The Goddesses of Kitchen Avenue: A Novel Read online

  It’s boring. I’m bored out of my mind. Bored with myself. Bored with this house. Bored, bored, bored. Bored enough that I’ve actually had clean-shaven legs every day for a week. And my eyebrows are perfect. Just finished plucking them, as a matter of fact (and the chin hairs and the chest hairs—why didn’t anyone ever tell us about the hair angles of middle age? If I ever land in the hospital for more than a week, you have to promise to bring me Nair, or I’ll come out looking like something that belongs in the circus).

  As for the rest, Rick’s still living in his tawdry little apartment across town and everybody keeps telling me I should be glad he didn’t move in with her, but I don’t know what difference it makes, since he’s not living with me. Actually, it’s not a tawdry apartment at all. It’s a charming Victorian place and he’s made it all homey with pictures and I really wish he were suffering in a poverty of homemaking, but he’s always been pretty good at that. There are pictures on the walls and plants at the windows and he makes his bed and keeps the place vacuumed. He keeps talking about getting a kitten, but he hasn’t done it yet.

  And you want to know how I know what the apartment looks like since

  I lift my head at the sound of a motorcycle on the street, trying to resist the swift pose of waiting that straightens my body. But my head tilts of its own accord toward the sound, listening for the differences that will tell me if it is the bike I want it to be—an engine so carefully tended that even though it’s more than thirty years old, it sounds like the luxurious purr of a tiger.

  It stops in the driveway and I close the e-mail, fast, click open the word-processing program, and pick a document at random. I’m hurrying, feeling the long seconds of the opening of each window like an ice age, and while the document is groaning its way to open, I reach behind me for the stack of research papers I’ve collected on Lorca, flip one open on the keyboard. I even remember to slap my glasses on my nose before he rings the bell. Twice in quick succession, our signal.

  “It’s open!”

  No matter how I brace myself, no matter how often I tell myself it’s time to get over this, the look of my husband catches me right below the breastbone. A pain.

  “Hey,” I say in the direction of the computer, and pretend to save a file. He doesn’t know the difference, really, but it makes me feel better. I stretch, as if I’ve been sitting there a long time. “What’s up?”

  Rick stomps his feet. “Gawd, it’s getting cold out there.” Unbuttoning his parka, he tosses back the hood, showing thick black hair that looks all the darker for the streaks of silver showing in it. Black licorice hair. His goatee, which he’s worn since we met twenty-five years ago, is showing the same frost. It only adds to the devilish aspect that’s always appealed to me so damned much. He’s wearing my favorite shirt, a vivid blue corduroy that makes his eyes look like chips of turquoise.

  I flip the pages on the Lorca paper closed. Wait. It seems very quiet all of a sudden. I can hear his breathing, the ring of wind chimes from next door. Rick tosses desultorily through the mail I leave for him on the table by the door, leftover stuff that doesn’t go to his house. Bills. Credit-card offers. “I came by to see if Annie wants to go get something to eat with me,” he says, finally.

  Annie, our youngest. “She’s working tonight, Rick.” Just as she has every Sunday night for the past six months, though I don’t add this. He’ll remember as soon as I say it out loud.

  “Oh. Right.” He smooths his mustache. Nods. “Well, then, how ’bout you? You want to grab a quick bite somewhere?”

  Very carefully, I say, “No, thank you. I just had some soup.”

  “Oh, boy!” It’s kindly mocking. “Made from scratch?”

  “Just some chicken and stars.”

  He inclines his head, looks me over. “You’re getting pretty skinny, kid. C’mon—a nice T-bone, a baked potato, all the trimmings? I won a little Lotto last night. Wanted to spread the joy.”

  The question is too unbelievably obvious, and would sound catty anyway: Why not take Carolyn? “I’m kind of in the middle of something. Thanks for the offer, though.”

  A shrug. He looks away, drops the mail on the table. “No big deal. I guess I’ll … uh … take off, then.”

  “Do you want me to have Annie call you when she gets in?”

