“I have one of our newest creations, Madam. This is a red and black buffalo plaid miniskirt with what they call flirty inverted pleats and a black scalloped lace hem.”
She put it up against me.
“You must surely agree, Madam, that this will be perfect for you with this black top,” she said. “Please, try it on, or our designer, Monsieur Daddier, will have a stroke and a half.” She snapped her fingers and called for champagne.
I laughed at her antics.
“That’s not too much of an exaggeration. I’ve been to these fancy-schmancy boutiques and fashion shows with my mother. It’s enough to make you puke. Go on, try it all on already.”
I did. The skirt was the shortest I had ever worn, and the top was so tight it felt like another layer of skin.
“Beautiful. Only you can’t wear a bra with that. It looks stupid. It’s no big deal anymore, Sasha,” she added when I showed surprise. “Don’t worry about your nipples. I’ll show you a little trick, no shows,” she said. She stepped back and looked at me hard for a moment. “You know, I think I remember Mother buying Alena some boots that would go with this. Let me look.”
She went into the closet and was out so quickly that I suspected she had known exactly where they were. They were a pair of high black boots with black fur at the top.
“Try them on. You look like the same shoe size.”
I had secretly tried on some of Alena’s shoes, and they had fit, so I knew these probably would. After I put the boots on, Kiera smiled.
“Wow, you’re really hot. I might get jealous,” she said.
Of me? How could someone who looked like her ever be jealous of me? I looked at myself in the full-length mirror. The girl who looked back at me looked so different that, for a moment, I imagined I was looking through a window at someone else and not at a mirror. Did I dare wear this?
“Now that I see you, I’ve got to rethink what I’m wearing,” Kiera said. “C’mon.”
I followed her to her suite. This was the first time I had seen her walk-in closet. It was a little bigger than Alena’s, and despite the way Mrs. March had been buying Alena clothes, Kiera’s looked fuller. It didn’t look as well organized, but Kiera seemed to know exactly where what she wanted was located. She told me to sit on the chair at her vanity table while she tried on one outfit after another—skirts, tight jeans, and dresses. She asked my opinion about each outfit, but they all looked great to me.
Finally, she decided on a pair of designer jeans with sequins up the sides and across the waist. She matched it with a blouse that wasn’t as tight as mine but left a naked midriff. Then she went to her jewelry and found a pair of earrings for me, as well as a gold necklace. After I had everything on, she looked at me and shook her head.
“Makeup,” she declared, and sat me down at her vanity table. I had never used lip gloss or mascara or eye shadow. As she applied it, she told me why I needed it. She used some blush and then decided we couldn’t go out without my having my nails polished.
“We don’t have time to do a real manicure, but let’s get some color on those fingers,” she said. “Didn’t you ever do any of this?”
“Once my mother did my nails, but she didn’t like me wearing lipstick yet. She didn’t wear much makeup herself. She had such a beautiful complexion. Once,” I added.
She nodded and averted her eyes. “I never really got the chance to do much of this with Alena,” she said, as if she had to match my loss with her own. Then she smiled. “But now I have you.”
She did my nails. She said she would have liked to do more with me but declared that we had to get moving. We hurried out. I couldn’t help feeling very excited, but when we reached the bottom of the stairway, Mrs. Duval was there and nearly dropped her jaw to the floor at the sight of me.
“Mrs. March said you have to be back by eleven,” she told Kiera, her eyes still fixed on me.
“That’s very unlikely,” Kiera said. “I won’t drive fast, and the movie doesn’t end until ten forty-five. It will be closer to midnight.”
“I’m just telling you what your mother told me.”
“Well, I’ll explain it to her when she returns,” Kiera said. She didn’t sound condescending or nasty. She made it seem like nothing anyone should have the slightest concern about.
Mrs. Duval turned to me. “You be careful, Sasha,” she said.
“She’s with me, Mrs. Duval.”
