by Alli Frank
“Then I’m pretty sure his interest in grabbing your dreads and taking you anywhere is nada. But I’ll give you credit for actually recognizing a hot dad when you see one, that’s progress.”
“Oh I recognize plenty of hot men, I just haven’t been bringing them home. With Etta leaving soon, guess it’s time to start imagining future possibilities. Lucky me, I have a great imagination.”
“HAAAAAAA!!!” Lola busts out like she won the lotto. “It’s about time you kicked Michael’s memory to the curb. “
Michael and I met six years ago when he was the city councilman for our district. Aunt Viv always went to the neighborhood meetings when the city councilman was attending. I thought she went to be politically active and have her voice recognized and her concerns heard, but then one night she bribed me to go with her with the promise of wings and potato salad afterward. In the first minute I knew Aunt Viv attending those meetings had nothing to do with politics.
It was love at first glance, but I didn’t make it easy for Michael. I refused to give him my number. Told him a city councilman should know how to connect with all his constituents. The next day, an eleven-year-old Etta handed me a business card and told me a guy who was kind of cute stopped by and that I should call. I took the opportunity to teach Etta the first lesson in dating that all women should know: You don’t go calling boys; they call you.
Two days later he showed up at a school tour. He took the whole tour, even asked a question during the Q and A. At the end of the tour I worked the room, talking to all the attendees except him. He waited me out. By the time the last overly engaged parent had left it was lunchtime and I was starving. I let him take me to lunch. Then I skipped the rest of the day at work and let him take me to bed.
For four years and three months Michael was the upstanding man three generations of Bordelon women had never experienced. For the first time in our lives Aunt Viv, Etta, and I did not have to do it all on our own. Something broke, Michael fixed it. Aunt Viv couldn’t reach a pot on a top shelf, Michael got it for her. Fairchild had a father/daughter dance, Etta got to go. And I got to properly fall in love for the first time at thirty-three.
Then, just a bit over two years ago Michael got an incredible job offer in Sacramento. When we were all together we encouraged him to take this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. When Michael wasn’t around, Aunt Viv assured me she would be just fine if Etta and I moved to Sacramento to be with Michael, not to mess with true love. I invited her to come along, but she told me her life was in San Francisco. Her life had been in San Francisco before I showed up as a babe and it would continue in San Francisco long after I left.
But the invitation to move to Sacramento with Michael never came. There was talk of long distance, there was talk of visiting each other on weekends, but there was never talk of becoming a real family.
Ultimately, I had to let him go for Etta. I didn’t want her watching her mother accept anything but true love and commitment from a man. She didn’t need the promise of a weekend father that I knew would eventually fade for reasons she was too young to understand. And I didn’t need a part-time lover. Alone was better than half-assed. So I took the lead and the three of us let Michael go. What was most heartbreaking was that he didn’t seem to mind going. That we, in fact, had been a layover for him on his trip to bigger and better things.
“Josie, as good as those four years were they were not worth closing up shop. Everybody needs some good lovin’.” Lola reminds me, more like a big sister than a girlfriend.
“How can you have three kids and have the brain capacity, let alone energy, to think about sex all the time? Nic is one lucky guy.”
“Oh I don’t spend my time fantasizing about having sex with my husband! You fantasize about your husband folding laundry or emptying the dishwasher or making dinner other than pizza. I think about having sex with anyone but Nic. Let’s just say I have a rich imagination, and as much as I would like to imagine you getting it on with Wonder Boy, it’s not even worth my very limited brain capacity, you know, since he’s GAY.” Lola licks the rim of her empty second glass of champagne and hops off her barstool. “Gotta go. My mini–Bruce Lee will be starving for his cheese stick. And, Josie, we are two years and a handful of months past Michael. As much as I applaud your recognition of a good-looking dad—even if he’s not straight—it doesn’t count as dating progress. Bring me a man who wants to sleep with women. That’s something I can work with.”
Every woman needs a girlfriend who speaks the truth. At almost forty it’s as necessary as a pair of Spanx.
