Madame Mirabou's School of Love

by Barbara Samuel

  “Go ’way,” she said, and pulled the pillow over her head. “It’s not a school day.”

  I grinned. Some things did not change. Just as I’d driven my mother crazy with my early-bird habits, Giselle drove me nuts with her nocturnal ways. I tugged the pillow off her head. “We talked about this last night, sweet potato. How long do you need?”

  “Twenty minutes.”

  “Okay. I’m coming back to roust you at eight-thirty.”

  “Fine! Can I just sleep now?”

  Chuckling, I put the pillow back down over her head. She snatched it and burrowed in deep. The rustled sheets made the smell of her, milk and oranges, rise into the air in almost visible waves, and my heart felt like it would burst.

  I hated her being gone! Hated missing her all the time, pining away for her phone calls.

  And yet, as a mother, I still felt I’d made the right decision. Daniel had advantages to offer that I simply could not. Because he was black and so was Giselle, painful as it was to go there. Because he did love his daughter madly, and maybe he’d made some points about the desirability of his being the primary parent.

  But sometimes I wondered if I wasn’t a coward. What was I afraid of? What was I afraid I couldn’t give her?

  I tossed the Sound of Music dresses into the Goodwill pile and riffled through the closet for something remotely appealing. There was a plain red button-up blouse and a khaki skirt I liked all right. My hair was too long, but I made an attempt to smooth it out, and it ended up looking like something from 1978.

  A sensation of tears built at the back of my throat, and I stepped back from the mirror. What was that about?

  Who was I now? I didn’t even know what I was supposed to wear, much less how to direct a young woman of color through the traps and difficulties she might face.

  Would they really be so different from my own? From my mother’s? Were women so different, color to color, or did we all have mostly the same issues?

  I didn’t know. I didn’t know who to ask. I didn’t know how much of this was my lack of confidence from the devastation of divorce and how much was real. It made me furious that I had to ask the questions at all, that we lived in a world so divided—still—that worries about race could divide a family.

  Before I could choke on my rage or my tears, I glared at my face in the mirror. “Get a grip.”

  Then I went to Giselle’s door. “Time to get up, kiddo.”

  It was nearly nine-thirty by the time we parked on the hill in Manitou Springs. Giselle had not yet really awakened, and yawned all the way across town, but she looked pretty in a low-slung short skirt and a cropped top that showed off her slim brown tummy and long legs. She’d left her hair loose and it tumbled in copper-and-brown ringlets that fell around her shoulders and elegantly angled face. What a pretty thing she was becoming!

  I’d parked in my shop space, and as we walked on the path down the creek, I said, “The shop I rented is right here. Do you want to see it before we go to Annie’s?”

  “Right here? This shop?” She looked dubiously at the weedy back area.

  “I got it cheap because it needed so much work. Sweat equity.”

  Her eyelashes, long and spikey, fanned upward as she looked at the brick building. “Let’s go in.”

  I opened the back door, letting the scent of cool dust out. I’d cleared most of the junk from the back room by now, and there were only cleaning supplies stacked up on the shelf over the sink, and leaning neatly against the wall. A quiet spill of green north light came in the bank of multi-paned windows. I gestured Giselle in front of me. “Remember. It’s still in raw shape. Kit and Evelyn, and maybe one of the women from my apartment building, are coming over this afternoon to help me get it ready to paint.”

  She moved through the narrow hallway into the front shop area, and turned in a circle. “Oh, Mom,” she sighed. “This is so great.”

  I grinned. “You like it?”

  “It’s perfect for a perfume shop.” She smoothed a hand over the wooden counter, eyed the high ceilings. “Do you have decorating ideas in place yet?”

  “Some.” I told her about the brainstorming for a conservatory feeling, the green and white to lighten the small space, the idea of painted wrought-iron accents. “What do you think?”

  She wrinkled her nose. “It’s not a bad idea. But maybe a little bland?”

  I tossed my Farrah hair out of my face. “Okay. So what are you thinking?”

