She used to balance a shiny knife on the windowsill to put on eyeliner but had upgraded to a little piece of mirror. Holding it at arm’s length, she angled it up and down her frame, checking how much her embroidered top covered, the length of her Javanese brown wrap. But should she dress to go out? Her big flat feet stuck out stupid down there. A bra? No bra? She should seem comfortable in her own house. Casual even. Cool, calm, and … jumping jitterbug at the sound of the gate opening, she peeped through the fretwork and braced herself to open the front door. There he was, stamping again, almost hopping and wiping his shoes on the step, in a frisky shaking-off-snow kind of way.
“Allo!” He jerked a big grinning chin up at her. “Allo again. Ah ha, look at you!”
She leaned forward for a kiss on the cheek and Pierre hopped inside onto the mat, wiping shoes again. Ata wondered if invisible rain was falling or did he step in something?
That night, that Frenchie-English walked in with a bottle of wine and romance gripped tight in a paper bag. Ata watched Pierre struggle with the kitchen knife and a fork handle — she had no corkscrew. She ordered Chinese delivery and he stumbled out to the gate to collect it. But it seemed he had never eaten a meal without a table, never eaten this close to the floor. He looked at the cushions and chose the single decorative stool, clutching his plate uncomfortably on his knees. She tucked her feet under her, closed her wrap to stop her leg glaring out.
The jalousie glowed with streetlight like pleated rice paper and talk didn’t crack the tension or stop the night hours from seeping out. Didn’t stop her from saying “Oh no, it’s not so late” when he mumbled he should be going because of the time. Politeness was why he said it. His eyes weren’t decent. The wolf’s greediness licked them over her slowly. He slunk over and stretched out on the cushions next to her. Pink shins! She had never seen such a thing on a wolf, nor human being. Hairless, too. She stared at them in amazement, half-horrified and half-curious at how delicate they were, the skin tight and shiny. His feet — high arches, fine-boned and feminine. What a thing. A Gypsy wolf, braced up against the wall, breathing in and out of a big deep chest.
Which animal lets a wolf into their home? This close? Greedy and charming, disarming with a laugh and ease, Pierre lay on his back, vulnerable. Waiting for her. Ata trapped her skittering deer-heart and smothered it fiercely. She reached out touching soft, silvery, khaki fur and a hard flank flinched. Pale ribs. A lean smooth stomach. Rippling throat and the gentlest nuzzling. A tongue at her lips.
It was she who crawled tiger-tense over him, tested her weight and pinned him, tasting more of this strange creature. Her back arched, she bit. And didn’t know what she was tasting. Couldn’t care. Just for that night. Every drop of his saliva, every piece of his strangeness — she wanted. Wanted to maul and stroke and rest her head on his big rib cage, under his heavy warm paw.
PORT OF SPAIN spreads below Ata, sitting on the little stone wall at the edge of the lawn. The hills wrap her back, curving into the distance on either side. They cradle the suburbs and town gently down to the waterfront. The Gulf of Paria is resting, against the belly of the island stretching south. The sea is still this morning, “flat as a millpond,” according to Pierre. For four years she’d heard him say it and Ata always remembers that now whenever she looks at the bay. It bothers her slightly because it is such a European description, for such a tropical scene. She tried again to compare the scene to an imagined English millpond. No reeds, no millhouse in sight, with the big wheel or windmill always in the paintings. No. The only similarity is still water. And maybe the color sometimes. But the expanse, the long smooth lick of it, far away and shining out to the solid horizon. The promising sky clear against it, clean and innocent, there. Baby blue, tinged with the white of heat to come, vaulting higher, trailing scanty clouds way over the hills. Innocence, at this hour of the day, making the tankers and cargo ships look like children’s toys, parked on watercolor paper. The fluffy fronds of the gru-gru bef palms and bamboo foothills close by give the scene a Cazabon touch, she thinks. An illusion of colonial pastoral bliss. The beguiling tropics. Is maturity compromised beauty?
Ata focuses on the traffic circling the big green savannah. The line of glittering toy cars along the west side. She feels the hills watching her, as they watch everything. Scrutinizing. The line of traffic down Maraval Road past the Tatil Insurance tower disappears in the downtown cluster, emptying bodies into their work holes; the Guardian news building, the Red House of Parliament, Excellent Stores, Central Bank twin towers, more office towers built by millionaire Syrians. Construction sites waited on the waterfront with cranes to be operated, the docks — containers and goods boats to unload. T&TEC generator silver chimneys puffing, National Flour Mills silos to be filled and emptied. And the National Stadium — nothing going on there but the highway around it crawling with cars, shuffling more people in from the richer suburbs of the West. No cars on the hills of the East. Trees, small houses, and tiny streets make them picturesque now too, hiding the torment of poverty and anger curling away to the South.
The hustle and knivery, the fumes and ugliness of the town — all of it is hidden from this wonderful open house and garden. A blessing. Luck. That she and Pierre had found it when they decided to live together. She scans again. And once more the watercolor virtue drifts … detailed landscape paintings and faded prints, by settlers and their descendants, the old photographs that preserve a false innocence, glimmer in this morning-soft view. The gentleness still exists, for archival moments. While the terror and violence of unstoppable undergrowth continues forging new-world progress and exotically dangerous new breeds.
A breeze must have fanned the millpond. A flicker of ripples runs lightly across the bay. “Cats’ paws,” Pierre calls them, and Ata likes that name. Wet prints tripping over the surface, disappearing on a warm wooden floor. Fleeting, is what makes it more beautiful — something you immediately want to see again. It will never happen in exactly the same way, though, and you will never know when it may. So you keep looking for that thing or moment, a shooting-star streak of emotion, wishing you could just keep it, for a second longer.
* * *
A heaviness moves with Ata from the warm stone wall toward the house. The grass feels slightly tough against her soles. It hasn’t rained in a while. The sun bounces off the pool, blinding, as she steps onto the pebble-textured concrete around it. The clean little bumps feel good, before the rough-cut stone along the guest room. The room’s drapes are still drawn, shutting the morning out. She stops briefly outside the French doors and listens for a moment, then continues on inside to the cool, smooth terrazzo floor. She can see that Thomas has already cleaned the living room. The floor shines beyond the beaming patches of sunlight. The settees are smooth, colorful cushions perfect in the low morris chairs on the veranda. Red anthuriums in their clay pots, and the glimpse of yellow lantana finish off the frame for the magnificent sky and view. Yes. Fixing it up with Pierre had given her more pleasure than she expected. Gardening, teaching him about tropical plants, packing beds with ferns and yuccas, spathiphyllum, night jasmine. The tall skinny palm tucked into the corner of the house, flat-leaved philodendrons crawling up the pillars — it all helped them fit together, better. She inhales deeply and turns back to the guest room, pausing briefly outside before knocking.