“You’re making it worse.” The woman smirked to a coworker behind a counter.
Hazel didn’t look up nor change her tone. “I need a mop.” Only Mary could hear her cursing the woman.
The woman scoffed. “Just leave it. I’ll call the janitor.”
Hazel rose, adjusting her suit jacket.
“What are you doing in here anyhow?”
Hazel nodded at Mary. “School clothes.”
“Perhaps ice cream after shopping next time.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The woman studied Mary. “Her eyes are striking. Is she Spanish?” She reached to touch Mary’s cheek and, instead of recoiling like she wanted to, Mary froze like a mannequin, understanding the woman’s dominion over her.
“No, ma’am,” Hazel said. Had the woman had the courage to look Hazel in the eye, she might have realized the answer to her own question. Instead, having lost interest, she flicked her wrist. “Well, go on now.”
Mary watched the woman as the escalator ascended to the second floor, hating everything about her, including the way she punched and held the phone buttons down longer than necessary to call the janitor.
Her mother pulled her against her side. “Don’t pay that woman no mind.”
“Why did she ask if I’m Spanish?” Mary didn’t know what someone “Spanish” looked like.
“Because she didn’t believe you could be mine.”
Mary fell silent. For in that moment, if only for a second, Mary had wished that she wasn’t her mother’s daughter. She wanted to be that girl on the second floor, looking over the rail. Had she not been her mother’s daughter, it wouldn’t have hurt so much to see her crawl.
Hazel would remain the king and queen of Mary’s world, but the encounter lodged an insecurity in her that became the undercurrent of her soul. She was now acutely aware that there was someone else, someone bigger, meaner, in charge over them all. She kept this realization to herself, sensing it would embarrass her momma to know Mary had just discovered how little control she had over Mary’s life and her own.
In the children’s department, Hazel handed her three blouses. “Take these and go sit with that girl.”
Cross-legged on the bench was the girl Mary had seen. She shook her head.
Hazel bent over to make eye contact, which made Mary feel like she was looking in the mirror. It calmed and scared her all at the same time. “You’re going to have to talk to people when we’re out.”
Mary didn’t know what to talk to that White girl about. The older she got, the more nervous around White people she became. Mary may have looked White, but she spent every moment of her life, except the four to six hours every Sunday when they were in Charlotte, being Negro.
“Now, take these blouses, go over there, and say hello. I’ll get you when I’m done.”
Mary dragged her feet across the white marble floor, scuffing the toes of her black dress shoes.
Before Mary could speak, the girl wiggled her tongue at her through the gap between her front teeth. “I’m Lillian.” She slid over to make room for Mary to sit.
Mary didn’t move but introduced herself using her full first name.
“Mary Magdalene? That’s a funny name,” Lillian said. Her face was round and rosy like the pair of ruby studs in her ears. They sparkled in the overhead light. Mary’s hands went to her own unpierced earlobes.
“It’s in the Bible.”
“My momma says religion was given to make us feel that suffering is noble. It’s not.” Lillian nodded to the left, where a short Negro woman was looking through swimsuits. “That’s my mother.” The woman had hair straight enough, like Mary and Lillian’s, to be brushed smooth into a bun without grease, but her skin was the color of bread crust, too brown for her to pass.
Mary had never seen a pair like herself and her mother. Mary pointed at Hazel, still at the blouses rack. “That’s mine.”
Lillian didn’t seem surprised. “How old are you?”
“Almost nine.”
“You’re small for your age.”
“How old are you?” Reference to her height made Mary feel like she was being challenged or sized up, assumed to be the weakest.
“I’ll be twelve in three days and I’m already taller than my mother.” Lillian slumped over. “I wish I was small like you. I’m growing out of all my favorite clothes. I’ll probably be tall like my father.” Lillian stuck her tongue out.
“I like your dress.” Mary touched the pale-yellow fabric. The white lace sash and trim matched Lillian’s ruffled socks and white patent-leather shoes. Mary scrunched her toes in her black ones and tucked them under the bench, regretting ruining them. They were hand-me-downs from church, but Mary had loved them before seeing Lillian’s new ones. The girl’s dress was new, too; Mary could tell by the smoothness of the fabric it had never been washed.
“Thank you; it’s my favorite. We’re here to take my birthday picture.”
If she were Lillian, it would have been her favorite too. Their skin was the same color, that of cream atop fresh churned butter—so Mary knew it would look good on her. Mary wondered how many dresses the girl had. Mary only had two good ones, a light-pink one and the tan one she wore at that moment. Hazel only took her shopping when the season turned or when she’d outgrown something, so most trips to Charlotte were spent looking.
Lillian touched her arm. “Maybe you can get your picture taken too.”
Mary turned to see her mother talking to Lillian’s at the coat rack on the back wall. Hazel’s ease told Mary that they knew each other.
“I’ll go next month, for my birthday,” Mary said. It was a lie; Hazel thought portraits were a waste of money. People see themselves every day in the mirror, why they need a reminder is beyond me. Hazel, everyone said, was a beauty—prettier if she ever did something with herself—but Hazel only dressed on Sundays. The rest of the week, she barely brushed her teeth, let alone put on lipstick. What do I need to look pretty for those people for? Pretty is as pretty does, and most of these folks ugly inside and out.
Both mothers came over, and Hazel motioned Mary to her. “Come meet Mrs. Catherine.” She said her name in three syllables: Cath-er-ine.
Mrs. Catherine bent to Mary’s eye level and then looked back up at Hazel. “What a beautiful child.”
Dressed fancy, like a White lady, Mrs. Catherine wore heavy face powder and was the color of cinnamon up close. Mary wondered if the powder was meant to cover her freckles or lighten her complexion, because it didn’t work for either aim. Lightening one’s complexion, only to still be too dark to pass, seemed as pointless as a Negro playing paleface. But Mary decided that if Mrs. Catherine was one of those Negroes who worshipped White traits, Hazel wouldn’t be so friendly to her. She talked about Mr. Ford, the Lakeses’ butler, who was enamored by the way Mrs. Lakes’s gray-streaked hair blew in the wind. He came in the kitchen every morning to watch her from the window.
“What happened down there today wasn’t your fault,” Mrs. Catherine said.
Mary hated that there had been two witnesses. “I should have been looking where I was going.”
Mrs. Catherine squeezed her hand. “It was an accident.” She led Mary to the railing, where the woman with the braid was scowling at a salesgirl who was being flirted with. “She’s sad-looking. She saw your momma with those eyes and cheekbones and wanted to spit. When people don’t like themselves, it makes them mean. You understand?”
When Mary smiled, Mrs. Catherine beamed at Hazel, as if she had the magic touch.
Mary left Charlotte that day with two dresses instead of her school clothes.
“You’ll be fine in your summer things for another few weeks. These dresses will serve you better than anything you have.”
CHAPTER 8
Elise
Sunday morning, October 29, 2017
“Have a good workout?” Sarah wiggled her fingers at her daughters from the gray marble island. Even first thing in the morning, with her hair bushy from the early-morning rain, she looked perfect.
“I enjoyed it,” Giovanni said.