Here Comes the Sun Read online

  By the time they’re done, they have bought half of what Delores had. Only Delores can sell this many souvenirs in a day, because, unlike the other hagglers, she knows she has a gold mine at home—a daughter she has to support—one who is going to be a doctor. She does it for Thandi. As she stuffs the foreign dollars, which will be saved inside the old mattress on the bed that she shares with her mother, inside her brassiere, Delores is convinced that someday all her sacrifices will be paid back. Tenfold.

  Thandi wants more. She searches for it in Mr. Levy’s Wholesale Shop, which is right across the street from Dino’s Bar on River Bank Road—the only road that takes people in and out of River Bank, a former fishing village on the outskirts of Montego Bay where Thandi has lived all her life. Mr. Levy’s Wholesale and Dino’s are the only two businesses left since the seafood shacks closed down. The construction and the drought have not only driven the fishermen out of work, but out of River Bank, leaving behind a community with not much to live off besides the highly taxed groceries each month at Mr. Levy’s.

  Mr. Levy’s Wholesale has been around since the beginning of time, it seems. The shop has fed generations of River Bank residents. Like the evolving population it serves, Mr. Levy’s Wholesale has changed owners many times—the business being passed down from father to son to grandson to great-grandson to great-great-grandson. The current Mr. Levy looks just like his predecessors, squinting into the black faces that yell their orders—“Missah Chin, Gimme a quarter poun’ ah rice. Gimme a pound ah flour. Beg yuh a bag a sugah nuh, missah Chin? Me will pay yuh lata. Gimme a cake soap wid baby oil.” Though Mr. Levy’s name is written on the outside of the store in bright red paint, people still refer to the owner as Mr. Chin by virtue of him being Chinese. Mr. Levy’s wife is a stone-faced woman who silently fetches the orders in the back. His two sons sometimes work the register when he slips out with his wife to eat lunch or dinner behind the mesh door, where customers can see them devouring spoonfuls of steamed rice or noodles. The shop carries a small quantity of staple goods like rice, milk, cornmeal, Panadol for colds or flu, Foska Oats, tin mackerel, spices, bread, and butter. Once or twice Thandi has spotted something exotic. Like last month when she discovered a chocolate bar that she had never seen before—the purple wrapper emblazoned with gold letters. Chocolat De L’amour. She tried it. Savored the richness of it on her tongue, on the roof of her mouth. The shop is always hot and stuffy, the warm air constantly being blown by a large fan in a corner. People go in and out. There’s nothing else they can do; if they lingered for too long they would faint from heat exhaustion or the smell of cat piss, courtesy of the big brown and white cat that sits by the counter and licks its paws. Thandi musters up the courage to raise her voice when Mr. Levy squints in her direction. “May I have a pound of rice and a bag of cornmeal, please?” She says this in perfect English, which attracts the stares of some people in the store. But the old “Chiney” man is unimpressed. He absently reaches for the items and shouts, “Five dolla!” without so much as a glance at her. His short fingers leaf through the Observer before him. Thandi wonders if he has ever seen her face. She wonders if he thinks she’s like all the others. With his eyes half closed, all black faces probably look the same to him. Behind the counter, Thandi identifies the Queen of Pearl crème that Miss Ruby told her to get. Another exotic thing Mr. Levy carries.

  She clears her throat. “Gimme Pearl too,” she says, the patois sounding strange coming out of her mouth given that she’s dressed in her Saint Emmanuel High school uniform, the pleated white skirt falling well below her knees, her white socks folded neatly at her ankles, her shoes polished to a shine. She gestures toward the crème with her chin, an action that she has seen the women in the shop do when they place their orders, their confidence evident in the way they stand, leaning with all their weight on the counter, one leg cotched on the back of the other. Thandi purchases the crème from Mr. Levy with the extra change from the groceries. She can tell her sister, Margot, that she bought a pack of pencils and an exercise book. Thandi has seen the effects of the crème on the women who use it, the lightness coming into their skin, and the darkness receding like a sinister shadow around their hairline. Take Miss Ruby, for instance. A woman who lives in one of the shacks not too far from the fishing boats. All over River Bank, people know about Miss Ruby and her new business. Because of her, women and girls who were nothing before have become something, their newly lightened faces rendering them less invisible and more beautiful, worthy of jobs as front desk clerks, bank tellers, models, head sales associates, and in some cases flight attendants.

