A Million Aunties

by Alecia McKenzie

  He’s doing okay, thanks, he taps in reply. See you soon.

  The note from Féliciane buoys his mood. He always has the feeling that she’s looking out for him, watching his back. She and Lidia had liked each other—two women trying to reconcile their different halves. It created an instant bond.

  The next message is from Stephen: How’s it going?

  Good. Thanks, man, he responds. Call you later.

  * * *

  He’s jerked awake when a pair of nurses wheel his father into the room. Chris stands up awkwardly as they transfer their patient with practised expertise to the bed. “Everything’s all right,” one says as they leave. He wonders how many times he will hear that.

  But his father does seem fine except for the bandages around the middle of his face. Chris touches the older man’s forehead, and his father opens his eyes briefly, looks confused, says, “Ah, it’s you,” and goes back to sleep. As Chris stands by the bed, another nurse enters. She’s carrying a bouquet of yellow tulips, which she hands to Chris with a smile.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “We don’t have any vases.” Chris looks at the tag attached to the flowers, as the nurse checks his father’s pulse before going out. Love, from F. and Leroy. They’re from Féliciane and her boyfriend, whom he has somehow never met. He puts the bouquet on the windowsill and settles back in the chair to wait until the anaesthetics wear off.

  Yes, his father will be all right.

  chapter five

  Two Fur Coats

  Féliciane had just read Chris’s message when Leroy entered the apartment carrying something wrapped in plastic. She went over to meet him in the centre of the living room and he kissed her lingeringly, still holding onto the package, which formed a soft bulk between them. He looked pleased with himself. Like a showman, he slowly pulled the garments from the covering and laid them on the sofa. Fur coats. Two of them.

  “Oh my God,” Féliciane said. “What am I going to do with two fur coats, Leroy? They’re fake, right?”

  “Wear them. New York cold enough.”

  “But you know fur is not my thing. People might start coming up to me and offering me money to do you-know-what. One of my friends said that used to happen to her all the time.”

  So Leroy told her this joke about a woman who was walking proudly down Broadway in her brand-new fur coat when a man ran up to her with a spray can. “Do you know how many animals had to die for you to have this coat?” the man yelled. And the woman turned and said calmly but loud enough for passersby to hear: “Do you know how many nights I spent on my back to have this coat? You better put that fucking spray can away.” And the guy was so shocked that he quickly disappeared.

  Féliciane didn’t find this funny at all. She stared at Leroy as he laughed his head off, wondering how she had ended up with a shopaholic. That was supposed to be her domain. But Leroy couldn’t pass a store without buying something. All crap, of course, Féliciane thought. Yet, how could you fault a man who constantly brought you presents? And it wasn’t as if he was spending her money. Her friend Cecile, for instance—she had a banker husband who took money from their joint account to buy Cecile gifts. And Cecile was always complaining to Féliciane, “If I wanted a gold bracelet, I would’ve bought the damn thing myself. At least it would be something I could wear. He has horrible taste.”

  “I totally understand,” Féliciane had said during one of their let-off-steam chats. “I guess Leroy likes to spend because he never had that kind of money growing up. You know, he makes better money than a lot of bankers, and if you don’t believe me, just try calling a plumber and see how much it costs.”

  “Tell me about it,” Cecile had said, rolling her eyes. “Plumbers are the new bankers.”

  That’s how Féliciane had met Leroy, over a blocked-up toilet. She’d got his number from Stephen, who knew him through somebody else who’d had to summon him during the night to avoid a flooded bathroom. It seemed like everybody up here kept in touch with people they knew from an earlier life. So she’d called Leroy. He came, and she watched him from the doorway as he worked, his movements seemingly efficient. He talked with hardly a pause, asking her where she came from and what she did. He said he’d always liked to draw as a child, but how could you make money doing that? And Féliciane said, “You should ask your friend Stephen. He’s the expert. He represents all the artists I know.” She didn’t tell Leroy about her inheritance, and he still didn’t know about it. She told him instead, truthfully, that her parents had bought the apartment for her.

  But those fur coats. She’d never worn fur, and every time she saw a woman in one, it made her think of Miss Pretty, the woman on the island that Stephen had told her about, who walked from one place to the next, wearing fur under the blazing sun. He’d told her the story when they’d been close, when he’d let down his guard for a too-brief couple of nights. But that was all water under the bridge. Now he was only her agent, the same as with Chris and the others he represented.

  She asked Leroy what she should do with the damn coats, and he answered, “Do whatever you want.” She wasn’t sure if he really meant it, or if he was hurt or offended, but she decided to go ahead and paint the coats since she had an exhibition coming up in five weeks anyway. She would paint faces on them, a woman with flowing, gold-tinted dreadlocks, the hair streaming behind her as she walked.

