A Thousand Acres_ A Novel - Jane Smiley [129]
I remember what I looked like because I looked different from Mommy and especially Daddy. Daddy was never without his work clothes, usually overalls, and Mommy always wore a dress. In the privacy of my bed, under the covers, looking down the waist of my pajamas or unbuttoning the top, I saw that I was naked inside my clothes, and another thing I distinctly remember about being a child is that awareness of oneself inside one’s clothes. Pinching shoes, a prickling slip, a dress that is tight across the shoulders or around the wrists, ankle socks bunching in the heels of my shoes. Mommy and Daddy never complained of their clothes, but mine seemed a constant torment. On the first day of school, first grade, a dress that Mommy had made me was too high and too tight in the waist. Every time I lifted an arm or leaned forward, the waist rode up against my lower ribs. At the last recess, when one of the boys wouldn’t vacate the swing, I bit him on the arm and drew blood. He had to go to the doctor and have a tetanus shot. At home, I was spanked and told to sit in a chair for an hour without moving. The dress had made me mad with irritation. I remember feeling my skin all over my body, feeling its exact surface against the world.
Ty and I spent our wedding night at the Savery Hotel in Des Moines. I was nineteen. I had never touched my breasts except to position them in my brassiere or to wash them with a washcloth. As far as I knew then, my hands and my body had never met without an intermediary washcloth. Certainly much time was spent scrubbing; washcloths in our house were rough and soaps were heavy duty. Just as you didn’t want to let the farm into the house, you didn’t want to wear it, either, especially into town. That was a matter of pride. But the scrubbing went beyond that. In and behind the ears, around the neck, all over the face, the knuckles, the fingernails, the armpits, the back where you could reach, then all below. I suppose what I was afraid of was some sort of stench. It did not bear actually thinking about. I scrubbed just like that before my wedding, knowing that when we got to Des Moines and my going-away dress came off, Ty would be repelled if I wasn’t perfectly clean and odor-free.
He wasn’t repelled, but he tried not to be overly curious, which meant that we disrobed with the lights out and confined ourselves, that first time, to hugging, kissing, and an insertion that seemed, more than anything, practical and hygienic. While we were doing it, I made a little prayer that my period wouldn’t suddenly come, mid-cycle, in response to defloration. There would be drops of blood, I had heard, so I kept one of the hotel washcloths beside the bed, and put it between my legs as soon as he pulled out. There were no drops of blood, only the wetness of our combined fluids, but I succeeded in preserving the sheet from it. The next day, I threw the washcloth in the trash chute at the end of the corridor. I remember that washcloth, obvious evidence that my midnight experiences with Daddy had lifted off me, leaving no trace in my memory.
But sex did make me touchy. It was full of contradictory little rituals. There had to be some light in the room, if only from the hall. Daytime was better than nighttime, and no surprises. I always wore a nightgown. When he pushed it up, I closed my eyes. When he entered me, though, my eyes were wide open, staring at his face. I hated for him to turn away or look down. I didn’t like it if either of us spoke. He made the best of it, and I never refused him.
I didn’t want to see my body.
I assumed that all of this was normal, the way it was for everyone. It went without saying that bodies fell permanently into the category of the unmentionable. I don’t know that there would have been much more communication had our mother lived—though she did tell me