May, 2013

She’s pretty like a fallow deer. Freckled caramel skin. She turns her wide doe eyes to me and smiles syrupy sweet. “Hi, you must be Evan,” she says, with a hint of condescension reserved for little kids and baby cats. I try to figure out what this beautiful strange woman is doing on my front porch, too young and too comely. The women in Noure are wide and stumpy with the country air in their hair and skin slick of morning grease. Mom loves to watch their eyes bug when she talks about our Italian imported kitchen table and the fine china on the top shelf they cannot reach.

At times, they would come over, cradling pie and cookies spilling over their breasts, fingers sticky with butter. And my mother would leave them standing on the front porch, fingers itching for her attention. Never an inch closer.

“Who are you?” I ask.

“I’m Beatrice.” She beams, like it means something. Her eyes were the shape of shells but when she smiled they were pretty, symmetrical crescents. “Can I come in?”

I shake my head slowly, a little confused.

But it doesn’t falter her smile, instead, she bends her knees to look me in the eye, “I hear you’re seven now. How little. So handsome.” Her hair is a long ink black cascading down the slender slope of her back. It tickles my arm and smells of the sea.

I frown. “I’m eight.”

She stands up and winks. “I know.”

I don’t think I like her very much.

Mom nudges me out the way and hands me the duster in her hand to pull the door open wider. “Oh you must be Beatrice. Please come in.” She encircles her arms around the woman in familiarity and they exchange light air kisses on dusty rouge cheeks.

I pick at the duster she had given me. Saturday is cleaning day and with each week of spring settled a thin sheen of dust on the furniture. Quietly, I unravel a long strand of grey fluff from the brush as the women exchanged pleasantries.

“Evan,” Mom summons my attention, “this is Ms. Clemonte. She’s going to be your new home-school tutor.”

I stare up at her and open my mouth to object, “But-”

“Shush baby,” she pinches my cheek and I turn flush. Mom begins leading Ms. Clemonte into the house. I follow close by her side, wondering if Ms. Clemonte had noticed my pink cheeks. “Mom,” I pull at the end of her dress. “I thought I was going to school soon,” I whisper urgently.

I was lonely. There was a finite number of video games and rocks to kick around the street in the infinite stretch of days. I had not grown much taller, and neither had the boys around the neighbourhood friendlier. It was an odd feeling to miss school, but I longed for the feeling of belonging. In the past year, Mom had been a stand-in, giving me textbooks for me to doodle in and practice exercises that saw only red and crosses. I wasn’t learning, and she knew.

“We’ll talk about this later,” is all she says, but she looks at me with a stare that I knew I could not retaliate. Even at eight I understood the threat in her eyes. While she would not beat me or confiscate my toys, she knew what I needed from her. In Noure, she was the centre of the universe and I orbited around her seeking warmth in this cold desolate town. Love was not a commodity, and she made sure I knew.

“You can set up here,” Mom brushes a hand gently over the side of the dining table. It sat next to a large window overlooking the backyard where Mom had planted a garden of flowers. It was spring but Noure had cursed the flowers to be frail and wilting. It was as depressing as the stack of books and paper Ms. Clemonte plops onto the table.

“Thank you Nancy,” she says, her saccharine voice so pitched it was almost infantile. It made my gums burn.

“I’ll leave you two to be acquainted.” Mom looks hesitant, but she retreats into the kitchen, where I knew in the corner of her peripheral vision she would find a space for us in full clarity. But when she turns around, Ms. Clemonte’s smile dissipates, and the honey glaze over her eyes is replaced by something sharper.

“You can call me Bea,” she says suddenly, and she’s smiling again, albeit almost mockingly. I notice her lips are painted a vivid stark red, brighter against her bronze skin and lightless hair. Mom would call her a whore. Red was sinful and non-existent in the household, except the basement door the house came with that mom seemed to have a certain sympathy for; “The devil’s basement” she called it, but she would say it with a smile. I don’t think I’ll see Ms. Clemonte again.

“You’re fired,” I tell her with the utmost sincerity. “I’m supposed to start school. She promised. Sorry for your time.”

I imagine her surprise, and it would bloom pleasantly across her face. But Miss. Clemonte doesn’t look at all fazed. Instead she laughs in a way that makes me feel small. “Oh silly,” she giggles. “You don’t want to go to school in Noure, if that’s what they’re calling it these days.”