“That’s why I said it,” Mrs. Duval replied, and walked away.
“That woman has come to hate me,” Kiera said. “She can’t wait for me to go off to college or something. She used to love me.” She sounded as if it saddened her, but then she smiled and added, “Oh, well, you can’t get everyone to love you, can you? Let’s go.”
When I got into Kiera’s car, the excitement of wearing those clothes, changing my image with the makeup, and going to socialize with older kids took a backseat to my realization that I was in the automobile that had struck Mama and me. A feeling of dark dread washed over me. It was truly as though I were committing a sin. I was surprised that Kiera hadn’t thought of what this meant. Maybe she had but was just better at burying it. She seemed to be in an entirely different place, a place where she could remember only what she wanted to remember.
“Oh, this is really exciting,” she said. “I feel like I’m taking my younger sister out for her first big night on the town.”
She drove very slowly and carefully through the gate and turned down the road. Because of my silence, she asked if I was all right.
“Yes,” I said, but my voice sounded small, the voice of someone lost.
“Don’t you be nervous about being with these guys,” she told me, misreading my silence. “They may be a few years older, but they’re not an inch better than us.”
Us? Was she trying to make me feel better by including me, or did she really believe that? I knew little about psychotherapy, but now I wondered if it could really be this effective. She had been going to therapy for some time. Why would the court send her if the judge didn’t believe it might change her, help her?
As if she could read my thoughts, she said, “I can’t wait to tell Dr. Ralston about this. He’ll surely be impressed, and maybe he’ll see an end to my therapy. Therapists can keep you going for as long as they want and keep that cash register ringing along the way.”
She looked at me. This time, I was sure she had read my mind.
“That’s not why I’m doing this with you, Sasha. I don’t really care if the therapy goes on for the rest of the year. My father can afford it, and it’s no big deal. The fact is, Dr. Ralston is easy to talk to now. I don’t resent him as much.”
“Really?”
“Let’s not talk about it anymore, especially in front of these lamebrains, okay?”
“Why do you like them if they’re lamebrains?”
“Simple. Because they’re fun,” she said, and laughed. “It’s all about fun. You’ll see,” she told me, and drove on.
When we got to Westwood, Kiera parked, and we walked two streets over to meet her friends. The four of them were there already and also ready to complain about how late Kiera was, but when they saw me, they were speechless for a moment.
“Who’s this?” Ricky asked, smiling. “This is not your little square cousin, is it?”
“You look terrific, Sasha,” Boyd said. They both looked impressed. I didn’t know what to say.
Kiera spoke up for me. “I made a few small improvements with her clothes and makeup. It’s no big deal. Don’t salivate in the street, Boyd. It’s unbecoming.”
“Oh, I’m becoming,” he said, and everyone laughed.
We went into the restaurant. Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought the people already seated watched us from the moment we entered.
“There are UCLA college boys here,” Deidre whispered, “and they’re looking at you.”
“Me?”
“Get used to it,” Margot said. “As long as you hang out wi
th your cousin.”
I glanced at the college boys who were looking our way and smiling. Was she right? They were looking at me? It wasn’t so long ago I had thought no boys would be looking at me with any interest, and not only because of my limp. Despite all I had now and all I had been given, the magnificent mansion in which I lived, the beautiful private school I attended, I couldn’t help believing that the stigma of Mama’s and my street life lingered. Somehow they would see through the expensive clothes and see the stains. Maybe they would still smell the odors of the street on me, no matter how much perfume I used.
Right from the first day I had entered Pacifica Junior-Senior High School, I had feared that someone might recognize me. So many people had walked past Mama and me while we were selling on the sidewalks or the boardwalk. Why wasn’t it possible that one of these students, if not more, might look at me and think, Isn’t that the same girl who sold lanyards on the boardwalk? Maybe one of these UCLA college boys was thinking that right now.
