Sullivan's Island

  “He sounds adorable,” I answered calmly, still coughing a little, “if you’ll drain the sink and give it some clean suds, I’ll wash the dishes.”

  “He is. He makes me feel so weird.” The last of the old water sucked its way down the drain with the sound of disappearing little girlhood swirling away right behind it. “I think I need a haircut. You know, something California. What do you think?”

  “We’ll see.” I cleared my throat. California? “I could use one too. Maybe next week we’ll go to the mall together.”

  “Well, that’d be cool if you’d take me to the mall, ’cause Lucy and I were gonna just go there next Saturday and hang and see if Jonathan shows up with this guy, Sonny, she’s like totally dying for.”

  “Hang?” I decided to smoke another cigarette and was wondering if I had any Xanax in the bathroom upstairs.

  “Yeah, you know, you go get your hair cut, Lucy and I can cruise and, you know, do the girlie-girl thing for a couple of hours.”

  “Girlie-girl thing?” I was having some trouble breathing and/or swallowing.

  “Mom? Are you all right?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “Your hands are shaking. Oh, great, you’re upset over the idea of me meeting a boy at the mall. Am I right?”

  “No, I mean, I don’t even know this boy. You don’t even know his last name! I mean, he could be a serial rapist, or a sociopath, or you could wind up pregnant!”

  “I can’t believe you! I can’t believe you would say that! Pregnant? Mom, are you like totally spassing or what? Gimme a break.”

  “Give you a break?” My eyes glazed over. “Look, Beth, there’s nothing more exhilarating than being attracted to someone else like this. Is this a marriage? Not so far. You don’t even know this boy’s last name!” I took a breath. “Now, why don’t we just calm down, and let’s see if he calls you.” There, that’s better, I thought. “Then, in the time-tested (and proven) tradition of my family, I’ll run a criminal background check on him, a driver’s license history, and we’ll see if he’s registered with the AIDS clinic at the health department. If he’s not, I’ll invite his parents over for an interview. I’m sure they can give references. And, if they’re not related to Charles Manson, then you can have him come and sit in the living room while his parents and I sit in the kitchen with a glass to the wall. How’s that for giving you a break?” Pave the way to better parenting through humor, I thought, patting myself on the back.

  “You’re not funny.”

  Her adolescent rage was escalating again and I floundered around to no avail trying to lighten things up a little.

  “You know what the problem with boys is? They ruin your skin. You fall for some guy and the next day you get acne like a bullfrog. You know what else happens? You get trapped in the bathroom and can’t get into a decent college!”

  That mildly got her attention, so I continued. “Yep! Ask your Aunt Maggie! You get in there in front of that old demon mirror and then you start obsessing about your hair and your makeup and is the hair on your legs making you look like a gorilla? And are your bosoms big enough or are they too big and then you start to sweat and does it show? You have to run, change your shirt. You can’t find one, you have to iron. Then, you’re habitually late for class, you flunk out and wind up on-line, at the Acme Training Institute, a loser guaranteed. I don’t think that’s what you want, is it?”

  “Are you all right, Mom? I think you’re losing it.” She was not even a little bit amused. She was, in fact, as angry as I’d ever seen her.

  “I’m not losing anything. I’m fine, quite fine.” I was not fine. Where did my composure go, anyway?

  “Mom? You know what your problem is? You’re trapped in the seventies! The Brady Bunch wasn’t real, for God’s sake. Nobody dates anymore; they just go to the mall or the video arcade or something and hang around. You think this guy is gonna show up with a corsage! God! You treat me like such a total baby, I can’t stand it!”

  It was my turn to get mad.

  “First of all, I don’t like your tone of voice and second, it’s not your job to tell me what my problems are. Third, I don’t treat you like a baby at all.”

  “Yes, you do!” Beth was serving up that most unpleasant stew of teenage screaming rage. “If Jonathan whatever-the-hell-his-last-name-is calls me and wants to meet me at the mall, I’m going if I have to take the bus and there’s nothing you can do about it!”

  She was absolutely shrieking at me and I didn’t know what to do except to pull rank.

