Mama (18 page)

The morning she was leaving, she was standing in front of the mirror in just her panties and a black lace bra, filling in her eyebrows with pencil. Mildred had been watching her from the doorway in silence. Freda saw her, but didn't say anything.

"That school taught you how to pluck your eyebrows like that?" Mildred finally asked, coming in and sitting on the bed.

"Yep."

"Next time will you do mine?"

"Yep."

"Just when is that gon' be, anyway?" Mildred asked.

"I don't know, Mama. I've got a full load of classes next semester. There's a good possibility I can go to school full-time and work part-time, and if I do, I won't have any money to come home. But it shouldn't be more than a year, two at the most."

"Two! I could be dead in two years!"

"Mama, you will not be dead in two years. Let me have a drag of that cigarette, would you?"

"Don't you thank that brassiere is just a little big on you?" she was joking.

"If you like it, you can have it, Mama."

"Naw, naw, naw. I don't want to take nothing off your back, girl, damn."

"Mama, you can have it, it's just a bra. Here," she said, unhooking it. "Wait a minute, I've got something else I wanted to give you." Freda opened one of her suitcases and handed Mildred four fifty-dollar bills.

"For me?" Mildred asked, surprised. "Oooo, yum, yum, yum. Thank you, baby. You sure you can afford all this? You know I can use it, but I don't want you to go home broke."

"I'm not broke, Mama," she lied. "You like these?" Freda held up a pair of silver earrings shaped like long teardrops.

"For me too?"

"If you want 'em."

"Want 'em! I don't like to be greedy, chile, but I've been watching them dangle in your ears since the day you got here. This is real silver, ain't it? Put 'em on me, right now, would you? Curly gon' be sick when she see these." Mildred was already admiring herself in the mirror. "How much you pay for 'em?"

"I don't know, Mama. Ten or fifteen dollars, maybe."

"I always knew you would grow up to have good taste. If you don't use nothing else I taught you, don't ever lose that. Don't waste your time or your money on cheap shit, baby, 'cause all you'll end up doing is paying for everythang twice."

Eleven

"D
O I WANNA COME
to Los Angeles? Is the sky blue? Do a bear shit in the woods?" There was no doubt in Mildred's mind whether or not to accept Freda's invitation. Hell, she'd seen a rat the size of a cat run under her bed, the front porch had finally caved in and torn off part of the roof in the living room, and to top it off, the septic tank had backed up and the toilet wouldn't flush. Mildred had felt so hard-pressed that she went ahead and moved into the projects. And Money had almost driven her crazy. He had stayed in and out of trouble and was just finishing six months at Ionia Men's Facility, which was a nice way of saying prison. He was coming home next week, but Mildred was glad she wasn't going to be here.

She asked Faye Love if she could borrow two of her good suitcases. Mildred never was one to let a man come between friends, although nothing ever came of Faye and Spooky. Faye, who had been to California before, was extremely jealous when Mildred told her. "You won't like it. I can tell you that right now," she said. "It's too damn hot, too big, and everythang is so spread out, you gotta ride in a car just to go to the grocery store. You better pray on your mama's grave there ain't no earthquakes when you get out there. Be just your luck, wouldn't it, Milly?"

"Chile, I'm ready for a earthquake and a hurricane and a tor nado, if it'll get me the hell away from here for a few weeks. And you can keep your thoughts to yourself, Faye. A herd of cattle couldn't stop me from getting on that plane. And don't let me hit the number before I leave. Hot damn!"

Mildred dipped into her rent money to buy a decent pair of white pumps and matching purse, a half slip, a couple of cotton panties, and a push-up bra. She knew she wouldn't get evicted from the projects. Everybody was always behind anyway.

Curly Mae let Mildred borrow four of her best summer dresses. "Chile," Curly said, rummaging through her closet to find something else Mildred might want to take with her, "if one of my kids was to get near a college and send me a one-way ticket to hell, I'd be out of here so fast, you wouldn't see nothing but the trail of dust behind me! You ought to be proud, Milly, you raised them kids right. I can't understand what's happened to old knuckleheaded Money, but you know how boys are. You hit the jackpot with them girls, though. Just keep it up."

What Curly had said about the girls was almost true, but not quite. Mildred thought Bootsey was getting too grown, and it was getting so that Mildred had to smack her every now and then just to let her know she wasn't as grown as she thought. She was always trying to prove she could do things better than Freda. Always sewing something or being creative in the kitchen. But her meals were usually too creative to be edible, and the clothes she made really did look homemade.