  “Well . . .” She pursed her lips, narrowed her eyes. “Perfumes are . . . vivid, right? Like, I think of cloves and spices as red and strong. You don’t make a soft kind of perfume, really. You like patchouli and musk and rose, and I’ve never ever smelled a perfume that you made that would be right for a lady to wear to tea, you know?”

  “Giselle!” I grinned ear to ear. “I had no idea you paid so much attention to my perfumes.”

  “I love the one you made for me. And when I miss you, I smell the one you helped me make for starting junior high. Remember?”

  “I do. You wanted it to smell like Constant Comment tea.” I laughed. “Which is where I got the idea for the one I made for you.”

  “Are you going to sell that one? Mine?”

  “I hadn’t planned to.”

  “I think you should. It’s just a really good fragrance, and not like anything else.” She gave me a coy glance. “But you have to name it Giselle’s Perfume.”

  “Done.” My stomach growled. “We can come back here after breakfast. I’m starving.”

  “Okay.” She noticed the litter box in one corner. “Is your cat here?”

  “I don’t know.” I went to the base of the stairs and called, “Kitty, kitty, kitty.” A little patter of paws on the floor over our head made me smile. He was coming around. I shook food into the dish at the foot of the stairs. “There he is.”

  He stood at the top of the steps, blinking yellow eyes owlishly down at Giselle and me.

  “Ooooh, he’s so cute!” she cried. “I want to come back after breakfast to see if we can catch him, okay?”

  “You can at least see if he’ll let you pet him.”

  “Is that an apartment up there?” she asked.

  I nodded. “We can look at it later, too. It really needs a lot of work.”

  “Are you going to live here?”

  I met her dark gaze. “I hope so. Eventually. We’ll see.” I glanced at my watch. “C’mon. Let’s go eat. I want you to meet everyone while it’s kind of slow.”

  We walked down the green path toward the back of Annie’s. The silvery creek was full of snow melt and roared down its narrow channel. Dozens of birds sang, and the high-altitude sun stretched bright fingers through the tree leaves.

  Giselle inhaled. “God, that smells so great! Can we go for a picnic, maybe?”

  With an unexpected ping of loss, I thought of Niraj, the cricket picnic we’d shared last weekend. “Did I tell you I saw a cricket match last Sunday?”

  “No! Was it cool?”

  “A little slow, but it was fun to do something different.”

  “I’ve been really interested in lacrosse lately. I found out I’m good at it.”

  “That’s fantastic, kiddo.”

  “So, can we have a picnic tomorrow?”

  “I have to work in the morning, unfortunately, but how about after I get off work?”

  “A late-afternoon picnic?”

  “Sure, why not? By the creek in Cheyenne Canyon?”

  She shrugged. “Okay.” Light danced in her dark hair, brought out the copper shimmer, showed the warmth of her skin tone. I was suddenly overwhelmed with happiness to have her with me, to be in her company. I flung my arms around her from behind. “I’m so crazy about you, you know that?”

  “Why?”

  I laughed. “Because you’re smart and strong and quirky and very good with color and you’re mine, mine, mine.”

  Instead of struggling against my arms, she leaned backward into me and put her hands
on my forearm where it looped around her chest. “Nobody says things the way you do, Mom. It’s one of the things I like best about you.”

  “Thank you.” I rubbed her arms. From the back door of Annie’s, a pair of figures emerged—Annie and Mary. “Good morning!” I cried, and tucked my chin into my daughter’s shoulder. “Here is my devastatingly fantastic daughter.”

  “Mom!” she cried, and rolled her eyes. I let her go with a chuckle.

  Annie’s eyes crinkled up. “If your mother will not sing your praises, who will?” She reached out a slim hand. “It is lovely to meet you, dear. Your mother speaks of you every day.”

  “Thanks,” she said.

  Mary raised her eyebrows at me, over the top of Annie’s head. “You’re just full of surprises,” she said, and I knew she was talking about Giselle’s obvious mixed race background.

  “So they say.” I shrugged. “Giselle, this is Mary, who is the dragon of the kitchen, but you know what she cooks? The sweet potato salad from Spoonbread & Strawberry Wine.”

  “Oh, my God,” Giselle said. “That is my favorite, favorite food in the world.”

