I'm thinking, now that Ruth is back, I might take a brief hiatus to recompose myself and not squeeze out little turds for updates.
I will be back!
I will be back!
20090512
French Kiss
The story is that I was just a kid when Mom left us, me and my father and my two sisters. My father gave me her old bathrobe she left behind, ratty blue and white striped cotton. Smelled like her perfume and Aquanet hairspray. She had a life to get on with, a life that didn't include us or who she used to be.
The next time I saw my mother she was living in Murfreesboro, Tennessee and remarried to a man she'd known for a month or two. His name was Lee and he was a burly Southern prototype who believed that heavy discipline was all it took to rear good children. Naturally, he had none of his own. I was eight at the time and I remember how my mother used to kiss him full on the lips, open mouth. I'd never seen her kiss my father that way. Me and the sisters sat in the kitchen of her two bedroom apartment and tried not to stare. Lee poked his tongue against his cheek to make sure we knew Mom had her tongue down his throat. "And that, girls, is a french kiss!" he'd bellow. Mom lowered her eyes and shook her head, her cheeks flushed. I couldn't decide if she was embarrassed or amused by the way her claret-painted lips twisted into a half-grin.
The story is that was the first time I knew I'd lost her for good. Until that visit, I thought she'd be back, thought she'd drive up to Bluffton, Indiana to that crappy rental house next to the gas station off the highway, thought she'd knock on the door in the middle of the night and we'd take her back like she hadn't stomped our hearts into dumb red confetti. I wanted the mother who hot rolled her hair into big, puffed out curls. I wanted the mother who handmade my Christmas dresses and knitted new sweaters for our birthdays. Not this mother with her fishnet stockings and dyed black hair. Her deep V-neck dresses and heels and cigarettes and french kisses.
The next time I saw my mother she was living in Murfreesboro, Tennessee and remarried to a man she'd known for a month or two. His name was Lee and he was a burly Southern prototype who believed that heavy discipline was all it took to rear good children. Naturally, he had none of his own. I was eight at the time and I remember how my mother used to kiss him full on the lips, open mouth. I'd never seen her kiss my father that way. Me and the sisters sat in the kitchen of her two bedroom apartment and tried not to stare. Lee poked his tongue against his cheek to make sure we knew Mom had her tongue down his throat. "And that, girls, is a french kiss!" he'd bellow. Mom lowered her eyes and shook her head, her cheeks flushed. I couldn't decide if she was embarrassed or amused by the way her claret-painted lips twisted into a half-grin.
The story is that was the first time I knew I'd lost her for good. Until that visit, I thought she'd be back, thought she'd drive up to Bluffton, Indiana to that crappy rental house next to the gas station off the highway, thought she'd knock on the door in the middle of the night and we'd take her back like she hadn't stomped our hearts into dumb red confetti. I wanted the mother who hot rolled her hair into big, puffed out curls. I wanted the mother who handmade my Christmas dresses and knitted new sweaters for our birthdays. Not this mother with her fishnet stockings and dyed black hair. Her deep V-neck dresses and heels and cigarettes and french kisses.
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