Becomings Read online

  She stared straight ahead, not really seeing. Her hand clutched the book of poetry while her lips moved to follow the rolling sounds that tumbled like a waterfall in her mind. Her thoughts were far away, carried by formless sensations and notions of fate.

  She turned automatically as her vision cleared. She opened the door and stepped inside.

  “You’re in early,” the matronly owner of the shop noted. Her own pinched and harried face hinted of a night whose restlessness had been an excuse to seek her solace in the reality of a day that would always be just like any other.

  Isabel nodded. She went to her sewing station and sat down. She stared down at the book in her hands, an anchor to a dream carried into wakefulness. She set it beside her, propped so she could see it.

  “I’d like to make something,” she said. “With my extra.”

  “Go ahead.” The woman barely glanced her way as she continued to tidy up, maintaining a semblance of activity that served to distract herself.

  Isabel drew out a folded bundle of dark blue silk, the richness of sapphires captured in its depths. She unwrapped it and laid the pieces across her work space. She swept her eyes over the uneven swaths of cloth. Her fingers closed around her scissors by touch. She began cutting the fabric freehand, humming as the blades snicked cleanly through the cloth and only the smallest of scraps fell aside.

  She gathered up the scraps and returned them to her bundle, slipping it into the drawer once more. She arranged the pieces she had cut, and set up her sewing machine to work.

  Her foot began to move in steady rhythm on the treadle, giving cadence to the rapid clicking of the machine while it sped the delicate needle and fine thread through the fabric. Her fingers appeared to guide the cloth without any thought, drawing it unerringly across the machine while she worked.

  The shop owner continued with her busywork, pausing to watch for a moment or two as Isabel’s creation began to form. Then she shook her head and continued to prepare the shop for the day’s customers, getting finished orders together and neatly aligning new bolts of cloth.

  An hour and a half later, Isabel was sewing on buttons when the first customer came into the door. Her fingers nimbly continued to stitch as she listened while the shop owner spoke with the woman. Isabel glanced at the woman, her wide eyes drawing in details, then she turned to tie off her thread.

  When the woman left, the shop owner glanced at Isabel. “Did you get that?”

  Isabel nodded. She folded her finished work carefully in paper and tied it up. She set it aside and began to work on her first order for the day.

  * * * *

  ISABEL WAS lying on her stomach on her bed, her fingers grazing like restless leaves through the pages of the book, when there was a soft rap at her door. She got up and walked to it, listening.

  “It’s Jeremy, Isabel.”

  She opened the door. He held a bouquet of flowers gathered loosely in one hand, and a bag slung over his shoulder. He was dressed casually, as though he had come from work not too long ago, although she was certain he didn’t really work at all. She accepted the bouquet with a small smile. She held the flowers close for a moment, and then carried them to her vase to freshen while he closed the door behind them.

  “How did you get out last night?” she asked, as she arranged the flowers with deft movements, creating a pleasing balance that brought out highlights from the simple bouquet.

  “Your landlady was up early, before dawn. She was kind enough to lock up after me when I asked.”

  Isabel turned, watching him carefully. “She doesn’t like me having visitors in my room.”

  “She won’t remember.”

  A shadow passed over her face for a moment. She walked closer to him, looking into his eyes, and felt the sensation return of being swept up by something outside her experience. She contemplated the feeling while she sought to see beyond, sensing that she was only being left with more questions.

  “Who are you, Jeremy?”

  His quiet face softened now, revealing again a glimpse of what she had seen the night before, caught in his private moment of reading. He unslung his bag, setting it carefully down beside him. “Someone who’s been searching for a very long time.”

  “How long?”

  “Time has little meaning when nothing changes.” He ran a distracted hand through his hair. “Would you like to go out?”

  “I’ve already eaten, and I’m not dressed . . .” She hesitated. “Where would we go?”

  “There’s a place not far away, with a good view. I thought we could look at the stars.” He hefted his bag from the floor. “I brought a telescope I made.”

  She paused for a moment, and then walked to her vanity where her wrapped bundle lay. She fingered it thoughtfully. “I made something for you, Jeremy.”

  She felt him draw close behind her, having barely heard him move. She turned slowly and handed it to him. She watched his face as he worked the string with fingers that seemed both delicate and strong, a juxtaposition she couldn’t quite reconcile.

  He lifted out the sapphire blue silk shirt and held it up. A row of mother of pearl buttons lined the front, each one like a tiny moon against a night sky. “You made this today?”

  She nodded. “Do you like it?”

  “It’s beautiful.” He held it up to examine it, his expression turned reflective.

  He unbuttoned his own shirt and shrugged out of it, revealing a lean frame that left Isabel again with a sense of quiet strength hidden beneath. He slipped into the new shirt, reveling in the fabric, unable to disguise his pleasure at the perfect fit. He stretched his arms out, measuring the length. He began to button it.

  “You’re very gifted, Isabel.”

  “Not all gifts are shared equally. It’s what makes them precious.”

  From the next room, the sound of a Victrola started up with the enchanting strains of Scott Joplin’s Bethena waltz. Jeremy closed his eyes, a serene expression forming around a quiet smile. “That brings back such memories. 1905.”