Angel, on the other hand, was still too damn quiet. She was like a cat. Look up and she'd be standing right next to you. Mildred thought of her as sneaky. She knew that behind Angel's gentle and sweet exterior, she was a slick number. Mildred didn't trust her out of her eyesight. To tell the truth, Angel was the only one who truly eluded her. She didn't know what to make of her. She'd just have to wait and see, and hope for the best.

Doll was already boy crazy. Every time Mildred turned around, she was drawing hearts with her and some new boy's initials in the middle, with an arrow darting through it. She talked on the phone nonstop. Mildred's instincts told her that Doll was probably going to be hot in the ass, and she dreaded the day when the girl found out about sex, if she hadn't already. Doll was too pretty; it was already going to her head. Thought she was gorgeous because her hair wasn't kinky and it didn't have to be straightened. It got so that Mildred made her wear ponytails to stop her from sweeping it away from her face like those white girls did in shampoo commercials.

"You gon' send me a postcard, ain't you Milly?" Curly asked.

"If my name is Mildred Peacock I'll send you a postcard. I might just call your old silly behind." Mildred had stopped using Billy Callahan's last name because she had never liked it anyway. Besides, she felt like a Peacock.

She'd been packed for three days now, and the night before she was leaving, Mildred could hardly sleep. She was too excited. Couldn't remember the last time she'd been this anxious about anything. She had put a fresh red tint in her hair so that it shone like copper, and Connie James had pressed it hard and curled it tight. She had had Angel polish her fingernails because she was too nervous. And she had even given herself one of those oatmeal facials, like Freda had showed her.

In the morning she took two nerve pills, ran her bathwater extra hot, and poured an excessive amount of bath oil in it to make sure the bubbles rose higher than the tub. She soaked until the last bit of suds disappeared, and when she finally got out, she talcumed her body down and misted it with Emeraude. She put on too much makeup because she was trying to hide the dark circles under her eyes. She wore bright orange lipstick, which complemented her skin and hair, and blotted her lips on a Kleenex. She tucked the bottom one in.

The airplane ride made Mildred giddy. A double shot of bourbon on top of another nerve pill helped to relax her, but not so much that she was able to fall asleep during the four-hour flight. Besides, she didn't want to miss a thing. "Just thank," Mildred said out loud, as she watched the clouds float by her window, "I'm going to visit my daughter in California."

When she spotted a copper-colored Freda at the arrival gate, Mildred hollered out, "Here I am!" And Lord have mercy, the girl had on skintight blue jeans. And she was wearing a man's sleeveless undershirt that had been dyed like a bleeding rainbow, and above and beyond everything else, the girl wasn't wearing a brassiere! But hell, it had been over a year since Mildred had seen Freda, and she told herself she wasn't going to start out by telling her how tacky she looked.

She kissed her oldest daughter real fast, getting lipstick all over her cheek, and pushed Freda away so she could get a good look at her.

"Since when did you stop wearing a brassiere?"

"It's too hot out here to wear a bra, Mama."

"Yeah? It can't get that damn hot. And when we get to where we going, you better find one. I ain't running around here with you bouncing around like some jumping beans." Freda hadn't forgotten her mama's bossiness, but decided she would comply this once to avoid any more arguments.

As the taxi drove out of the airport, Mildred thought she was dreaming. Row after row of palm trees lined both sides of the streets, and the sun was piercing through their leaves.

"So, these is palm trees, huh? Lord have mercy. Don't look like they give off much shade, though, do it?"

Freda just laughed.

Mildred didn't say anything for the longest time. And even though the taxi driver had his air conditioner on, Mildred rolled her window down and let the ninety-degree heat hit her in the face. She didn't even know how hot it was. She was too busy looking at the mountains, the beautiful houses, the tall buildings, and the people driving all these brand new cars, many of which she'd never seen before in Michigan. When the taxi finally pulled up in front of a white stucco building, Freda dragged the suitcases from the car.

"This damn sure ain't nothing like Point Haven, is it?" Mildred asked. "Everythang is so clean and bright. Look at these streets, they all paved. And everybody must sweep their sidewalk every day or something, huh?"

"No, Mama. The city keeps it clean like this. Did you bring enough clothes, or what? You're only staying two weeks. Looks like you brought enough things to last at least a month."