  Mary smiled. “Is that right? As it happens, I’m making it for the lunch special today.”

  “No way!”

  She nodded. “Way. I’ll send some home with your mama, and you can have it for supper.”

  “We’re going in to have breakfast,” I said.

  They nodded, and we all moved through the kitchen. From behind me, Mary said, “Niraj is there, by the way.”

  Butterflies leapt, swirled, fluttered. Anticipation? Fear? He had not called or anything. “Oh.” I glanced back over my shoulder at her, wondering if there was a warning. Was he with someone? I frowned at her. What?

  “Just saying.”

  I put my finger to my lips, cocked my head toward Giselle. Mary nodded. Giselle pushed through to the dining room and I rushed back to the kitchen. “Is he with someone or something?”

  “Not that I saw. What’s up? I thought you had a hot date with him the other night.”

  “I did.” I sighed. “It’s . . . oh, I’ll tell you later.”

  “All right.” She picked up a stalk of celery. “That ain’t the only story I want to hear, now.”

  “Right. There’s not much to tell, really. I’d better get out there.”

  Mary nodded.

  I went into the restaurant, my tummy full of fluttering. Giselle stood by the bar, looking around curiously. In this world, against the orchids and ferns and Victorian styling, she was so plainly not white.

  But it also would be very hard to say just what her background was. She could have been Turkish or Cuban or Greek; East Indian, West Indian, or America Indian; Puerto Rican or Maori. A woman of color, as they say. Which was why her father had pushed so hard for her to live with him.

  And why I’d given in. Maybe it had been cowardly. I still wasn’t sure.

  But just now, that beautiful girl was with me, here and now, and in her narrow shoulders and deep bust, in the quirk of her distinctive smile, I could see myself. She was my daughter, too. “Ready?” I said.

  It was only then that I saw Niraj, sitting on the other end of the bar. I started, and didn’t know whether to stare until I met his eyes or rush away. He looked wonderful with his hair shorn and his shoulders covered in a pale green shirt that brought out the cinnamon tone of his skin. I felt my spine soften, as if in insistence that we should lie down together right now.

  “Mom!” Giselle said. “You are so staring at that guy! Do you know him?”

  At that moment, Niraj looked up. He didn’t smile. He did not look away. He raised his hands in front of him and put them together, as if in prayer, bowing slightly: namaste. A spiritual greeting, he’d told me. The spirit of me greets the spirit in you.

  Pierced, relieved, I brought my hands together, too, and bent to greet him, a silent namaste in return. “I know him,” I said. “Let me introduce you.”

  “You lied, didn’t you?” she said. “He’s your boyfriend.”

  “Not exactly.”

  “I don’t want to meet him.”

  For a moment, I wasn’t sure what to do. There was no manual of dating to which I could refer. I gave him a look, shrugging a little, and let Zara seat us in the west alcove. As I sat there, a sucking sensation made my chest feel hollow, and the back of my neck burned. I felt torn exactly in half. Daughter and man. To whom did I owe allegiance? She had been born from my body, and I would know her all my life, spirits willing. He was new, and perhaps only in my life for a moment. By that measure, I should respect my daughter’s wishes.

  But Niraj had been kind to me, very patient, and I did not want to wound him. And after all, wasn’t I the elder between my daughter and me, the person who supposedly knew some of the answers?

  From some mysterious place inside of me, a voice said, What do you want, child? It sounded like the voice of the mountain, the spirit mother who had drawn me into this job, into the shop.

  “I’ll be right back,” I said to Giselle, and I rushed into the bar.

  Niraj was already gone. Damn. “Where did Niraj go?” I asked Zara.

  “He left. Seemed a little put out.” She put down a package on the bar in front of me. “He asked me to give this to you, and said to say it was . . .” She paused, and gazed up toward the ceiling. “Oh, yeah. A gift between friends.”

  I picked up the box. “For the record, I really screwed up with him.” And now my daughter was pissed at me. “When you get a chance, can I get some coffee?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Before I went back to the table, I stood at the bar and opened the package he’d wrapped in soft fabric. It was a smaller version of the statue on his mantel, the elephant-headed god who looked so happy and fat.