I feel annoyance curl around my tongue when I argue, “I think I do.” I’m awoken every morning by the honk of a school bus that has come to whisk away the pig-boy down the street and I would find a weighing mass of jealousy in my stomach that wouldn’t pass until lunchtime.

“It’s less of a school but a detention center. The kids are vicious there.” Her voice loses its pretentious jubilance and all at once her tone had grown serious. “I’ve witnessed several stabbings before.”

But I’m prideful, and I’ve never been a small kid. “I think I can handle it.”

“If you don’t believe me, I can take you there.”

I feel my eyebrows rise in surprise. “Really? You’ll take me…outside?”

“What do you mean outside?”

“Mom doesn’t really let me go past the block. She says that there’s people that snatch children right off the streets. And they have guns.”

Ms. Clemonte taps her chin. “That’s true.” Yet a mischievous grin stretches over her face. “But I say fuck it,” –I flinch at the harsh word– “I don’t always encourage this, but I suppose it’s hard to believe anything until you see it for yourself.”

The thought of adventure makes my toes tingle and I cannot help the smile of anticipation that finds my lips. “Ok fine, you’re hired Ms..Clemonte.”

She rolls her eyes. “Call me Bea.”

-

She made me take quizzes for the rest of the day, to gauge my understanding. I was poor in english and science but math came surprisingly easy to me. I feel the shallow relief of not being completely useless in my studies. Although I was probably behind given my year long hiatus from school.

“Do you like to read?” Bea looks almost quizzical at the grammar worksheet I handed her. I don’t think I did very well. “Not really,” I answer sheepishly.

She shakes her head in mute disappointment. “You should, it’s a good habit. I used to detest reading, until I found the right book that is.”

Bea looks at me then. The sun had fallen, leaned against the roof from a day’s worth of fatigue. Her skin was aureate against the window, and her eyes brindled with gold. I was momentarily stunned by her beauty, it was almost surreal.

“Do you like Greek mythology?”

My mouth was dry as the desert, and my tongue a lifeless fish. “What?”

She grins, a crimson lash across her face, bleeding into her golden skin. “Do you like monsters and gods and absurd tales of war and strife?”

“Yes?”

“Perfect. Trust me, I’m going to make you fall in love with reading. Let me tell you the story of a boy who flew too close to the sun…”

I blink. “How is that possible? Did he have superpowers?”

“Hush.” She rolls her markers across the table and settles back into her chair. “No, he was mortal, much like you and I. And he had a great father, Daedalus, who was the world’s greatest inventor…”

-

“He should’ve listened to his father.” We had moved to the couch a while ago, textbooks abandoned and strewn across the dining table, forgotten. I swung my feet lazily over the pillows, drawn to her words.

“Hubris is cause of many undoings,” she agrees from the foot of the couch. Bea tilts her head up to look at me, her long hair a dark inky spillage over the white couch cushions. I note how young she looks in this moment. We were children submerged in tales and fantasies. I was intrigued.

“I wish I could fly away too.” I think of Noure, it is like the labyrinth that King Minos had imprisoned Icarus and his father in as a punishment. I wish for wings, to carry me over the bubbling creeks in Horizon summers.

“Where would you go?”

“Home.”

“Where’s that?”

“I used to live in the north. The air smells different there. It was colder there, but not wet like it is here. There were big lakes there, moss green but clear as glass. In spring, the flowers would bloom around the water.”

She gives a small sigh, almost dreamily. “That sounds beautiful.”

“If we had wings maybe I’ll take you there,” I joke, although a little down with nostalgia. “What about you?”

“No, this is my home. It is not beautiful, but there is nowhere I’d rather be.” Her face creases in thought, but then it’s replaced by her smile, which seems to be ubiquitous and adorned so naturally she must have been born with it.

“I think we’re done for today,” she says, and gives a small guilty yawn. She hops up from the floor and leaves to collect her things.

Mom is making dinner, and the smoky scent of roasted meat permeated the room. The air tasted delicious. She looks tired though as I rounded the kitchen, hunched over the counter over a steaming bowl of mashed potatoes. Her skin was ashen and wore bruises beneath her eyes.