"If I like it, I might stay longer than two weeks, so shut up. I swear, if you knew how you looked without no brassiere. It looks downright nasty. Gon' get your little fast ass raped again out here if you don't stop thinking you so cute."

Now why'd she have to go and say that, Freda thought. She had done such a fine job of forgetting that awful day. Mildred interrupted her thoughts.

"How far are we from Hollywood?"

"This is Hollywood, Mama."

"No shit," she said, grinning.

"No shit. Look. Over there through the smog. See those hills? That's Hollywood, where the movie stars live. On a clear day, you can see the sign. As soon as you get some rest, we'll get on a bus and go see some of it, okay?"

"Rest? Girl, I ain't tired. You thank I'm some old woman or something. I'm only thirty-seven. I probably got more energy in my baby finger than you got in your whole body."

They opened the wrought-iron gates that led into the courtyard of Freda's building. A calm and empty swimming pool stood in the center. There were two floors of apartments surrounding it like a motel. Rock and roll music was drifting out of open doorways, and a few people were barbecuing on hibachis. Some of Freda's neighbors waved and welcomed Mildred to LA. Invited her to stop by for at least one drink before she left. Said they had heard all about her and told her she didn't look old enough to be Freda's mama. Mildred felt like a celebrity.

"Is that a real swimming pool or am I still dreaming?" Mildred asked.

"It's real Mama. I thought I told you I had a pool."

"You did, but I thought you meant the kind you had to fill up with a hose."

"Just about everybody has pools in LA."

"Some people really know how to live, don't they, baby? How much rent you paying for all this? I bet you picked the most expensive building in town, didn't you?"

"It's pretty cheap, Mama, believe me."

"Yeah, I betcha," Mildred said, blushing. Her daughter had already started to move up in the world, and Mildred was proud, but she didn't know how to say it without sounding corny.

Once they had settled into Freda's apartment, Mildred walked to the picture window and looked up into the hills. This sure was pretty. And this glittery ceiling was too much. Mildred didn't much care for the pea-green carpet, or that monstrosity of a plaid couch, but she wasn't going to say anything about it.

"Did you pick out this furniture?"

"No, this apartment was already furnished," Freda said.

Then Mildred started scouting around. She was looking for dust, spiderwebs, anything that looked amiss, but she couldn't find anything. "You keep this little place pretty clean, huh? How much did you say you were paying for it?"

"I didn't say."

"Well?"

"A hundred and ten."

"Really," was all she said.

Mildred picked up a brown and green plaster-of-paris vase Freda had bought in Tijuana. "You collect some nice creative art," she said. Iridescent posters of Jimi Hendrix and all the signs of the zodiac hung on the wall, along with a few other atrocities splattered with psychedelic paint that glowed in the dark. "This place ain't bad, ain't bad at all. I'm proud of you, baby." There. She'd said it. And that's all Freda had been waiting to hear.

"Thank you, Mama. I'm glad you are."

Freda had worked overtime for the past three months so she could pay for Mildred's trip and finally buy some new glasses, dishes, towels, throw rugs, and a real chenille bedspread. She had also stayed up half the night making sure everything was spotless.

During the next two weeks they walked block after block down Sunset Strip and Hollywood Boulevard. Mildred kept gloating about how Curly and Faye would just die if they could see her. She snapped her Instamatic, using up two whole rolls of film the first day. They went to Grauman's Chinese Theatre, where Mildred stepped on the stars' footprints and reminisced about the old movies, to the Wax Museum, and to a taping of a Dionne Warwick special, which almost floored Mildred. She couldn't wait to get back home and tell Curly about this. They took buses to Beverly Hills where they window-shopped because Mildred was hesitant about going inside. Freda told her that this was America, that her money was as good as anybody else's, so Mildred spent three dollars and bought Curly a limegreen ashtray with a gold map of the movie stars' homes painted on it. They went to Century City and had lunch in an outdoor café. They went to a market, where Mildred had to touch the oranges and lemons and grapefruits and limes just to make sure they were real and bought a grocery bag full of them to take home. She'd never even heard of an avocado, and didn't much care for them when Freda made her that guacamole. By the end of two weeks, Freda had spent almost every cent she had put aside for her mama's visit, but she couldn't remember having had this much fun with anybody, and it had been well worth every penny.