The Other Side of Paradise: A Memoir (15 page)

“Stacey, you mad? Is what you doing with we money? Is Mama tell you fi throw them back in?”

The last coin plops into the shallow water below. Green bucket in hand, I tell her to get the yellow one and follow me. Underneath the house, I turn the tap counterclockwise and fill the bucket to the brim with clean water. I take Elisha’s bucket and set it under the pipe. When it is full, we make our way back to the tank. I scoop handfuls of mud into the buckets and tip both buckets into the tank. The top layer of mud on the ground soon disappears. We have to dig dry earth to make each bucket muddy. We keep going until the muddy water is almost up to our knees. Then I toss in the hats and the socks and the knife and the bicycle chain—everything is returned to the abyss.

The earth around the tank is full of holes now. The brown dog is curled in the biggest one. I deliver my hardest kick into its side. It looks up at me, surprised, before it scampers off to the cellar.

Elisha stares at me. She is covered from head to toe in mud. “Little girl,” I say, “look at yuh-self! How you manage to get so dirty? You should be ashamed of how you look. Go inside and go bathe your stinking dirty skin!”

“Stacey, is what me do why you bawling after me so? You think is me make you throw away all that money?” She sucks her teeth and stomps away. As she slams the bathroom door, I kick the fish tank so hard my toe-nail on my big toe breaks and bleeds. I wash off the blood in the brown water. The rastaman has passed already, but I climb up onto the front gate and slowly swing back and forth, softly singing his song.

D
iana’s seventh-grade biology book says it is supposed to be “haemoglobin-red.” I peer down at the weird fluid, sitting smack in the center of my pink panties, and wonder if the brown stain, shaped like an egg, is “haemoglobin-red.”

The glossary in the back of the book defines haemoglobin as “the iron-containing respiratory pigment in red blood cells of vertebrates, consisting of about 6 percent haeme and 94 percent globin.”

I toss the book behind the toilet and examine the egg-shaped culprit again. I know exactly what is happening to me. I am having my first period. Every girl between the ages of ten and thirteen should get it. The book says if you do not get it, you might be a hermaphrodite. That is someone whose vagina has its own penis. The book says the proper name for my coco-bread is
vagina
. I don’t know if I like the word
vagina. Vagina
sounds like it is the name of a disease that jezebel women get. I study the book, reading and rereading everything about the “Peculiarities of the Period.” There are supposed to be “adult urges,” and dull pains, commonly known as “cramps,” and “a flow of menses that is recognizable as life force by its haemoglobin-red hue.”

I want to talk to Auntie, but I am afraid she would box me in my mouth for asking her anything about my vagina. But I know I have to ask her for the sanitary napkins.

I pull up my shorts and walk carefully to the veranda. I revel in the thick wetness squishing beneath me. I stand by the door and watch Auntie turn the pages of her big black Bible.

She licks her finger and turns a page. “Is why you standing there watching me like you is a policeman so? What you want?”

“Nothing, Auntie. Is just that—I mean—something—happened to—I think I just—”

She frowns and looks up from the page.

“Stacey, me don’t have all day fi listen to you hem and haw. Say what you saying and stop talking like you is a handicap!”

I take a deep breath and blurt out in one breath, “Auntie, I think I just started menstruating and I don’t have any of the sanitary pad things to put on.”

She sighs and looks out at the banana trees. When she does not say anything, I follow her gaze to the young fruits hugging themselves into a bunch.

“Auntie? Should I ask Diana for some of hers?”

“How old you be now, Stacey?”

“Ten, Auntie. I going to be eleven the end of this year.”

Auntie shakes her head and sighs again.

“Auntie, what I must do about the pads?”

“Well, Stacey, to tell you the truth, those kind of things a young lady must buy for herself. But because it happen upon you sudden, I will buy them this time.”

I calculate how many mornings I will have to forgo car fare so I can buy the monthly sanitary napkins. I am already walking to school most mornings, and I still can’t buy much more than a box juice and banana chips for lunch.

