Lila Blue

by Annie Katz

I took a deep breath. It was already hard for me to listen. My mind filled with accusations and complaints and judgments. Listen, I told myself. Just listen to the story.

  "He worked in a lumber yard in Moscow where your grandfather and I had our barbershop," Lila said. "Terry stayed home in their little apartment, and they seemed happy. Their son Mark was born in January."

  She searched my face and I nodded for her to go on. I couldn't trust myself to speak. I took my hand away from hers and tucked both my hands under my legs. I stared out at the dark ocean that stretched half way around the world.

  "Terry had always been moody. I worried about that when they first started dating. David was happy and he tried to make her happy, but I think she felt trapped by having to take care of a baby when she was so young. She tried part time jobs while her parents took care of Mark, but that wasn't enough to satisfy her."

  I thought of my mother and how she wasn't satisfied unless she had a new man every six months. I tried to see David, a kid right out of high school, carting lumber around all day, coming home to a baby and his unhappy wife. Talk about trapped.

  "When Mark was two, Terry left David, and she took Mark to Texas to live with her grandmother who ran a day care business. David followed them, trying to win Terry back or get a job down there so he could be near Mark. Terry refused to speak to David, she wouldn't let him see Mark, and she began filing for a divorce.

  "David stayed in Texas a while longer, until Terry started seeing someone new, and then he gave up." She shook her head.

  "Something in him was broken when he got back to Moscow. He wouldn't work, he started drinking and I don't know what all. It was 1971 and young people were trying everything they could get their hands on. Ray and I were desperate to help him, and Terry's parents did everything they could, because they loved David too, but nothing we tried helped.

  "The turning point was when he wrecked his pickup truck on a mountain road outside of town. It was a miracle he survived, but apart from a few bad bruises and one cut on his leg from the gear shift post, he was okay." She sighed. "Physically, anyway. His body was much stronger than his spirit."

  I was beginning to get a sense of him, David, Lila's son, Mark's father, my father. I was hungry for more of the story, but I could tell Lila was tired. We'd both been through enough for one day.

  "Grandma, we can talk more tomorrow," I said. "It's okay. Really."

  I tried to smile, but my smile got all crooked and turned into something else. Then we were both crying and hugging each other and laughing and crying some more. It felt so good to finally talk about him.

  "What a day we've had, Cassandra," Lila said. "What a wild, wooly, full of life day."

  We took turns washing our faces, and we drank tall glasses of cold water. We didn't go to bed, so the story continued.

  "We encouraged David to get away, travel, find out how people live in other places. He chose California, where everything was happening, so we sent him to Sacramento. Ray's younger sister and her family lived there, and we thought it would be safer than San Francisco. Ray's sister helped him find a place to live and a job in a nearby restaurant. That's where he met your mother."

  I filled her in on the part I knew about, the wedding chapel in Reno and my birth six months later.

  "He never told us, Cassandra. He checked in with Ray's sister once in a while, and she let us know when she heard from him. The first we learned of Janice and you was when he showed up in Moscow the summer you turned two. We fell in love with you and your mom. We were so happy to have David home again."

  "Did he love my mother?" I asked.

  "He loved her. They loved each other. They held hands all the time, and they were kind and funny and silly together. She was a better match for him than Terry. Yes, he loved her."

  "She said everything he told her was a lie."

  "I'm sure he lied, sweetheart. He probably didn't tell your mother anything about Terry and Mark.

  "Ray and I assumed Janice and David weren't married. We didn't think David would want to marry again, and they were free-spirited California kids, so we didn't know.”

  "Maybe we should have asked questions," Lila said. "Many times I've thought back over those days, trying to make things turn out better for everyone."

  "Tell me about me, Grandma," I said, trying to get a picture of myself at two years old with loving parents and loving grandparents.

  "You were a fairy tale princess. With your blonde curls and big green eyes, and so bright, so smart. There was a popular song on the radio then, "Yellow Submarine," and you could sing the whole thing by yourself. Your daddy would start the song, and you would sing it all the way to the end. We laughed and laughed. You were perfect, my dear. Just as you are now."

