Creative Emulation: Lila

My inspiration for writing my Lila emulation was to somehow incorporate the melancholy tone I often felt was present while reading Lila. I feel like Lila often reads as sad and lost and melancholy which reminded me of the story I wrote for my NW emulation about the immigrant nurse who becomes pregnant with a wealthy doctor’s baby because I see her character as being lost and sad. Because of the similarity I felt was present I knew I wanted to continue writing a story that followed that plot line and decided to develop a specific scene from the original story into its own piece.

I also knew I wanted to somehow incorporate a family member from my main narrators past as Lila often recalls memories of Dolly. I tried to string that throughout the story and have the memories of her family surface when she’s feeling lost or in somewhat of a daze as other things are going on around her.

This is a creative response I wrote for one of my graduate classes.

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His side of the bed was cold and the divot his body made was gone because he never stayed long enough to make one. The sheets were stiff but soft and their creases were hard and fresh from the dry cleaners or the department store package. Her hair was matted on the left side where she had been laying and a single bobby pin was hanging by its tip on her right. She pulled it out and left it on the nightstand. They had met earlier that night after his shift was over and he called and asked her to meet him. She was already halfway home when she got the call. She turned around anyway.

She stood on old train platforms for an hour. The planks of wood on Washington & Wells were stiff from the cold. The heater glowed orange and rattled over her head until the train arrived. She realized her hair was stuck in the zipper of her coat when it pulled at her scalp as she shimmied through the revolving doors of his building. She checked her face in the mirrored walls of the elevator as she went up. Her tanned skin was flushed a muted rose and her lips were cracked on the edges. She used her thumbs to smooth out the corner of her lips and push the bobby pin further into her black hair. She swiped a finger under her eyes where her mascara had smudged and smoothed out her coat. Just as the doors opened she twisted the burgundy scarf she had knitted higher on her neck. The stitches reminded her of her mother. She walked out and to the door at the end of the hall and knocked.

She could hear his low voice from behind the door. When he didn’t come she knocked again. She heard the shuffling of feet and the door slightly release as he turned the thick lock on the other side. When the door opened, he stood wearing a pair of gray sweatpants and a navy blue t-shirt with the name of a university she didn’t recognize. He held the door open with one hand and had his cell phone in the other. He flicked his head toward the living room, a nod meaning she could come inside. She took off her old boots which were aged from the weather and stood them together by the door. She unzipped her coat and laid it on the metal bench in the front hall and gently placed her scarf on top of it.

She had found him wandering around the kitchen. As she watched him pace back and forth she could make out words about the new pediatric wing the hospital where they worked was building. He had told her about a few small details regarding the remodel but kept most of it a secret. Most of what she knew came from conversations she overheard while he was talking to one of his own colleagues. She glanced over her shoulder and saw two place settings made up at his dining room table. There were wine glasses at each setting but only one was filled with the expensive cabernet he always drank. As she got closer she saw silverware lying in the middle of his dish next to a half eaten medallion of beef. Dark greens sat in a pile on the other side of the plate with balsamic vinaigrette that had run down the edge mixing and pooling with the blood of the meat. The second plate held the same meal but untouched.

“Listen Mark, I don’t care. I don’t know how we’re going to get the money but we’re going to get it because we need it. We need two more of those machines and you’re going to get the money from them. I don’t need to know how you do it. Just do it,” he said as she listened and stood over her beef. She never got used to eating meat like that. Her mother used to rub all their meat in a cracked ceramic bowl filled with yellow and brown spices. She tried to make meat like that at home but it never came out the same. He cracked pepper on top of his bleeding meat and ate his greens.

“I didn’t get a chance to shower after the gym,” he said putting the phone into the pocket of his sweats, “so sorry about that.”

He kissed her on her cheek quickly and scanned the table.

“I’m finished,” he said as he looked at his plate, “but you can eat after we’re done, right?” He walked toward his bedroom before she could answer so she followed him, slowly, like she did the week before.

When he was finished he kissed her mouth for the first time that night. She could taste the wine on his lips. He got up from the bed and pulled up his sweats that had fallen to his ankles. With his body gone her skin filled with goose bumps as the cold air hit her chest and bare arms.

“Get dressed and come eat,” he said over his shoulder. His phone was already out of his pocket, the screen lit his face.

She laid there for a while. She smoothed her hair. Left the bobby pin. Her toes made little teepees in the sheets at the foot of the bed. He didn’t seem to notice the extra puff in her stomach. She kept her lower half covered with the department store sheets. She put her scrubs back on before leaving his bedroom and made sure to pull the material tightly away from her stomach so it wouldn’t cling. He sat at the head of the table and sipped his wine slowly while he scrolled through pages on his phone. She sat down quietly next to him and methodically began to cut her meat.

Her mother taught her how to knit. They would sit on the porch outside in the worn lawn chairs where the breeze was warm and the cement floor was dirty. She was eight or nine when she learned and her mother would say, “tirar con más fuerza, mi hija”, pull tighter, my daughter, when her stitches were too loose. Balls of cheap and colorful wool would fall all round their ankles until they spun them into socks that were too hot to wear and blankets that always stayed folded on the back of couch. Her hand had slipped while cutting through a piece of fat and her wrist bumped against the glass of the table top. He glanced over at the glass before he returned back to his screen.

She wondered what her parents were doing back at home. Maybe her father was picking papayas. He would always tuck one under his arm in his shirt and bring one home for her after work. Maybe her brothers would be kicking a ball caked in dirt around a dusty street corner. Maybe her mother would have taught her sister to knit.

“I’m going to have a baby,” she said putting a piece of meat in her mouth, “it’s yours.”

This time he looked up.

“Excuse me?” he said.

“I’m three months pregnant,” she said.

“How are you positive it’s mine?” he asked as his voice grew impatient.

“He’s yours,” she said.

He got up from the table spilling the glass of wine he had poured her and she had not touched.

“How could you have let this happen? Do you know what this will mean for my career if it gets out I’m having a child with the immigrant nursing student?”

He shuffled back and forth and ran his hand furiously through his freshly dyed hair. She watched the crimson drops fall into her lap from the stain they started on her stomach.

“No one will hear of this. You’ll have to start at another program. Mercy Hospital.” He stopped pacing and looked at her and said, “I won’t be financially responsible for any of this.”

She stood without a word, without blotting the engorged plum stain on her green scrubs, without finishing her meat. She walked to the metal bench to gather her coat where she could still hear him going on about reputations and responsibilities. She opened the thick door, walked down the hall, waited for the elevator doors to open and when they did she stepped in, and tightened the scarf around her neck with one hand while the other was tucked safely under her growing belly.