  It’s her house Thandi heads to.

  She walks along the Y-shaped river that cuts into the village. It separates and flows in opposite directions—one side runs into the wide expanse of the sea, while the other side runs in the direction of the hill that hovers over the town from the tail end of the fork. The water settles into a small cove shaded by bamboo and live oaks. The village got its name because if one were to look down from the top of the hill, the shacks would look like interspersed cardboard boxes on the land surrounding the river. A small fleet of fishermen’s boats are anchored on the side where the river meets the sea. They’ve been there, floating on the water like sleeping whales, since last December before the drought. The area has been roped off for the construction workers—men marching up and down the shore with thick hard hats and heavy rubber boots, combing the sand with a sense of purpose as though searching for buried treasure.

  When Thandi was a little girl she used to accompany her mother to buy fish from Miss Ruby out this way. She remembers standing in line outside Miss Ruby’s shack, watching Miss Ruby scale the fish, effortlessly slitting them with a sharp knife that revealed the red lining under the belly. But Thandi’s first visit to Miss Ruby by herself came only recently—long after Miss Ruby stopped selling fish. Thandi wanted to show her teachers and classmates how responsible she could be by running for form prefect, but she lost to Shelly McGregor, who, though average and unpopular, was voted favorite among the nuns and students. Thandi felt certain the loss had to do with her darker complexion, which she believes is the reason for the burdens that weigh as heavily as the textbooks she carries for subjects she has no interest in studying. But Thandi has one more chance to shine—Dana Johnson’s sweet sixteen party, which is months from now. It’s Thandi’s first party and the last social event before the final exams in June. She imagines herself wearing the nice fuchsia dress she saw in the window of Tiki Boutique near her school in Montego Bay. Her lighter, brighter skin would look good in a color like that; and it will surely make her feel like she belongs.

  Thandi sits naked inside Miss Ruby’s old shack on a bench. The shack is made of zinc and wooden planks, the exposed nails rusted from the open air that enters from the sea. A leaning mango tree rests on the roof from Hurricane Gilbert, giving shade from the sunlight and protection from potential voyeurs. Black mangoes dangle inside, some of them rotting with dried seeds. Every so often the sea breeze whispers something against the zinc roof or the gaping windows, leaving behind a salty breath that Thandi can taste on her lips. It’s mid-February, but the humidity and drought they’ve been experiencing make it feel like the dry, hot months of summer. Thandi’s back is hunched and her shoulders rounded. Tiny ants crawl on the dusty ground, a few making their way up the bench. She crosses and uncrosses her legs, fearing they might crawl into the mouth of her vagina. Across from her, Miss Ruby combines creams together, squeezing them inside a big white jar that used to contain hair-straightening cream. The woman expertly mixes the concoction with the tail of a metal comb, her tongue stuck between her big pink lips as she furrows her eyebrows in deep concentration. She never breaks a sweat in the overbearing heat, though she wears a hooded sweatshirt that covers her forehead and arms to prevent burning from the sun. A pair of loose-fitting pants covers her legs.

  “Yuh have the Queen of Pearl?” Miss Ruby asks. Thandi nods and hands it to her. “I don’t wan
t it now. Yuh should use it daily. Not dat it’s any strongah than my concoction. But if yuh use dem together, yuh g’wan frighten fi see how it wuk miracle. Yuh mus’ be careful same way,” Miss Ruby says to Thandi. “How is school?”

  “Fine,” Thandi says in a voice as small as the ants crawling on the floor. She puts the Queen of Pearl crème back inside her schoolbag.

  “Yuh ready fah the CXC?”

  Thandi shrugs. “I guess so.”

  Thandi’s entire high school career has been spent preparing for this one exam from the Caribbean Examination Council for nine subjects. All except one was chosen for her.

  “You guess?” Miss Ruby puts her hands on her hips. “Yuh betta be. It’s in four months, no? That’s a big, big deal. My cousin in Kingston fail five subjects last year an’ did haffi tek them ovah. Anothah girl end up dropping out an’ going to vocational school fi learn a trade. You is yuh mother’s only hope. Yuh know how hard she wuk fi send you to dat school?” It’s true. Delores cheats tourists out of their money with cheap souvenirs she sells for triple the price in Falmouth Market, and Margot works long hours at the hotel. They do it for her.

