by Bev Marshall
Mama’s business is makeup. She sells Elizabeth Arden at Salloum’s department store in Zebulon. My mother got the job because she’s beautiful. Her hair is the color of tobacco streaked with gold and it falls in soft waves that ripple across her shoulders when she walks across a room. Her smooth white skin, without a pimple or blemish of any kind, is as soft as a feather pillow, and she keeps it that way by applying moisturizers twice daily. Since I have entered puberty and am engaged in a war with pimples, Mama has brought home jars of a variety of pimplefighting weapons that smell dreadful but seem to be winning. I have her nose, and I’m hoping that somewhere within me lies a gene that will develop into fabulous breasts exactly like hers. Mama says I got my long slender feet from Daddy’s gene pool.
My father’s name is Kenneth Woodrow Andrews, and because he died before I was two, I don’t remember anything about him. I’m absolutely certain he was much nicer than any of the men who treat me like a kid when they stand in the living room waiting for Mama to make her appearance. I know what Daddy’s voice sounds like because he talks to me sometimes when I get the hot fudge sundae blues. That’s what Mama calls them.When you’re feeling as rotten and low and hopeless as you can be and you think the world’s biggest sponge couldn’t mop up all the tears inside you, the remedy is this: You drive to the Tastee-Freez and order the large-size hot fudge sundae. And when it comes, the bright red cherry on top cheers you up a little, and then you spoon the first bite into your mouth and you taste the warm chocolate and the cool vanilla ice cream and the sweet sweet whipped cream, and you look at yourself in the rearview mirror of the car and you’re wearing a white mustache, and you smile just a little, and after you’ve taken the last bite, satisfied and filled with that cup of joyful sweetness, suddenly you don’t have the blues anymore.
But you can’t always get to the Tastee-Freez, especially when you’re only thirteen and you can’t drive. So sometimes when I get the blues, my father comes and whispers words that sound like music and he tells me how much he misses me, how much he wishes he were here to hold me in his arms and kiss away my pain. I close my eyes and see him as he looks in the picture on Mama’s nightstand. He is wearing a checkered shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair, black as Jim’s hooves, is swept back on the sides, and one piece falls across his forehead just above his laughing eyes. He is tall, with narrow hips and long slender feet encased in shiny brown alligator boots. I can feel his strong hands on my shoulders, his lips soft on my forehead. Sometimes he makes silly faces with his eyelids turned inside out and his fingers in his mouth stretching his lips out toward his wiggling ears. Other times his amber eyes are filled with pain, and I see his broken body lying beside the hunk of twisted metal that was his motorcycle. Mama often rode with him, but on the day of the accident, they had argued; Mama had thrown a potted plant against the wall where he stood, and she told me that he left the house brushing fine black dirt out of his hair. He hadn’t stopped to pick up the helmet he usually wore.When Mama got the call from the hospital, she had finished repotting the asparagus fern and set it on the dining table between two candles that she planned to light when he came home.
After Grandma left, I did say a prayer, a plea for forgiveness for my latest sin. I knew that God couldn’t be fooled like Grandma and Brother Thompson, so I asked Him to order the Holy Spirit to enter my heart and make things right. I also asked Him for breasts, Jehu Albright’s love, and a daddy just like the one He had taken away from Mama and me.
Chapter 2
LIQUID EYELINER ISN’T EASY TO APPLY AND IT DRIES ON YOUR lids like cement. By the time Grandma got home, I had used up a third of a jar of cold cream trying to scrub off the wavy lines around my eyes. Right away she noticed the heightened color of my skin and felt my forehead for fever. All through supper she worried I was coming down with a summer cold or maybe the red measles or, Lord save us, scarlet fever. Papaw stuffed the last bite of pound cake in his mouth and, after a couple of swallows, said, “Bullshit! There’s nothing wrong with Layla Jay. She looks fine to me.”