“Okay, Auntie, thanks very much for buying them this time.”

“Never you mind any thanks! The only thanks I looking for is from God. I do not do anything for anybody for any reward here on earth. The Heavenly Father has my great reward. Now go inside the room and pass me my black handbag.”

After she gives me the money, I fold the notes and head out to Miss Elaine’s shop. As I step over the rocks I try not to think about the uncertain red spreading over my favorite panties. I know the smell of Stayfree maxi-pads. I see Diana walking to the bathroom whenever she gets a visit from her red auntie from Red Hills. Stayfree is cheap, but it smells like dead flowers. I worry that people will smell the pads on me and know what is happening to my vagina. I wonder how the pad will stay inside
my panties. The Stayfree pads are different from the ones in the book. The one in the book is the one you have to tie to your waist.

At the shop, Miss Elaine stuffs the pack of pads inside a brown paper bag, and then quietly slides it across the counter.

At home, I hand over Auntie’s change and dash into the bathroom. I lock the door behind me and rip open the plastic packaging. The flowery-sweet scent makes me gag. I hold my breath and examine the pink and white strip. There is a picture of a hand tearing off the strip. The picture also shows the pad lying lengthwise along the crotch of the panties. I quickly peel the strip off the adhesive and pull up my panties. I check to make sure everything is secure. I am no longer worried the pad will fall out of my shorts. They put a lot of glue on the pad so it can really stick. The book said there would be some pain, but the sharp pulling beneath me is unbearable. I can hardly move from the pinching of my hairs pasted to the sanitary napkin.

“Two hours,” I tell myself. “Only two hours, Stacey. Then you can change it.”

I carefully make my way to the back of the house. The pulling is too intense. I have to stop walking. I park myself on the back steps, but every shift of weight is agony. An hour later, I am sure something is wrong. I limp back to the bathroom, taking the bag of napkins with me.

This time, I read the instructions on the bag: “Important: Make sure the adhesive side of the belt-less maxi-pad lays flat against the crotch of the panties.” I read the instructions again. Then I take a breath and yank the used pad from my vagina. It hurts so much everything goes black. For a few moments I am unable to make a sound. And when my vision clears I see more black hairs on the pad than on my vagina. I try to fold the pad in two. But the sticky part isn’t sticky anymore.

Suddenly the day seems so dirty. I want to wash all of it away. I decide to take a shower. Then Auntie begins knocking violently. “Stacey! Stacey, open this door! Open it! Open it before I break it down.”

I step out of the shower and pick up the pad before I unlock the door. I stand there naked, soiled pad in hand. Auntie looks at the brown adhesive side of the beltless maxi-pad and grabs me by the shoulder.

“You think money grow on mango tree? Why you wasting the pad? You never see that you put the thing on wrong?” She is shaking my shoulder so hard that everything seems to be happening in slow motion. I hear
her voice from far away. “You waste the thing for nothing! For foolishness! Stacey, you believe you are big woman now, eh?”

Her voice drops and the shaking intensifies. “These sort of things must be done secretly! Nobody don’t need to see you making a damn fool of yourself. And why you was in here naked? You was in there looking at yourself? Lord Jesus Christ! Don’t make me find out that you in here doing anything to yourself!” Her finger is in my face. “If I catch you in here looking at yourself again, I will show you how water walk go to pumpkin belly! Now wrap up that thing with newspaper and throw it outside. Nobody want to see your dirty nastiness!”

Her voice drops to an almost imperceptible rasp. “And make sure you stop talking to those boys over the fence. You must be mad if you think I going tolerate no babies under this roof.”

I am confused. “But, Auntie, I think you could only get a baby if a boy put his penis
into
your vagina.” The sentence is all the way out before I realize I should have kept my mouth shut.

“Jesus God in heaven! This pickney have mouth, eh? Who ask you for no long argument?” She pushes me against the sink and raises her right hand to hit me.

I duck and raise the brown pad to defend myself.

Her arm freezes in the air and she jumps away from me. Her expression of utter horror makes me want to laugh out loud, but I am too afraid she would kill me. So I wait until she slams the door behind her before I fall to the ground laughing and crying until I can’t move anymore.