  “Yeah, that’d be good.” He turns toward the door, putting his hands in his pockets. “Ah! I almost forgot.” He carries over a handful of highlighter pens in pastel shades—green, yellow, pink, blue—at least a dozen. “They had these on special at Wal-Mart and I know you never go in there. Thought you could use them. You know, for your research and all.”

  There’s a cut on one of his knuckles that I haven’t seen, one that hadn’t been properly tended, by the angry look of it. I want to touch it, offer medicinal advice, and force myself not to. Up close, he smells of himself, a scent I’ve been trying to wash out of the pillows for three months now. I can’t look at him as I accept the pens, feel his index finger brush over my palm. “Thanks.”

  “You all right?”

  “Could you just go now, please?”

  He backs away. “Sure.” Another step, a pause. I wait, gritting my teeth. “Sure,” he says again. “Sorry. I’ll talk to you tomorrow or something.”

  I sit there frozen and staring at the highlighters, hearing the Indian’s engine fire up and roar away, fade into the distance. I’m holding the pens so tightly that my wrist starts to ache. “No crying,” I say aloud firmly, opening a drawer and dumping the pens inside. “No more fucking crying.”

  WOMEN IN BOXING

  1720s: First staged fights between women in London—Bouts involved punching, feet and knee kicking to all parts of the body, mauling, scratching, and throwing, and tended to result in serious injury for one or both boxers.

  1880s: First regulations applied to the sport of boxing.

  5

  JADE

  By ten, two of my aunts have arrived. Grandmama’s sleeping, so I duck out to get some gas for my car. I got into town on fumes. Tomorrow, there’ll be a lot to do.

  That’s my excuse, anyway. What I really want is a couple of drinks. To get to the liquor store, I gotta have the gas.

  There is a pack of men at the station. I reconsider going in, just to avoid the hassle. Think again of that drink and pull in anyway. Most of the guys are young. Doesn’t matter much. Older men aren’t as mouthy as young, but they have ways of making their feelings known. I’m not in the mood for old or young.

  Pulling my hood over my hair, I get out. The wind hits my thighs and I shiver, wishing for gloves as I fit the nozzle in the tank. Gonna be hard to get used to the cold after eight years in California.

  I punch the button for midgrade unleaded. Nothing. I look over my shoulder, see that the fluorescent-lit convenience store is crowded and the two clerks have probably not heard the pump click on. I jab it again, harder. As if more force will make the bell ding more loudly behind the counter.

  Still nothing. My thighs are starting to freeze. With a sigh, I leave it and head inside.

  I see right away why the line is all male. The girls behind the counter are supple as new rubber. Their uniforms don’t do anything to hide their shapes. Smart move. Hard to go wrong catering to man’s lowest common denominator.

  My back is hurting from the long drive from California. My eyes are stinging. I have to be very careful not to think of my grandpa. Shifting from foot to foot, I try to warm up. One girl giggles when the dog at the front of the line holds on to his money so she has to tug on it.

  Good God.

  I knock back my hood and lift my chin, turn sideways to push through the knot of men. “Excuse me.” The waters part with little murmurs. Sure thing. Anytime. One brushes my breast with his arm. I flick a withering glance down his body, shove him with my elbow the smallest bit. To the girls I say, “Could you turn on that pump out there?”

  “I’ll pump it for you, baby,” says someone behind me.

  I turn
. In my boots, I’m six foot one. Taller than most of them, which gives me the advantage of looking down my nose. I give them the same once-over they gave me. Shake my head. They part to let me through, one letting go of a low rolling trill, very soft. I don’t bother to turn around again. Men.

  Outside, I jam my credit card back in the slot. Blink hard in the cold. Aside from my grandpa, men are dogs. Pigs. I don’t know why I keep hoping to find out something different.

  I drive a mile up the road to a liquor store and buy a bottle of Rémy Martin, small enough to tuck in my pocket. It makes me feel guilty—my grandmama doesn’t tolerate alcohol—but I’m thirty years old. Hot milk ain’t gonna do the trick.

  I avoid the cousins and aunties in the living room. Hide in my room behind the closed door, pour a hefty measure of cognac in a juice glass, put on Alicia Keys.

