فصل 15

Chapter fifteen

Maturity

I was fascinated by lesbians and I feared that I was one. I noticed how deep my voice had become. It was lower than my schoolmates’ voices. My hands and feet were not feminine and small. In front of the mirror I examined my body. For a sixteen- year-old my breasts were sadly underdeveloped. The skin under my arms was as smooth as my face. I began to wonder: How did lesbianism begin? What were the signs of it?

One night a classmate of mine called to ask if she could sleep at my house. My mother gave permission. In my room we shared mean gossip about our friends, giggled about boys, and complained about school and life. Since my friend had nothing to sleep in, I gave her one of my nightdresses, and without curiosity or interest I watched her pull off her clothes. I wasn’t conscious of her body. Then suddenly, for a brief moment, I saw her breasts. I was shocked. They were small, but they were real. They were beautiful. A universe divided what she had from what I had. She was a woman.

If I’d been older I might have thought that I was excited by both a sense of beauty and the emotion of envy. But those possibilities did not occur to me then. All I knew was that I had been excited by looking at a woman’s breasts. Something about me wasn’t normal. I was miserable. I must be a lesbian. After examining myself, I reasoned that I didn’t have any of the obvious characteristics-I didn’t wear pants, or have big shoulders, or walk like a man, or even want to touch a woman. I wanted to be a woman, but that seemed to be a world which I was not going to be allowed to enter.

What I needed was a boyfriend. A boyfriend’s acceptance of me would guide me into femininity. Among the people I knew, no one was interested. Understandably the boys of my age and social group were interested in the yellow- or light-brown-skinned girls, with hairy legs, smooth little lips, and long straight hair. What could an unattractive female do?

I decided I had to do something. Two handsome brothers lived up the hill from our house. If I was going to try to have s@x,

I saw no reason why I shouldn’t experiment with the best candidates. I didn’t expect to interest either brother permanently, but I thought I could interest one temporarily.

I made a plan that started with surprise. One evening as I walked up the hill, the brother I had chosen came walking directly into my trap.

“Hello, Marguerite.” He nearly passed me.

I put the plan into action. “Hey,” I began, “would you like to have s@x with me?” His mouth hung open. I had the advantage and so I used it.

“Take me somewhere.”

He asked, “You mean you’re going to let me have s@x with your I assured him that that was exactly what I was going to do. He thought I was giving him something, but the fact was that it was my intention to take something from him. His good looks and popularity had made him so proud that he couldn’t see that possibility.

We went to a furnished room occupied by one of his friends, who understood the situation immediately, got his coat, and left us alone. He immediately turned off the lights. I was excited rather than nervous, and hopeful instead of frightened. I had not considered how physical the act would be. I had anticipated long kisses and gentle touches. But there was nothing romantic about the knee which forced my legs open, nor in the rub of hairy skin on my chest.

Not one word was spoken.

My partner showed that our experience had ended by getting up suddenly, and my main concern was how to get home quickly. He may have sensed that he had been used, or his lack of interest may have been an indication that I was less than satisfying. Neither possibility bothered me.

Outside on the street we left each other with little more than “OK, see you around.”

Thanks to Mr. Freeman nine years before, I had had no pain of entry, and because of the absence of romantic involvement, neither of us felt that much had happened.

At home I reviewed the failure and considered my new position. I had had a man. I had been had. I not only didn’t enjoy it, but whether I was normal or not was still a question.

There seemed to be no explanation for my private problem, but being a product (“victim” may be a better word) of the Southern Negro values, I decided that I “would understand it all better later.” I went to sleep.

Three weeks later, having thought very little about the strange night, I realized that I was pregnant.

The world had ended, and I was the only person who knew it. If I could have a baby I obviously wasn’t a lesbian, but the little pleasure I was able to take from that fact was overcome by fear, guilt, and self-contempt. I had to accept that I had brought this disaster on myself. How could I blame the innocent man whom I had asked to make love to me?

I finally sent a letter to Bailey, who was at sea with the navy. He wrote back, and he warned me against telling Mother of my condition. We both knew she would very likely order me to leave school. Bailey suggested that if I left school before getting my high school diploma I’d find it almost impossible to return.