I close the Mills & Boon romance novel and decide to call my own father after school tomorrow.

When the last bell rings, I quickly make my way to the telephone booths on Church Street. It is Friday evening, so the phones are busy with people checking to see if relatives abroad will wire them money for the weekend. I wait while a woman on the phone asks her daughter if she will ever come back to Jamaica. I cannot hear the answer, but the woman nods as tears roll down her cheeks. She reminds her daughter to send money for the children’s school fee. “And don’t forget you say you was going to send me a new hat fi Easter. All right, all right! Me know it expensive. Take care and cover up good from the cold.” When she says good-bye, her nose is running and she is wiping her eyes.

I slip into the narrow booth. I search for the number in the big yellow phone book. I trace my finger down the long list of Chins. There are four Junior Chins listed right after Joan Chin. I draw courage from the
memory of Summer demanding answers from her estranged father and dial the number with an address on Leader Avenue. I jump when someone answers on the first ring.

“Hello.” The voice on the other end of the phone is deep, melodic.

“Hello…” My voice cracks.

“Yes, hello? Hello? Hello?” His response is impatient. “Is anyone there?”

“Hell—hello. Is this Mr….?” I have no idea what to say.

“Hello? Hello? Who is this? To whom do you wish to speak? Hello? Who is this? What number is it that you want?”

I take a deep breath and grip the receiver. My fingers ache. “Is this Mr…. is this Junior Chin? I want to speak with Junior Chin.”

“Yes, this is Junior Chin. Who is this?”

“This is Staceyann Chin and I want to know if you are my father.”

The silence on his end of the phone is made louder by the sound of cars honking as they pass by me on the street. I look at a bright red Honda going by and wonder, if he has a car, will let me ride in it?

“Oh, Staceyann…”

My name sounds so sad on his lips, not excited like I had imagined. Maybe he is worried about how much money it would cost to be my father. I know that he has other children. And children are very expensive. I want to tell him that he doesn’t have to give me any money. I just want him to go places with me and talk to me about the books I read. I want him to know that being
my
father isn’t going to be expensive.

I remember Summer’s speech to her father.

“I really don’t want your money,” I begin. “I can take care of myself. I’m going to be somebody someday, a lawyer or a doctor. Doctors and lawyers make a lot of money. I won’t need any of your money. I just want my identity. You know, my roots. I want to know if I got my nose from you and my crooked little fingers. People say I must have got those things from you. My mother’s nose is different and she doesn’t have any crooked little fingers. And I’m a really nice person, I read a lot of books and I get good grades, and…and…”

He sighs. “Okay. Can you come by my office on Tuesday? Do you know where it is? It’s on Barnett Street—right in front of the police station. You can come right after school.”

“Yes, sir! Okay, see you on Tuesday, sir!”

I
run all the way to the furniture store. At the front desk a round-faced, friendly woman with clear nail polish on her fingers is talking on the phone. When she puts the receiver down, I say good evening and ask for Mr. Chin.

She wrinkles her brow and asks, “Which one of the Mr. Chins you looking for?”

“I am looking for the owner of the place, Mr. Junior Chin. He said I should come today.”

“You have an appointment? And what is this in regard to?”

The phone rings.

“I am Staceyann, his daughter. And he told me to come.”

She doesn’t say anything else. She just points me in the direction of his office and picks up the ringing phone.

“He is around the back. Is the last door behind the red rolls of upholstery—just go down there and knock.”

I navigate my way around the giant rolls of red cloth. I step over the planks of wood and follow the long hallway. I tap lightly on the door.

“Come in.”

I hesitate.

“Come in! Just push the door and come in!”

The office is a small room with piles of furniture paraphernalia all over the chairs, the desk, and the floor; bits of red velvet upholstery, wooden legs for chairs, floral cushions for couches, nails, hammers—I have to clear myself a path to a chair.

“Sit down there, young lady.”