  Féliciane loved living in New York, feeling this was finally a place she could stay. She’d grown tired of London’s gloom soon after she finished her studies, just as she’d been drained by Paris: the rudeness, the aggression, the let’s-have-another-demonstration mentality, the I’m-better-than-you philosophy. Her memory of the only exhibition she’d had in her home city still rankled. After a successful run, during which her family and friends had supported her by buying items they’d probably throw away, she’d asked the gallery owner, Bertrand, for the money due her, and he’d paid her a fraction of what she was owed. When she demanded the correct amount, he’d sniffed, “Tu n’es malheureusement pas une artiste qui peut imposer ses conditions.” And he’d refused to pay. She’d been shocked at the level of condescension and arrogance, although she’d lived amidst this all her life. She discarded the idea of getting her father involved, as he could’ve sent a letter threatening legal action, but she knew then that she needed a break from her country.

  Still, you can’t keep moving. She hoped things would work out so that she and Leroy stayed together, although one could never know. People come, and people go.

  The first time Leroy slept at the apartment, he woke her up in the early hours of the morning, saying she was talking in her sleep.

  “You kept on saying ‘Miss Pretty.’ Who’s Miss Pretty?”

  And Féliciane mumbled, “Ma tante,” and kept her eyes closed. He held her and went back to sleep. He didn’t understand what she said then, but now he would recognize the words for “My aunt.” He’d been learning some French phrases and he yearned to go with her to France. But he was in for a long wait as Féliciane had no desire to go home just yet.

  She didn’t tell him about Miss Pretty because she would’ve had to tell him about Stephen, and it might have been hard to explain a connection forged through knowing that you both were essentially the same—terrified of connections. She and Stephen understood each other too well. That was part of why it hadn’t worked, would never work. She might eventually tell Leroy, if the need arose. For now she kept thinking of Stephen and Miss Pretty as she painted the fur coats and prepared the other pieces for the exhibition.

  Some days she went to the studio to work, although it wasn’t the same since Chris had left, even if other artist friends sometimes came in to borrow the space. She hoped Chris had found a measure of healing on the island and had come back in better shape than when he left. She was glad he had returned, even if it was just to care for his father. What had happened to Lidia could’ve happened to her too, or to any of her friends. Wrong place. Wrong time. You could have a lot of luck or a
lack of it. Still, she wished it hadn’t been Lidia.

  Other times she worked at home, happy to be in the apartment. It had two small bedrooms and a big living-dining area—spacious for New York. She loved the gleaming wooden floors, and the light, especially the light. Since the apartment faced southeast and the buildings across the street were lower, the front room was awash in light from late morning until the sun went down. Féliciane used one of the bedrooms to store her art material and some of Leroy’s more outlandish purchases—the djembe drum, the carved Kenyan stool—while a few of her paintings stood on easels in the living room. She knew that her friends wondered how a plumber and an artist could afford to live in such a place, but as Leroy always said, “It’s none of their rass business.” Several people had tried to pry into their lives, saying things like, “Leroy must be doing very well,” but Féliciane would just nod vaguely and leave them to their wonderings. Her motto was: never talk about your inheritance. It was something she’d grown up with—never tell them how you make it. She came from a country where everyone had a hidden stash, or some kind of scam going, some kind of arnaque, and it was just something you learned to deal with. As for the inheritance, it had come from her grand-mère, whose father had been a notaire. Her grandmother had left all the grandchildren, Féliciane and her cousins, a tidy sum. Such a legacy was a true gift from the gods when you chose to do art, or when art chose you. Still, the apartment had come relatively cheap because the building across the street was a mafia hangout. They discovered this after her mother and father had signed the papers. When Féliciane paid attention, she could see the men coming in and going out at all hours of the night. It was always better to mind your own business.

  Leroy had told her he’d been living in New York for donkey years. He’d come with his mother when he was fifteen, and while his mother had gone back home years later, he had stayed. Yet, sometimes Féliciane thought he was the newer arrival. He insisted on speaking as if he’d just got off the plane. “Why would I want to talk like them? You think they want to talk like me?” he said, when she asked. She didn’t see the point of that attitude, but she only shrugged; whatever made people happy. Leroy’s friends told her that she sounded like him when she spoke English, and they found that to be hilarious—a Frenchwoman who had an accent in English like she was born on the island. But she had in fact learned most of her spoken English from the people she hung out with in London, people from the islands, and now Leroy. Her book-English had come from her high school, the Lycée Manislas in the sixth arrondissement where you had to choose what to do with your life three years before you graduated. Everything was set out for you. Féliciane had followed the route and then escaped as fast as she could, first to London to study art and then to New York to do the kind of art she wanted. In between, she’d tried to give her homeland another chance to make her stay, but it hadn’t worked.

  She knew she appeared as if she might’ve come from the islands, though, and sometimes she entertained herself by pretending. That was the thing with her kind of skin, you could be from anywhere, and it confused the people she met for the first time. When they asked the inescapable “where are you from” and she responded “France,” they looked surprised and gave a long drawn-out ooohhh. Sometimes to put them out of their misery, she would add, “My mother is from Côte d’Ivoire and my father is French.” Then she could see from their eyes that they were doing the math, blending the hues. People got uncomfortable when they couldn’t place you, when you didn’t wear the robes they expected you to wear or have the hairstyle or hair texture that provided the much-needed clues.