  “Nothing I can do about it? You’re telling me what I can and cannot do? I don’t think so, Beth, oh, no. Let me tell you something, my defiant young daughter, you’re going noplace unless I give you permission. And if you want to be treated like a grown-up, try acting like one and living up to your commitments! I come home after another underpaid, unending day, working in the most excruciating, humorless, literary abyss in the world and walk right into a land mine of filthy dishes and food and trash all over the place. I don’t need this, Beth, it’s not fair.”

  “Just because I didn’t run home from school and do the dishes, I’m not old enough to go to the mall with a friend? Do you remember that I’m fourteen? Hello? Fourteen!”

  “I don’t care how old you are; when you start acting responsibly, then you’ll get all the privileges you want! And watch your mouth, Beth, because you’re very close to getting a slap in the face.”

  She stood at the door of the kitchen, which led to the dining room, and her blue eyes flashed the hatred of a formidable woman, not my little girl.

  “Go ahead. Slap me. It won’t make any difference. You know what I wish? I wish I lived with Daddy. He understands me and so does Karen.”

  “Karen understands you because she’s your peer,” I stuttered. “You know the court’s granted primary custody to me. Even though it may seem like a living hell at this moment to both of us, it’s how it is, so get used to it.”

  “You’re just jealous of Karen because she’s young and pretty,” she hissed. “Maybe if you lost some weight and bought some clothes from this decade, Daddy might come home.”

  “That’s not why your father left!”

  “Yes, it is! Why can’t you face the truth? God, Mom, the way you look is embarrassing. You look like those women on Court TV!”

  I couldn’t believe she had spoken to me this way. I was stunned. She stormed out of the room and I followed her down the hall. She raced up the stairs and slammed the door of her room.

  “This has nothing to do with you following this Jonathan person around a mall, do you hear me? Nothing to do with it!”

  I couldn’t help it. I walked into the living room and stood before the huge full-length mirror with the gilt frame, my inheritance. I broke down when I saw myself—a forty-six-year-old woman, with some very tired and afraid blue eyes, wearing a dress that hung on her like a rag from fashion hell. My eyes got hot. Tears welled up and spilled over in a fury like boiled-over oatmeal and they made me mad too. Hot and thick, they rolled down my face. I hated crying. I had thought I was doing pretty well until then. That woman in the mirror was not who I was.

  This should’ve been the time in my life when Tom and I were concentrating on finding our poetry, cherishing moments like this with Beth. Her first boyfriend, and I couldn’t handle it. I should’ve been gracious and understanding and said, “This is great! I remember my first crush!” I could’ve told her about Simon, the big fish that got away and how I had loved him. I’d never told her about him. But no, I was incapable of doing that because I was so afraid. I was afraid I couldn’t make it. I was afraid because I felt alone and what if I lost her too?

  The next thing I knew I had lowered myself into this sitting fetal position on the floor and started to wail, not giving a damn if the world heard me. So I wept, quietly at first, pitying myself for the loss of my Tom. Okay, he might be the fastest zipper in Charleston, but dammit, he was mine. We’d planned to retire to Sullivan’
s Island. I had dreamed forever that we’d buy a house next door to the Island Gamble and our children would always love Maggie’s! I thought we’d all grow old rocking on that front porch together, eating boiled peanuts, and take our rightful position as old-timers, being as opinionated and as eccentric as we wanted to be. Let the young folk think we were peculiar and we wouldn’t care. We’d all laugh our way to the other side together. What happened to my dream? What happened?

  I blew my nose and thought some more, looking at myself in the mirror. In my mind, I could see Livvie wagging her finger at me. I had always been reasonably good-looking but now I looked like I’d been rode hard and put up wet, like Daddy used to say. All at once I was infuriated that two people could bring me to the point where I sat on the floor and wept. I felt Livvie smiling. I began to talk to the mirror as though she were there, listening.

  “Tom Hayes,” I muttered under my breath, “he doesn’t deserve me or this girl of mine who, by the way, needs her behind kicked. No, no, this isn’t about my weight. This is about Tom Hayes and his withering little pecker turning fifty! So, Miss Karen thinks he’s the stud of all times, huh? I wonder if she watches the digital clock like I used to. Three minutes, Big Tom! Time’s almost up! Ha! Have a ball, you losers. And you think he’s generous now? Just wait until you marry the son of a bitch, you can kiss the mall good-bye!

