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Tonight we sit alone in the parlor, our shared bedroom, whispering secrets to each other in our nightgowns like we're little girls spending our summers in Michigan with Grandma Simone, sharing a bed with each other again. There's no school come morning so tonight we gossip to our hearts content. We talk on school, friends, romance, family, and even our thoughts about the world. The night is warm, we're young and the world is in arms reach.
"I wish we looked more alike" She confesses with her fair skin, rosy cheeks, and pink lips and I don't get it. Why would anyone want to look more like me? My skin is brown and not anything close to passing as white, only my bottom lip is anything close to pink and let's not even mention the color, or lack thereof of my cheeks. She's lucky in her skin and for that I envy her .
"I wished I looked more like you" I confess, when really I wish I looked more white.
"Aren't we just asking for the same thing then?" We're not but she wouldn't get it with her round, big eyes, and brown hair. Or maybe she would because of those things.
Either way she doesn't continue.
"Mom once said she wished Clarence and I weren't so dark. Said 'It makes it harder to say you're mine'" I thought I knew shame before but how truthful her words were cut deep. After all what's the use of the seventy five if I only use the quarter.
"She didn't mean any harm Helen" I'm well aware, it's just the truth of the fact.
'Oh is that your daughter Ada? you don't look a thing alike' 'Ada you can be honest, is she really Izydor's?' 'Did you steal her from a negro Ada?' 'Ada look me in the eye and tell me shes mine!'
I wish I was white.
Clarence and Margaret are lighter than me, Margaret being the lightest. Dad is lighter than Mom but mom is darker than Margaret. Dad and his parents have the same complexion, grandma is a little pink though. Grandma Simone is darker than me and we don't know anything about Grandpa aside from him being white. That's seventy five percent but I still came out black.
Only Grandma Simone, Clarence, and I can't get away with being in a Whites only place, everyone else can depending on how hard people look.
"…Sorry" Sorry for what, being born lucky in your paleness? Sorry for not being darker? sorry I don't look more like you? Sorry I'm this dark? Sorry for ruining the mood?
"I Wish I looked more like you" I say, with my Brown skin, sharp nose, and blue eyes.
"I wished we looked more alike" She responds, with her pale skin, flat nose, and brown eyes.
We're not asking for the same thing and we both know it but neither of us mention it. Tonight I'm thirteen turning fourteen, she's seventeen turning eighteen, the air is warm, and we haven't been to Michigan in over 2 years because our grandma is in poor health.
Tonight we're young and have the whole world ahead of us.