Free The Appetites of Girls by Pamela Moses Page B

gleaming through my open shutters, wakeful with eager thoughts.
    The following week, I convinced Mother to buy me a second halter top and a fitted red miniskirt with a calla lily painted on the pocket. And I began while dressing to take scraps of toilet tissue from the bathroom and fold them into two wads. These I arranged under the cotton of my blouse so that two small mounds protruded. I was learning the right clothes to wear, the way to stand with my hip askew and smile in order to draw attention. I was discovering the womanly manner of chattering nonchalantly that invited approving, winking eyes.
    No longer did I eat my suppers in solitude on the bamboo love seat in the corner, finding that if I lingered near the bar, pointing my toes, glancing every so often at the crowd, it was only a matter of time before Donavan or one of his friends approached me with a soda and soft phrases that seemed to seep through my skin. “Looking so lovely in your skirt tonight, missy.” “Such a nice smile you have, miss. Sweet like sugar.”
    One evening after Mother finished her shift, I announced to her themany attentions I had received that night, tossing my wrists as I spoke as though these were things to which I had grown quite accustomed.
    “Oh, Opal,” she said, sweeping her fingers through her hair so that it fanned behind her neck. And she shook her head, her lips curling as though I had made some silly mistake. “Lord
knows
how many drinks those men have had!”
    No! No! She didn’t understand how their eyes had glittered as they talked to me, how their voices had crooned with meaning. But before I could tell her, Mother was joined by some visitor from a neighboring table. Within minutes they were deep in conversation, their shoulders brushing, no longer aware of my presence.

    Midway through the summer, a group of twelve Americans arrived at the White Heron. They would stay for five weeks, we learned, in the guest bungalows at the far end of the courtyard. Among the twelve were two middle-aged couples, a family with three small children—white as the guinea fowl in Ezra Dupree’s coop, two young women who wore matching hair scarves, and a graying, olive-skinned man who reminded me of Cary Grant, the old movie actor. Raymond Mordue, we soon discovered, was his name.
    “
He’s
handsome, isn’t he,” Mother said, spotting him across the restaurant patio as we descended for dinner.
    “Oh, yes,” I agreed, repeating her enthusiastic tone. “Very handsome.”
    She shook her head with amusement as if she hadn’t really expected me to respond. “A little old for you, my pet, don’t you think?” she laughed.
    I smiled as broadly as I could in case she should suspect the lump tightening in my throat. Then I watched as she glided off to seat the first table of guests, the diaphanous rose of her skirt fluttering behind.
    Late into the third evening of his stay, after dining with his friends,Raymond Mordue meandered toward the dimly lit table where I had joined Mother, and asked if he might pull up a chair. He wore a thick cologne that tickled my nostrils, like the scented incense coils that burned in some of the local shops. He had just returned from traveling through all of Asia and much of Africa, he said, having recently retired from his job in advertising. He traced his tanned fingers over the tabletop as he spoke, outlining a map of his route. In the autumn, he would be joining a friend’s wine import business, but a few decadent weeks in the Caribbean seemed a perfect conclusion to his time off. Unlike the other men whose company Mother had accepted, Raymond addressed his every word to
both
of us. As he told of safaris in Kenya, mountain hikes through Tibet, he gazed into my eyes as well as Mother’s, was pleased, I thought, with my interest as much as hers. I nodded as he talked and propped my hands on the table edge, displaying the iridescent pink with which I’d polished my nails earlier in the day. Every few