Bath Time
by Feminam Publicus
My mother would grip us by our forearms, causing Gabby and I to squirm, twist, and fight out of her hands. She would walk out of our lush green backyard with these two propellers spinning wildly from her body, screaming and screeching to let us play for five more minutes. We didn’t want to go in there. There, where we would be forced into hot sudsy water and scrubbed with a mesh loofah until our skin resembled her children. Her children were not those wild banshees building mud castles in the backyard. Her children would never wear their school clothes when jumping into murky puddles at the bottom of the driveway. Her children, those darling little angels whose teachers adored their manners, would never release the fishes from the tank into the soaking wet grass to see them swim through the blades. Gabby and I are dragged into the house, past the picture where her children posed in front of church steps with white dresses and bright teeth, of which I stick my tongue out at.
“Your faddah keep forgettin’ allyuh is gyuls!” she says, ushering us into the small bathroom. Dad had let us play outside for longer than usual, and was not paying attention when we grabbed the hose to soak a dry portion of the yard. He did not mind so much that we were enjoying mud adventures, just as he did in Trinidad. We loved him for this — for allowing us the freedom to run freely, without hesitation, into the depths of hunting trip adventures, rescuing princes and marrying them, and long lost treasure searches, as long as we were in our back yard.
My mother reaches over to the silver hot water knob and twists it forcefully. With a screech, it jets out of the shower head, rinsing down the porcelain tub and heating its cold surface. Our muddy clothes is tossed in the corner behind the door, causing a few splats of dirt and grass to paint the fluffy pink bathroom mat with dots of grime. Gabby shoots me a look, her annoyance at how mom is dramatically behaving over a little bit of mud, which could easily be washed out of our school clothes, being conveyed with a roll of her eyes. I shrug, and itch harshly at my legs. What’s there to do. Mom’s pissed, we just have to put up with it until she feels better.
I look at my body to evaluate the damage. My hands are completely caked with wet soppy dirt. My knees have bits and pieces of grass hanging loosely onto whatever mess it has attached itself too. My legs become itchy, the way it usually does when I am outside for long, as if the grass carry anti-me itching serum to release whenever I am running through them. Gabby looks worse. Her entire face is covered in the mud from the backyard. Mom was especially angry with Gabby for this, but she didn’t understand that there was not a way around this — when you are pretending to be hunters in the African jungle, you have to be camouflaged. You don’t just saunter up to the lion (see: tomato plant) and ask it nicely to die for you. You have to be prepared, don the appropriate hunting mask, take your spear (broomstick) and really have at it.
“Get allyuh ass into de showah right now,” she says to us.
And we do, obediently, avoiding eye contact as she loads the loofah up with body wash, and begins scrubbing us down. I look at my skin now, which resembles the church girl in the photo, and feel a little bit of relief that the itching on my legs has stopped. Gabby’s face has become as clear as the water she was washed in. My mother has finally softened, grabbing two towels hanging on the towel rack, and wiping our faces softly. She gives us each a kiss on the forehead, and wipes down the rest of our bodies before helping us out of the tub.
“Der’s my little princesses,” she says to us. And we don’t mind that we have been promoted from African hunters to mommy’s little royals, because the towels are warm, and my mother is no longer upset with us, and our eyes feel a little more heavy that usual.