I pick up a large kitchen knife and try to chop up some carrots on the table where it appears she was making a salad of sorts. “Mom, do you want my help?”

She turns around slowly, distracted by the potatoes, but her eyes grow wide at the glinting knife in my hands. “No!” She snaps quickly, and roughly snatches the knife from my hands. She cradles the knife to her chest almost protectively, and something akin to relief flashes across her frenzied eyes.

Feeling chastised, I fold my hands behind my back. “Sorry? I was just trying to help.”

She lets out a long winded breath, but her eyes are calm again. “It’s a man’s job to make money. And it’s my job to cook,” she says patiently.

Mom starts chopping the carrots, and I watch her maneuver gracefully over the haphazard cuts I'd made. “Someday, will my wife make me food?”

“No silly,” she smiles, almost secretly. “I’ll always be there to cook for you.”

-

“Would you like to have dinner with us before you leave?” Mom calls for Bea from the kitchen, who had just swung her tote bag over her shoulder.

“That would be lovely. Thank you.” Her voice had reverted to its sweet ass-licking pitch. “I just have to call my parents first, they might worry. Can I borrow your phone for a quick call? Mine died a while ago.”

Mom pulls off her apron. “Of course, let me go get my cell. Our landline doesn’t work anymore. It’s been down for ages.”

“Oh actually, my dad is an electrician. I’m sure he’d be more than willing to help take a look.” I almost roll my eyes at her blatant adulation.

“No no, I wouldn’t want to bother the busy man. We do fine without it….wait a second.” Mom hurries upstairs to fetch her phone. I shake my head at Bea, who shrugs in feign innocence. What, she mouths.

After Bea’s call, we set the table for four. Mom puts out steaming platters of food: roasted chicken, bread rolls, mashed potatoes, pie. There was enough to feed an army for days and more. Mom had cooked for our guest, for show, but I was not complaining. There must be some odd etiquette for women to be pretentious in interaction.

“Mmmm…That looks delicious,” Bea remarks, observing the spread. “I usually have rice and dumplings at home. This is a welcoming change.”

Then Dad fills the doorway. He is a large man by nature. He regards Bea with his eyes first, silent but appreciative. I understood to some extent. Her beauty was bold and it demanded attention. “Hello,” is all he says, then finds his seat at the table.

She was right, dinner was lovely. I savored the tender meat of the chicken and licked my fingers in appreciation. The soft filling of the shepherd's pie spilled from its buttery confines, warm and settled comfortingly in my stomach. Meanwhile, the adults found interest in interrogating Bea.

I learn that she’s only nineteen, and that she’s been living in Noure her entire life. Although her family was from the Philippines, she’s never been. She would love to though, she spoke fondly of the distant lands. Halfway through the meal, mom says something that makes Bea laugh even though it was not at all funny. The strap of her dress slides off one shoulder. And I see my father notice, his eyes go faraway. I watch as they trace the supple slope of her neck. If Bea noticed, she did not show. I felt a twinge of annoyance towards my father, at his disrespect. He would be sorry for it, mom would make sure.

When the night reached its natural conclusion, Mom nudged me to walk Bea to the driveway. The moon was pale and illuminated only the soft contours of our faces. We tread silently along the grass until my curiosity broke the stillness.

“Why do you act like that around my Mom? It’s unnatural.”

Surprise passes her face, but her voice is earnest. “You’re right. It is not who I am.” She thinks for a second. “I know the type of woman your mother is, and I wouldn’t cross her. I’d advise you not to either.” I don’t know if her honesty was meant to offend. But it didn’t, for I also knew my mother.

But it must be some obligatory courtesy for a son to defend his mother, regardless of its sincerity. “My mother is kind. You don’t have to pretend around her.”

I watch her jaw tighten just the slightest, and then her head turns towards me, half lit in the night. “You’re young.” There was little meaning nor sense that ever followed that phrase. Nonetheless, I bite my tongue. “But there are certain things you must learn about Noure. We live not only at the edge of the world, but at the edge of our humanity. Everything fucked up about the world exists here. Poverty, crime, pollution, corruption.”

Her eyes were shadows now, lightless and cold in the warm night. “No one moves to Noure because they want to. You’re either born here or you have to be here because there’s nowhere left for you to go.”