  “I was born that year,” Isabel said. “They told me, in the orphanage. How old are you, Jeremy?”

  She waited, part of her listening as the lilting music began to gain complexity, its quiet opening transforming into a fuller melody that seemed to carry within itself a message of promise.

  “A little older. Does it matter?”

  She shook her head, trying to understand whether or not that was true. She walked to a hook beside the vanity where the clothes she had worn earlier were hung. She stepped out of her pajama bottoms and laid them over the chair, and slipped on the long, heavy skirt. She changed tops, fingers working the buttons while she stared at the vase of flowers. She carried her worn oxfords to the bed and sat down to put them on. “These are my work clothes.”

  “You look lovely, Isabel.”

  She smiled, her face hidden as she bent to tie her shoes. Next door, the song finished. After a pause, Joplin’s Leola started up, the notes delicately chasing after one another like spring raindrops.

  “Shall we go?” He offered her his hand.

  She took it, and stood up. He slung his bag over his shoulder and they left. As they walked down the street, she breathed deeply, reveling in the night air. The coolness had returned as it always did, when the sun’s long journey across the sky gave way to evening’s reign. She looked up to the night sky, wondering if the stars would ever be the same again for her after tonight. She wondered about what Jeremy had said about time, and change.

  Jeremy watched her stare upward, her face cast in the still glow of moonlight. He slid his arm in a natural way around her waist, pulling her closer. “Do you enjoy going out at night, Isabel?”

  “Sometimes.” She was still gazing upward, trusting her feet and Jeremy’s sureness to guide her safely. “This is different than last night.”

  “Because we’re not among those other people?”

  She was quiet for a moment. “I dress like them.” Her hand rose, fingering
her tresses. “Sometimes I make my hair like theirs. But I’m not like them.” Her eyes lowered from the sky, finding his. “You’re different, too, Jeremy. But not like me. You’re separate, but you belong. Like the strength that you won’t show. Two halves that make up a whole.”

  They turned north, toward the hills that loomed like long shadows cast into the darkness by the last lights of the city.

  “At night, I feel like I’m who I’m supposed to be,” she said after a moment. “It’s different in the day.”

  “Like Cinderella?”

  “I don’t know who that is.”

  “She has many names.” He glanced at her, and a warm smile formed on his lips. “Cendrillon, la Cenerentola, Aschenbrodel . . .”

  “Who is she?”

  “Someone who has transcended.”

  They continued to walk, the quiet sound of his steps masked beneath the syncopated clop of her own shoes. She glanced down periodically at her feet with a small frown, troubled by a sense of separation she felt, even with the warmth of his arm about her. She stole a glance at him. He was staring off into the darkness, eyes roving with practiced ease, but he smiled in a way that gave her reassurance when he sensed her looking.

  They left the light from the last buildings behind as they began to ascend, following a winding route that led deeper into these great shadows that lay like slumbering dragons in the night.

  As they passed beneath the thicker cover of trees, the darkness closed around them like a veil, hiding them from the illumination of the moon. Isabel was aware only of the steady and sure footsteps of Jeremy beside her. She clutched his arm, somehow certain that although she couldn’t see where they were going, he was able to. The gentle pressure of his arm about her waist seemed to steer her effortlessly around even the smallest obstacles. At times she barely felt the ground beneath her feet, as if she were floating just above the earth before settling with the lightness of a feather again.

  They passed into a clearing, and Isabel was struck by the vista that unfolded before them. The night sky with all its multitude of stars swept down to the city waiting below, awash with its own lights, yet none able to surpass the moon in its full brilliance above. She felt Jeremy release her as he knelt, his bag by his side.

  She stared at the city with its lights laid out below like strings of diamonds trailing behind and across one another, interspersed by rubies flashing into emeralds, and then back again. Her eyes wandered up to the sky, and she wondered about its timelessness. She was aware that Jeremy was lying down now, and heard faint clicks as he set up his telescope.

  She looked down and saw he had laid out a blanket. She reached down and untied her shoes, and set them aside. Stretching out her legs, she reclined beside him as he swept the telescope up where a large pattern of bright stars shone in the sky. He made a final adjustment, and then moved away from the lens, inviting her with a smile.

  She bent her head close. Her lips parted in awe.

  Jeremy spoke softly, his breath the lightest caress on her cheek. “Long ago, there was a young girl named Callisto, who served the goddess Artemis. She took pleasure in her life, and fulfillment in her service.”

  Isabel listened, conscious of the warmth of his body, not touching but close beside her. The light wind stirred the grass around them, like whispered voices from the past.

  “One day Zeus chose to take from Callisto what she would not have given by choice. To punish her, Artemis turned Callisto into a bear, which Zeus set high up in the sky where she would forever remain, together with the son she bore.”

  Isabel felt a silent tear roll down one cheek. She wiped it away as she peered up into the heavens. For a moment, the stars seemed to blur, refracting and multiplying, the way raindrops do when they capture a stray beam of sunlight. She blinked, and her vision cleared.

  She felt Jeremy move beside her and the telescope shift just perceptibly as it found a new place in the sky. His hand fell away to rest between them again.