Papaw hadn’t been sick a day in his life and his theory was that churchgoers were more susceptible to disease because they spent so much time worrying about going to hell. And worry could kill you. He also believed a few swigs from the whiskey bottle he kept in the toolshed repelled germs and made you impervious to small aches and pains. Even Grandma had to admit that Papaw was a wondrous human specimen.We had seen him toss a two-hundred-pound hog out of the garden, swing a pickax like it was a piece of cardboard, and he was the longest hitter and fastest runner on the Elks baseball team.This was truly amazing because his lack of worry and his consumption of whiskey didn’t extend to making him immune from accidents, which happened to him frequently and freakishly. He had lost three toes on his right foot when the jack broke and the car fell on him, half of his left ear had been torn off by a squirrel that for some unfathomable reason had leapt onto his head, he had a deep scar on his cheek from a flying fishhook, and two of his teeth were knocked out when he had a wreck in his Ford truck.We found them sitting straight up on the dashboard below the dent his head had made when his truck crashed into Mr. Moscary’s delivery van. Although Grandma believed that these accidents were divine warning signs to her husband, none of these mishaps compelled him to go to church on Sunday. Papaw told her that God wanted him to use the time more wisely, and he continued on happily riding Jim across God’s pastureland. After Grandma enlisted the preacher’s help, Brother Thompson offered to pick him up for the men’s supper after Wednesday prayer meeting, but Papaw refused, saying, “If God wants me sitting on a pew in Pisgah Methodist Church, He’ll have to come down and give me a ride on His donkey.”
When I asked Grandma why she hadn’t chosen a husband more like herself, she took the longest time before answering. “Claude was such a cutup, handsome, of course, and very different from the other boys I knew.The first time I ever went out with him, I was smitten. Back then, I longed for adventure, and whenever I was with Claude, well, it was like my blood ran faster, like I was more alive. I could actually feel a sunset, smell the smoothness of glass, hear the taste of a ripe plum. He could make a simple walk to the pond seem like an expedition to some exotic place.” She had smiled then, risking a quick glance at me before she turned her eyes to the quilt she was stitching. Lifting her shoulders in an uncharacteristic shrug as if she didn’t care or maybe understand her allegiance to Papaw, she said, “Who knows, Layla Jay. Maybe it was as simple as that old adage that opposites attract. And to this day I don’t know why your papaw fell in love with me. He knew I was a churchgoer, raised in a home where laughing too hard was frowned on. My mother believed that if you let go of your emotions and allowed them to take over you, then you were vulnerable to Satan entering your body. Papaw thought that was the craziest thing he’d ever heard and told her so. So Mother didn’t come to our wedding. If you could call it that. Just a justice of the peace and me wearing a suit with a homemade camellia corsage. ” She gripped the scrap of material she held so tightly that her knuckles shown white. “I nearly didn’t marry him because Claude told me straight out that he wasn’t getting married in any church, and that he wasn’t going to be preached to every week. I didn’t think I could live with a man who was so opposed to my beliefs, but that next Sunday the sermon was about witnessing to others, how we ought to embrace the doubters and sinners, how it was our duty to be disciples for Jesus. I felt the Lord was speaking through our pastor directly to me, and that afternoon I told your papaw I would marry him.”
If Grandma regretted her decision, she never let on that she did. I suspected that for all her nagging about attending church and fussing about Papaw’s whiskey drinking and wild ideas, he could still make her blood run a lot faster than a revival preacher could.
After we did the supper dishes, Grandma and Papaw went to bed early like always. I slipped out of my room and tiptoed down the hall to Mama’s room to wait for her to come
home. When I was younger, I nearly always fell asleep before her return, but tonight I was wide awake when I heard the crunch of Will’s tires on the gravel drive. Scooting across the bed, I knelt beside the window where I could see the entire circular drive lit by the porch lights.
When they got out of Will’s Le Mans, I saw that Mama was wearing my favorite dress, the one Grandma had forbidden her to wear when the preacher came over for Sunday lunch. Mama said that God didn’t give her great breasts intending for her to hide them, and the ruffle on the bodice of her bright blue dress was a perfect display shelf for them.Will took her hand as they walked toward the house, but the wide gap between their bodies was a sure sign that this was their last date. I propped the window up with the stick that we used to hold it in place, and with my nose pressed against the screen, the sweet scent of freshly cut hay wafted into the room as I watched Mama reenact the scene I had witnessed so many times before. Lifting her breasts, she breathed deeply, let out a little sigh, and shook her head. “It’s been fun, Will, but Mama doesn’t like you, and before we went out today, I promised her I wouldn’t see you again.” She offered him one of her half-smiles. “You know how much I like you, but I just can’t go against my mother. I hope you understand.”
