What's Mine and Yours(89)

“Mr. Riley gave me a big role.”

“I was reading about that play. He cast you as a man in jail. That Mr. Riley is not your friend.”

“I like being Claudio.”

“Please, we both know you’re no actor. This is about her.”

Gee felt his voice rising. He was sick of his mother telling him who he was and who he wasn’t. “You’re the one who wanted me to go to Central in the first place.”

“And I still do. I don’t think those boys are going to cause you any more problems. They’re just some little punks who did what they did cause they thought they’d get away with it. Cause there were three of them.”

Gee felt himself shrink under the idea that he was an easy target.

“But they won’t do it again. I’ve already called their parents to let them know I’ll make it my personal business to send those boys to jail if they ever so much as look at you again.”

“Ma, I told you I just want to leave those boys alone. I want to forget about this.”

“So they get to put their hands on you and walk away free? Gee, I swear, I’ll never understand you. It’s like you’ve got no pride in yourself at all.”

“What’s there to be proud of? You just want to fix my life because you couldn’t fix yours.”

“That’s not how I see you at all.”

“How do you see me then?”

Gee felt himself clamoring for his mother. What would she say? He waited to hear.

“It doesn’t matter how I see you. It matters how you see yourself. When are you going to learn that, Gee? I don’t know how else to show you.” Jade stood up and sighed. “You’re going to quit that play. Leave all this drama behind.”

“I am not quitting,” Gee said quietly.

There wasn’t a trace of rage in her voice when she answered him. “We’ll see about that.”





15



April 2019


A town near the Crystal Coast, North Carolina

On weekday afternoons, the theater was a holy place, emptied of its congregants. It was cool and unlit, the curtains drawn back from the stage, the austere rows of stiff metal chairs. Noelle felt like a small seed at the center of the dark, cavernous room.

The next production was Frankenstein, and Noelle was painting the North Pole: blue-black water, the iridescent fragments of glaciers. She tipped her paintbrush in teal and silver to make the edges shimmer, where the ice touched the water. She worked over a scroll unfurled on the floor of the stage, listening to music from her portable speaker. She sang along in her tongue-tied Spanish.

Sombras nada más, entre tu vida y mi vida…

The day outside was bright and warm, breezy. It was spring on the coast. She had a few hours before she met Ruth, and she hadn’t been able to resist a morning in the theater. It was soothing, peaceful to work under the sweet light streaming in from the street, her hands stained blue. When she was done, she sprayed the paper with fixative, clipped it to a rack to dry.

She rode her bicycle the few miles from the theater to downtown. She rolled past the graveyard, the rows of Queen Anne houses, many of them boasting bronze plaques engraved with their build dates. The sound glimmered around her as she rode over the bridge, but it was the vegetation, not the water, that reminded her most she was somewhere different: her new home. The myrtle shrubs and goldenrod, the fans of palmetto on the front lawns, the red cedars and wild olive trees. Noelle liked to think these would be beautiful names for a child—Cedar, Olive, Myrtle. Even Palmetto. Why not? If Hollywood actors could name their children after fruit and bugs, then she could name hers after a tree, a bush.

Ruth was waiting for her on the boardwalk in a little park, shaded by craggy, windblown trees. She sat on the edge of the fountain, her hair peroxide blond, twisted into a fat braid. She wore navy exercise pants, a sun visor, and a bright green T-shirt that read Clementine Farms. Her body was heavy and firm. She threw open her arms for Noelle.

“Aren’t you a vision,” Ruth said, and Noelle looked down at herself. There was nothing special about the cork sandals she wore, her black pants and gingham blouse.

“It’s all here,” Ruth said, and caressed her face. “You look happy. Are you happy here?”

“Yes, ma’am. I am. Where’s Bailey?”

“Oh, he went off to give us some time, just the two of us. You’ll see him before I go.”

“I haven’t seen him in—how long?—sixteen years. He’s still a little boy in my mind.”

“He’s a man now. I couldn’t be prouder of the two of you. Come on. Let’s eat.”

Noelle led Ruth to her favorite pub. They had tables on a wooden deck overlooking the water, the boats anchored in the marina, the birds pecking around the boardwalk. They could see, too, the wild horses roaming the sliver of island in the bay, digging for groundwater with their hooves. They ordered quickly so they could spend their time together talking. Noelle ordered the fried shrimp and a green salad, Ruth the blue crab cakes and cheddar grits. They had beers: Ruth’s tasted of peach, Noelle’s of cucumber and ginger.

“Well, it suits you,” Ruth said. “This little town with its craft beer and fancy menus.”

“This is all for the tourists,” Noelle said. “But I do like the breweries. They remind me of living in a big city.”