  My girl. Her first CD is just about the only thing that’s gotten me through the past eighteen months. “Fallin’ ” took on some deep meaning when Dante went to jail, mainly because of the video. Which, if you haven’t seen it, shows a woman going to see her man in prison.

  I’m wishing my mama were in the other room, but she called and said she’d be on down in the morning. One of her kids is in a little trouble. Not a child of her body, you understand, a child of her heart. She has dozens. Mostly I love her for it.

  From the trash, I pull out the picture of Dante that I tore in half, fit together the two sides of his face. My chest feels like somebody’s jumping up and down on it. Just because a man turns out to be a snake doesn’t mean you stop loving him.

  In the desk is some yellowed tape. It still sticks, and I use it to patch the picture together from the back, taking care to match the edges exactly.

  I take a long swallow of Rémy. It doesn’t burn away my self-hatred any.

  * * *

  The relatives start pouring in the next morning. Most of them get on my last nerve before an hour has passed. They fill my grandmama’s house like a flock of ravens, all noise and shine.

  Some of them are all right. Aunt Ti-ti, with her elegant head and smooth voice, Uncle Jerome with his big old laugh. Others—well. Loudmouth Tyrell, my cousin Jo Ester’s husband, with his gold tooth and constant smell of alcohol; Alberta, my grandmother’s sister, who wants to boss everybody around and takes charge of the kitchen with her hefty self; the low-life second cousins from Five Points in Denver who are all about their gangsta designer fashion show and bad manners and sulky selves. I push them up off the chairs when adults come in. “Find some way to make yourselves useful.”

  “Like what?” says Malik. He’s the leader of the second cousins, seventeen, and already six foot three. He wears a sparkling-clean jersey, jeans so big you could fit three people inside them, his boxers carefully hanging out. He stands up to intimidate me, show me how big he is. “We’re guests here.”

  “Boy, please.” I roll my eyes. “You’re not guests, you’re children, and you’re here to show your grandmother some respect, so start showing it. Get your pansy butts up and go help Aunt Alberta with whatever she needs. You give her any lip, I’ll tell all your girlfriends about changing your nasty drawers when you were two. Hear me?”

  His eyes slide away. He mutters. The others almost snicker.

  “Excuse me? I didn’t quite hear you.”

  He’s a big bad boy, but not stupid. “Yes, ma’am,” he says in my general direction.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  My mama touches my arm, bends in to talk to the boys. “How you doin’?” she cries, and hugs each one in turn. Real hugs. They can’t help but respond. She says each of their names, touches their heads and arms. “Why don’t you boys come with me and we’ll see about getting the beds made in the basement for some more folks?”

  Her way is better than mine. My tolerance for bad children stops at about age nine. Hers continues well into the early twenties. In some circles, including my world of social services, we’d call her codependent.

  She sweeps them away. Like my grandmother, she’s getting hippier and hippier as the years go by, but she’s vain about her figure and works hard to keep what she can. Today she’s wearing light blue slacks and a blouse with a peacock-feather design. Her natural hair is cut short and slicked back at the sides, which shows off her Choctaw cheekbones and long eyes. Maybe she feels my gaze, because she winks over her shoulder, making us coconspirators.

  She’s not codependent. That’s what I’d tell my work circle. It might look like it sometimes, but my mama just makes a place for people to be themselves, figure it out. One of these boys will likely land in her apartment before he’s through, trading cooking and cleaning for a room while he gets on his feet.

  The funeral is in two more days. Two more days of all this noise and nonsense, and I’m going to be ready for a shotgun and a big bottle of Rémy Martin. When the phone rings, I’m not expecting anything. I grab it to stop any more noise from polluting this world.

  “Hello.” I bark it, the way I would at work on a busy day.

  “Collect call from Dante Kingman. Will you accept the charges?”

  No, says the sensible part of my brain.

  “Yes,” says my speaking voice.

  Dante comes on the line. “Hey, baby.” His voice is a weapon, a blanket of dangerous velvet. It invites me to set down my burdens, let myself be wrapped up in it.

  Which is why I moved a thousand miles away from him.