  "Grandma, don't tease me. I'm horrible."

  "Cassandra, don't you dare think that for one second. You are glorious. Beautiful, smart, sweet. Don't believe anyone who says you aren't. If you doubt your magnificence, don't even believe yourself."

  "Grandma!" I said, jumping up to use the bathroom. I liked what she said, though, and I bowed to my image in the bathroom mirror and said, "Glorious! Cassandra the Magnificent!"

  I was still giggling when I rejoined Lila on the couch.

  "What's funny, sweetheart?"

  "You are, Lila," I said. "Lila the Glorious!"

  We both laughed until we realized we were exhausted. It was so far past bedtime that Chloe and Zoe had given up on us and put themselves to bed. Tired as I was, I took time to write Cassandra the Magnificent in my journal, along with Glorious! Sweet! Smart! Beautiful! Extraordinaire!

  As soon as I snuggled under Lila's quilts in my little bedroom, I smiled and fell asleep.

  I woke late the next morning, tangled in sheets. The quilts had been kicked off onto the floor beside the bed, and I nearly tripped on them when I got up to use the bathroom.

  I'd been dreaming all night, it seemed, one vivid mind movie after another, as if the dreams had been lining up ready to be played and somehow I had pressed the on button.

  In the kitchen, Lila was at the table writing in her journal. She smiled and said, "Sweet dreams?"

  "So many dreams," I said. "I don't know if they were sweet, though." I poured myself half a mug of coffee and filled it up with milk and sugar.

  "I dreamed, too," she said. "I'm just recording the best one here." She finished in her journal then closed it and freshened her coffee. "Tell me the dream you remember best."

  I sat beside her and stared out at the misty fog. A few people were walking on the beach. I recognized them from other mornings. "The main one was about a big house," I said. "It was night, and I was alone, and I opened tall double doors and walked in. The entry hall was shadowy. No one was there. Stone floors and no furniture."

  "Go on," Lila said, and I realized I'd been staring into middle space seeing the dream replay in my head instead of telling it.

  "The main thing was a spiral staircase. The stairs were carpeted with a bright red runner, so bright it seemed to be illuminated. Red was the only color in the dream.

  "I walked up the stairs and at the top was a long hallway lined with closed doors, almost like hotel rooms, with brass numbers on the doors." I couldn't remember this part very clearly. My mind was supplying a choice of memories, as if it were trying to fill in the blanks, as if I were back in the dream world trying to read the numbers. I shook my head to pull myself back out of it.

  "What happened next?" Lila asked. She leaned toward me, intensely interested.

  No one had ever cared about my dreams before. When I had bad dreams as a kid, my mom washed my face with a cold cloth and said, "Forget it, Sandy. It's a dream. Dreams don't mean anything."

  Lila was giving me a different message here, and I wondered if my mother ever had dreams or if anyone ever wanted to hear about her dream houses.

  "The dream seemed to change then," I continued, "or I can't remember the middle part, and then I was standing in a room at the end of the hal
l. The ceiling was very tall, like a church steeple, and there were beautiful red glass windows high up on the walls. Light came through the windows and filled the room with pink. It was beautiful and strange. Then I knew I was not alone. There was some kind of animal in the room, hiding in the shadows, but I couldn't see it. I got the sense it was a wolf or a dog, big, but I wasn't afraid. It felt like my dog, one I'd lost and forgotten about. I was trying to find some way to get more light in the room, a light switch or lamp or something, but I couldn't find anything. I was still looking when I woke up."

  "How did you feel when you woke up?" Lila asked.

  "Well, the sheets were all twisted. I'd kicked the quilts off the bed. It was hard to come out of the dream." I closed my eyes to try to recall. "How did I feel? Frustrated that I couldn't find the light. Anxious. Hopeful? I hoped the animal was okay."

  "Good," Lila said, nodding her head as if what I had said made perfect sense to her.

  "But how could it mean anything?" I asked. "It was just a dream."

  "Just a dream?" Lila said. "Dreams can be warnings, gifts, messages, blessings. Dreams have saved my life!"

  That sounded crazy to me. "How could a dream save anyone?"

