On the Gulf

A Fugitive’s Wife

39 A FUGITIVE’S WIFE The old lady now is getting me to read letters aloud to her; furthermore, I have to answer them. She is in charge of my soul at this point. Everything depends on her. Of course, she is going to take some advantages. That is to be expected. . . . Dear Agnes paragraph indent if I do not write you more often please do not think that I am not always interested in you and your boys you are often in my thoughts do you know how to punctuate? Yes, but now I have to start over (I am giggling at my own inattention) I wrote that in the letter. To her it isn’t funny. She isn’t feeling at all well. She regards me as a bad child. I should be grateful, continually grateful. Instead, in a sense, I mock at her, whenever I behave carelessly, whenever I laugh. Your new ballet shoes arrived. They’re over there in the white box. From New Orleans. Oh! My true chord is struck. My self goes streaming toward the box, all on its toes. Restrained, I walk across to open 40 / A Fugitive’s Wife the box, standing in repose in the classic third position I often take, heel in instep. Pink! Wasn’t that what you ordered? Perfect! I thought they’d send white instead. Is your skirt pink? I can dye it. I have before. You’ve got to get well for the program. . . . Before we got the dance thing going at the Bozart, I was just a young mother with a beat-up Volkswagen and a little girl, driving to park in some bay up the beach alone, wandering afternoons among the clumps of seaweed, dodging the occasional person who wanted to talk, picking up driftwood. You can see it in advance, sanded, varnished, trimmed a little, angled to best advantage, ornamenting the chic coffee table at the cocktail hour. One day I made a good find, really remarkable, something that looked like two children with hands joined, tense and joyous with their playing. I must show it, was my impulse. Where? I sneaked it into the new development for the arts near the coast city whose name I was supposed never to mention. I’ve sneaked in here too, you realize, much like driftwood myself: mother, and daughter hardly walking yet, hardly talking yet (Where’s Dod-dee? When Dod-dee tummin?) It was there I saw the new dance stage. Chills went up and down me. I had studiously kept my leotards packed away, along with the satin slippers and the tulle skirt, the black practice shoes, the two costumes for productions at A Fugitive’s Wife / 41 the Eastern college—“Graduation Ball” and Prokofieff’s “Cinderella,” my one starring part. My head began to whirl, silently orchestrating. I stood before the window where the stage was, watching and waiting for someone to come who, I could see without speaking to them, would be in touch with what I knew. But no one came. The work on the stage was not going on and no class was then in session. The boy in the design school, which had a shop opening onto the street, had been kind and responsive. Where are you from? Staying around here? Yes, it’s good . . . I see what you see in it. Let me show you one we got last week. Maybe I’ll put yours in the window. Now I went back to him. Kathy is tired and fretting. I carry her. The ballet school. Oh, they’re going to do all sorts of modern and folk dancing too, but they haven’t got started. That’s coming later. We had this huge grant, see? Instead of coming in a whoosh the money comes a little at a time, so we opened some shops to keep going, now it’s fun, so we’ll keep them. There’s been a world of interest. Cute advertising, I say. Bozart? You like that? Sure? Y’all staying around here? Yes and no. I smile in a don’t-push-me way and he notices it. Not much difference between us, age-wise. We could for a moment be tableau stuff—mother, father, child. Except he’s gay. 42 / A Fugitive’s Wife Next step, to rig up a practice bar, realize my happiness. Mrs...