had delivered two beds for the girls and a mattress and dresser for me.
Barefoot, I left my car and walked onto the lawn. The grass was cool but dry against my feet, the heavy dew still hours away. All in all, it was early. Somewhere, Westmore students vomited in the shrubs at the edges of half-acre lots in which kegs sat on back porches. Teenage girls passed out in places they shouldn't, and Sarah would be, if I knew her, just starting her night out in the East Village. It took me a moment to remember her current boyfriend's name, but as I reached up to touch the branch of the dogwood tree, I remembered its filLin-the-blank quality. Joe or Bob or Tim. A one-syllable, easily replaceable name. Like Jake.
I walked to the center of my front lawn and lay down, spreadeagled.
I looked up at the stars. How did I end up in a place where doing such a thing marked you for crazy, while my neighbors dressed concrete ducks in bonnets at Easter and in striped stocking caps at Christmas but were considered sane?
I let my shoes and purse fall from my hands. Only a few stars were out. The earth was cold beneath me. "There are children
[88]
The Almost Moon
starving in China," my mother had frequently said to me when I gorged on food.
"That doesn't mean I'm not hungry," I whispered now. I thought of her face when I had brought Jake from Wisconsin to meet them. He had been the first, and last, direct challenge to her power. She had welcomed him with a floor show so extreme that it was almost painful to watch. She forced herself to smile and bow and scrape as if he were the lord of the manor and she merely a lowly thing. Why hadn't I seen the truth? She had a steely resolve that surpassed anything Jake and I might build.
Our swizzle-stick empire was so fragile in the end. "The only thing you've ever loved is your mother!" he had yelled at me. I had refused this truth, brought my hands up as if to stop a blow.
I knew where my mother was. She was not in the heavenly skies but in her basement, stone-cold dead. I had her braid in my purse to prove it. I forced myself to stare at the sky—unblinking.
If she was there, I couldn't make her out. She could be a dark star behind a cloudy mass, like the tiny tumor that finally comes to kill, but I did not see her, no matter how hard I looked.
I turned onto my side. The final leavings of Hamish drained out of me. I felt spent and oddly whole and ready to sleep. I thought of the platform I was scheduled to mount later that day and the pose I was meant to strike. I was in the fourth week of sitting for Tanner Haku's Life Drawing class. I had, until the day before, been working out in front of the mirror with small weights and doing yoga even more diligently in order to keep my muscles teeming just below my skin. I knew that was what Haku wanted, and I knew adapting to the teacher's wishes was the linchpin of life modeling. Not just striking the pose but understanding what amount of physicality he or she wanted you most to bring. Natalie was having her usual cream-cheese-and-bagels semester, as the instructor she was perpetually assigned to was a
[ 8 9 ]
Alice Sebold
faux Lucian Freud. He wanted rolls of fat and body hair and a good patch of scarred or rash-strewn skin.
"Slump!" he would command.
Modeling had been something I'd talked her into. She had been reluctant at first, self-conscious of her body, but it had led to a part-time job in the bursar's office, and now she balanced the two.
I pushed myself up off the ground and stood, gathering my shoes and purse and finding my keys with the trusty flashlight attached. This, like the cell phone, had been another motherinspired gift. I had often approached the mall like a sergeant arming a battalion. Mother and I would have cell phones. Mother and I would have flashlight key chains. Mother and I would have new stainless-steel teakettles, down-filled pillows, Scotchgarded all-canvas slipcovers. If. Then. If we shared X, then all would be ready
Barefoot, I left my car and walked onto the lawn. The grass was cool but dry against my feet, the heavy dew still hours away. All in all, it was early. Somewhere, Westmore students vomited in the shrubs at the edges of half-acre lots in which kegs sat on back porches. Teenage girls passed out in places they shouldn't, and Sarah would be, if I knew her, just starting her night out in the East Village. It took me a moment to remember her current boyfriend's name, but as I reached up to touch the branch of the dogwood tree, I remembered its filLin-the-blank quality. Joe or Bob or Tim. A one-syllable, easily replaceable name. Like Jake.
I walked to the center of my front lawn and lay down, spreadeagled.
I looked up at the stars. How did I end up in a place where doing such a thing marked you for crazy, while my neighbors dressed concrete ducks in bonnets at Easter and in striped stocking caps at Christmas but were considered sane?
I let my shoes and purse fall from my hands. Only a few stars were out. The earth was cold beneath me. "There are children
[88]
The Almost Moon
starving in China," my mother had frequently said to me when I gorged on food.
"That doesn't mean I'm not hungry," I whispered now. I thought of her face when I had brought Jake from Wisconsin to meet them. He had been the first, and last, direct challenge to her power. She had welcomed him with a floor show so extreme that it was almost painful to watch. She forced herself to smile and bow and scrape as if he were the lord of the manor and she merely a lowly thing. Why hadn't I seen the truth? She had a steely resolve that surpassed anything Jake and I might build.
Our swizzle-stick empire was so fragile in the end. "The only thing you've ever loved is your mother!" he had yelled at me. I had refused this truth, brought my hands up as if to stop a blow.
I knew where my mother was. She was not in the heavenly skies but in her basement, stone-cold dead. I had her braid in my purse to prove it. I forced myself to stare at the sky—unblinking.
If she was there, I couldn't make her out. She could be a dark star behind a cloudy mass, like the tiny tumor that finally comes to kill, but I did not see her, no matter how hard I looked.
I turned onto my side. The final leavings of Hamish drained out of me. I felt spent and oddly whole and ready to sleep. I thought of the platform I was scheduled to mount later that day and the pose I was meant to strike. I was in the fourth week of sitting for Tanner Haku's Life Drawing class. I had, until the day before, been working out in front of the mirror with small weights and doing yoga even more diligently in order to keep my muscles teeming just below my skin. I knew that was what Haku wanted, and I knew adapting to the teacher's wishes was the linchpin of life modeling. Not just striking the pose but understanding what amount of physicality he or she wanted you most to bring. Natalie was having her usual cream-cheese-and-bagels semester, as the instructor she was perpetually assigned to was a
[ 8 9 ]
Alice Sebold
faux Lucian Freud. He wanted rolls of fat and body hair and a good patch of scarred or rash-strewn skin.
"Slump!" he would command.
Modeling had been something I'd talked her into. She had been reluctant at first, self-conscious of her body, but it had led to a part-time job in the bursar's office, and now she balanced the two.
I pushed myself up off the ground and stood, gathering my shoes and purse and finding my keys with the trusty flashlight attached. This, like the cell phone, had been another motherinspired gift. I had often approached the mall like a sergeant arming a battalion. Mother and I would have cell phones. Mother and I would have flashlight key chains. Mother and I would have new stainless-steel teakettles, down-filled pillows, Scotchgarded all-canvas slipcovers. If. Then. If we shared X, then all would be ready
Similar Books
![[Shadowed Path 01] - A Woman Worth Ten Coppers](/res/aob/book1.jpg)
