Breathe by Joyce Carol Oates
Author:Joyce Carol Oates
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ecco
Published: 2021-06-10T00:00:00+00:00
âMAâAM?ââA WAITER HAS APPROACHED MICHAELA, hesitantly.
A young Mexican-American waiter, it seems. Evidently the café is open. Or has just opened. The waiter regards Michaela with a wary smile as if his experiences with White women tourists has not always been pleasant.
But Michaela doesnât look like a tourist. She doesnât even look White, she thinks. If you look closely her skin is smudged, sullied.
She isnât sure how long she has been seated at the table. In her entranced state time moves unpredictably: with glacial-slowness, then in quick leaps and pleats, as if someone is leafing impatiently through the pages of a book. She has made her way through a portion of the manuscript but much of it will have to be examined a second time, and probably a third; she makes little progress, for she keeps finding more problems.
The morning heâd said quietly as one might report the temperature:
âIâm so much weaker than I was yesterday.â
Michaela turns the oversized manâs watch on her wrist hoping to see the time but the exact time eludes her.
âMaâam? Is something wrong?â
I am not maâam. Please.
But of course Michaela is maâam. Michaela is a White woman, and Michaela is maâam. The waiter is no more than twenty-five years old. Whoever she is, she hasnât been twenty-five for a decade or more.
âWould you like to order something now, maâam, or would you like to wait for your friend to return?â
ââFriendâ? What do you mean?â
The waiter glances about the terrace with a quizzical half-smile. As if there is someone in the vicinity of whom he has lost sight. A handsome boy with a narrow fox face. Sideburns, a small mustache. He might be as young as twentyâyounger. Michaela wonders what the wary dark brown eyes see, seeing her.
âWas someone here with me?â Michaela is trying to remain lighthearted. Exude an air of caprice. As if she is just joking with him, not menacing him but simply joking with him, not altogether serious.
âExcuse me, did you sayâyou saw someone here with me?â
Hesitantly the waiter says yes. He is not so certain now.
âWhat did he look like?â
The waiter smiles uneasily. For possibly this is a joke. A White womanâs sense of humor? He explains that he hadnât seen her companion very clearly.
âIt was a man?â
A man, yes.
The waiter seems anxious to escape. No drink order seems to be forthcoming. He is torn between sympathy for the solitary White woman and a simple wish to escape her.
âWas he tall? With dark, graying hair? A little older than I am? Was heâdid he seemââ
The waiter shakes his head quickly, donât know, maâam.
Michaela has more questions for the young man but he slips away from her. Disappears into the café. The afternoon sky has darkened, flashes of lightning illuminate the sky like livid veins. When she looks more closely, she sees that the café is darkened, there is a closed sign in the window.
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