FOUR
“Mama, we need to talk about next year.” Etta is setting the dinner table. I spy Aunt Viv fake minding her own business. She’s been washing the same bunch of collard greens for about five minutes.
“Not right now, I’m exhausted. I had my first tour today and Lola made me have two glasses of champagne.” I can feel it coming—three, two, one.
“Now, baby, I don’t want to let her go, either, but Etta’s time, it’s comin’ and Lola don’t make you do nothin’ you don’t want to do. When you two women gonna stop acting like a couple of girls? Drinkin’ on a Tuesday afternoon waitin’ on your kids. I should call child protective services on you two.” How is it Aunt Viv can simultaneously make me feel old because Etta will soon be leaving me for her own life and infantile for loving my Tuesday afternoon drinking dates with Lola? “Etta, don’t you mind your mama, you go right ahead, I can tell you have things to say. And she’s gonna listen, trust me.” Aunt Viv points her chef’s knife at me. In almost fourteen years of collective decision-making the score is currently 823 Aunt Viv and Etta to my 62, and at least 50 of those times Aunt Viv was either out of town or at least out of the house.
Etta strategically moves over to the sink to lock arms with Aunt Viv. They are now a united front looking to take me down.
It’s not that I don’t want Etta to go to college and become her own person, of course I do. Since she was small, I have planned all the ways I would make sure Etta did early adulthood differently than me. I’m thinking Cornell or Dartmouth, a rural Ivy nowhere near the distracting trappings of big-city life. Etta can study engineering, computer science, or math; she has consistently shown promise in all three areas since second grade. A gorgeous, brainy, black female with that kind of academic background will play well in the job market. Then, if she wants to go to graduate school in New York or D.C. or London on her own dime I’ll be fine with it because she will be a fully cooked human being. No pasties and full-body waxes for Etta.
Etta is a smart and focused girl. I’m not saying that as her mother, I’m saying that as a professional who spends her waking days assessing the full range of human aptitude and ability, or lack thereof. The smarts I attribute to her great Fairchild education and genetics (I was a fabulous student, just a lousy decision-maker), the focus to her long-standing dance career with the San Francisco Ballet School. Etta brilliantly uses her body to create beauty and art, something neither her absent grandmother nor I could make happen. Ballet has also kept her out of trouble, healthy, and sheltered from the trappings of the world. Fairchild and ballet are all Etta knows, and I will make sure her next step in life will be as promising (and as safe) as the last fourteen years. What I want for my child is no different than any other parent: I want Etta to be happy, to have options in life, and I want to make sure she doesn’t return to my couch. I came back to San Francisco to try to end an unfortunate two-generation cycle of Bordelon women using their bodies rather than their brains to make a living. It will be different for Etta. She will rewrite our family story to be one of brains over beauty, NOT the other way around.
Admittedly, what I don’t know is how I’m going to pay for this expensive turn of family events. Even though I’m a Fairchild alum and unquestionably an extraordinary employee (minus the crank calls I make to Roan pretending to be from his favorite Japanese restaurant informing him
there is actually pork in his beloved gyozas—take that, you vegan freak), this whole applying to college business is far more complicated than I remember and it’s leaving me with one feeling—overwhelmed. Historically, when I’m feeling overwhelmed, my MO is to work hard to ignore the situation that is creating the anxiety. This is a learned survival skill I refined early in my childhood. Whenever I would wonder why my mama left me, why she never came back, why she thought Aunt Viv would do a better job raising me than she could, I would compartmentalize my questions because when I tried to ask Aunt Viv she refused to give me answers. I was met with a dismissive, “Oh you don’t really want to know anything about that, you’ve got a good life with me haven’t you, child?” To this day I still don’t know if all that time Aunt Viv actually knew where my mother was but wouldn’t say or if Aunt Viv was as clueless as I was. Either way, growing up, my mother was not a topic up for discussion.
