Charlene returned the tube to the shelf. The lights in the pharmacy gave her a headache. Skin care products all in a row. Sunscreen. Wrinkle cream. Acne cream. Keisha would be asking for that soon. Keisha was Marcus's little girl who was quickly becoming not so little. Soon she'd be at the age where she'd need a mother most. She couldn't talk to her daddy about woman things. Maybe then Charlene could be the mama that her body wouldn't let her become. She put a box of salicylic soap into the basket. It would be good to have on hand.
The end of the aisle was the somewhat condescendingly named "ethnic" section. Except it was better now that "ethnic" wasn't just a well-intentioned euphemism for "Black". Now it had Latino products, imported from faraway lands. Charlene liked to look at their exotic and sometimes sinister-looking labels. Boxes and bottles of mysterious soaps, colognes, and weight-loss teas. A jar of skin-bleaching cream. Charlene hadn't seen one in years. She picked it up and studied it.
Keisha wouldn't need that. Her mother was produced by two idealistic flower children and intended to be an ambassador of Black and White harmony. Keisha was what Charlene's own mother would call "high yellow". At first, it didn't make sense to Charlene. Yellow was what Nikki Ling was sometimes called at school, and even that wasn't accurate. The high yellow Black women that Charlene's mother pointed out to her were somewhere between Nikki Ling's color and her own. None of the crayons she had at school were dark enough to be Charlene-colored.
She almost had a baby, a little girl. She imagined her with warm golden skin, soft hair, and eyes the shone like honey. Solomon thought he was the father but he wasn't. Her true father was an angel. He saw the bruises on Charlene's body and he wanted to kill Solomon but he was a good angel so he couldn't do that. Instead, he kissed her belly and drew all of the Solomon out of the fetus and replaced it with sweetness and beauty. The baby's name would have been Angela, after her father, but Angela died before she had the chance to be born. And with Angela's death came the death of any future children Charlene would have. Solomon knew what the angel did, somehow, and he got his revenge. It was the only explanation.
The end of the aisle was the somewhat condescendingly named "ethnic" section. Except it was better now that "ethnic" wasn't just a well-intentioned euphemism for "Black". Now it had Latino products, imported from faraway lands. Charlene liked to look at their exotic and sometimes sinister-looking labels. Boxes and bottles of mysterious soaps, colognes, and weight-loss teas. A jar of skin-bleaching cream. Charlene hadn't seen one in years. She picked it up and studied it.
Keisha wouldn't need that. Her mother was produced by two idealistic flower children and intended to be an ambassador of Black and White harmony. Keisha was what Charlene's own mother would call "high yellow". At first, it didn't make sense to Charlene. Yellow was what Nikki Ling was sometimes called at school, and even that wasn't accurate. The high yellow Black women that Charlene's mother pointed out to her were somewhere between Nikki Ling's color and her own. None of the crayons she had at school were dark enough to be Charlene-colored.
She almost had a baby, a little girl. She imagined her with warm golden skin, soft hair, and eyes the shone like honey. Solomon thought he was the father but he wasn't. Her true father was an angel. He saw the bruises on Charlene's body and he wanted to kill Solomon but he was a good angel so he couldn't do that. Instead, he kissed her belly and drew all of the Solomon out of the fetus and replaced it with sweetness and beauty. The baby's name would have been Angela, after her father, but Angela died before she had the chance to be born. And with Angela's death came the death of any future children Charlene would have. Solomon knew what the angel did, somehow, and he got his revenge. It was the only explanation.