  I wished, very much, that he was here to thank.

  20

  Nikki’s Perfume Journal

  SCENT OF HOURS

  Roxanne

  Time: 5 P.M.

  Date: spring, 2006

  Elements: Camaraderie, the heavy grape smell of wine, a hint of smoke from Roxanne’s cigarette breaks, the lurking promise of snow in the air, women laughing, pizza, Roxanne’s Ode to Penises.

  Notes: what does anger smell like? red pepper? gunpowder?

  At the end of breakfast, Giselle was beginning to come out of her funk. At least she wasn’t glowering at me the whole time, and had managed to engage in a couple of civil exchanges about weather, a book she was reading, and a friend who had had her eyebrows lasered. “I have really awful eyebrows,” she said. “Do you think I should do that?”

  “Well, the thing is, eyebrow styles change. I’m not against permanent hair removal, but eyebrows seem a little iffy.”

  “I never thought about that.” She showed me her arm. “Do you think my arms are hairy?”

  “Not really.” I rubbed my fingers over the downy softness. “A little hair is normal.”

  “Not if you’re totally coolly African,” she said with a snotty tone in her voice.

  I made a derisive noise. “I suppose you mean Keisha.” At her annoyed expression, I narrowed my eyes. “She’s not doing the superiorly black thing with you, is she? Because she’s about as mixed blood as anyone in America.”

  “Dad says I got your Irish hairiness.”

  I burst out laughing. “Probably. But you also got my great legs and nails, so count your blessings. Tell him I said so.”

  She grinned. “It’s okay, Mom. I just wanted to tease you a little. Keisha does sort of play up her unwhiteness, but I don’t care. Everybody in California is mixed, so it ends up being totally cool. I like what I look like.”

  “So do I.”

  I looked at the check, across which Mary had written: FREE. I grinned. “Now we need to decide what we’re going to do. Do you want to come with me to the shop, or go back to the apartment? I have friends coming to help me clean, so it shouldn’t take that long.”

  “I’ll go with you. Can I try to c
atch the kitten?”

  “Sure.” I pushed back from the table. “It’s only a one-bedroom apartment, by the way, but I figured you could have the bedroom and I could take the living room when you come to visit.”

  “What if I wanted to live with you again?”

  I paused. “Do you?”

  “Sometimes, I do.”

  “Well, maybe I’d just keep the apartment I have, then.”

  She chewed her lip. Lifted a shoulder. “I guess we can cross that bridge when we come to it.”

  “Good idea.” I paused. “You know I’d love to have you, don’t you?”

  “Yeah.” She bowed her head. “I want to go to the shop now.”

  As we approached the front door of the shop, I noticed Roxanne and Amy were waiting by their car, both of them smoking cigarettes.

  “Gross,” Giselle said.

  “Be nice.”

  “No one smokes in California. Nobody.”

  “I know. But these are my neighbors and they’re here to help me, so you’d better be nice. Got it?”

  “Whatever.”

  Roxanne was dressed in tiny black jean shorts and a bandanna-style halter top. All of her was tan and lean and riot-worthy. Large sunglasses hid her eyes. In contrast, Amy wore oversized pants, a big T-shirt, and several thousand pounds of silver chains—necklaces, bracelets, a belt. Her hair sported red streaks today. “Hey, you guys!” I said. “I’m so glad to see you! Amy, this is my daughter, Giselle.”

  “Hey,” Amy said.

  “Hey,” Giselle said in return. “Want to help me find the kitten?”

  “Where is it?”

  “Upstairs, I guess.”

  Amy shrugged. “Sure.”

  “Let me unlock the front door,” I said, and I flipped through the keys, realizing this was the first time I’d ever opened it from this side. “So,” Amy said, standing behind me. “Like, my mom said you were going to paint a sign in the window? And I do a lot of silk screening, so I could, like, probably make you a stencil if you want.”

  “Really?” I pushed the door open and turned around to look at her. “Would you be willing to do it on spec? I don’t have a lot of cash.”

  “Sure.” Her hands were in her pockets, and she gestured with her elbows. “If you want, I’ll make some sketches first.”