“Okay, you want to talk about next year. Do you have anywhere that you are planning on applying early admit? Perhaps prioritizing Cornell or Dartmouth would be a good idea. Living in upstate New York or rural New Hampshire will be a wholly different experience for you, one I think you would really enjoy.” (An opinion I have based on absolutely nothing.) “Tomorrow after school let’s talk to Krista in college counseling. She’ll help us get this whole early admit thing figured out.” Take that, Aunt Viv, I engaged in the post-graduation conversation and I nailed it. Clearly day drinking does not inhibit my above-par parenting skills.
I pull out the cushioned chair at my usual spot, excited that the dining table is crowded with a menu of catfish, greens, and cornbread tonight. Digging into my fried fish I notice Etta shoot Aunt Viv a look of panic. I put down my fork and turn a hard gaze on Aunt Viv.
Aunt Viv takes her time dabbing the corners of her mouth with her napkin and looks to Etta. It occurs to me that Aunt Viv is conveniently wearing her power wig—straightened chin-length bob with a front-bang sweep. She named this one her Queen V one day after she mistakenly heard me call it her “Queen Bey” look. All business—no bullshit.
“You go on, baby girl,” Queen V says, smoothing her manufactured hair.
“Okay,” Etta starts, barely above a whisper. “Mama, what if I was thinking of maybe, uh, ah, well . . . a less traditional type of college, but still one of the best, I promise?”
“Huh? Take that fork out of your mouth, I can’t understand you.”
“What if I was thinking of, you know, a less traditional college than the ones you’re talking about?”
“I’d say stop thinking.” I knew I was not up for this conversation after a two-champagne Tuesday. Aunt Viv needs to learn to mind her own business. I could rip that wig right off her head. Where is this coming from? Etta has never been a kid to stray from the norm, from the expected. I did too good a job making sure of it. The number of times I’ve tried to get her to skip ballet and come to the movies with me are too many to count. She refuses to miss a day of dance, not wanting to disappoint her master teacher, Jean Georges. Five days a week for the past ten years, Etta has always done exactly what she was supposed to do and that has included not ditching dance class for the movies with her mama.
“Now, Josie, don’t be so quick to judge. Your path was not so much of a straight line.”
“Exactly, Aunt Viv, and I’m going to save Etta from the sheer idiocy she may be genetically predisposed to when it comes to making big life decisions. Learn from your mother’s mistakes, Etta. The less traditional path—I’m here to say, not so glamorous. Unless you define glamorous as standing butt-ass naked in a crowded changing room as two assistants pull the skin around your kneecaps up to your mid-thighs with duct tape so your knees look unnaturally bony like a nine-year-old boy’s.”
“Hear her out, Josie. This is Etta’s life, not yours.”
“Oh, Etta’s life is my life as long as I’m payin’ for it.”
“You shush, Josie Bordelon, and listen to this child. Imagine if you had had half an inkling to call me and tell me what your twenty-one-year-old brain was thinkin’ before you marched into that college office and dropped out of NYU tryin’ to cash in on a modeling career.”
“If I had called and told you my plan you would have ripped me in two like an old rag.”
“You got that right, but I woulda listened to you first before I’d gone and done it. Etta baby, go ahead, you say your piece. Tell your mama what you’re thinkin’. And then let’s get back to dinner. God help you two if my fish goes cold.” There’s no greater offense in Aunt Viv’s world than when people around her dinner table allow her food to go cold.
Etta takes a deep breath and sets a steely stare on me. “MOM.”
“Before you go down this road, remember: I gave you life. And save that white girl Mom talk for your friends. I’m your mama and don’t you forget it.”
“Seriously, Mama?!?!?!” Etta whines, too easily thrown off her game in my humble opinion. The kid needs to toughen up before she flies the nest. She wouldn’t survive a day in New York.
“Alright, alright. Tell me what you’re thinking, I promise to have an open mind.” Under the table I cross my fingers.
“I want to apply to Juilliard.”
“Juilliard? Juilliard, Juilliard? Like in New York City, Juilliard? Like where students dance or sing or strum a guitar and hope they can audition for an understudy role in an off-off-Broadway production that pays literally nothin’?”
