When Darkness Loves Us

Martha leaned against the doorway and watched the red, orange, and yellow sunset streak across the horizon. Above, the clouds were puffy white, but to the east, they were already dark, night clouds. Her feet were swollen, her ankle throbbed, but she was reluctant to go back inside. The cool of the evening was coming, and it was just beautiful outside.

She dragged the heavy rocker out to the front porch and lowered her bulk into it. Then she wished she had brought a cold glass of lemonade with her. It was lovely out here—how come she never thought to do this before?

Because I’m learning, she thought. I have a friend, and now things are different.

Inside, the little house was filled with emptiness. Priscilla had gone, and with her went the gaiety of life, the smiles and joys of pleasure. The kitchen table was piled with packages, and a new television stood in the corner by the sofa, but all those things weren’t fun without Priscilla.

Martha rocked and watched the chickens scurry toward their coop. She unlaced her shoes and took them off, feeling the fresh air on her hot and wrinkled toes.

Priscilla had been coming over a lot lately. They painted the living room last week, a cheery yellow. Today they went shopping. Priscilla explained to Martha that the bank held a whole lot of money for her, and that money was for spending. They went to the bank and Priscilla talked to the manager. Martha made an X on a little card, and when they left, with everybody staring at them, Martha had more money in her purse than she had ever seen before. And Priscilla said there was plenty more where that came from.

They drove, too fast, it seemed, to the new shopping mall just south of Morgan. They bought two new dresses for Martha, some wool slacks and sweaters, since winter was coming, a new coat they found on sale, and the new color television with a box to change the program from way across the room. They looked at new sofas and chairs and bedspreads and curtains. There were more electric gadgets than Martha had ever imagined, more colorful things, pretty golden statues, books and pictures and paintings and lots and lots of people and even more cars. A whole farmful of shining cars, windshields glaring in the sun.

Priscilla had told her she had enough money to throw out all her old furniture and buy new, so they looked and looked and Martha loved it all, but she loved what she had in the house best. She bought new towels, though, for the bathroom and kitchen, some underwear, and six new loaf pans.

There were some heavy bookends with little golden birds on them that Priscilla just loved, so Martha bought those, too, and gave them to her. Priscilla’s eyes lit up, and she hugged her, right there in the middle of the store. Martha felt embarrassed, so she took the mirror out of her purse and worried over her nose.

They went in and out of shops all day long, Priscilla laughing at everything and Martha trying to keep up. She tried to understand, she tried not to think about her feet, she tried to enjoy everything as Priscilla did, but she just felt out of place.

Finally, they left, and drove home with the car filled with crinkling packages and fresh things. Priscilla helped bring the things inside; then she left, and all the joy went out of the day.

The sun sank down and the shadows grew. Martha felt a chill, so she left the rocker on the porch and hobbled inside. She turned on the television and lay down on the sofa. There was a man talking. His face was green. Idly, she wondered where the green people lived, and when she woke up, the house was dark and quiet, except for the white fuzzy buzzing on the screen.

Martha twisted the tube of flesh-colored makeup and looked in the mirror. Slowly, carefully, she traced the scars around her nose like Priscilla told her, like she did with the lipstick so long ago. With an awkward little finger, she tried to mush the line out—“Blend it, Martha”—so it didn’t look worse than the scars. Nothing looked worse than the scars. They began between her eyes and ran down both sides of her nose to her lip, half an inch wide, shiny and smooth with ridges like little ladders. On the left side of her nose, the scar was jagged. She blended as best she could, then powdered her whole face. It looked better.

She turned toward the door, then back quickly to the mirror to see what she looked like at first glance. At first glance she looked like Martha, with a crooked lump of flesh tacked on to the middle of her face like a horned knob on a tree. She had hoped this stick makeup would give her a nose like Priscilla’s. Smooth and pink with little brown dots across it. Small, with even little nostrils. Her nostrils were warped—one was large and round, one was dented and caved in on one side. She striped on red lipstick and put on one of her new dresses. She was going to find another friend today.