“Don’t look back at them,” Kiera whispered. “They’ll get annoying if they think any of us is showing interest.”
I looked down quickly, and she slipped me the menu.
“The burgers are out of this world here,” Boyd told me.
“Since you’re not from this planet, it makes sense that you’d know,” Deidre told him.
“I’ve sent you out of this world from time to time,” he retorted.
“Shut up,” she said.
Everyone laughed, but I didn’t. Why were they always trying to hurt each other if they were such good friends?
“You’re wrong, anyway, Boyd,” Ricky said. “I’m the one who sent her out of this world. You barely got her off the ground.”
“Big shots,” Margot told me, pointing her thumb at them. “Or should I say single shots?”
“Ha, ha,” Boyd said. “It takes only one shot to hit your target.”
Fortunately, the waitress came over, and they stopped their game of insults. It took so long to get served and to eat that we had to rush to make the movie. I held them all back with my limping, but no one seemed to care if they made the movie in time or not. It was just something to do. In the theater, I ended up sitting between Kiera and Ricky. He smiled at me and let his hand drop over the seat arm so that it was against my thigh. During the movie, his fingers played with my miniskirt. I didn’t know what to do, but when he lifted it a little to touch my thigh, I jumped, and Kiera turned.
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing much,” Ricky said. “That’s the problem.”
“The problem is, you don’t have any patience,” she told him.
“That’s Ricky,” Boyd said. He was on Kiera’s other side and leaned over her to talk to me. “PE Man,” he said, jerking his thumb toward Ricky.
“Shut your mouth,” Ricky told him.
Boyd laughed and sat back.
Ricky didn’t bother me for the remainder of the movie, which had some very funny scenes but was basically pretty stupid, I thought. I didn’t say so, because the others, including Kiera, seemed to think it was great. Later, after we parted to go home, I asked Kiera what Boyd meant when he called Ricky PE Man.
“He was just teasing him,” she said.
“I know, but I don’t know what that means.”
“It means premature ejaculation. You know what that is?”
“I think so,” I said. I wasn’t really sure.
“It’s when a boy, a man, gets excited too fast and the girl gets nothing out of it.”
“Oh.”
“Anyway, I can tell you for a fact that it isn’t true, so don’t worry about it.”
I looked at her. She knew for a fact?
She smiled. “Hey,” she said. “Don’t look so shocked. Relax. This is your first day of real class in the real school. Here, I’m the best teacher. And,” she added as we reached her car, “it’s tuition-free.”
She laughed, but something told me it wasn’t tuition-free.
Something told me there was a price to pay.
22
The Price
Mrs. Duval will be happy,” Kiera said as we drove through the opened gate just before eleven-fifteen.
“How will she know what time we arrived?” I asked.
“You’ll see.”
Sure enough, when we parked and went into the house, Mrs. Duval was there to greet us. Kiera glanced at me and smiled.
“As you can see, Mrs. Duval, you didn’t have to worry. Both of us are still in one piece,” Kiera said.
Mrs. Duval said nothing. She watched us go up the stairs, Kiera giggling.
“Did you have a good time today?” she asked when we reached her suite.
“Yes, thank you.”
“No, thank you, Sasha,” she said, and then she surprised me even more by hugging me. “Sweet dreams,” she said, and went into her bedroom.
I hurried to mine. It was still difficult to think of it as mine. There was so much of Alena in it, not haunting it as much as continuing to possess it. I slept in what had been her bed with her choice of headboard. Most of the clothes I wore every day had been her clothes. Her pictures were still on the dressers, tables, and walls. I wished it was different, wished that her things were gone and it was really my bedroom suite, but I felt guilty wishing that. I now knew as well as anyone that those you loved died gradually after their funerals. The blood of their immortality consists of the memories you have of them. As they are gradually forgotten or thought of less and less, they drift farther away, closing the lid on that darkness. Mrs. March, as would any mother, refused to close the lid.
