“You Must Be a Lady”
A creaking house hid in a field of golden and wild grass inspired to sway by the wily wind. From the degraded barn, two abandoned canoes rusted. One canoe poked out from a well-worn door as if to save itself.
The farm didn’t impress Anita. She’d come with her dad and mom, but her parents had recently divorced, sending seeds into the wind.
In her head, she thanked the powers above her that her mom had run off with the boss. That meant she wouldn’t have to listen to the endless droll of, “We should do this,” and “why don’t you ever get a raise?”
To Anita, her mother was selfish, self-centered and everything she didn’t want to be. She didn’t care if the beautiful blonde fell into murky waters and choked on water snakes. Perhaps she could melt into the pond while being chomped up by snapping turtles covered in moss. Their backs appeared as little islands when they sat in the shallow water, waiting for some wayward fish to swim by, sticking that tongue out, the snapping turtle would eat the fish.
“Oh, Anita, you will never attract a good man. You’ll be trapped with someone like your father. I can’t wait to get out of this small town with its nosy ways. Can you believe that Claire had the nerve to sell me off-brand perfume? Goodness and heaven, as if I don’t have enough on my mind. I have to take care of your father and you. You’re like infants without me. I don’t know how you’ll manage. Perhaps your dad will find some tramp with wide legs.” Her mother reapplied her lipstick, a dark red symbolizing she had style, not bold and cumbersome as bright red would have been.
And yes, Anita knew her mother had been a beauty queen, prettier than any other woman in the state. She lost her crown drunk driving with some lawyer.
Anita’s father was a patient man. He did the chores around the house. He said very little to his family, as if he would poison himself if he drank our words. To us, he simply existed to be yelled at, to clean the dishes, to never ask too much out of a soul. Sure Anita saw a frown pop up on his already creased lips.
Why is he like this, Anita wondered to herself. He could leave. He could fly away like her mother did on metal wings, and then it would be me and the rats, crickets, snakes, rabbits, everything that ran away from where they were supposed to be and came into the house. She would weave a dress and run out into the fields of tall grass, forgetting the time, pretending she was something she wasn’t, a ballerina, a model, or simply wild.
Anita stopped mid-thought. She didn’t know how to sew, cook, fold clothing, or do much of anything when she thought about it. She put her hand on the table and brought a hotdog to her plate. The obnoxious scent of hotdogs drove her nuts, but she enjoyed the fresh smell of meat, protein, strength.
When her father took the plates away in much the same way a robot moved, she wanted to say something, but she couldn’t get her mouth to work.
A few weeks passed. Her mother didn’t return to the depressing place known as Golden County. Sure the fields of grass and caresses of wind charmed the passerby. When you live in a place, however, everything is boring. When you leave, you miss it. When you come back, it turns grey in your mind, even if the fields boast the brilliant gold they’d been endowed with.
At sixteen, Anita began to feel the pressures of adulthood approaching. Her father began to cough and had to sit down several times on the rotten steps, at the same time. He pulled his hair back, added grease. When he looked at Anita, it was if he were already dead and finally saying goodbye. She didn’t feel close to him. In her world, he supplied what she needed and asked for little in return.
“Anita, find my screwdriver… Anita, have you seen the cat? Anita, I’m leaving.”
When her father spoke those words, tears fell down her face, the words she’d thought before but had not believed. Her father leaving did not bother her as much as the fact that things needed to stay in place or he would fall, and the house would fill with all that didn’t belong: the snakes, the squirrels, the rats, and the stray cats who occasionally snuck into the small attic.
“You can’t leave me, dad,” she said. Her voice quivered as the wind hit the door, trying to get inside.
“I have to, Anita. Don’t speak of it to anyone. There’s enough food for three months in the pantry. You’ll have to find a way to make ends meet.”
And the next day, he left. What few words he spoke hit her in the stomach, and she watched his old farm truck creak away almost as if ashamed.
Anita ate some of the food from the pantry. A week passed before she wore decent clothes to go into businesses. She knew she’d have to get a job.
She noticed a small store at the end of the town. An old lady, African American, rocked back and forth in her old, wooden chair. Her wise hands wrinkled with wisdom, her hair peppered white and grey held in a bun on top of her head.
“Um, ma’am. I see you have a help wanted sign,” Anita said.
“Yes, sure do. Have you ever worked before?” The woman asked. Her dark, deep eyes penetrated the awkward stare, but it didn’t stop the eyes from taking in every ounce of sunlight. Anita felt the wisdom from her lips.
“Um, no, I’m only sixteen,” Anita said.
“Oh, that’s old to start to work. Did you help your mother around the house?”
“No, my, um, mother ran away, and so did my father. I live alone,” Anita said. Her voice went a note higher.
“A spoiled child,” the woman said. She started knitting again. “We’ve got so many of them these days, don’t do a damn thing. Well, I’m happy your belly will get hungry, so you don’t scamper off into the city before we close in the winter. Spoiled, spoiled children always quit.”
“I am not spoiled. I am completely alone…”
“Let me see your hands,” the wizened woman said. She picked the pinky finger and began to move it back and forth. Anita could tell the woman worked hard on a farm in her younger years, not as lost as Anita had been when they had to move away from all they knew in the nice suburb in a sleeper town.
“Ah, indeed, spoiled, spoiled hands.”
“Ma’am. How am I spoiled? You tell me that. You don’t know what I’ve been through,” Anita commanded.
“You speak up against your elders, too. Do you want me to be your mother?” the old woman’s hands reached behind the chair at an awkward angle.
“I don’t need a mother,” Anita said. Her olive skin flushed with red blood.
“You need something, child, before the years eat you up, and your young muscles don’t move so fast.”
“Eaten up?”
“They do that, faster to the weaker ones who give up and drink gin. Spoiled, spoiled children,” the woman said.
“Your hands so soft, you must be a lady,” the woman said.
“Must be a lady?”
“You must be. I’ll treat you fine and bring you whatever you want. Hungry?” the woman asked.
“No..”
“That’s a start. You never know what’s cooking,” the woman said. “You didn’t ask, of course, but my name is Heritta. I’ve been here a while. In fact, I’ve been here for eternity.”
The words constructed themselves into a skeletal pattern in Anita’s mind. The hot summer breeze rolled into the store, so much wind.
“So are you going to give me the job or not?” Anita thundered, sick of the strange ways of this woman.
“You don’t want me to be your mother. Too much to do already.”
“I’ll go.”
You must be a lady, Anita said in her mind.
“Eaten up, eaten up,” Heritta said as she rocked.
The wind caressed her face as it always did.
Smoke chases beauty.
Dust chases wisdom.
Fire is destiny.
