Free Sourland by Joyce Carol Oates Page A

her body as if a coarser skin were pushing through, her husband would never notice.
    She hurried downstairs, she was kneeling with the children. Hugging the little girl, the little boy. Mommy? Mom- my ? In two arms she hugged them, what did they have to show her? Easter eggs? So many? Yes they were beautiful but hadn’t Ismelda understood that Mommy wanted her to wait, they would make the eggs together? She spoke sharply to Ismelda at the stove, Ismelda didn’t seem to hear, it was a maddening trait of hers, seeming not to hear so her employers had to raise their voices, invariably you sounded like a bully, a fool, raising your voice to a Filipina woman scarcely five feet tall, staring at you with hurt eyes. And the children were clamoring at her, suddenly she wished them gone, all of them gone, banished from her so that she could think of her lover. I am a murderer she thought. I am the one. Her children crowded her, adoring.

BONOBO MOMMA
    T hat day, I met my “estranged” mother in the lobby of the Carlyle Hotel on Madison Avenue, New York City. It was a few weeks following the last in a series of surgeries to correct a congenital malformation in my spine, and one of the first days when I could walk unassisted for any distance and didn’t tire too quickly. This would be the first time I’d seen my mother since Fall Fashion Week nearly two years ago. Since she’d divorced my father when I was eight years old my mother—whose professional name was Adelina—spent most of her time in Paris. At thirty she’d retired from modeling and was now a consultant for one of the couture houses—a much more civilized and rewarding occupation than modeling, she said. For the world is “pitiless” to aging women, even former Vogue models.
    As soon as I entered the Carlyle Hotel lobby, I recognized Adelinawaiting for me on a velvet settee. Quickly she rose to greet me and I was struck another time by the fact that my mother was so tall . To say that Adelina was a striking woman is an understatement. The curvature of my spine had stunted my growth and even now, after my last surgery, I more resembled a girl of eleven than thirteen. On the way to the hotel I’d become anxious that my beautiful mother might wince at the sight of me, as sometimes she’d done in the past, but she was smiling happily at me—joyously—her arms opened for an embrace. I felt a jolt of love for her like a kick in the belly that took my breath away and left me faint-headed. Is that my mother? My—mother?
    Typical of Adelina, for this casual luncheon engagement with her thirteen-year-old daughter she was dressed in such a way—cream-colored coarse-knit coat, very short very tight sheath in a material like silver vinyl, on her long sword-like legs patterned stockings, and on her feet elegantly impractical high-heeled shoes—to cause strangers to glance at her, if not to stare. Her ash-blond hair fell in sculpted layers about her angular face. Hiding her eyes were stylish dark glasses in oversized frames. Bracelets clattered on both her wrists and her long thin fingers glittered with rings. In a hotel like the Carlyle it was not unreasonable for patrons to assume that this glamorous woman was someone , though no one outside the fashion world would have recalled her name.
    My father too was “famous” in a similar way—he was a painter/sculptor whose work sold in the “high six figures”—famous in contemporary Manhattan art circles but little-known elsewhere.
    â€œDarling! Look at you —such a tall girl—”
    My mother’s arms were thin but unexpectedly strong. This I recalled from previous embraces, when Adelina’s strength caught me by surprise. Surprising too was the flatness of Adelina’s chest, her breasts small and resilient as knobs of hard rubber. I loved her special fragrance—a mixture of flowery perfume, luxury soap, something