the top of the hill I spotted a black-and-white marble staircase. On the right, a large wooden cross was nailed into the earth, its paint blistered from heat.

  The wind ruffled through a eucalyptus tree, rallying a squall of brittle leaves that skittered against my hat. The breeze was chalky with hot dust and vaguely skunky from oregano roasting in the hedgerows. I took a deep breath. Isabella and I would have Italy to ourselves for a whole year! My opportunity was finally at hand—we’d study side by side and drink red wine at wobbly roadside tables. We’d stay up talking long into the night, reading Italian poetry, debating Renaissance art. Together. Always together.