Boy, Snow, Bird(69)
Arturo sighed and said tonelessly: “Thank you.” Gerald turned in his son’s direction with a look of puzzled appeal, but Clara spoke first: “Can you really mean it, Pa, that all folks have to do is look the part? Does Viv get no credit at all from you for working damn hard and being good at what she does, plain and simple?” Her tone wasn’t aggressive, more idly inquisitive, and she didn’t look her father in the eye, but stared at the square of floral wallpaper above his head, clearly not expecting great things of the halting answer he began to give her.
Olivia leaned forward and snapped: “For God’s sake, wake up from your dream world, Clara. You go and find out how many colored women are pulling down the salary that Vivian is, and we’ll talk about this again.”
John began nodding. “You know she’s got a point there, Clara.”
Olivia half smiled at him and Clara half frowned at him and he said: “Not that passing is the way.”
“That statement would carry far greater weight with me if it had come from someone who stood even a remote chance of passing,” Olivia said.
(From the moment Clara had first spoken up, Agnes Miller had been sadly humming “Sinner Man,” of all songs. Oh, sinner man . . . where you gonna run to? Arturo asked her to cut it out and she said: “Cut what out?”
“The humming, Agnes. The humming,” Arturo told her. “We don’t need it right now.”
She stopped, bewildered. “Who was that humming? I didn’t like it, either. Oh . . . I see . . . you’re sure it was me . . . ? I’m so sorry.”)
Olivia looked across the table at Vivian, who’d tied a scarf around her head. “I see now that you must do what you want, Vivian. Stop keeping your hair tidy, if that’s what you think is damaging it—I’ve never had any trouble in that area, but as I say, do what you want to do. I’m your mother and God knows I’d rather have you well than sick. Do you understand?”
Everybody kept still. I’d become aware of my neck swiveling as I looked at each person who spoke. This watchfulness was partly selfish, I was anticipating an episode of plate hurling and wanted to be sure I wasn’t caught in the crossfire. Snow and Bird hadn’t moved their heads much—it was their gaze that had been traveling from person to person, on opposite sides of the table. But if my daughter and her sister had noticed each other’s expressions, they might’ve been surprised to find that they both looked exactly like Judgment Day.
Vivian walked around the table to her mother’s seat and shyly submitted to being kissed on the forehead. There was also a whispered recital of pet names I never knew she had. Agnes piped up: “I hear they’re beginning to say that black is beautiful now.”
Olivia gave her friend a deeply cynical look and said: “We’ll see. Would anyone like some more of these potatoes? They’re very good, Clara.”
“Fattening, though . . .” Agnes murmured, but Olivia continued: “I hope you’ll let me have the recipe.”
“Sure,” Clara said, in a faint voice. Maybe she couldn’t find the caustic tone she wanted. Brazenness can knock you sideways like that.
—
i volunteered to clear away the plates once everyone was done eating, and Snow got up to help me. Vivian and Agnes and Olivia talked over one another. Oh no no no, Snow, you’re the guest of honor, leave it ’til Phoebe comes tomorrow—but Clara gave Snow the nod that sent her to the kitchen sink with me.
I meant to ask Snow how she and Bird were getting along. I’d thought they’d be inseparable, but I hadn’t really seen them together. I’d seen Bird roaming the woods with her gang of five, and I’d seen Snow out on the terrace of Flax Hill’s European-style café (European-style as far as any of us could tell, anyhow), smoking cigarettes, hearing out marriage proposals, and giving them marks out of ten. The girls in the group laughed indulgently, knowing that Snow was too nice to want what wasn’t hers, and why not let your boyfriend practice proposing so he’d get it just right for you? The girls’ laughter got a little artificial when Snow dropped her lighter and six or seven of the boyfriends vied to pick it up. Bird’s fifteen-year-old beau couldn’t speak for stammering when he encountered Snow on the porch; yes, of course he did. Here’s what I couldn’t have foreseen—that I’d be anxious for Snow and her sister to be friends. More specifically, I thought it would be better if Bird liked Snow. I couldn’t give a reason for this anxiety; Bird has disliked people before and they’ve been fine. But like everybody else around here, Bird isn’t quite as she was. Maybe the timing of this visit is bad. While Snow’s out in the evening, Bird plays Julia’s lullabies at low volume and sits cross-legged beside the record player, listening with a vacant expression. Arturo asked me if Snow was aware that Bird had borrowed her records, and I mixed him a drink and handed it to him before I answered. “Don’t take this as me bad-mouthing your daughter; I’m not. It’s not so easy to tell what Snow is and isn’t aware of. She very sweetly keeps those cards close to her chest; I hope you won’t deny that.”
My husband drained his glass, and when he spoke again, it was about Bird, not Snow. He reminded me of how she’d been deeply interested in the Cinderella story for a few months when she was nine years old, how she’d had one or the other of us read it to her a countless number of times and gone to sleep without expressing approval or disapproval until one night when Arturo closed the storybook and she asked: “Is it a true story? Not the fairy godmother stuff and her dress turning back to rags at midnight—I know that’s true. But Cinderella just sweeping up all those ashes every day and never putting them into her stepmother’s food or anything—is that true?” He said he knew it was dangerous to say yes, but another part of him thought So what—she can’t prove it isn’t true. Our daughter settled back onto pillows and said pleasantly, “I think they’re lying to us, Dad,” before switching off her bedside lamp to let him know he was dismissed for the night. He said that the way Bird was listening to Julia’s voice reminded him of the way she’d listened to the Cinderella story all those times we’d told it to her. He was understandably concerned, so I told him everything was going to be okay, which was another lie of the Cinderella variety.