“Yes, that’s the one,” Etta confirms, twisting her napkin around her index finger, not meeting my eyes.
“Etta, my fondest memories of you as a child will always be you on stage, your grace, your beauty, and yes, your talent. But, OVER MY DEAD BODY will you be going to a four-year university, if Juilliard is even considered a university, to focus on dance when I have been paying thirteen years of tuition for you to get a first-class education. That is not part of the Bordelon family plan.” I’m feeling ambushed by my family. How long has Aunt Viv known and whose idea was it? And how far down this road have they gone?
“Discounted tuition,” Etta shoots back. Oh no she did not! I grip the edge of the table to hold myself back from yanking Etta out of her chair and tossing her into her room.
“Your dead body,” Aunt Viv considers, passing the collard greens. “That can be arranged. Now eat, you two. Y’all are acting a fool at my dinner table and this conversation ain’t goin’ nowhere good tonight.”
“This conversation ain’t going nowhere ever,” I mumble under my breath.
“I heard you,” Etta says, not looking up from putting vinegar on her greens.
Good, I think to myself.
FIVE
FROM: Randy Chavez
DATE: October 3, 2018
SUBJECT: School Tour
TO: Josephine Bordelon
Dear Ms. Josephine,
Mrs. Lawton told me I had to write you a thank-you e-mail after the tour, but I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say. Mrs. Lawton hired me last year because she was worried about her husband’s safety and said all the big men in Silicon Valley have bodyguards so her husband needed one, too. I thought I would be driving Mr. Lawton around, making sure no one gets close to him, getting him a sandwich from Subway, and maybe keeping my mouth shut, you know, if he had a girlfriend or boyfriend or something. In my line of work you don’t judge. I really didn’t know that by bodyguard Mrs. Lawton meant a dressed-up babysitter for her kid.
So anyway, the school tour was pretty good, not as boring as I thought it would be. I’m thinking of quitting my job, though. I’m not going back to school; I hated it the first time around. Either way, maybe sometime you would like to go out and grab a beer?
Randy
Did I just get asked out on a date by an applicant’s disgruntled staff member? Lola’s going to love this one. I always send her my best e-mails knowing these little gems make her day. If she actually sug
gests I go on a date with Randy, though, I’ll have to punch her face. Next e-mail.
FROM: Meredith Lawton
DATE: October 3, 2018
SUBJECT: Fairchild School Tour
TO: Josephine Bordelon
Josephine,
I always thought Fairchild would be the perfect school for Harrison, but once I saw the Ingenuity Lab I knew we had made the right choice! Harrison is going to die when he gets his hands on those tools. You do make the children wear hazmat suits when working with power tools right? We don’t want anything to happen to Harrison’s fingers, his piano teacher would be devastated.
Beatrice Pembrook agrees that Fairchild is the absolute best place for Harrison. Has she talked with you yet? I know it’s on her to do list, but she’s hosting a dinner for 500 this weekend to raise money for the India Basin/Hunter’s Point redevelopment project so her life is insane. It was a wonder she was able to carve out time for lunch with me yesterday. I guess that’s what the closest of friends do for one another though, am I right?
Randy, our bodyguard, should be writing you a thank-you e-mail as well. He shared with me that he could really see himself attending Fairchild alongside Harrison which makes me rest easy when I think about Harrison going off to big-boy school. There are so many crazy people in the world these days, the idea of someone coming after a high-profile child like Harrison is downright terrifying. I’m sure you can understand how having Randy there to protect him will really put Christopher and me at ease. And I know Randy is keen to stay with our family until Harrison is through middle school and has earned his black belt. Randy is beyond committed to our family, I feel so blessed. And don’t worry; Christopher will be at the parent interview, he’s devastated he couldn’t make the tour, truly. Harrison’s education is of utmost importance to him.
Off to see my meditation guru. I have upped my sessions with her to three times a week to get me through admissions season. I want to make sure in the midst of this crazy time I maintain being a centered mother and wife. It’s so important to prioritize self-care particularly during trying times, don’t you think?
