Godmother: a novel

  She laughed. "You are a wily one," she said. "I am an aes-thetician, you know, a beauty connoisseur, not to mention an artiste. You don't think I can see how gorgeous you were once? I mean, not that you aren't now."

  "You can't see that," I said slowly. "All my beauty is long gone. Trust me. Vanished without a trace."

  But maybe it hadn't, I thought now. Not quite. I moved my head back and forth. My hair swung down to my shoulders, thicker, I was sure, than it had been before. And he, in the diner, had looked at me as if I were beautiful. Something was still there, some power inside me, trying to come out.

  "Your hair, for one. It's like snow. Were you a platinum? You had to have been."

  "A redhead," I said.

  "No kidding. I would love to see a photo."

  "Well ... " I said, reaching up and touching my hair selfconsciously. "I don't think I kept any." I had a dim memory then: of smoke and flame, a face crumpling into ash.

  "You don't have any old pictures?" she asked. "You gotta have one or two around, some box stashed somewhere that you look at late at night." She winked, goading me. "Come on. I know you've got locks of some hot dude's hair stashed away. Some rose pressed in a book. Or something far more scandalous?"

  "You are mad," I said, laughing.

  She leaned over and pulled out a plastic bag, took out a cushiony pink curler.

  "I haven't seen those in years," I said.

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  "I know," she said. "I love them. I'm a sucker for everything retro, I have to admit. It's a bona fide problem of mine. I can't even believe sometimes that I was born in the eighties. It seems so criminal."

  "Your life seems exciting enough, even so. This is a wonderful time to be young."

  She snorted. "Ha!" she said as she rolled up a section of my hair and snapped the roller closed. Her fingertips brushing my scalp, sending tingles through me. "There's no romance to anything at all anymore."

  "Oh, I think you can find some here and there still. Don't you?"

  "Well, it doesn't find me," she said, waving dismissively "You know, I always fall for liars. Isn't that right, Kim?"

  The purple-haired woman, silent before now, looked up and laughed. "Oh, hell yes," she said. "This girl's dated every loser in the city. Seriously. Every one."

  "I just fall easily, I guess," Veronica said, sighing. "I'm what you call a romantic. Unlike Kim here, who had the misfortune to be born without a heart. She's like out of The Wizard of Oz or something."

  "She falls in love in two seconds," Kim said. "Next, next, next!" She snapped her fingers.

  "No heart at all. A real shame," Veronica said, turning to me. "You believe in love at first sight, Lil?"

  The question took me off guard. "Yes," I said immediately, without thinking.

  She paused with a roller in her hand, midair. "You've totally fallen in love at first sight, haven't you?"

  I looked at her in the mirror. I could feel my pulse quicken, my cheeks flush red. I had never spoken about

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  Theodore to anyone. How wonderful it would be to tell someone after so long, I thought. What could it hurt? It felt right, speaking it out loud, to her. I had never felt that way with a human. She was so much like Maybeth, but not even Maybeth had understood what had possessed me that day I kissed the prince.

  "Yes," I said, my voice quivering. "It was so long ago, but yes. When I was a girl." I paused. I found myself tensing up, expecting something terrible to happen.

  "What was his name? What was he like? Tell me everything!" Her eyes glittered with interest. She plucked another roller from the bag.

  "Well," I said. "His name was Theodore, and he was very beautiful. Like a prince." I warmed to the topic. "He had black hair and just the most ... interesting face. Kind eyes, very intelligent. Everyone loved him. I mean, every girl I knew wanted him, to be with him. But not me, not at first."

  "So what happened? Where did you meet him?"

  "I was out one day, with a friend, and then there he was. He looked up and saw me; and that was it. I kept staring at his lips, his skin, his eyes. But it was more than that. It was the way he looked at me."

  I could see him, right there: his dark hair falling in his face, the curve of his mouth, his pale eyes looking straight into me.

