Twenty‑two

You’re almost black and I’m white as a Q‑ tip; you’re cheerful and I’m melancholy.

I remember your yellow car very clearly: a yellow Fiat 127, an old model you never see around anymore. It was funny, it looked like a cartoon, and we were the main characters. You had a raincoat the same shade, canary yellow. For me you were “the lady in yellow. ” You had two earrings that looked like sweets, yellow and soft with a slight dip in the middle. I watched them as you drove. I looked at the mole behind your ear, the mole that identified you as my mother. You were that mole. Without that mole you wouldn’t have been yourself, not even with the yellow raincoat and not even with the sweets in your ears.

After lunch we stayed on our own and played like two sisters only a few years apart. You spoke to me and I listened to you. You spoke to me because while I was listening to you I was serious and moved my head as though to say, “I understand, don’t worry, go on. ”

You told me so many things, Mum, and none of them are in my head now, but perhaps they’ve taken root in my soul.

Afterward, when you were tired of talking, I asked you, “Mum, where are we going today? ”

You shrugged, giving me a trusting smile, and said, “Who cares? Let’s just get in the car and see where it takes us! ”

That yellow 127 was enchanted, it always took us to different places, and to me those places were enchanted, too. Anonymous places, deserted, gray squares, the houses of chattering and theatrical relations, the beauty parlor run by your best friend, the one you exchanged important confidences with, thoughts about marriage and husbands. Sitting on a stool, I studied your body, covered with creams and oils. I can still smell their perfume – I only have to think about it.

Your words and your friend’s words have remained fundamental for me: I think it was in that room in the beauty parlor that my sexual journey began. I think it was there that I first heard talk about men and first began to form any sort of an idea about them. I was all ears, I was always discovering something new, some new curiosity was always being satisfied. Every day, when I asked, “Mum, where are we going? ” I hoped you would say, “To the beauty parlor! ”

The 127 was our nest, our refuge. From what? Time, perhaps. You were twenty‑ five or maybe even younger, and I was nearly five, but we both sensed that time would steal something very precious from us: our levity.

When you swapped the yellow 127 for a red car, our relationship changed, and I was forced to go alone to the enchanted places, the places of illusions.

“Tomorrow your daughter will be able to walk the roads of life alone, the roads woven of tears and dreams, and perhaps her wound will be in her heart. ”

Do you remember those words? I remember them. Every day.