Babyface

by Norma Fox Mazer

  “Why are you saying all this?” Martine put down the magazine. “What’s going on here, Toni?”

  Toni’s eyes suddenly filled. “I can’t stand how cold you are to me. We’ve been sitting here for one hour without a single word. And it’s like that every night. I just made up my mind I had to say something. Maybe it’s stupid of me. I’m going home in a couple of days, I didn’t have to say anything.”

  “I’ll agree with that,” Martine said.

  Toni bit her lip. She didn’t have anything definite to go on, it was all feeling, intuition, instinct. Could she trust that? What if Martine was this way with everyone? But she couldn’t be, Toni reasoned, or how would she have any friends?

  “You know, just the way you look at me,” Toni said, more bravely than she felt, “and the way you don’t look at me, makes me feel disliked by you.”

  “Look at you, don’t look at you … What does that mean, Toni? Isn’t that rather vague? I thought you were intelligent. What are you doing, plucking things out of the air this way? You’re creating a problem, is that it? Are you bored?”

  If not for her sister’s tiny, sarcastic smile, Toni might have backed off then. “Why do you take out your feelings on me?” she said. “What did I ever do to you?”

  Martine stared. “I don’t—”

  “You do,” Toni said.

  “Well, if I do—” Martine bit her lip. “If I do that, I apologize,” she said stiffly.

  “You’re giving me that cold smile again. You don’t take anything I say seriously. You treat me like I’m not real, not a real person.”

  Martine sat up straight. “I’m not the one who treats you that way! It’s Mom and Dad who do that. My point exactly about that awful nickname. Babyface,” she said scornfully. “Is that you?”

  Toni’s eyes smarted. At that moment she wanted to be home so much, she could hardly stand it. Don’t cry, she ordered herself. Do not cry. Deep down, she must have been hoping Martine would deny everything, that she would swoop her up in a hug and say, “Toni! Of course I like you. I love you! You’re my sister, aren’t you?”

  But what Martine did was look up and say, “So you think I never liked you?” She fingered the pages of her magazine. “Well, who knows, you just might be right.”

  CHAPTER

  SIXTEEN

  Later that night Toni awoke to find Martine shaking her. Shadowy light from the street made dark, menacing shapes of the furniture, and her sister, her hair wild and snaky, loomed over Toni. “Wake up,” she said. “Wake up.”

  “What time is it?” Toni mumbled.

  “One, two, I don’t know. What does it matter, I haven’t been able to sleep. I want to talk to you.”

  Toni pushed aside the sheets. She didn’t know anything she’d want to hear from Martine, or anything she’d want to say to her, except that she hated her, and this was the rottenest time she’d ever had in her life, and maybe she would like to kill her. “I’ve got to pee,” she said, and fled into the bathroom.

  She sat down on the closed toilet seat. She didn’t turn on the light. Maybe she’d stay there all night. Not come out until morning. Outside, a siren wailed. Toni bent over with her head on her knees. She’d sleep right here.

  “Toni?” Martine was knocking on the door. “What are you doing in there?”

  “None of your business,” Toni mumbled.

  Martine knocked on the door again. “Come out, please.”

  Toni opened the door. “What do you want?”

  “I told you, I want to talk to you.”

  “In the middle of the night? What about?”

  “Our talk, last night—it’s kept me awake for hours.”

  “Did it? I’m glad,” Toni burst out. She went back to the bed and slid under the sheet on her side.

  “This business of me not liking you—have you got it in your head that I’m jealous of you?” Martine said. “Is that the story? That I’m the jealous older sister, and because of that I don’t like you? Is that what’s underneath all that whining? If so, forget it, I’m not jealous.”

  “I don’t whine,” Toni protested. “And I didn’t say anything about jealousy.” She sat up. “Anyway, you agreed, you said it yourself. You said you didn’t like me. I didn’t make up a story. Why are you doing this now? I was sleeping! I want to go back to sleep. Why can’t you leave me alone?”

  “Let me remind you that you started this, Toni.”

  “So what if I did? I want to end it. I don’t even want to be here. Two more days and I’m going home, and you can forget about me for the rest of your life!”