  “I may go down, dammit, but I’ll go down fighting. Just who the hell do they think they are? And just what do they expect from me? I look like Mrs. Court TV? Well, I guess I do! Every last dime goes to Miss Beth’s constant harangue for clothes! It’s always something! Maybe I should just fly to Atlanta and blow the bank at the shops and forget the furnace repairs. Or maybe I should just skip groceries and the phone bill…hire a personal trainer and get a massage and a pedicure!”

  At this point, my shirt started getting wet. I hadn’t cried like this since we buried my mother. And where was she now, when I needed her? Gone and useless, like always. I cried for her, as I never had when she died. I couldn’t stop. Maybe this was the cry I owed myself, I thought, and then, I was done. I could either continue to be defeated or I could get myself back together. Beth.

  Oh, no, Miss Beth Hayes, I’m your mother and you will not treat me this way! It’s bad enough that Tom left me for Karen, but who are you, at fourteen, to dare to criticize? You have no idea the sacrifices I have made for you. More than anyone ever made for me…

  I never heard Beth come down the stairs. Suddenly, she was next to me with a box of Kleenex and she was crying too.

  “I’m sorry, Momma, I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s all right”

  “I never meant to make you cry like this.”

  “Sweetheart, you know I love you, but if you ever speak to me that way again, I’ll rip your ears off.”

  “And you should. I never should have said what I said about Karen. Karen’s a jerk. And I don’t want to live with Daddy. He’s a jerk too. I just wanna be with you, right here.”

  She put her head on my shoulder and I looped my arm around her. I stroked her gorgeous auburn hair and in that moment peace was restored. She was my little girl again. I accepted a Kleenex from her and blew my nose so loudly that we both started to laugh.

  “Daddy’s not a jerk,” I offer magnanimously, “he’s an asshole. And Karen’s not a jerk either, she’s the slut of the world, that’s all.” I continued to stroke her hair. “Don’t share that with anyone, okay? Let’s keep this between us.”

  “Mom, I would never repeat it. I agree with you.”

  “If I’d met Karen under other circumstances, I’d probably find her interesting and amusing.”

  “No, you wouldn’t. Can I have a Kleenex?” She blew her nose and leaned back into my chest, the way she had as a little girl. “She’s so lame, always tossing her hair. All she talks about is karma this and retrograde that. She wears this huge crystal around her stupid neck and talks about close encounters. Maybe she thinks aliens are after her.”

  “Now, there’s a plan to get rid of her!” I raised my eyebrows and smiled at Beth. “I like it! Yeah, can’t you see the front page of the Post & Courier? ‘Charleston Woman, Owner of Insignificant New Age Bookstore, Abducted by Aliens!’ Wouldn’t that be fabulous?”

  “No such luck, Mom. Come on, I’ll help you burn dinner.”

  Beth pulled me to my feet.

  “Burn? I never burn the chicken. I just like it dead. Salmonella, you know.”

  “Whatever.” Beth smiled at me. “You need to wash your face.”

  “Hey! Who’s the mother around here, miss?” I swatted her backside.

  “Hey! Quit killing me! Listen, forget about Jonathan. If he calls, we’ll figure it out.”

  Upstairs in my room, I realized I had won this battle unfairly. By allowing Beth to hear me cry I had tipped the scales in my favor. My mother used to do that all the time. When she couldn’t argue to a win, she’d spread the guilt as thick as peanut butter on white bread. Then she’d cry, and oh, how Marie Catherine Hamilton could cry. Big MC with the champion tear ducts. She cried more tears during her life than Shem Creek holds shrimp. Her despair was the backdrop of my childhood and probably what made me the sharp-tongued wench I was today. I was terrified of weakness and sadness and made jokes about everything. Maggie, on the other hand, denied everything. Even at Momma’s funeral I looked at her and said, “As usual, old MC’s lying around and we’re doing everything.” She looked at me and responded, “What do you mean? She’s fine.”