  "I felt like I already knew him but at the same time like I had to know everything about him. I didn't realize how much it had affected me until I returned home and he was all I could think of." I remembered it: the ache in the pit of my stomach, flowering like a wound. "He saw me. No one else could. I mean, when he looked at me, I felt like I'd been invisible until

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  that moment." It was the first time I'd tried to explain it to someone else, and I could not find words strong enough to contain those moments, the freedom I had felt in them.

  "Oh, gosh," Veronica said, wistful, lifting her hand to her face. Her rings caught the light and glimmered faintly. "I'm so jealous. I just have the worst luck. Or I just pick all the wrong dudes." Kim nodded at the second choice to me in the mirror. "How'd you two get together? Tell me everything! I love knowing that things could be like that--at least once upon a time. I was so born in the wrong era."

  I stared at her for a moment, my heart racing, but she only looked back at me, smiling and expectant. Warm, open to everything. Go with it, I thought. We were in forbidden territory now, things I had never said before, to anyone. "It took me completely off guard," I said. "Of course, you never expect it. But then there was a dance. I wasn't supposed to go to it, but I went anyway, to find him."

  Veronica did a strange shimmy then, and her striped skirt flared around her knees. "Such a rebel you were," she said. "I knew it! So great."

  "It was great," I said. I remembered the excitement burning through me, the feel of the silk touching my skin. "I made quite an entrance, too. Everyone stopped dancing, the band stopped playing, he stepped out of the crowd and extended his hand to me. It was straight out of a fairy tale."

  "Ahhh," she said, exaggeratedly swooning. "Why don't we have these things? Dances, nights like that. So what happened? What happened to your prince?"

  "God, you are a nosy bitch," Kim said, but when I looked over, she was smiling and leaning forward in her chair, rapt.

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  "It wasn't meant to be," I said, almost shaking with excitement. The words felt like sparks coming out of me. "We talked and danced for hours. It was the only time I knew how wonderful it is to dance in a man's arms, to just feel like you could fly, but it's him, all him, who's making you feel that way."

  "Yes," Veronica said, her hand on her heart. "I can see it like I was there. It breaks my heart. Nothing is beautiful now, the way it was before. With me and my friends, it's all getting drunk and making out in back rooms, you know?"

  "No kidding," Kim said.

  I looked at them both and saw how vulnerable they were behind the masks of makeup, the elaborate clothes and hair.

  "How long did it last?" Veronica asked. She paused with a lock of my hair in her right hand, a curler poised beside it.

  "I only saw him twice," I said. I could feel myself flush. I was too aware of how hollow the words sounded.

  Her face fell open. "Oh, Lil," she said. "Why?"

  I was surprised by her reaction, and even more so by mine: the clutch in my chest, the ache at the back of my throat. "It wasn't meant to be," I said. "It wasn't allowed. It was a different world then."

  "Ah." Veronica reached out and touched my shoulder. "You couldn't run away together or anything?"

  I shook my head. "Something ... happened. There was an accident." I paused. "It's hard to explain. It might sound foolish to you--I mean such a short thing, meaning so much."

  "It doesn't sound foolish at all," she said, and I saw the sadness in her that I had read in her journal. It was so close

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  to the surface, I realized. "I had something like that once. I wish I could find something like that again. I don't care if it's only
for one night. I just want to feel alive. Really alive."

  "You know," I said, feeling the excitement rise up in me, flowering out through my chest, "there may be someone new coming along for you. A new love. I have a feeling about you, in fact. That maybe there's a dance in your future, too?"

  "Ha!" she said as she started spritzing the rollers with some sort of spray. "No guy interested in me would ever go near anything like that. Trust me. Unless you're talking about a lap dance."

  Kim guffawed.

  "Well," I said, smiling, "I think the one coming along will be different. Much quieter, a poetic soul. Maybe even a business owner to boot."

  "Hmmm," she said. She narrowed her eyes and looked at me. "Are you trying to set me up, Lil?"

  I shrugged. "Maybe."

  She turned to Kim. "Why is everyone always trying to set me up? Am I that hopeless?"

  "Yes," Kim said. And then to me, "Please set her up. I am begging you."

