//creative//
Fall 2019
Fall 2019
And I Did Not Die
Sara Rosin
My mother called me darling the way her mother had called her. Her closet was full of noise and clutter and she never sat down for a moment unless she was painting her face with her long fingers and the thin wooden brushes she kept on her desk. She would sit, staring into the mirror, her eyes framed by thin lashes and thin skin made puffy by age and weariness. Whatever weariness there was, though, she hid it well, my mother. She would brighten her dull, brown eyes and carefully lift the bones of her cheeks, tipping the corners of her lips into a brilliant smile. Where her lashes were thin, her lips were thick and full of blood, stained by faint veins that sank like lipstick and accentuated the white of her teeth. Her smile would animate her cheeks, her color, her knuckles, her bones. I didn’t know if she was real or not.
On the night before I began grade school, she started her makeup and I sat there. She drew her words out like they were doused in velvety syrup. To me, she was as rich as her lips and as lovely as her pearl earrings.
“Darling,” she drawled. “You are so very beautiful to look at, aren’t you?” I tucked the wisps of hair behind my ears. I beamed. I blushed.
“Darling, you must know I want you to live in this world like you made it up. You mustn’t be scared of seeming fraudulent, understand?”
What did she mean?
But she was so very elegant. Her shoulder blades cut diagonal lines in her skin and the satin of her dress lay delicately against them. She painted her eyebrows first. She filled them in with a stick of color and remembered when she was a little girl talking to a little boy. He thought nothing of her, she was sure of it, but she remembered when he had pulled at the bottom of her dress and told her she was too much of a girl. He couldn’t spend time with girls when he would wear blazers next year in grade school.
But she also remembered a man who had pulled at her dress and told her she was just right. His hands looked much like the wood of her chair and her brushes, gnarled and a color that was almost polished, but not quite, and beautiful and old and dead.
“Now darling, you must know how important it is to have your own things. You want to feel as if you belong to yourself and no one else, don’t you?” She picked up her blush now.
But I belonged to her, didn’t I?
As a dusty pink ate at the bulge of her cheeks, I looked at my hands, child-like and plain. They were soft, and slid into my mother’s so quietly, with such ease. I thought of how we would hold hands as we slept. She would hold on just the right amount and I would stay up for hours because I had to know what it was like to feel safe like that.
Mother would lie there too, her pale hands wrapped around my tanned warm ones that beat blood and youth into the rest of her body. Most nights, she would dream of her school dress. How it hadn’t belonged to her and how she had had to take it off when she was told to. Her other hand would pinch the skin of her hip so tightly, and she would wake up marked and bruised.
“My darling, you really are a dream, aren’t you? Always stay asleep if you’re having a wonderful dream, alright?” She worked on her lashes now, those thin lashes that framed her dull, eyes. She curled them so that her eyes dominated her heart-shaped face.
I felt at home smelling her sweat mixed with the perfume she always wore. It reeked of the roses we had dropped onto her mother’s grave as her body was lowered in too jauntily. She stood next to her mother’s husband, her small frame swallowed by a silk black dress, as he lowered his hand too jauntily.
“You must listen to me darling, you must. Because I hadn’t heard from anyone when I was your age.” She looked at herself in her mirror, her whole face now painted.
“Oh, but darling, I did not die, did I? I did not die, I did not die.”
On the night before I began grade school, she started her makeup and I sat there. She drew her words out like they were doused in velvety syrup. To me, she was as rich as her lips and as lovely as her pearl earrings.
“Darling,” she drawled. “You are so very beautiful to look at, aren’t you?” I tucked the wisps of hair behind my ears. I beamed. I blushed.
“Darling, you must know I want you to live in this world like you made it up. You mustn’t be scared of seeming fraudulent, understand?”
What did she mean?
But she was so very elegant. Her shoulder blades cut diagonal lines in her skin and the satin of her dress lay delicately against them. She painted her eyebrows first. She filled them in with a stick of color and remembered when she was a little girl talking to a little boy. He thought nothing of her, she was sure of it, but she remembered when he had pulled at the bottom of her dress and told her she was too much of a girl. He couldn’t spend time with girls when he would wear blazers next year in grade school.
But she also remembered a man who had pulled at her dress and told her she was just right. His hands looked much like the wood of her chair and her brushes, gnarled and a color that was almost polished, but not quite, and beautiful and old and dead.
“Now darling, you must know how important it is to have your own things. You want to feel as if you belong to yourself and no one else, don’t you?” She picked up her blush now.
But I belonged to her, didn’t I?
As a dusty pink ate at the bulge of her cheeks, I looked at my hands, child-like and plain. They were soft, and slid into my mother’s so quietly, with such ease. I thought of how we would hold hands as we slept. She would hold on just the right amount and I would stay up for hours because I had to know what it was like to feel safe like that.
Mother would lie there too, her pale hands wrapped around my tanned warm ones that beat blood and youth into the rest of her body. Most nights, she would dream of her school dress. How it hadn’t belonged to her and how she had had to take it off when she was told to. Her other hand would pinch the skin of her hip so tightly, and she would wake up marked and bruised.
“My darling, you really are a dream, aren’t you? Always stay asleep if you’re having a wonderful dream, alright?” She worked on her lashes now, those thin lashes that framed her dull, eyes. She curled them so that her eyes dominated her heart-shaped face.
I felt at home smelling her sweat mixed with the perfume she always wore. It reeked of the roses we had dropped onto her mother’s grave as her body was lowered in too jauntily. She stood next to her mother’s husband, her small frame swallowed by a silk black dress, as he lowered his hand too jauntily.
“You must listen to me darling, you must. Because I hadn’t heard from anyone when I was your age.” She looked at herself in her mirror, her whole face now painted.
“Oh, but darling, I did not die, did I? I did not die, I did not die.”
//SARA ROSIN is a first year at Barnard College. She can be reached at ser2206@barnard.edu.