  It was the same with her work. Some people had a problem with installation art, even fellow artists. The thing was—she could paint on a canvas like Monet or Manet if she wanted to, and sometimes she did, but it was the placing of objects to tell a story that excited her, or the images on unusual materials, to catch viewers off guard. Both Chris and Stephen had told her not to listen to anybody, to do what she wanted, even if it was “way out there.” She couldn’t wait for Chris to return to the studio. Lidia’s death had affected everyone in their circle, affected the work, brought out the inner darkness that she was still fighting. Féliciane didn’t expect the fake fur coats to create any light, but she had to do something with them. She wondered if she should invite Chris to the exhibition, but then decided against it. Give him time, Stephen had said. She would go to visit him afterwards, when his father was out of the hospital.

  * * *

  The day before the show Leroy came home with two statues of a Rastaman. Not one, but two. Jamais un sans deux, Féliciane thought. But it might have been worse. It could’ve been three. Each statue measured a metre and was carved from a pale wood that looked like pine.

  “Where did you get those now? And who’s it supposed to be—Bob Marley?”

  “A guy from home was selling them on the sidewalk, down on Nostrand,” he answered, grinning. “It favour Bob, right?”

  “And you couldn’t resist? Really?” She didn’t know whether to smile or be angry.

  “The guy looked kinda hungry. At least now him have some money for food.”

  A long sigh escaped before Féliciane could stop it. “So where are we going to put them?”

  “How bout in front of the window, so that if the mafia people ever start firing shots, we have something to block the bullets?”

  She started giggling but then got serious when he looked at her. She remembered how afraid she’d been to go to concerts in the months after killers went on the rampage at home, and this was when she was already far away. Leroy had told her about waking up at night when he was little, with shots exploding all over like in an old cowboy movie, and it even happened during the day too, around his school. She watched him put the statues in front of the window, but far enough back so as not to block the light. He stood still for a moment to take in how they looked, and she walked over and wrapped her arms around his waist from behind. She remembered standing in that same position before, by the window, with Stephen. She blotted out the memory.

  “Do you think you could buy two more? Maybe I can put them in the show.”

  Leroy laughed, turned around, and hugged her.

  * * *

  The fur coats were the centrepiece of the show. Paul, the gallery owner, had invited the press for a preview the day before, and Patricia Merenzo had written in the Post that the show was a “bold statement for animal rights.” So, earlier in the evening, a bunch of activists had shown up, and everything was going swimmingly until the caterers brought out the foie gras on toast, the little ham sandwiches, and the wild boar terrine. Féliciane had asked the Fondation Française, which was sponsoring the show—her father knew someone who knew someone—to skip the foie gras but she supposed everyone had to do their part to support the local meat industry back home. She heard whispers of “foie gras, can you imagine,” “doesn’t she know how they force-feed those poor birds,” and “what do you expect, she’s French, even if she doesn’t look it,” and the activists marched out.

  “I did tell you to serve only ital food, right, Fellie?” Leroy said. “Why you never listen to me?”

  But she didn’t have time to explain about the Fondation, as Stephen was there now, trying to introduce her to some of the clients he’d brought along. She asked Stephen how Chris was doing, and he muttered, “Fine, fine.” Féliciane wasn’t sure what that meant, but she had learned not to ask questions. People from the island, and especially Stephen, preferred you to mind your own business, unless they gave you permission to stick your nose in.

  She looked over at Paul, whose pleasure permeated the air. He was pasting a red Sold dot onto her piece titled The Lost Sum. In it she had glued coins she’d found onto a thick slab of wood. The coins had come from all over the city. New York received thousands of tourists who lost their national currency on sidewalks and in parks, and she was always on the lookout when she went walking or jogging. Copper-coloured coins. Silver. Pale gold. Some
made of plastic. Bearing the images of kings, queens, long-dead presidents. Paul winked at her and pointed his thumb almost imperceptibly at the installation of rope and tree branches she’d named Knotted Life. It looked like that might sell as well. Some people evidently appreciated foie gras. As she gazed at Paul’s glowing face, it struck her that he was awaiting the next big thing, the next big artist since his star Cinea Verse, aka Dulcinea Evers, died several years back. But Féliciane knew she wouldn’t be The One.

  At the end of the evening, the fur coats were still there, and for a moment she and Stephen stood together in front of them, both of them drinking wine from Bordeaux. This was how they’d first met, at an exhibition, he coming to her side as she looked at one of Chris’s paintings. But the drink then had been a dark Belgian beer, produced in a monastery for centuries, the label had implied.

  “It’s Miss Pretty, right?” Stephen asked, staring at the images on the fur.

  “Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. She’s been in my head since you told me about her.”

  “It is Miss Pretty,” he repeated, and she thought of the story he’d told her, during that intense week when he’d slept at the apartment, long before Leroy came to rescue her from a malfunctioning commode.

  “Did I tell you she’s been demanding to see me?” Stephen asked now.

  Féliciane shook her head.

  “She got hit by a motorcycle. Some young guy with his new bike. And no insurance, of course. My aunt called me about it. She’s lucky she only ended up with a broken leg.” He paused. “I might fly home next weekend. Do you want to come with me?”