  “Calm down.”

  “I am calm. You calm down!”

  Martine sighed. “Look, this is getting out of hand. Let’s both be calm. Can you hear this? I am not jealous.”

  “I never said you were.”

  “And I do not not like you.”

  “You do not not?”

  “That’s right, I do not not. I do not not like you. Okay?”

  What was she supposed to do now? Agree with Martine like a doormat, no matter what her eyes and ears and brains told her? “It’s okay with me,” she said. “You can say anything you want. I still think you don’t like me.”

  “Oh, hell.” Martine slid down in the bed.

  There was silence. The refrigerator clicked on. The air conditioner hummed. Otherwise, silence.

  Toni closed her eyes. She and her sister were lying only inches apart, but they might as well have been on separate continents.

  “This place is too damn hot,” Martine said suddenly.

  Was that her fault, too? This apartment was too small for two people. It was a little torture box! She pushed the sheet off her shoulders and lay still, very still. Through the walls she could hear the elevator—a gusty, hollow sound, like wind at the shore. If only she were at the shore … the sun … sand … cool water on her feet … Julie said, Look at the waves, Toni! There was a crash, and Toni opened her eyes. Martine was talking.

  Her voice rattled like pebbles in Toni’s ear. “This notion of yours that I don’t like you. Give me evidence. Give me something solid, not just this wimpy, boo-hoo you-don’t-like-me stuff.”

  “You don’t kiss,” Toni said.

  “What? I don’t kid?”

  “That, too. But what I said was kiss. Kiss.” Toni sat up. She could feel the heat rising off her skin. “When you kiss, you kiss air.”

  “What are you talking about?” Martine said.

  “And you don’t hug,” Toni went on doggedly. “You never touch me. When you call Mom, you don’t talk to me. When you come home, we never do anything together. You don’t care about me. You don’t even know I exist.”

  “Oh, I know you exist, all right. I can’t overlook your existence.” Martine laughed briefly. “But, listen, do you think relations between people are a one-way street? What about you? When did I ever hear you say, ‘Martine, let’s do something’?”

  “You wouldn’t want to if I did.”

  “Maybe I wouldn’t,” she said coolly. “But did you ever ask? And another thing, you’re making me out to be this cold person, and I resent it. I know I’m not the most demonstrative person in the world, but that’s not a crime. Alex understands. He says that for me, holding hands is an emotional thing. That’s the way I am. I’m reserved.”

  “I’m not,” Toni said in a hoarse voice. “I’m emotional.”

  “Well, good for you. That and a dollar fifteen will get you a ride on the subway.”

  “And Mom and Dad aren’t that way, either. They like to hug and kiss.”

  “Really? What makes you so sure of that?”

  “Because I live with them, Martine.” Toni hated this. She hated fighting. How had she gotten into this mess?

  “I know you think you’re an expert on our parents,” Martine said, “but did it ever occur to you that there are things you don’t know about them? Tell me, when was the last time you saw them hugging?”

  What was Martine getting a
t? What things wouldn’t Toni know about her parents? Nothing, she told herself. As for them hugging, she wanted to spit out her answer: “They hug all the time, for your information!” But it wasn’t true, and when she tried to remember the last time she’d seen them even touching hands, she couldn’t. And for some odd reason her heart began to thud under her ribs.

  Martine was talking again, in a low voice, almost as if to herself. “When I was your age, I could hardly wait to get away from home. It was so awful. I thought everything would be terrific if I could just get away from them.” She was bent over her upraised knees. “And then, when I did get away, when I went to college, it wasn’t terrific there, either.” She spoke so softly, Toni had to turn to hear her. “I didn’t have anyone to depend on, no one but me,” Martine said. “And that’s the way it’s been. No one but me.… I did everything for myself. It’s hard. It’s hard being alone, knowing there’s nobody you can turn to.”

  “You had Mom and Dad,” Toni said. She felt scooped out, breathless. That awful thudding under her ribs wouldn’t stop.