I sit down in front of the desk. He looks at me for a long time before he speaks. He is kind of handsome, and darker than most Chinese people. His hair is a little wavy and peppered with gray. I never imagined my father with gray hair. The pictures of my mother are youthful and vibrant. Every hair is in full color. He doesn’t look like someone my mother could be with. He is kind of old. Handsome, but old.

“How can I help you, little miss?” I am confused by his question.

“Well, I called because—because…well, I mean, you are my father. We should get to know each other.”

“What are you reading?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You say you read a lot. What are you reading now?”

I don’t want to tell him about Blade and Summer, so I lie. “I am reading a book called
The Silver Sword
. It’s about some children who lost their parents in the war and they are going somewhere to try and find them. The children are Polish. They are from Poland.”

“Young lady, we have to talk about some things, here.” He is silent for a beat. Then he continues. “Do you know how a woman gets pregnant?”

“Yes, of course,” I reply. “First, she has sex with a man, and then he gives her sperm and the baby grows in her for nine months, but only sometimes—I was born at less than seven months. That’s how I am with everything. I do everything fast. People say that is why I am bright, because I do things before I am supposed to.”

“Well, if your mother and I had had sex,
then
you could be my child. But I never really had sex with your mother. There’s no way you could be my child.”

“But I’m half-Chinese…” I don’t understand what he is saying.

“I know, but you didn’t get any of that from me.” He holds my gaze as he says it.

“But people say I look like your other daughter…” I am floored.

“I know. I know. It’s obvious that you are of Asian descent, but there are a hundred Chinese gentlemen in Montego Bay. It must have been one of them, because it was not me. I am very sorry. But that is the truth. Believe me, young lady, if I had had sex with your mother I would tell you.”

His eyes look like he is telling the truth. I don’t want to call him a liar. I do not want him to be a liar. It does not matter that people say I look exactly like his daughter Karen or that I have ankles that turn in like his. He says that I do not belong to him and that is that. I want to scream at him and call him a bastard, a piece of shit, a coward. I look at his face again; he believes every word he is saying. He looks right at me and I see that this is very difficult for him. Suddenly, I want to protect him. I say the most comforting thing I can think of. “Well, I guess that’s all you can say, there’s really nothing more. My mother said you are my father, you say you are not. She is not here to contradict you. Don’t worry about it, sir. There’s nothing else you can do.”

I pick up my bag and stand.

“You know something, Mr…. I really appreciate your telling me. Big people don’t tell children things because they think we are too young to understand. But we understand a lot more than most people think. The thing is, I feel like a big person most of the time. Thanks again for your time, sir, good evening.”

I leave the building with the staff staring and passing comments on how tall I am, how much I look like my mother. Another Chinese man who looks very much like my father stops me at the door.

“Stop there, man. Stop a little bit.” He takes me by the shoulder. “What is your name?”

My eyes fill up. His face seems magnified. “Staceyann. Staceyann Chin.”

“Okay, Staceyann. Your father is not here every day. But I am here every day. My name is Desmond. So I am your Uncle Desmond. And you can come and see me anytime you want, you hear me? And if you need something fi school—a book, or a pair of shoes—just come here and I will try and see what I can do, you hear me?”

I am sobbing now. Uncle Desmond is very kind, but I don’t want him. I want my father. I want my father to call me back and tell me that he was just joking with me. That he made a mistake and that he is sorry.

“Listen to me, Stacey.” Uncle Desmond shakes me gently by the shoulder. “If I am not here, ask the lady inside. She is my wife. She is your Auntie Joan. And she will help you, you hear?”

I nod and head out toward the front of the store.

The workmen, staining a new dresser, nod and tell me I look exactly like my sister. “You are the dead stamp. And you have the same body as your mother. She was slim and neat just like you!”

I have never seen these men before, yet they all seem to know my mother. I walk to the taxi stand, hugging my schoolbag to my chest so that I won’t fall to pieces. Auntie is going to be upset because I am late. My uniform needs to be washed for school the next day. I want to kill my father who is not my father. I want to be dead.