I couldn’t see his face, but Will said just about the same thing they all said when Mama used the sword of Grandma’s disapproval to cut them off. “Aw, Frieda, you don’t need your mother’s permission to date anybody.”
Mama fished for the house key in her purse. It was definitely over. When she held the key, she looked up at Will. “Hon, I am a widow whose circumstances are hard, and if it weren’t for my parents, my little girl and I wouldn’t have a pot to pee in or a window to throw it out.”
Now came the moment that made me hold my breath. Would he walk away or would he snap up Mama’s bait? He hesitated, most likely deliberating on how much he was willing to do to keep on dating her. Finally, he drew a long breath. “I guess I understand how it is with you and your mother, but, baby, I sure wish you’d change your mind.”
Mama’s voice sounded really really sad. “I’d love to, but I just can’t. I’ve got Layla Jay to think about.”
“Well, I guess this is good-bye then.”
“Mmmm. Bye, Will.” Mama leaned over and kissed him hard before he turned to jog across the wet grass to his car.
Looking up to the quarter moon, I smiled and whispered yet another prayer. “Thank you, Lord. Please send Mama a better man next time around.”
Back in 1962, the year before this one, Darryl Thomas (who called me kiddo and tweaked my nose every time he saw me) had nearly been The One when he stepped right into the trap Mama set out to snare him. After her “pot to pee in” speech, he had offered to buy Mama and me a nice little house of our own, and Mama was dancing among the stars every day that week. But God is good. On the next date, Darryl reneged on his offer and admitted that he couldn’t afford us on a policeman’s pay.
Mama hadn’t promised Grandma anything, of course, but she had promised me that someday she would find a nice rich man who would be a good daddy, who would get us a house of our own and take us to see the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France. Mama was crazy about all things French.
When I heard her key in the door, I slid down between the covers and closed my eyes. “You asleep?” she whispered.
I opened my eyes. “Nearly was. How was your date?”
She tossed her purse on the bed and kicked off her red high heels. “Boring. Last week Will told me we would go dancing across the state line at Skinnys, but it was closed.We couldn’t find one place that served liquor on Sunday in Zebulon and so we wound up going to see some stupid show he wanted to see about prisoners of war way the hell back in World War II. And the popcorn was as stale as the movie.”
I sat cross-legged on my side of the bed next to the window. The wind had shifted and hot air drifted into the room. I lifted my hair from my neck and said, “Was it the one with Steve McQueen? The Great Escape?”
Mama came over to the bed and sat next to me. She sounded tired when she said, “Yeah, and when he rode that motorcycle ... well, it just ruined the whole movie for me.”
June and I had gone to the Palace and seen the show the week before, but when I had watched the scene of Steve McQueen driving that motorcycle like a daredevil, I hadn’t thought about the connection between the bike and my being a half-orphan. I guessed that no matter how many men Mama dated, Daddy was the one she’d always love. I put my arm around her and kissed her cheek. “Will won’t be back?”
She smiled then. “Nope. He got the boot tonight.” Mama stood and went to her dresser and pulling her hair back with a silver clip, she smeared cold cream on her face. “Mother will be happy I’m sure.”
Grandma tapped on the door and opened it simultaneously.“Happy about what?”
Mama lit a cigarette and blew a smoke stream toward Grandma. “I broke it off with Will, the devil’s own disciple.”
Grandma didn’t say anything, but her face muscles relaxed with satisfaction. She looked over at me. “Get some sleep, Layla Jay.You might be coming down with something. Remember how red your face was earlier.”
After she closed the door, Mama stubbed out her cigarette and pulled a tissue from the gold box on her dresser.“What’s this about your face?”
