We get to her room and she goes over to her dresser for a set of tweezers. Then, she takes my face into her hand and studies it.
It is like looking in a mirror. Her eyes that reflect mine, in both color and intensity, bore into me before I’m forced to look elsewhere from nerves.
She knows something’s eating at me before I even open my mouth and she gives me a look that says she’s waiting for me to spill.
“Just say what’s on ya mind,” she commands before she starts her torturous quest of plucking the hairs off my chin. “You look constipated.”
I fiddle with my thumbs, tempted to confess the group chat mess. But I can already picture her laughing herself sick.
So instead I say, “Za’s brother is back.” Which comes out of nowhere and makes Mum’s brows lift.
“The football one?”
“Yes.”
“Mm-hm.”
“And he’ll be at the dinner,” I add, trying to sound casual.
“Mhm.”
I frown. “Why you ‘mhm’ like that?”
“Because,” she says simply, “I know how yuh feel ‘bout him.”
“Tuh,” I scoff. “When I was a kid, ay? I’m over that.”
Her mouth quirks. “Oh… I see. Big, bad Francine nuh feel nothin’ anymore, no true?”
“I don’t,” I insist. “And the big comment is so unnecessary.”
She gives me a look. “Gyal, mi ‘member when yuh cry fi di whole week straight when him lef goh Africa. Mi did haffi lie tell Chinaza seh one a yuh uncle dem did dead.”
I groan, and rub my cheeks to stop the heating. “That was years ago and I’m past that. Things change.”
“Mm.” She watches me closely. “So why yuh bring him up then?”
I hesitate, fiddling with my thumbs. “I don’t know. I just… I don’t know how I feel about being around him again. Part of me wants to ignore him, but the other part—” I pause, chewing my lip. “The other part wants to make him feel how he made me feel.”
Her grip suddenly tightens on my chin, making me look her in the eyes. “Yuh ain’t giving the man no trouble, right?”
I roll my eyes. “Why does everyone think I’m the trouble?”
“Because, Francine,” she says, leveling me with the stare only Jamaican mothers have, “Trouble a di only ting yuh know how fi draw, mi swear.”
I grin because she’s not wrong. “I’m behaving, I promise. Well… I did cuss out Sister Maria today at church, but that doesn’t count.”
Mum shakes her head, muttering under her breath. “Dat jancrow. Yuh know she pass har place wid mi last week? A ask mi how yuh get so big.” Her eyes flash with annoyance. “Mi tell har seh yuh favor ya luscious mudda. An she favor box car.”
I burst out laughing, swatting her arm playfully as she smiled.
In moments like this, I’m reminded—I could never hate my body. It reminded me too much of my mothers and I’d never hate the body that brought me into this world.
I could never hate the stomach that held me. The arms that comforted me. The breasts that nursed me. I didn’t have it in me to look at myself in disgust when I stood here because of the woman who looked exactly like me.
My love for my mother made me love myself.
Mum tilts her head, squinting at me when she was done. “Yuh had a lotta hair pon ya chin eh,” she states as if it’s a new revelation. As much as I love her and everything she gave me, she could’ve spared me the PCOS. “Hope yuh neva carry dat go a church.”
