'You should tell someone.'
'You cannot report a ghost to the police.'
Joseph's hands were creeping up my arm and going through the top of my nightgown.
'I tried to get rid of it,' she said, 'Today. But they wanted me to think about it for twenty-four hours. When I thought of taking it out, it got more horrifying. That's when I began seeing him. Over and over. That man who raped me.'
'We'll come and visit you this weekend,' I said.
'I want Joseph to meet Marc.'
I felt his other hand creeping up my thighs, his hair smelling like aftershave as his face approached mine.
'Manman, I have to go,' I said. 'We'll visit with you on the weekend. Maybe Saturday.'
'Saturday will be a wonderful day then,' she said.
He reached over and pulled my body towards his. I closed my eyes and thought of the Marassa, the doubling. I was lying there on that bed and my clothes were being peeled off my body, but really I was somewhere else. Finally, as an adult, I had a chance to console my mother again. I was lying in bed with my mother. I was holding her and fighting off that man, keeping those images out of her head. I was telling her that it was all right. That it was not a demon in her stomach, that it was a child, like I was once a child in her body. I was telling her that I would never let anyone put her away in a mental hospital, that I would take care of her. I would visit her every night in my doubling and, from my place as a shadow on the wall, I would look after her and wake her up as soon as the nightmares started, just like I did when I was home.
I kept thinking of my mother, who now wanted to be my friend. Finally I had her approval. I was okay. I was safe. We were both safe. The past was gone. Even though she had forced it on me, of her sudden will, we were now even more than friends. We were twins, in spirit. Marassas.
'Can we visit my mother this weekend?' I asked Joseph.
'Whatever you want.' He was panting.
'You were very good,' he said.
'I kept my eyes closed so the tears wouldn't slip out.'
I waited for him to fall asleep, then went to the kitchen. I ate every scrap of the dinner leftovers, then went to the bathroom, locked the door, and purged all the food out of my body.
Chapter 31
There were three of us in my sexual phobia group. We gave it that name because that's what Rena-the therapist who introduced us-liked to call it.
Buki, an Ethiopian college student, had her clitoris cut and her labia sewn up when she was a girl. Davina, a middle-aged Chicana, had been raped by her grandfather for ten years.
We met at Davina's house. She was the only one of us with a place to herself. Buki lived in a college dorm and, of course, I lived with Joseph.
Davina had a whole room in her house set aside for our meetings. When we came in, we changed into long white dresses that Buki had sewn for us. We wrapped our hair in white scarves that I had bought. As we changed in the front room, I showed them the statue of Erzulie that my grandmother had given me. Davina told me to take it into the room myself, as I pondered what it meant in terms of my family.
The air in our room smelled like candles and incense. We sat on green heart-shaped pillows that Davina had made. The color green stood for life and growth.
We bowed our heads and recited a serenity prayer.
God grant us the courage to change those things we can, the serenity to accept the things we can't, and the wisdom to know the difference.'
I laid the Erzulie next to our other keepsakes, the pine cones and seashells we collected on our solitary journeys.
'I am a beautiful woman with a strong body.' Davina led the affirmations.
'We are beautiful women with strong bodies.' We echoed her uncertain voice.
'Because of my distress, I am able to understand when others are in deep pain.'
'Because of our distress, we are able to understand when others are in deep pain.'
I heard my voice rise above the others.
'Since I have survived this, I can survive anything.'
Buki read us a letter she was going to send to the dead grandmother who had cut off all her sexual organs and sewn her up, in a female rite of passage.
There were tears rolling down her face as she read the letter.
'Dear Taiwo. You sliced open my soul and then you told me I can't show it to anyone else. You took a great deal away from me. Because of you, I now carry with me an untouchable wound.'
Sobbing, she handed me the piece of paper. I continued reading the letter for her.
'Because of you, I feel like a helpless cripple. I sometimes want to kill myself. All because of what you did to me, a child who could not say no, a child who could not defend herself. It would be easy to hate you, but I can't because you are part of me. You are me.'
We each wrote the name of our abusers in a piece of paper, raised it over a candle, and watched as the flames consumed it. Buki blew up a green balloon. We went to Davina's backyard and watched as she released it in the dark. It was hard to see where the balloon went, but at least it had floated out of our hands.
I felt broken at the end of the meeting, but a little closer to being free. I didn't feel guilty about burning my mother's name anymore. I knew my hurt and hers were links in a long chain and if she hurt me, it was because she was hurt, too.
It was up to me to avoid my turn in the fire. It was up to me to make sure that my daughter never slept with ghosts, never lived with nightmares, and never had her name burnt in the flames.
When I came home from the meeting, I found Joseph sitting in the living room with Brigitte on his lap.
'Listen to this.' He grabbed her and jumped up. 'Say it again, pumpkin.'
'Say what again?' I asked.
'She said Dada.'
At his prodding, Brigitte said something that sounded like Dada.
'Say it again.' We were both cheering.
Her eyes lit up as she watched us.
'Sweetie, say it again, please,' I said, secretly rooting for 'Mama.'
She clapped her hands, keeping up with our excitement.
'Oh please, honey, say it again. Dada. Dada.'
'Mama. Mama. Manman.'
She said Dada and laughed.
Joseph jumped up in the air and simulated a high five.
'She's saving Mama for when she can really talk,' I said. 'Dada is such a random sound.'
'You're green with envy and you know it.'
I went to the kitchen to make myself some tea.
'How was the meeting?' he asked.
'Good.'
'Your mother called. She says she urgently needs to talk to you.'
The baby was saying Dada over and over, trying to capture all his attention.
'Your therapist called too,' he said. 'She wanted to know if you'd be coming for your visit tomorrow. I said yes.'
I let him play with the baby while I went in to call my mother.
'Marc is downstairs making me some eggs,' she said.
'Are you all right?' I asked. 'Joseph said it was urgent.'
'It was an urgent feeling. I just wanted to hear your voice.'
