Becoming Smooth
“Traveler” by Tracy Whiteside
Mindy’s legs are angles of sharp bones the day she asks if she can shave. The hair is barely visible to the eye, but when I brush my hand from ankle to knee, it’s there. Fuzzy and light brown. I say we can go to CVS, with a brightness in my voice that gives away how high I feel at the idea of us banding together, once again, partners in problem solving. She grimaces at my enthusiasm but heads for the car.
My own first attempt at shaving came the weekend after the swimming unit started in seventh-grade gym class. There, I’d gripped the gutter, the chlorinated water lapping and swirling around my legs as they kicked at the wall. My dark brown hairs swished back and forth, comforting and warm. Each stood on end as I scissored; they trailed my body like the tails of shooting stars.
But afterward, Brooke Patterson smirked at me as we toweled off in the locker room. She walked to the shower to whisper to Gwen Daugherty. Hands guarding lips, a covenant formed, their eyes on me as they huddled under falling water. By their legs, bare and smooth, they merged into one four-legged, two-headed, Speedo-clad monster. “Hairy freak,” they said, as I pulled my jeans on and stared into the empty space of my locker.
That weekend I rooted through the cupboards in my parents’ bathroom for something to make me smooth. I found two electric razors, the black familiar one Dad used to trim his beard, the other hidden in a box at the back of the sink cabinet. My mother’s, though I’d never seen her use it. I switched it on; it whirled to life with a pathetic low murmur. I swiped it up my legs and felt the tiny electric teeth grab, yanking each hair, each star’s tail, before slicing them off. The effect left me barer, certainly, but cold and covered in a fine stubble.
I tried to place the box back exactly where I found it, so my mother wouldn’t notice.
Now, in CVS, Mindy takes off ahead of me with a determined step. Her ponytail bounces behind her, like she’s 6, her first soccer game. Her legs were stocky then, a little chubby even. She ran with purpose, hilarious purpose, because she only ran in circles, following wherever the ball went. I fear she’s a follower still, in new ways, ways that lead to nothing good. She crackles with a desire to be accepted. She goes quiet when her posts don’t get enough hearts, and she told me once, crying, that the worst thing happened: her two best friends broke their daily chain of snaps with her, ending a streak I never understood. I see how her eyes take on a familiar mannerism, one I used to inhabit myself, an unwillingness to let her gaze meet anyone else’s for long. A perpetual glancing away, a staring into a space beyond space, out the fog-covered car window, anywhere to signal she be left alone. When she pads down the hallway to her bedroom, there’s a squirrliness in her step, like she’s trying to stay in the shadows, not make a sound. She spends so much time in that room, door closed, phone glow on her face, and I loiter outside, afraid to knock.
I steady myself on the tampon rack. We stare at the options in the razor aisle, and she selects one with a soothing lotion strip and four blades and speeds to the counter.
The cashier rings us up.
The week after I shaved, the summer’s warmth lingered, so I wore shorts to school. In home economics, we were learning to sew. I moved fabric through the sewing machine with concentration. The magic of two pieces of fabric becoming one entranced me. A boy sat next to me. I’d barely noticed him; even now, his name won’t come. As I sewed, he placed his hand under the table on my bare skin. His clammy fingers moved up my thigh. I did not look at him. I did not want him to touch me; I did not stop him. I thought of the stubble, of being wrong even in this. He stopped when Mrs. Banerjee came to the table and said, “Laura, is everything ok?”
“Yes,” I lied. “I’m fine.”
I stopped wearing shorts after that.
I don’t notice the cashier handing us the plastic bag.
“Here you go,” she says, annoyed, and I grab it.
“Smooth, Mom,” Mindy says as we walk through the sliding doors and out.
Once home, I follow her upstairs. There, a wall falls, at least for a moment, as she lets me advise her for about 45 seconds — use shaving cream, pull up with a gentle but consistent pressure, no jerky movements, don’t nick yourself, be careful, you’ll bleed. I go on just too long, and she grabs the package and huffs out, “I got it, geez,” then she shuts the door and turns on the water to discover for herself how it goes, what it’s like to become bare and smooth. I wonder if she’s thought about what that means, how this is just the first time she’ll have to perform this ritual, how she’ll be performing it almost daily for years to come. I wonder if I should explain another way.
There’s more to warn her about. I pound on the door.
“What?” she yells over the running shower.
I hesitate.
Your legs, your bones, your skin, your hair follicles – every part of you is precious. It’s OK if you would rather let it be, if you stayed covered and warm.
What I actually say is nowhere near enough.
“Just be careful.”
“Mom,” comes her water-logged reply from what sounds so far away. “I’m fine.”
I sit on my bed, and I’ll still be there when she gets out.
about the author
Krista Jahnke is a writer from suburban Detroit. Her short fiction has appeared in Bright Flash Literary Review and is forthcoming in the Northwest Review. Her journalism has appeared in numerous outlets including the Detroit Free Press and the Chicago Tribune. She lives with her husband, two sons, and a talkative female cat named Robert.
about the artist
Tracy Whiteside is an award-winning, internationally published Chicago photographer specializing in creative art. Her art is always meant to ignite the imagination. Tracy wants to open the viewers’ mind and encourage them to examine their own soul and spirit.