In the back seat of Sacha's Mercedes-Benz wagon, speeding along toward Bourg le Compt, I've noticed a rash forming on my middle finger. The constant rise and fall of Chopin creates a harmonic back-drop for the stampede of white and tan cattle out my window.
I watch the rash spread up my arm, to my throat. It holds on my skin like an oil, slowly moving down through the layers of skin. It finds my lungs, my windpipe. I gasp. Sometimes I intentionally daydream to create more profound group dynamics.
We've stopped. Inside this man's courtyard- he is offering us drinks, as he is expected, and we all fulfill our role by accepting- the ground is made of pebbles. He has pears hanging from his wash-line. I look at the man, a well built, tan 30 something, and mouth slowly "so they don't get blemished". He is constant in his smiling, and assisting his 7 or 8 year old son in eating his green beans and roast chicken. The child doesn't want to finish, and the father insists. The small one lets his eyes roll as he takes another bite.
Sacha's face is not to be seen untwisted- be it in laughter, or in anger, or subconsciously from that 5th glass of wine. He taught me about, in descending order of factual correctness- Woodworking, Drunk-driving, Birds, The French, and most notably, America.
Leaving the house that I had thought would be a home was not sad. It was simple. A walk downstairs after a sleepy goodbye to Hudson, a cup of cold black coffee, and another ride in the Mercedes-Banz wagon.
Then a span of days without concern. Without thorns, or stale bread. Fish and soup and salad and cakes and creams. And two twin size beds, together, but not. Haiti and the Dominican- but not Hispaniola.
A string of smiles and rolling eyes. Eyes rolling like amber when it was sap. Rolling down, left, up. Down, left, up. A pupil drawing a crescent. Down, left, up.
How could a parent tell a child not to roll their eyes?
Rolling eyes are better than no eyes at all.
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