What's Mine and Yours(97)

“Take it easy,” she said. “Maybe I was wrong. He might still turn up after all.”



The morning of the first dress rehearsal, Gee woke up early to practice his big speech. It was from the beginning of the third act, when Claudio tries to convince his sister Isabella to trade her virginity to Angelo for his freedom. It was twisted, the biggest sign Claudio wasn’t all good intentions. He was selfish, pleading, but Gee empathized with his feeling, his terror of death. Ay, but to die, and go we know not where, he said. To lie in cold obstruction and to rot. Those lines came readily to him. He tripped over the middle parts of the monologue, the ’tis, the clauses so long they lost their meaning. He rushed until he got to the phrases that anchored him, reminded him of what he was trying to say. The weariest and most loathed worldly life…is a paradise to what we fear of death.

He did all right, and when he was through, he kissed his fingers, pressed them to the picture of Ray on the wall. He wished his father could come and see him in the play. He went downstairs.

Linette was already dressed and frying eggs in the kitchen. She had agreed to drive him to the school. To his surprise, Jade was at the table, too, her eyes rimmed in black, an untouched cup of coffee in her hands. She was in her pajamas, but she didn’t look as if she’d been sleeping at all. Gee wouldn’t be surprised if she had slipped in that morning, changed into her pajamas, and come back down. She liked to pretend. He was sick of it.

“Linette told me where you’re going.”

“It’s no big secret.”

“You don’t listen, Gee, do you? You don’t listen at all.”

“We already talked about this,” he said, but Jade went on.

“You’re playing with fire, and I’m trying to help you see that the wrong choice can ruin your life.”

“Why don’t you just say that having me ruined your life, if that’s what you mean?”

“Gee!” Linette interjected. “Show your mother some respect.”

“She should just come out and say it, instead of pretending I don’t know what she means.”

Jade sat calmly at the table, knitting and unknitting her fingers. “My life isn’t ruined,” she said. “But believe me, I know things about that girl that you don’t want to know.”

“I wouldn’t care.”

“That’s cause you’re not thinking with your head.”

Gee felt a rush of shame. He said nothing, stepped back onto the stairs as if he could turn and run for his room, shut the door.

“If you go on with this play, don’t you expect me to come and see it.”

Gee was struck dumb, silent. “You would do that?”

“If you want to act like a man, then I’ll treat you like one. If you think you’re grown, then you be grown.”

“But all the other parents will be there.”

“Don’t expect me to sit there and cheer, like I’m proud, when I’m not.”

Gee felt that his mother was testing him. She wanted to show him how weak he was, compared to her. She wanted him to give in. And she was right—he was weak. He wanted her to say she’d changed her mind, she didn’t mean it. He waited, and she didn’t.

“Linette, will you take me now?”

Linette had stopped working over the stove. She leaned against the wall, biting her lip hard, and she looked as if she’d burst into tears. She nodded at him, turned off the burner, left the eggs in their oil in the skillet. She gathered her things in a hurry, and Gee slumped out to the courtyard. He heard Linette and Jade arguing. When Linette came out, she flung an arm around him, ferried him to the car, and headed for Central.

“I’m sure by now I’ve told you why I never wanted to have kids.”

“Mm-hmm. You spent your whole life taking care of them, and you didn’t want to anymore.”

“And look at me. Will you look at life? I’ve been watching over you for ten years.” Linette seemed to blink back tears. “Although you hardly need me now.”

“Come on, Linette,” he said, because he didn’t know what else to say. Did he need her? He liked having her around. Did anybody really need anybody?

“It’s been the great privilege of my life. Do you know why?”

“Cause you loved Daddy.”

“No, sir. I’m no martyr. Even in my old age.” She caressed his face, where he was tender. “I’m with you because I want to be.”

Gee was unmoved; he was still thinking about Jade.

“Right. She’s the one who got stuck with me,” he said.

“You’ve got to understand. If your father had lived longer, she might have become a different kind of person. He helped her. But this is the mother you got. And she’s trying.”

Gee didn’t care. He was tired of everyone making excuses for grown-ups who didn’t know how to act. He’d woken up feeling triumphant: he was going back to Central, claiming his role in the play. And she’d taken that from him. She saw no good in anything he did.

“I got beat up.”

“I know, sweetheart.”

“And she still has to have her way.”

“I know.”

They were off the freeway, rolling across the train tracks that crossed behind the old factories. Soon, they’d be at the school.