During the first three months, while I was adapting myself to the fact of pregnancy (I didn’t link pregnancy to the possibility of having a baby until weeks before its end) the days seemed to mix together. The passing of time was never completely clear.

Fortunately, Mother was busy with her own life. As long as I was healthy, clothed, and smiling, she felt no need to concentrate her attention on me. As always, her major concern was to live the life given to her, and her children were expected to do the same. And to do it without being too much bother.

My breasts grew larger, and my brown skin grew smooth and tight. And still she didn’t suspect. Years before, I had developed a behavior which never varied. I didn’t lie. It was understood that I didn’t lie because I was too proud to be caught and forced to admit that I was capable of lying. Mother must have decided that since I didn’t lie I also didn’t deceive. She was deceived.

All my motions were concentrated on pretending to be the innocent schoolgirl who had nothing to worry about except exams. School recovered its lost magic. For the first time since Stamps, information was exciting for itself. I buried myself in facts, and found delight in the logic of mathematics.

Halfway through my pregnancy, Bailey came home. As my sixth month approached, Mother left San Francisco for Alaska. She was going to open a nightclub and planned to stay three or four months. Daddy Clidell was told to look after me but I was more or less left on my own.

Mother left the city with a cheerful send-off party, and I felt deceitful for allowing her to go without informing her that she would soon be a grandmother.

Two days after the war ended, I stood with the San Francisco Summer School class at Mission High School and received my diploma. That evening I revealed my fearful secret and, in a brave gesture, left a note on Daddy Clidell’s bed. It read: Dear Parents, I am sorry to bring this disgrace on the family, but I am pregnant. Marguerite.

The confusion that followed when I explained to Daddy Clidell that I expected to deliver the baby in about three weeks wasn’t funny until years later. He told Mother that I was “three weeks along.” Mother, back from Alaska and regarding me as a woman for the first time, said, “She’s more than three weeks.” They both accepted the fact that I had been pregnant longer than they had first been told, but it was impossible for them to believe that I had carried a baby for eight months and one week, without their noticing.

Mother asked, “Who’s the boy?” I told her.

“Do you want to marry him?”

“No.”

“Does he want to marry you?” The father had stopped speaking to me during my fourth month.

“No.”

“Well, that’s that. No use in ruining three lives.” There was no criticism. She was Vivian Baxter Jackson. Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between.

Daddy Clidell assured me that I had nothing to worry about. He sent one of his waitresses to buy dresses for me. For the next two weeks I went to doctors, bought clothes for the baby, and enjoyed the coming event.

Quickly and without too much pain, my son was born. In my mind gratefulness was confused with love, and possession became mixed up with motherhood. I had a baby. He was beautiful and mine. Totally mine. No one had bought him for me. No one had helped me through the months of pregnancy I was afraid to touch him. Home from the hospital, I sat for hours by his bed and admired his mysterious perfection. Mother handled him easily and with confidence, but I feared being forced to hold him. Wasn’t I famous for awkwardness? I was afraid I might drop him.

Mother came to my bed one night bringing my three-week-old baby. She explained that he was going to sleep with me.

I begged uselessly. I was sure to roll over and crush out his life or break his bones. She wouldn’t listen, and within minutes the pretty golden baby was lying on his back in the center of my bed, laughing at me.

I lay on the edge of the bed, stiff with fear, and promised not to sleep all night long. But I fell asleep.

My shoulder was shaken gently. Mother whispered, “Maya, wake up. But don’t move.”

I knew immediately that the awakening was about the baby. I became tense. “I’m awake.”

She turned the light on and said, “Look at the baby.” My fears were so powerful that I couldn’t move to look at the center of the bed. She said again, “Look at the baby.” I didn’t hear sadness in her voice, and that helped me stop being frightened. The baby was no longer in the center of the bed. At first I thought he had moved. But after closer investigation, I found that I was lying on my stomach with my arm bent at a right angle. Under the tent of blanket, formed by my elbow and arm, the baby slept touching my side.

Mother whispered, “See, you don’t have to think about doing the right thing. If you’re for the right thing, then you do it without thinking.”

She turned out the light, and I patted my son’s body lightly and went back to sleep.