  Thandi swallows, looking down at her uniform piled on the floor like a rumpled sheet. It used to give her a sense of pride, but at this very moment, as she stares at it, she considers the other uses one could make of the white material that costs more than groceries for a month. Because of the expense, Thandi only owns two sets of uniforms, washing them by hand every evening after school, then ironing them for the next day.

  She looks down at her brown thighs. They haven’t changed a bit since her last visit. “Do you think I can get light in four months?” she asks Miss Ruby, thinking of the party and the boys who will be there.

  “You took the plastic off,” Miss Ruby says, a tinge of accusation in her voice.

  “It was too hot,” Thandi tells her. “I felt like I was going to pass out.”

  “I used to be black like you, but now look at me . . .” Miss Ruby turns her head from side to side for Thandi to see her salmon-colored skin, delicate with the texture of scalded milk. “See how bright my skin come? If yuh follow instructions yours will get this way quicker. Now dat yuh ’ave di Queen of Pearl, yuh might be lucky. If yuh want faster results, use it twice ah day.”

  She rubs the concoction up and down Thandi’s neck, back, arms, and shoulders. She rubs everywhere but her butt crack. Miss Ruby is hardly tender. Thandi wonders if Miss Ruby’s roughness is punishment for not having followed her earlier instructions. She imagines her blackness peeling off, the hydrogen peroxide Miss Ruby pours into the mixture acting like an abrasive, a medicine for her melancholy. She closes her eyes as the warm formula touches her skin. Miss Ruby works her way to Thandi’s chest. The circular motion of a stranger’s hands on her breasts makes Thandi blush. She has never been touched this way. She opens her eyes and searches for something—anything—that can take her mind off the sensation of this strange woman’s fingers. She imagines herself as a fish Miss Ruby rubs down with salt and vinegar before frying. Her eyes find the ceiling. Had she been able to lift her arm, she would trace the things she sees projected from her mind.

  “Luckily yuh ’ave good hair already,” Miss Ruby says. “Good, coolie hair. Yuh daddy is a Indian?”

  “I don’t know,” Thandi says, still staring up at the planks in the ceiling. “Never met him.”

  “Tsk, tsk. Well, God played a cruel joke on you. Because, chile, if yuh skin was as pretty as yuh hair, you’d be one gorgeous woman.”

  Miss Ruby isn’t saying anything Thandi hasn’t heard before. Her mother says the same thing, often shaking her head the way she does over burned food that has to go to waste. “It’s a pity yuh neva have skin like yuh daddy.” Thandi is neither the nutmeg-brown that makes Margot an honorable mistress—a rung lower than a bright-skinned wife—nor is she black like Delores, whose skin makes people sympathetic when they see her. “Who want to be black like dat in dis place?” Miss Ruby once said to Thandi about her mother.

  Miss Ruby gives Thandi the homemade mixture in the jar for her to apply as needed. “Only as needed,” she stresses. “These are very strong chemicals that could kill yuh.” She then reaches for the Saran Wrap and begins to wrap Thandi’s arms and torso. A mummified Thandi sits and listens to Miss Ruby’s instructions:

  “If yuh waan come quicker, leave on the plastic. Don’t wash. Don’t go in the sun. If yuh haffi go in the sun fah whateva reason, mek sure seh yuh covah up at all times from head to toe. If yuh start to feel like yuh g’wan faint, jus’ drink wata. It mek yuh sweat more. Whatevah yuh do, nuh tek off the plastic. An’ remembah, stay outta that sun!”

  Miss Ruby repeats these words like an ominous warning, her eyes pouring into Thandi’s. Thandi listens and nods, though she wants to rip the Saran Wrap off and jump in the river. She imagines her skin boiling, becoming molten liquid underneath the plastic wrap.

  “Do I have to wear this all the time?” Thandi asks.

  “Heat an’ sweat is yuh advantage. Jus’ bear it,” Miss Ruby says, stamping her with a look.

