White Oleander

We walked out into the sunshine, gravely, like people after a funeral.

I took Niki into the Permanent Collection, I had to see the goddesses now. In the Indian rooms lived the rest of the ancient equation. Ripe figures dancing, making love, sleeping, sitting on lotuses, their hands in their characteristic mudras. Shiva danced in his bronze frame of fire. Indian raga music played softly in the background. We found a stone Boddhisattva, in his mustache and fine jewels. He had been through the door that Rothko painted, and held both that and the dance. He had come out the other side. We sat on the bench and allowed his heart to enter us. Other people came through but they didn't stay. Their eyes flickered on us, and they moved away. They were like flies to a stone. We couldn't even see them.

IT TOOK a long time to come down. We sat with Yvo

Suddenly I couldn't stand to be inside our cramped, ugly house, with Sergei and his goldfish, its mouth opening and closing stupidly. I took some paper and watercolors onto the porch and painted wet on wet, streaks that became Blakean figures in sunrise, and dancers under the sea. Niki came out and smoked and looked at the rings around the streetlights. Later Rena and Natalia shared their Stoli with us, but it didn't do a thing. Rena was the fox woman and Natalia an Arabian horse with a dish face. They spoke Russian and we understood every word they said.    ,

By three in the morning, I was getting awfully tired of snowflakes and the way the walls were breathing. Make tinkle for A

IN THE MORNING, I cut out words from the fu

WHO IS    ANNIE

29

As I HAD PROMISED, I accompanied Yvo

Yvo

"Dar es Salaam," I said.

"I miss him, don't you?"

"Not that much," I said. "He's way older than me." I imagined a big blond man who brought me dolls from his different tours. Heidi dolls, dope hidden up their skirts.

"He sent me five hundred dollars for the layette," she said.

"Made me promise not to go to yard sales. He wants everything brand-new. It's a waste of money, but if that's what he wants ..."

This was fun. I was never a little girl playing games with other little girls, dolly mommy daddy games.

They showed her how to hold the baby to her breast, holding the breast in one hand. She suckled the plastic child. I had to laugh.

"Shhh," Yvo

Later, Yvo

They explained about the epidural and drugs, but no one there was going to have drugs. They all wanted the natural experience. It all seemed wrapped in plastic, unreal, like stewardesses on planes demonstrating the seat belts and the pattern for orderly disembarkation in case of crash at sea, the people taking a glance at the cards in the seat pocket in front of them. Sure, they thought, no problem. A peek at the nearest exit and then they were ready for in-flight service, peanuts and a movie.

RENA SOAKED UP the fierce April sun in her black macrame bikini, drinking a tumbler of vodka and Fresca, she called it a Russian Margarita. The men from the plumbing contractor next door loitered by the low chain-link fence, sucking their teeth at her. She pretended she didn't notice, but slowly applied Tropic

Tan to the tops of her breasts, stroked down her arms, while the workmen grabbed their crotches and called out suggestions in Spanish. The metal chaise was half-collapsed beneath her, we were lulled by the sound of the rusty sprinkler watering the lawn of crabgrass and dandelions.

"You're going to get skin cancer," I said.

She rolled her bottom lip out. "We 're dead long time, kiddo." She liked to say these American words, knowing how they sounded in her mouth. She lifted her Russian Margarita, drank. "Naqdaroviye."

It meant to your health, but she didn't care about that. She lit a black cigarette, let the smoke rise in arabesques.

I was sitting on an old lawn chair in the shade of the big oleander, sketching Rena as she soaked up the blistering UV rays. She sprayed herself with a small bottle filled with ice water, and the men watching over the chain-link fence shuddered. You could see the shape of her nipples through the knitted fabric. She smiled to herself.

This is what she loved, to make a few plumber's grunts come in their pants. A sale, a Russian Margarita, a quickie in the bathroom with Sergei, that was as far into the future as she cared to look. I admired her confidence. Skin cancer, lung cancer, men, furniture, junk, something would always come along. It was good for me to be around her now. I could not afford to think about the future.