My Name Is Venus Black(45)

Her presence there reminds me of Leo and me lying on my bed, naming planets and counting stars. The memory hurts, so I turn my attention to Piper. “What did you do at school today?”

“Nothing. I played solitaire at recess.” I taught her how a week ago.

“Did you win?”

“Only when I cheated.”

We are quiet for a while, staring at the ceiling. Elton John’s “Levon” is playing on KJR on my clock radio, and it makes me want to cry. I can’t do that with Piper here, so I try to hold back tears.

“What’s really wrong with you? I can tell you’re sad,” Piper says.

“I saw my mother today.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Your mother?” She says it like it’s such a surprise that I have a mother. I think she’s seen me as belonging only to her and to the here and now. “Is she pretty?”

I think about this. “I guess so. But she’s kind of old now, like forty-two or something.”

“Where did you see her?”

“At the Big Dipper.”

“Why are you sad?”

I sigh. “It’s hard to explain.” Then I gently ask, “Do you want to talk about your mom?”

“I don’t know,” Piper says. I smell bubble gum on her breath and I suspect she’s been spending her milk money on gum and candy. I always spent my milk money that way, too, so I let it go.

“Piper, do you miss your mom?” I’ve never before directly asked Piper about her mom.



“Of course!” she says, as if I’ve insulted her.

“Sor-rry,” I reply. “Not everyone loves their mom, you know.”

“Don’t you?” she asked.

“I don’t know about that anymore. I used to. But I’ve been mad at her a long time.” Why did I go down this road?

Piper turns onto her side and props up her head to look at my face. “Really? How come?”

“She made some big mistakes,” I tell her. “You’re not old enough to understand.”

Piper huffs. “I am old enough to understand. If I had my mom, I would be soooooo nice to her. I would love her even if she made big mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes, right?”

I sigh again. “You’re right, Piper. But some are just harder to forgive.”

“So if I make a big mistake, you might not forgive me and then you won’t love me anymore?”

“Oh, Piper! For God’s sake, no. That’s not what I’m saying.” Since when did Piper decide that I love her?

I sit up and climb over Piper’s body on the bed. “Let’s go make cookies,” I say, which is actually one of the few motherly things Inez did with me. We always made the peanut butter kind, and I loved making the crosshatch in the dough with the fork.





On December 12, we celebrate Piper’s tenth birthday at Farrell’s Ice Cream Parlour. It’s Mike, Curtis, a new friend of Piper’s named Amy, and myself. Amy’s a funny, quiet little thing with chunky brown hair and a tiny face. But I’m so glad Piper has a new friend.

After we get home from Farrell’s, I sneak out into the garage to retrieve Piper’s present.

The kitten is black with green eyes. If it were up to me, I’d name him Spooky. But I already suspect his name is going to be Felix. It’s one of Piper’s favorite old cartoons. She likes to sing the jingle about the wonderful, wonderful cat and laughing so hard your sides ache.

I have Spooky-soon-to-be-Felix in a cardboard box with an old towel. I tell Piper to sit down at the kitchen table and cover her eyes. When she opens them, she stares dumbly at the box.

“Open it!” I say. She lifts the lid. Peeks in. Squeals, “It’s a kitty! Oh my gosh, it’s a kitty!” She gingerly lifts out the kitten, which appears to have been sleeping. He’s supposedly eight weeks old. “He’s so cute! He’s perfect!”

I am smiling so wide. We had a kitten once when I was four. After I purposely dropped him in a full bathtub, I planned to put him in the dryer. Fortunately, Inez caught me in the act, and Toby lived to die another day, courtesy of a car.



“You like him?” I ask.

“I love him!” she exclaims. She hugs me around the waist and won’t let go. “Thank you, Annette. Thank you!”

“What are you going to name him?” I ask, gently unwinding her arms.

“I don’t know,” she says, her green eyes going serious.

“What about Spooky?” I ask.

She thinks about this. “Spooky,” she says. “Like he’s scary?”

“No, but since he’s black—”

“I know, I know!” she screeches. “Felix! Felix the wonderful cat.” And she goes off into the cartoon jingle.

I have this girl nailed.



* * *



—

THE FOLLOWING MORNING, it’s totally dead at the Dipper when Danny sidles up to the pastry window. “Hey. It’s the only girl in the world who doesn’t like me.”

“That’s not true,” I say. “I’m sure there are plenty of others.”

“Ouch!” he says. Danny has a largish nose—something we share. He also has broad shoulders and long lashes that would suit a girl fine. He reminds me a little of Tad Martin from All My Children. Sometimes I watch that soap on Mondays when I’m off work.