  “Queen Berenice shared a great love for her husband,” he said. “When he was forced to leave her during a time of war, she chose to sacrifice her long hair to Aphrodite as a symbol of her love, and to show her desire for him to return home safe. The goddess granted her wish, and brought Berenice’s hair into the night sky for all to see the level of her devotion.”

  Isabel shifted and looked at Jeremy. He was smiling at her, eyes warm with remembrance.

  “When I saw you last night with your hair up, and later when you let it down, it reminded me of that story.” He brushed light fingers over the long tresses that lay like a fan across her back.

  She inclined her head to rest her cheek for a moment against the warmth of his hand, then looked up to the sky. She felt him adjust the telescope once more. She brought her eye down to the lens again.

  “Persephone was the daughter of the goddess Demeter. One day Hades, the lord of the underworld, stole her away to become his queen. Her mother was distraught, and appealed to Zeus. But Persephone had fallen to the temptation of a single pomegranate in a moment of hunger. For that, she was forced to spend half of each year below with Hades, and half above, with her mother.” Jeremy ran his fingers slowly through the grass, releasing a faint scent of renewal, a promise of spring.

  Isabel closed her eyes and breathed deeply, a smile transforming her face. She moved closer to him, no longer satisfied with the small space between them.

  “So warm,” she murmured.

  She pressed against him and felt her heart quicken again, a sensation as if she were running toward something incomparable, and beyond her experience. She felt his arms encircle her, bringing her even closer as she brushed her lips to find his. A tingle rippled through her as she opened her mouth, accepting him.

  As they kissed, she felt herself begin to swim with a heady feeling, unlike any she had known before. She felt him draw away a little as though to save her from sinking too far, to give her choice. His lips moved to her cheek, and her thoughts began to clear, becoming less hazy. She felt a rush of heat build from inside that came from knowing this is what she wanted. Her fingers unerringly found each button of the shirt she had made for him, and she slid it away, marveling at the strength that lay hidden beneath his skin, and thinking of promises made, and choices granted.

  Her eyes opened as they made love, finding their focus in the stars above.

  * * * *

  ISABEL WAITED on the steps of her building as the sun faded, and then fell. She hummed to herself, finding rhythm with the sound of passersby and melodies from the automobiles that rumbled past. A few times, the door opened behind her and she sensed her landlady watching her for a while, before closing the door once more.

  She was still in her work clothes, and her foot moved unconsciously in an echo of its daily routine on the treadle. She curled and uncurled a finger in her black hair flowing over her shoulders, thinking of sacrifices made, and wishes granted.

  She closed her eyes for a long while as the evening deepened, her face turned up to the sky, picturing a blanket of stars on which she lay. She experienced a caress that was sensed more than felt, a light touch sparing yet familiar in its intimacy. She opened her eyes.

  Jeremy stood at the foot of the steps.

  She got up, her knees creaking after sitting for so long. She blinked twice to make sure he hadn’t disappeared.

  “I missed you, Isabel.”

  “I missed you, too, Jeremy.” She paused. “I wasn’t sure if you would return.”

  His eyes searched hers, and she saw something in his face now she had never noticed before, and rarely seen only when watching other people with one another.

  “I had no choice,” he said.

  “But if you could choose?” she asked, uncertain what he meant.

  He walked up the steps and slipped his arms about her, his warmth dispelling the cool of the evening. She felt her heart quicken as his cheek pressed close enough to hers that she felt his lips form a smile. His breath stirred her
hair as he whispered in her ear.

  “I’m giving choice to you, where it belongs.”

  He pulled back slightly and brushed his lips against hers. She realized what it was she had seen, and was confused by the array of emotions she recognized in his expression. Her heart beat faster, unsure what it meant for her.

  “Would you like to come up?” she asked.

  He nodded. His hand found hers and they walked inside together.

  As they started up the stairs, a door opened on the ground floor and her landlady stepped out, fixing them with a long stare.

  “Isabel, you know the rules.”

  Isabel lowered her eyes and gave a slight nod.

  Jeremy favored the landlady with a casual look that to Isabel seemed to mask a brief intensity, the way a photographer’s flash illuminates his portraiture for too small a fraction of time to be counted.

  “We won’t be long,” he promised the landlady in a reassuring tone.

  The landlady’s eyes had become muted, like the dull marbles young boys would hunch over on the sidewalk during their evolving afternoon competitions with one another. She turned without a word and walked back into her apartment, shutting the door behind her.

  Jeremy squeezed Isabel’s hand, and they began to ascend the stairs once more. Isabel spared a trailing look back at the landlady’s closed door, her brow furrowing in thought.

  When they entered her apartment, Isabel stood for a moment, hands folded in front of her. Next door, they could hear Mamie Smith singing That Thing Called Love, each verse drawn out in a voice of longing for promises unfulfilled.

  She crossed to her vanity where the book lay, beside the vase of flowers. She bent her head for a moment, savoring the subtle fragrance of the blooms.

  “Would you teach me how to read, Jeremy?” She stared down at the book, and her hand caressed the cover. “If you have the time.”