  I have made ten thousand resolves not to let him get to me. He is twelve hundred miles away. We are divorced. He has turned out to be what everybody always said, a two-bit hustler who has a way with women.

  And still I say, “Hey, Dante.”

  “God, girl, it’s good to hear your voice. I was hoping I’d get you.”

  I’m already walking across the room, carrying the remote with me into my bedroom, and closing the door. “How are you?”

  “I’m all right, but I’m calling to see how you are, baby. You holdin’ up okay?”

  In my mind, I see my grandfather’s face. His wild salt-and-pepper eyebrows, his patient eyes. The way he worked his mouth when he had a tool in his hand. I make a little sound. “I missed him by maybe an hour.”

  “Oh, baby, I’m so sorry.”

  I cry a little bit. Dante is so patient, just makes comforting noises over the line. I imagine my head is tucked into the place between his neck and shoulder, where he smells like starch and a hot iron and Dial soap. His hand is rubbing up and down my spine, his lips on the top of my head. The vision is so real, I stay with it longer than I should.

  After a minute, I take a breath. “Sorry. Thanks for listening.” Wipe tears off my face with the flat of my hand. “How are you doing, Dante? Have everything you need?” I make a small joke. “Plenty of stamps?” Since cigarettes aren’t allowed anymore, stamps are the money of the penal system.

  His low, wicked laughter comes through the line. “I’m all right for now. I’m taking some classes, in accounting, so maybe I can do something constructive when I get outta here.” He pauses. His voice deepens, softens. “I know you don’t believe me, Jade, but I’m gonna do right this time. Goddamn, baby, I miss you.”

  I speak the truth in a whisper. “I miss you, too, Dante. So much.”

  “Don’t stay gone too long, all right?”

  “We’ll see. My grandma needs me right now.”

  “I know. Don’t forget your man needs you, too. I am your man, baby. Maybe you’re not my woman anymore, but that don’t change my heart any.”

  In front of my eyes, I see his throat, think of it against my lips. “Somebody wants the phone here, Dante. I have to go. Take care, okay?”

  “Baby, write me a letter, will you? Please?”

  “I can do that. Tonight.”

  “I love you,” he says.

  I can’t think what to say back. “Bye, Dante.” Gently, I hang up.

  Maybe I was wrong to leave California. He sounds so sad and lonely out there. The truth is, there
was a lot wrong, but none of it had to do with me doubting how much he loves me. He does.

  Dante. Ribbons of my insides fall in bloody pieces on the floor. I have to sit down on the bed and put my face in my hands, put a pillow over my mouth. I want to tell him to stop calling. I want to forget all of it, get rid of my memories, go on to the next part of my life.

  Instead, I’ll write him a letter.

  It doesn’t make any sense, this passion I feel for Dante Kingman. From the outside, I know what it looks like. One of those twisted, lust-based sexual connections in which a smart woman makes a big mistake. And maybe that’s what it is, but how could I be that stupid?

  One of the gangsta cousins bangs on the door. “Yo, Jade. You done wit’ that phone yet?”

  “I’ll bring it out in a second.” But I can’t bear to stay in the house. Trudy is going to be sick of me before we’re through, but just this minute I don’t have any other escape. I throw on my coat. On the way to the door, I dump the phone in Malik’s lap.

  always, always: garden of my agony,

  your body elusive always,

  the blood of your veins in my mouth,

  your mouth already lightless for my death.

  “Gacela of Unforeseen Love”

  FEDERICO GARCÍA LORCA,

  Translated by W. S. MERWIN

  6

  TRUDY

  Monday mornings used to be a nightmare—kids running helter-skelter, tossing through book bags for missing homework assignments, lost mittens, a shoe finally discovered behind a bathroom door, and me trying to make sure everyone had at least a few bites of breakfast, a glass of milk, some protein and carbs to see them through their days. We went through it every Monday, as if we were surprised, over and over, at the stunning return to routine.

  My fault, I’m sure. I was never able to be one of those mothers who had all important appointments written in ink on a big main calendar. In fact, I’m pretty sure they invented those reminder calls from dentists and doctors just for me.