Later Amarelle would attempt to shatter the picture of marital bliss.
Veronique, who worked at her sister's hospital, was in fact the mother of two
children whose father – an islander and a hopeless womanizer – she'd left back there.
She met her Jewish husband in the hospital's EKG room where he'd been sent for a
routine examination; and where as she tried to affix the suction cups on his surprisingly
hairy chest, he made funny conversation; so funny, she could barely contain her profess-
ional demeanour.
He told her he'd never felt so relaxed, so safe, as at that moment in that room, in her
hands.
They fell in love. Just like that? Just like that, Amarelle said, opening her eyes wide,
and going on to reveal her suspicion that Veronique was a little schemer: up from the
islands with two growing children, and looking for permanent residence.
In any event the Jewish fellow, single, about forty, balding, broad at the hips, with
connections to a moneyed Jewish family in Manhattan, this fellow proposed to her one
week later; and to everyone's astonishment they got married. Now she was pregnant,
the little schemer.
They appeared to have not too many friends, which explained their appreciation of
Aschelle's gesture, inviting them to drive out to Poughkeepsie on Labour Day; and now
this man also from the islands, also kind, patient, not in any way discomfited by their
racial coupling.
Veronique offered to refill anyone's plate. She chastised the laziness of her husband
who, she was prepared to wager, had been spoiled by his Jewish mother.
Left along for awhile Aaron asked, "So what do you do…? where do you teach?" Then
he talked about a friend of his who'd gotten into trouble with the NYC Board of Education.
Radix crossed his leg and listened.
Veronique returned, her face and fleshy shoulders glowing with the healthy promise
of her pregnancy; she offered to fetch drinks and went off again. Aaron continued his
story about his friend and the Board of Education.
A gentle, generous fellow, this Aaron; eager for friendship; talking up a tide to keep
their tiny group afloat and perky. And when Veronique came back and sat down they went
at each other again for a bit, husband and wife so sure of each other, staging these little
pillow fights without the slightest embarassment.
At some point, sensing saturation, and unsure of Radix' disinclination to talk, Veronique
switched the topic to the subway system; how relieved she felt not to be using the trains
so often, now that they lived in Riverdale. No, not so much the jostling crowds; not the
terrible draft in the tunnels. It was that horrible screech of metal when the trains came
into the station and jolted to a stop. That was what she couldn't stand.
"Doesn't take much to make her happy," Aaron said.
"That…and bruised fruit. I can't stand bruised bananas. You know when sometimes you
peel them…? and they're all dark and mushy and…bruised?"
"Otherwise, she's one happy lady," Aaron said.
(from "Ah, Mikhail, O Fidel!", a novel by N.D.Williams, 2001)
FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN 