Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas - Maya Angelou [30]
There were young women who had the exotic sheen of recently fed forest animals. Although they moved their fine heads languorously this way and that, nothing in the room excited their appetites. Unfashionable red lips cut across their white faces, and the crimson fingernails, as pointed as surgical instruments, heightened the predatory effect. Older, sadder women were more interesting to me. Voluminous skirts and imported shawls did not hide their heavy bodies, nor was their unattractiveness shielded by the clanks of chains and ribbons of beads, or by pale pink lips and heavily drawn doe eyes. Their presence among the pretty people enchanted me. It was like seeing frogs buzzed by iridescent dragonflies. The young men, whose names were Alfie, Reggie and Roddy and Fran, hovered around these fat women, teasing them, tickling them, offering to share a portion of their svelte beauty. None of the company spoke to me. That I was one of the three Negroes in the room, the only Negro woman and a stranger as well, was not a sufficiently exotic reason to attract attention.
I sipped the wine and listened to the concert of gossip and bon mots, repartee and non sequiturs.
Don stooped beside me and asked if I was all right and had I met everyone. I told him I was and I had, and added a sincere smile. His high pink color, green eyes and fire-red hair made him the prettiest person at the party, and he had a sense of humor I found missing in the other blades, despite their clacking laughter.
He looked into my eyes and found the lie. He stood and turned quickly. “Everybody!” He spoke just below a shout. “Everybody!” Voices quieted. When the room was still, he spread his arms and fanned his fingers away from his wrists and nodded toward me. “Everybody this is Rita. She's an artist, a truly tremendous dancer. She is absolutely the world's greatest. I thought you should know.”
People peered at me. Most found nothing remarkable about the announcement and, indeed, if at that moment I had executed a tour jeté from a sitting position, it would not have pried them away from their indifference. Only the plum-soft women marked the statement and cared. Each round face softened and smiled on me.
Don dropped his arms and said rather weakly, “Well, I just thought you ought to know.” To me he said, “Don't mind these people, Rita. They're only pretending to be blasé because they don't know what else to pretend to be. I'll get you some wine.”
One large woman came over to me carrying a pillow. She gracefully settled on the floor at my side, denying her bulk.
“I'm Marge.” Then she told me, “And you're Rita.”
“That's right.”
“And what kind of dancing do you do, Rita?”
“Modern ballet and interpretive.” (I knew a shake dancer named L'Tanya who could quiver her hips so fast they disappeared in a blur and she called her performance interpretive.)
Marge's mouth made an O. One young boy who had been courting her wafted over to us. He folded down beside Marge and arched an arm over her round shoulders, his hand dropping on the rise of her breast.
“And what have we here, Mother dear?”
She nearly suppressed a giggle. “Reggie, you're too naughty.”
He turned to me, holding his lips tight. “How now, brown cow?”
I knew or should have known it would be a matter of time before some racial remark would be made. Here this chit was calling me a brown cow.
“Rita, this is Reggie. Isn't he a naughty boy? Naughty, naughty.” She nearly kitchy-kooed his chin.
I made my diction as prudish as the young man's was prissy. “I haven't the faintest idea whether he's naughty or not. I do know that if he's your son, at least one of you has something to be ashamed of.”
Reggie blanched and tightened. “You have a nasty mind to go with that nasty mouth.” His voice sharpened with indignation. “What are you doing here, anyway? Who asked you?