  “Did I?” In the dim glow from the street, Martine’s eyes were just darkness. “You think I had Mom and Dad? It didn’t seem that way to me. It seemed to me they had all they could do just to keep their own problems under control.”

  What problems? What did she mean? What was she talking about? What was so awful at home that she had to get away? “I don’t understand,” Toni said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Martine got up and moved restlessly around the room in her bare feet, finally lighting on the windowsill. “It’s cooler here,” she remarked. She looked out. “Do you believe it, the dog patrol is out in the park at this hour.”

  Toni didn’t want to hear about dogs. “What were you saying about Mom and Dad?”

  Martine didn’t answer for a moment. Then, “Nothing,” she said. “If you don’t know …”

  “If I don’t know what?”

  “They’ve kept you in ignorance,” she said. “I knew they would. That was part of their agreement.”

  Toni couldn’t make sense out of anything she was hearing. She waited for more, but Martine was silent and soon got back in bed and pulled the sheet up to her chin. “Listen, I’ve said too much. You don’t know about these things, and maybe that’s just as well. Who am I to disturb the universe? … Let’s go to sleep. I have to work tomorrow.”

  A growl came out of Toni, and she bit the pillow.

  “What are you doing?” Martine said.

  “I don’t know. Having a fit! You started telling me something and then you stopped. I hate being treated like a dumb kid.”

  “Did you ever hear of Pandora, the one who opened the box she was told to leave alone? Leave it alone, Toni.”

  “Why should I? You made it sound like something awful was happening at home, you said you couldn’t wait to get away from Mom and Dad. Why? Why do you make it sound like they did something horrible to you? Tell me what you mean.”

  “Do you really want to know?” Martine said.

  “Yes,” Toni said, and her heart began that awful thumping again.

  “Well, Toni, you think there’s just one Mom and Dad, but I know something else. Mom and Dad changed their style when you came on the scene. No more talk about divorce, no more arguing. Not in front of the baby! Sure, it was okay for me to sit in my room and shake when they got going, that never stopped them. But they stopped for you.”

  “Stopped what?” she said. “What do you mean, ‘when they got going’?”

  “Fighting,” Martine said flatly. “Didn’t you hear me?”

  “Mom and Dad fighting?” There was an impulse in Toni to laugh in her sister’s face, and yet she felt sick and scared. What was she going to hear?

  “When I was fourteen, they broke up,” Martine said. “They’d had another big quarrel and Dad slugged Mom. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

  Toni swung around. “What did you say?” Was Martine crazy? Her father slapping her mother? No, not slapping—slugging. “Dad, you’re talking about Dad? He never touched Mom, never in his whole life.” Her voice was firm, but her lips felt loose, wobbly. “He wouldn’t do that. He’s not that kind of person. And Mom wouldn’t let herself be hit! She wouldn’t stay with Dad for one moment—”

  “Exactly. That’s why she finally decided to get a divorce.”

  It was all too bizarre. Fights? Splitting? Divorce? Martine could have been talking about Julie’s parents. “I don’t believe you,” Toni said breathlessly.

  “You think I’m lying? No, Toni. I saw it. We were in the kitchen. I saw Dad do it. He hit Mom, hit her hard enough for her to fall. And get a bloody mouth. And then he threw a chair down on the floor and kicked it.” Martine was talking in a monotone now. “I picked the chair up. I don’t know why I did it. Then he left. Mom started peeling carrots and crying and saying she was going to leave him.”

  Toni’s heart was beating wildly. “You don’t cry when you peel carrots. That’s onions.”

  “He moved out,” Martine said. “I don’t know how long he was gone. Maybe a month. I remember how big the house felt with him gone. And how quiet. I was glad. He got a room at the YMCA. One day he came to the house to get his clothes. Mom wasn’t home, but I was. He got his stuff and left. Then, maybe a month later, Mom found out she was pregnant. And he came back. They stayed up all one night, talking. Talking, talking, talking. I was in my room. I could hear them all night long, talking. I remember being scared that they were going to start fighting. But they didn’t. And it was after that they bought the house on Oak Street.”