“Just had to scrub it hard because I couldn’t get that eyeliner off of me. I was trying to draw a line out toward my hairline like you do, the Cleopatra look, and you know how Grandma feels about me wearing makeup.”
Mama laughed. “Practice practice. Next year you’re going to get to wear all the makeup you want. We’re going to get out of here soon. I promise.”
Mama had made this vow every year since I was old enough to understand it. I knew it was important to her to think that someday we’d be free of Grandma’s rule, but I didn’t mind it nearly as much as she thought I did. There were a lot of good things about living with Grandma and Papaw. Grandma wasn’t nearly as harsh with me as she was with Mama. Of course, I didn’t disobey her openly like Mama did.
I jumped off the bed and kissed her.“I believe you,” I said.“This year will be the one.”
Mama smiled at herself in the mirror.“You bet. Now scoot! It’s late, and tomorrow you register for school.”
I skipped my nightly prayers as I felt I had prayed plenty enough for one day. I pulled back my spread and sheet and lay spread-eagle on the bed.The overhead fan was broken, and the heat lay as heavily as a winter coat on my body. I closed my eyes and saw Sandra Dee kissing Troy Donahue in the cave in the picture show I had seen before The Great Escape started playing at the Palace. Sandra and Troy had gone all the way, and she got pregnant. I figured this would probably happen to me if a boy ever fell in love with me, but I didn’t need to worry because only one boy, Frankie Denham, had ever kissed me, and that was because he had to when we were playing post office at his birthday party back in sixth grade. After the kiss he told me that his mother had made him invite me because she and Grandma were friends.
Grandma had lots of friends. There were all the ladies at Pisgah Methodist who called her an angel when she showed up with covered dishes at their houses whenever they were sick or just had had a busy week. And she was the favorite pink lady at Zebulon Infirmary, the president of Beta Sigma Phi, and all of my teachers adored her because she volunteered for room mother every year.
Mama, on the other hand, had only one girlfriend, and Grandma didn’t like her. Cybil Richards had been twice divorced and was Mama’s best Elizabeth Arden customer. That’s how they became friends. Mama had done a makeover on her that she said made her look the best she ever had. Of course, she wasn’t nearly as pretty as Mama, but people were always telling her she looked like Ali MacGraw with shorter hair. She was tall, nearly six feet, dwarfing most of the other women who worked alongside her in the office building on Ninth Street. Cybil was Ned Pottle’s
personal secretary. Mr. Pottle was a certified public accountant, and since he filed tax forms for almost everybody in Zebulon, Cybil was, therefore, privy to the size of everyone’s bank accounts. After tax season ended, Mama’s friend had lots of free time to try on makeup at the Elizabeth Arden counter. Her nights were busier. She spent a lot of them with Ned when his wife played bridge or when an important meeting was devised as the means to spend the evening at the Slumbercrest Motel out on Highway 51. I knew this because Mama didn’t believe in keeping secrets, especially when they were “so much fun to tell.” I enjoyed being treated like a girlfriend instead of a daughter, and relished every detail Mama was willing to divulge, but the more she told, the more wary I became of confiding in her. And yet I usually couldn’t help telling secrets I had planned to keep. Mama had a way of tricking me into revealing my most private thoughts. I could never figure out how she entrapped me because she was so damn good at it.
Thus far I had been able to keep my love for Jehu Albright a secret, although I knew it was just a matter of time until Mama got it out of me. In fact, I imagined she would unearth every pebble in my soul the next day when we registered for school. Because both Jehu’s and my last names began with an A, we would be registering at Zebulon Junior High at the same time, and Mama would be sure to notice, even feel, my hunger for Jehu’s love. I was ready for the spark to ignite, and my hopes were high. Hadn’t a special look passed between us when he shook my hand after church? And reflecting back on the day, it now occurred to me that perhaps he had chosen to horse around with James Louis because he was my cousin. And I would be looking my best tomorrow in my blue denim wraparound, a madras blouse, and fake pearls Mama had bought for me at Woolworth’s. With all of these positive thoughts swirling in my head, I was filled with confidence and bravado that night.