  Thandi regrets saying anything, sensing her complaint might be interpreted as her wanting less out of life. Less opportunity. Less chance of attracting the type of boys her mother and sister want her to attract (the type who will be at the party for sure). Less chance of acceptance in school. Less chance to flunk school—the only ship on which black girls like her could float, given that their looks will never do it for them. Her mother tells her this too. “Di only thing yuh have going for you is yuh education. Don’t ruin it.” Meanwhile, the unintelligent “brownins” in school end up with modeling contracts, or with boyfriends with money they can spend on them. The less attractive ones get good jobs in their family businesses. What else does she have to fall back on if she fails the exam, besides her drawings? But no one wants those. No one respects an artist. So when Thandi puts her clothes on, she pretends to ignore the crinkling of the plastic under her uniform and the nausea that comes over her.

  Miss Ruby examines her skin, her eyes like a sharp razor raking over Thandi’s body as though looking for areas she might have missed—dark patches that need to be rubbed, scrubbed down with the rigor of someone scouring the bottom of a burnt pot. Or the way she used to scale fish. Her dark eyes have in them a subtle hostility that reminds Thandi of the way the girls and nuns at school look at her. Can she tell Thandi doesn’t belong? Can she sniff her deceit? Perhaps in that moment Thandi reminds her of someone who did her wrong. Or of herself—the way she looked before she bleached her skin. How suddenly her mood changes once Thandi pays her the money.

  “Remembah to stay outta the sun like ah tell yuh,” Miss Ruby says. “’Cause you and I both know, God nuh like ugly.”

  When Thandi exits Miss Ruby’s shack, she exhales. She hadn’t realized she was holding her breath all that time to prevent herself from inhaling those chemicals that stank up the place. The pungent ammonia has replaced the fish smell.

  On her way back, Thandi takes the shaded path, which happens to go past the pink house—one of the nicest houses in the entire River Bank community. In fact, it’s one of only two houses in River Bank built with real cement and blocks and a shingle roof. It even has shutter windows and indoor plumbing.

  The pink house is owned by Verdene Moore, who is watched closely because the whole community knows what she is capable of. There’s no Miss before the woman’s name—like there is for all the other older women Thandi has to address that way—for the same reason there’s no Mrs. Not that the women in River Bank marry. Marriage is for people like the parents of the girls Thandi goes to school with. She thinks about the heavily made-up, well-dressed mothers accompanied by distinguished-looking fathers at school functions where Thandi’s only parent in attendance is Delores. Her father, the last she heard, lives in Westmoreland. There are mostly common-law arrangements in River Bank, where the men live with the women, which is usually enough to seal a relationship. The thing about V
erdene Moore that Thandi grew up hearing is that she lures little girls to her house with guineps so she can feel them up. Women have caught her in her yard smiling at them as they pass by with watermelons and icicles between their lips on those hot days when their skirts and dresses cling to their bodies like a second skin. It is known and has been known in River Bank’s history that Verdene Moore is the Antichrist, the snake every mongoose should have hauled off the island and eaten alive; the witch who practices obscene things too ungodly to even think about.

  Last August Mr. Joe, a stuttering nomad people hire to cut their weeds, found a dead dog in Verdene Moore’s yard with what looked like teeth marks in the animal’s bloodied side. He hollered and ran down the street, wielding his machete in the air as though slaying the wind. To this day people believe Verdene Moore killed the dog. A dried-up, bony mongrel. The type of animal that people kicked in the head or sides to move out of the way, the type of animal people fed bones and leftover meals and any rubbish they could find. The type of animal that attracted fleas and sniffed and licked its own rump. A detestable animal that became a poor, helpless animal overnight, because Verdene Moore killed it as a sacrifice in one of her rituals. People stay away from the woman, who keeps to herself anyway. No one even knows what really goes on in that pink house. Her mother, Miss Ella, had died and left it for her. Surely it’s a beauty, with its shingle roof, big yard, French doors, and windows with shutters; but the darkness inside can be seen from the road through the open windows, where white curtains billow and fall like ghosts.

  Thandi takes extra steps to hurry along, managing not to look at the beautiful garden in Verdene Moore’s yard, with flowers of every color in the rainbow, or sniff the heavy scent of the bougainvilleas that line the fence, where hummingbirds hover, then zip out of sight. They are an anomaly, for the drought has made it hard for the flowers this year. Even the red hibiscuses hang from their stems like the tongues of thirsty dogs.