Page 41 - The Geography of Women

The Geography of Women 27

how I was needin her an wantin her more n needin her. I
felt kinda awkward in my shorts an top. My thigh-feelin
made me dizzy as a cyclone about to touch down on a
couple a trailer parks.
Jessarose smiled not like I was a kid an dumb with the
hornies, but she acted natural. She smiled, but she didn’t
say hello. Instead, she said, “She won.”
“Who won?”
“Mizz Lulabelle. She won. That’s who.”
“What’d she win?”
“She won Mister Apple.”
“Dummy,” I said, “She won him when she married
him. Besides everyone knows it’s the man who wins the
woman’s hand, not the other way aroun.”
“Such a little ninny,” Jessarose said.
“Takes one to know one.”
“Silly! This whole summer you learned nothin bout
bein married?”
She had me stuck.
She took my hand. “Someone wins,” she said. “Some-
one surrenders.”
“Mizz Lulabelle been arm-wrestlin with Mizz Vivi-
enne Chastaine again?”
“I mean Mizz Lulabelle won the power in this house.”
She set me down on the porch glider.
“Power over what?”
“Over the chairs, over the tables, over the rooms, over
the bed. Over Mister Apple.”
“What’s that mean exactly in English?”
“She can make him do anythin she wants.”
“She can?”
“Even better. She can do anythin she wants.”
“I don’t understand.” Remember I had no mama to

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