  "Hey," Veronica said. "My taste may be bad, but it's my taste, and I'm very attached to it!"

  "Well," I said, "I might just happen to know a fantastic man, very brilliant and handsome, who has"--I could barely contain my excitement now--"a ball coming up. That he needs a date for."

  "You've got to be kidding me," she said. "A ball?"

  "Yes," I said. "At the Pierre Hotel."

  "What kind of a guy goes to a ball? Seriously."

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  "A rich one," Kim said. "One who is not a loser. And were you or were you not just lamenting the fact that these things don't exist anymore? If you don't go, V, I will personally strangle you."

  "Well ..." Veronica said. "I didn't mean in New York."

  "You're going." Kim looked at me. "She is so going!"

  "Great!" I said, clapping my hands.

  "I don't know," Veronica said, speaking more loudly as she took a blow dryer to the mass of curlers. "The last time someone set me up, I spent an entire hour of my life hearing about video games."

  "I'm not sure this person even has a television," I said.

  She snorted. "Probably too busy with his comic-book collection."

  I closed my eyes, listening to the hum of the dryer, not even minding the heat of the rollers against my scalp.

  When I opened my eyes a few minutes later, she was unfurling my hair from the rollers. It dropped in huge, bouncing waves to my shoulders and flipped up at the ends. She brushed through the curls with a wide, flat comb, a can of hair spray in one of her hands.

  "I hope my hair is half this gorgeous when I get older," she said. "Look at yourself."

  I turned to the mirror. My hair looked like pure snow, sparkling in the sunlight. It swirled and swooped along my face and then swept past my shoulders.

  A grin broke out over my face, erupting like boiling water.

  Veronica jumped up and clapped. "I'm so good!" she said, dancing. "A genius!"

  Kim shook her head. Veronica stuck out her tongue at her and looked down at me, ebullient.

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  "Thank you," I said, and squeezed her hand. "You are an artist."

  "An artist who's going to a ball," Kim said. "What could be cooler?"

  "Stop with that," Veronica said, pointing to each of us with the bottle of hair spray in her hand. "The both of you."

  "Don't you want to know the name of your prince?" I asked. "His name is George. He owns Daedalus Books. And he's a book collector. He likes old things, too."

  Veronica made a face. "Sounds like a prince, all right. I'm getting allergies just thinking about it."

  "Oh, come on," Kim said. "Who are you kidding? How many dresses do you have hanging in that closet of yours, with no place to wear them to?"

  "Listen," I said, standing up, watching my hair shimmer and gleam in the mirror, "why don't you just stop by the store? Sometime soon? I'm almost always there, and George is there at least half the time. Just come see what you think. I'll even give you a book or two, on the house. What do you have to lose?"

  Veronica rolled her eyes, defeated. "Fine!" she said. "Fine, fine, fine. This is all I need. One more person convinced I'm a romantic failure. And you haven't even met any of my beaux!"

  "You should thank your stars for that, Lil," Kim said, as I handed her my money.

  To my surprise, Veronica threw her arms around me and kissed my cheek. "I'm so glad you came in today," she said, stepping back. "And I do need some help, I ain't gonna lie. So thank you. I will totally come by the bookstore."

  "Me too," Kim said.

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  "Well," I said, taken aback. Feeling, for a second, tears beating at my eyes. "I very much look forward to it."

  I was so close. So close to setting things right.

  I walked into the street again and headed down Avenue B, letting my hair swish against my neck. If I spread out my wings, I thought, I could fly over and above all of this, stretch out my arms and hurl myself into empty space, feel the clouds dipping into my skin as I stared down at these streets, these faces, all of them as small as stars sprinkled over the night sky.

  The street was alive. A slim-hipped, slouching boy with hair to his waist walked by, and I let my eyes roam down his neck and arms and jeans. I felt more like my old self than I ever had. If I blink, I thought, I can make the boy feel anything, be anything. I could feel my old powers coursing through me.

  I felt as if he, Theodore, the prince, could be around any corner, waiting for me. Surely that had been him in the diner. Surely none of these things had been a coincidence.