  Well, I hadn’t used my wit fairly and I could no longer deny that Beth and I were dealing with my own adjustment to Life After Tom as well as hers. As I washed my face, I realized I held the ammunition to decimate Beth’s relationship with Tom. Piece of cake for a brutally clever girl like me. After all, Tom’s pants didn’t fall off in a strong breeze. He was the bad guy, not me. I could let her know about the money situation, tell her the toothbrush story, tell her how I’d found them, but no, I wouldn’t allow myself to sink that low. It was as if Satan was tapping me on the shoulder but, thank the Lord, I recognized the devil’s evil touch.

  Now, if my mother were in my position, what would she have done? Easy. She would’ve had a meeting at the table with all us children and stood on the Bible while she informed us that our father was a fornicating sinner and that he had chosen another woman over his own flesh and blood. Then she would’ve lined us up on the front porch while she threw all his clothes over the rail and forbid us to say good-bye to him. Finally, she would’ve gone to bed for a year and let us fend for ourselves while she drank and cried away her grief.

  And if Livvie were in my shoes, what would she do? She’d take Tom aside for a little “come to Jesus” meeting and give him the tongue lashing of his life. She’d tell him how it was all gonna be, in simple English and Gullah, so nobody got confused in the future. Then she’d tell her children not to worry, that everything was gonna be fine and that Daddy still loved them just as much as yesterday and that life goes on. She would then get on with the business of raising her children and putting food on the table.

  “Well, this girl is about to rise like a phoenix,” I said to my bathroom mirror. “Put on some lipstick and go deal with your daughter, and this time, be fair.”

  I SERVED “TWICE dead chicken,” nuked potatoes and salad from a bag, wondering how I’d ever gained weight from my kitchen. Beth and I found our rhythm again and everything was fine.

  “Want some help with the dishes, Mom?”

  “No, honey, you go do your homework. This isn’t a big deal. But if you’d put some soap in the washing machine, there’s a load of towels in there, that’d be a help.”

  “Sure. No problem.”

  She pushed back from the table and took her dishes to the sink, rinsing them and placing them in the dishwasher. I sat staring into space and listening to the fill cycle of the washing machine begin, followed by her footsteps. She kissed me on the head, the same way I do to her, and in that moment we bo
th grew up a little more.

  As I cleaned the kitchen I found myself sighing a lot as relief spread through my body. I decided to polish the bottoms of my pots as several sitcoms on the television droned in the background. My mind was traveling. I poured myself another glass of white wine and flipped on the eleven o’clock news in time to catch the weather report.

  “High tomorrow, ninety-seven, lows expected to be in the eighties tomorrow night. And if you’re going out tomorrow, don’t be surprised if it feels like the tropics, as the extreme humidity is gonna cause a very bad hair day all over the Lowcountry. Expect shower activity off and on throughout the day…”

  The young, blond meteorologist smiled and tilted her pretty head as she spoke and I found myself imitating her while I poured Cascade into the dishwasher and turned it on to do the small load, amusing myself once again with the banalities of life in this information-obsessed society. Finally, I moved the towels to the dryer, turned off all the lights and made my way upstairs to Beth to say good night.

  I opened the door and saw her sitting in bed, wearing a Citadel football jersey and reading her history book with great intensity. The low light of the room was warm and the cabbage roses of her wallpaper seemed to expel a sweet fragrance. Her room was the perfect expression of a young girl balanced somewhere between childhood and womanhood. Posters of the Grateful Dead hung on the back of her bulging closet door and her old teddy bears, frayed to a nub from years of affection, were pushed in between textbooks on the shelves above her word processor. Her cheerleader pom-poms hung from her closet doorknob. Around the top of her room were Barbies, perhaps over a hundred of them, their frozen idiotic smiles and zombie limbs sticking out like twigs in a molded plastic garland. They always made me laugh to look at them. Occasionally, I would take one down and pretend to be her in a singsong voice to get Beth to talk to me when she was annoyed about something. But tonight, I just stuck my head in the door and traveled the room with my eyes, waiting for Beth to see me. She looked up at last.