  "Look in the Bible," Lila said. "Angels were always appearing in dreams telling people to go here or do that. God still sends angels to us in dreams." She laughed. "Waking life, too, of course. God sends angels whenever we need them."

  "Grandma! It was a dream."

  "It's okay, Cassandra. I just get a little excited about the subject. I've been working with my dreams all my life. My own grandma taught me to read dream symbols when I was very young, so now I'm surprised when people don't pay attention to their dreams. Dreams are your hotline to the subconscious, Freud's murky underworld of the Id. Some people believe this life is all a dream, that the nature of consciousness is to dream, and we dream up physical reality. 'Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream,'" she sang.

  "That's a kid song!" I said, alarmed by the implications of her ideas.

  "And a profound spiritual truth, hidden in plain sight," she said. "I love dreams. The whole subject could keep me coming back several more lifetimes."

  She raised her arms out to take in the ocean and sky before us. "Thank you, Dream Mother!"

  "Grandma," I said, shaking my head at her. "You are so weird."

  Her laugh made me happy.

  "Thank you, sweetheart," she said. She gave me a quick hug and kissed my cheek, then got up and whipped up some banana waffles for breakfast. She dressed them up with peanut butter and maple syrup. They were weird, but I have to admit they were delicious.

  Lila had the day off, and she wanted us to do something special. It was July second, and already families were coming to the beach resorts for the long weekend.

  "What sounds good to you, Cassandra?"

  She didn't say anything about continuing the David story, and I didn't mention it. I wanted to rest at the 'Cassandra the Magnificent' part for a while.

  In answer to Lila's question, I smiled and shrugged. I was happy staying home reading. Gray clouds hung low over the ocean, and the air was heavy with mist.

  "I'm making an afghan for Jamie, and it's almost done," she said. "I could show you how to knit if you like."

  "You made the afghans too?" I asked. Was there anything my grandma couldn't do?

  "The pattern is very simple," she said. "The fancy yarn is what makes them so pretty. After you've learned the basics, we'll visit Kitty Lynn's shop and choose the color you want for your afghan."

  "Okay," I said. "If it's easy."

  I told Lila about how my teacher in fifth grade made us all learn to sew on buttons. Then we each had to design a cloth bookmark and sew it by hand. Mine had blue daisies down the center. I gave it to my mom. Even though she never needed a bookmark for anything, she said it was really pretty and put it in her jewelry box. I didn't have any trouble threading needles and learning how to make even stitches. Some of the boys in class grumbled like crazy about having to sew, but our teacher was strict. A few people ended up getting more blood on their bookmarks than thread.

  "If you can sew a bookmark, you can learn to knit," Lila said. "You're very coordinated in the kitchen, and you're good with your hands. You'll see."

  When I tried putting my jeans on after breakfast, the rubbed places on my legs still hurt, so Lila loaned me a jumper she'd made for herself. That's when I noticed we were about the same height and size. I thought she was bigger, but she wasn't. I think I still saw myself as a little kid, but her clothes fit me. Even her shoes, size ten.

  I wore her long denim jumper over a pink t-shirt that Shelly sent me from Wisconsin. The shirt was the tourist kind showing a giant fish shaking hands with a fisherman. The caption was, "Meet the Catch of the Day at Jessie's Fish House." Shelly had a wacky sense of humor sometimes, but this was ridiculous. I was relieved that the bib of the jumper covered the picture on the shirt. I didn't care about fashion, but even I had limits to what I was willing to wear in public.

  "We'll knit for a while," Lila said, "and then we can drive down the coast to a fish and chowder place for lunch. It's right across from a beach where seals rest. Sometimes you can see fifty of them there. Does that sound good?"

  I nodded. Everything sounded good to me.

  The knitting lesson went well, and though it was terribly awkward for the first hour, I finally was able to hold both needles and guide the yarn where it needed to go without dropping everything and making a tangled mess. My arms and shoulders ached from my fierce concentration, so I put everything down to go make us some tea.