  I peered into the restaurants I passed, glanced into the boutiques and coffeehouses and the huge self-service laundry on Seventh Street. I was struck by a pile of wonderful junk bursting out of one of the storefronts, just off the sidewalk: a faded white hatbox, a bright red Formica-topped table, racks of colorful clothing. In the window I saw boxes spilling over with fake pearls and rhinestones and gold chains. I ran my palms down the sleeves of the dresses hanging from the rack.

  I was suddenly conscious of my dull shirt, the tattered skirt dropping down my legs. I picked out a purple-striped dress and went inside, barely able to stop myself from laughing. The fabric shimmered in my hands.

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  In the shop it appeared that every vase and knickknack and piece of clothing in the world had been crammed onto the shelves and racks and boxes. I wandered through the aisles and touched everything: a lamp in the shape of a stretching ballerina, a painting of a smiling pit bull, beads that looked like miniature Easter eggs. As I approached the glass case in front of the cash register, I nodded to the woman behind it as she sat folding scarves into a box. And then my eyes fell upon the most wonderful thing, something that could have been crafted by fairies: a scarf with every color in the world in it, that seemed to change color under my gaze. I reached over, ran my fingers across it. The scarf seemed to glitter and spark under my touch, and for a moment I couldn't look away.

  "Don't you love that?" the woman behind the counter asked.

  "Yes," I said, picking it up. It was large and diaphanous, as big as a shawl. "It reminds me of something, a place I used to love."

  The woman was tall and thin, like a column, and her hair was held back with chopsticks.

  Ten dollars and it s yours. Would you like to try on that dress?"

  "Yes. Yes, please."

  She led me back to a space that was barely big enough to stand in and then drew the drapes closed around me. I checked that not a sliver of the space was showing to the room outside it, then carefully removed my old clothes and slipped the dress over my head and let it fall.

  I turned to the mirror. I was transfixed by the image in front of me: It was me but not myself, the dress snug against

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  my body but not too snug, just right, and the purple stripes gleaming against my skin.

  "Do you have a pair of shoes that might go with this?" I asked, peeking my head out. "In a six?"

  "Let me look," the woman said. A minute later she brought me a pair
of shiny pumps. I slipped my foot into one. It fit perfectly. Just like the glass slipper, I thought, laughing to myself.

  When I left the store with my old clothes and tennis shoes squashed into a shopping bag, the heels felt strange on my feet. I loved the clacking sound they made as I walked down the street. I twisted my shoulders to feel the dress shift and trickle along my skin.

  I knew that George and Veronica would fall madly in love, live happily ever after, the way she had been supposed to so long ago. What occurs in the world of faerie will become manfest in the world of men. This was it, I thought. The mistakes of the old world corrected in the new one. A new beginning.

  I started heading uptown. Almost as if my body had a mind of its own. I craved something. The water. Trees. Flowers. Something from the other world. All my old loves will be returned to me. The sky felt so close I could have reached up and touched it.

  You should just go home now, I told myself. Go home and rest. Take a bath. Watch television. On a Saturday afternoon there was always some old movie on, something with a Carole Lombard or a Marlene Dietrich.

  But I didn't feel ready to go back. My feet made a steady rhythm on the sidewalk. I could walk for hours sometimes, despite my creaking bones and soft body, as if I were in a

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  trance. A remnant of my fairy existence, I supposed. That day every street felt like a revelation. I had to warn myself not to stare too hard at the people I passed; I wanted to touch them all, talk to them, stare at their faces, ask about their violin cases or leather portfolios or the books peeking from their bags. I wanted to pet every single dog I saw strutting or slinking past.

  I thought about going to the pier, but I found myself heading north instead. Eventually I turned on Twenty-eighth Street, and I realized then what I had come for. Pots of flowers and tall, gangly trees lined the streets on either side. It was like entering a forest, the only street in Manhattan where you had to brush past leaves and branches to get down the sidewalk. I breathed it in. The buildings were dilapidated, hardly changed from the century before. I paused in front of a bamboo tree and ran my fingers up the side.