Perhaps by embracing me, if that was really what she was doing, Kiera was avoiding the pain of losing her sister. Would I be doing the same thing in relation to Mama if I accepted Mrs. March even as a surrogate mother? Could you really slip people in and out of your family the way you slipped your feet in and out of different shoes? It seemed so mean and horrible to me right now, but I knew that people did it all the time. Husbands and wives remarried and slipped new spouses into the spaces beside them on their beds, into the chairs across from them at their dinner tables, and into their arms when they danced.
Maybe loneliness was worse than grief after all. The guilty feeling that followed and grew as you began to accept someone else and bury your loved one deeper could be overcome. In the beginning, you did that by using anger. How dare the one you loved so much die? How dare he or she not fight off death, defy fate or destiny, or drive away some mysterious plan God supposedly had? There should have been some greater resistance so as not to leave you alone.
After that, you thought, if the person you loved was just as loving of you, he or she wouldn’t want you to be lonely. When you found someone else, it was almost as if you were building a new relationship for your loved one who had passed away as much as for yourself. Why add grief to the soul already struggling in the afterlife?
Mama would want me to have someone fill the role of a mother—and a father, too. Mama would want me to have an older sister looking after me. Mama would want me to be happy and safe and healthy. After all, she drank whiskey and gin not only to escape who she had become but also to escape feeling guilty about not providing for me. I was like a can tied to the tail of a dog or a cat. No matter how fast she ran or what turn and twist she made, I was there, clanking behind her, reminding her of just how deep down she had fallen. Maybe that was why she refused my help carrying her suitcase and why she ran so blindly in the rain that night. Maybe she was only trying to escape.
Okay, I thought as I sat on the bed while I was still dressed in the clothing Kiera had chosen for me and still wore the makeup. I’ll put on Alena’s clothes. I’ll accept Mrs. March’s affection. More important, I’ll accept Kiera and let her be my big sister, at least for now, at least until I can stand as alone as anyone can stand. I’ll try not to forget Mama, but I won’t use her as a reason to reject any of this anymore.
It was fun being with Kiera and he
r friends. It was exciting. I liked being a regular teenager, flirting, laughing, saying outrageous things. I wanted to have their dreams and possess that same invulnerability that made them reckless, carefree, and rebellious. Up to now, since Mama’s death, I had been in some sort of cloudy, vague place. Because of the fiction that had been created about me, I no longer had my name. At least, with Mama, even on the street, I knew who I was. Whatever space we found in the parks, on the beach, even in that deserted automobile, became ours, whether it was for a short time or not. There was nothing I could call mine in my new place. It was funny to think about it, but I was living in one of the biggest homes in Southern California, and I was still homeless.
So, don’t blame yourself for accepting Kiera’s friendship, I told myself. Don’t go to sleep feeling guilty. If you need to justify it, justify it the way Jackie Knee, your nurse, proposed. Be selfish now. Take whatever you can get, even their affection. Embrace it. Turn something into yours.
I gazed at myself one more time before taking off the clothes and washing off the makeup. As recently as just days ago, I would never have imagined myself looking and feeling like this. A new kind of energy had entered my body. I could see it in my eyes and could feel it everywhere, tingling right down to the small of my stomach. I loved the new feeling.
I looked back at the bed as if I expected to see my old self lying there, looking as lethargic and lost as ever but angry at me for leaving her behind.
Go away, I wanted to tell her. Go your mousy way into the shadows, and drown yourself in self-pity. Dwell on your limp. Practice your “Yes, sir” and “No, sir,” and remain a beggar hoping for some handout of love. Do that while I seize the tail of the wind.
My old self disappeared like smoke. With a new bounce in my steps despite my limp, I prepared for bed, and when I went to sleep, I didn’t think about Alena and my sleeping in her nightgown and in her bed with her favorites, the giraffes, above me. I thought about myself and about the way those UCLA college boys had been looking at me.