  “Our house?” Stupid question, Toni thought, but she was in a state of shock. Was Martine telling the truth? Had her father really hit her mother? Slugged her? Hit her hard enough to knock her to the floor?

  “Mom told me they were having a new start. They were putting aside their differences. None of us was ever going to talk about the past again. And we didn’t. The idea was to protect the baby. Keep the baby innocent. Pretend everything is okey-dokey. In other words, lie, lie, lie.”

  Toni sank down in the bed. “I just can’t believe it,” she said. “I just can’t believe that about Dad.”

  Once Toni had read a book where the heroine would look at the clock every time something happened to her. Two-ten, she’d think, I’ll remember this moment forever. If she got a splinter, she would look at the clock. Six-fifteen, I’ll remember this moment forever. If she forgot her locker key: Nine-twenty, I’ll remember this moment forever. It was silly and funny.

  Toni looked at the clock. Two-twenty-four, I’ll remember this moment forever. Only this wasn’t silly, and it wasn’t funny.

  CHAPTER

  SEVENTEEN

  Wednesday, the last night of Tony’s stay, Martine came home from work wired up and talking fast. “It was a zoo at work today. I need a corner to stand in and scream. Toni, get out of those jeans. We’re going out to eat.”

  “We can order in,” Toni said. They’d done that a few nights.

  “No, I don’t want to eat in or order in. It’s your farewell dinner. Let’s do it right. Hurry up, get dressed. Alex is calling later, I have to be back for that.”

  Toni put on a skirt and blouse. She combed her hair and looked at herself in the bathroom mirror. Was she possibly the same person she’d been ten days ago? How could she be? Ever since the night Martine had told her about their parents she had been walking around as if in a dream. Mom. Dad. Who are you, really? Who am I?

  Outside, the sidewalks steamed. It had rained earlier. They walked to a restaurant in Little Italy, crossing Houston Street on the way. “Why is the name of a Texas city on a New York street?” Toni asked. She didn’t care, but she felt the need to talk, to say something, to keep her thoughts at bay.

  “I don’t know, but you say it ‘how-stun’ to rhyme with ‘wow-fun.’”

  The restaurant was five steps down from the sidewalk. There were half a dozen tables covered with
blue-checked cloths. Everything was simple and plain, except the prices. Toni read the right-hand side of the menu. “This place is expensive.”

  “Don’t worry about it, the food is great. Relax.”

  Relax! Martine was a fine one to talk. Even the way she ate was tense, eating rapidly and sighing between bites of the veal parmigiana. But finally she leaned back, tipping her head up toward the ceiling, and said, “I have to learn to let the job go. I am learning. It’s gone.” She wiped her hand across her face and sat there with her eyes closed, taking deep breaths. She opened her eyes and smiled. “So, Toni. Tomorrow you go home.”

  Toni nodded. “I packed today. I didn’t do much else.”

  “You should have gone to a movie or something, done one last New York thing.”

  “I went to a movie yesterday.”

  “Oh, I didn’t know.”

  Toni mentioned the name of the movie. Her napkin slipped to the floor and she bent to pick it up. When she straightened up, she took a breath and said, “Martine, you didn’t know about the movie because you didn’t ask me anything about my day.”

  “Do I have to ask everything? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Toni bit her lip. There was always an answer from Martine. Maybe she was right, but how do you tell things to someone who doesn’t seem interested?

  They had iced tea, spumoni, and cookies for dessert. They chatted, wary with each other, or so it seemed to Toni, sticking to safe subjects like the weather and the food. Then, nibbling a cookie, Martine looked across at Toni and said, “So, have you thought at all about the things I told you about Mom and Dad?”

  Toni held the frosty glass against her cheek. She nodded.

  “And—?”

  “I don’t know. It’s—I don’t know. I hate to think about it. Dad hitting Mom.” The moment she said the words, her lips felt numb. It was too horrible to think about.

  “I remember when Dad came back home … from living at the Y? I felt so mixed up, confused,” Martine said. “I was relieved in one way, because I didn’t want my parents to be divorced. But I couldn’t see them as the happy couple. They were covering up. They were pretending everything that had happened hadn’t happened. You want to hear this?”