  Being on the Oregon coast turned a person into a tea connoisseur. Lila had about a dozen kinds in her tea canister, and by then I'd tried them all. I choose lemon grass and orange blossom tea, and brought the tray in to the couch where Lila and I were working. The heavy clouds outside were dumping sheets of rain on the beach, and I was happy to be indoors.

  Lila barely looked at her knitting. Her hands knew what to do and they did it. She hummed and glanced outside. Chloe and Zoe were curled up together asleep on a finished afghan Lila had arranged for them by her feet before we started the knitting lesson. A couple of times while she was teaching me, she had to remind them they had their own yarn and couldn't play with ours.

  I poured our tea and inhaled warm fragrant steam from my tea mug while I waited for it to cool enough to sip. It was hard to remember my life before Lila. I had learned so many new things, and Lila seemed to believe I could do anything. I felt right on the verge of something wonderful.

  While I sat enjoying being safe and warm, I felt something sticky trickle out between my legs. I hurried to the bathroom, but dark blood had already soaked through my cotton panties and left a damp stain on Lila's denim jumper. I was so embarrassed and humiliated I cried. I sat on the toilet wiping myself the best I could. I couldn't figure out how to get to my room where I had stored my box of sanitary pads, so finally I had to call for help.

  "Grandma?" I said. "Grandma, I made a mess. I need help."

  She came to the bathroom door, opened it a crack, and peeked inside. "What is it?"

  "Blood," I said. "I've ruined your jumper. I'm so sorry."

  Lila laughed, "Oh, Cassandra, everything is fine. You don't need to be sorry about anything. This is all perfectly normal. We'll get everything cleaned up in no time."

  She did help me clean up quickly by getting the pads and clean underwear from my room and another of her jumpers, this one red corduroy. "Like your red dream," she said, as if the correspondence delighted her.

  Then she gave me a lesson in washing blood out of fabrics, just as she'd taught me so many other things. "Cold water as soon as possible," she said.

  She held my soiled underwear under the tap in the laundry room and squirted liquid soap on it. “Just scrub the blood out, rinse it good, and then it's ready to go in the laundry with the rest of the clothes."

  "Your turn," she said, handing me the j
umper that had a damp place on the skirt about the size of a quarter.

  I washed the blood out, and it wasn't that bad. She was right. Nothing was ruined after all.

  "It's all part of being a woman, Cassandra. Welcome to the Moon Lady Club. I'm proud of you." She hugged me, and I collapsed in her arms and let her hold me and stroke my back.

  "Oh, sweetie, isn't life amazing?" she said.

  I had no idea how to respond, so I didn't even try.

  She took my hand and led me back to the couch. "Is this your first time?"

  "Second," I said. "The first time was just a little, right before school got out."

  "Good. This is perfect," she said. "We were here at home, so it was easy. Now you can plan ahead and be prepared."

  She went to her desk and pulled a little booklet out of the back of the top drawer. "Here," she said, bringing it back to me along with a red pen. "Here's a two-year calendar. It can be your moon book. Circle the days you bleed, and soon you'll find a pattern and will be able to predict your menses by how you feel. The first year or two it might be erratic, but soon your ovaries will get on schedule, and you'll be very good at knowing when to carry extra supplies when you go out. For now it will be wise to pack clean underwear and a couple of pads in your backpack, just in case it surprises you."

  I nodded and sighed. I thought back to the first time, the day my mom had called menstruation a curse and thrown my underwear away. I circled June fourth and fifth and now July second.

  Sitting here with Lila, who acted like bleeding was a special privilege, it was hard to believe only a month ago things had been so different for me. Maybe my whole life in California was a bad dream, and I was finally waking up.

  I went back to concentrating on knitting, and pretty soon my stitches became more even. They were still too tight, though, and my hands cramped from being so tense. Lila said I needed to loosen up, let the fingers and the needles and the yarn dance gently with one another.

  "A waltz, not a tango," she said, and when I clearly didn't understand the analogy, she got up and danced with one of the sofa pillows.

  "Watch," she said, and she began to sing one of her country songs, "I was waltzin’ with my darlin’." She glided around the living room, gracefully missing the furniture and cats, who woke up and jumped on the couch beside me to get out of her way.