Bitter in the Mouth

After giving up on fairy tales, Thomas began telling Linda vaguely masked stories about his own life in New York City: “His words triggered incomings after incomings, but I was enthralled, finally enchanted by what he was saying to me” (175). By the end of her first summer with Thomas, he had stopped telling her stories for reasons unknown to Linda, but she continued to dream about them.

As a result, Linda wasn’t surprised when she saw the photographs of Thomas in New York City for the first time, though she was surprised to see her father as a young man, standing with “a young woman whom I didn’t know but whom I recognized” (176). Baby Harper had sent the photographs to Linda long after she moved up north, while she was living with Leo, with the intention of discussing them with her after she had had some time to sit with them.

After Harper’s first flight to New Having, he “became a traveling man” along with his new partner, Cecil, the owner of the local funeral home in Boiling Springs, whom he began dating after Iris’s passing (178). Like Kelly, during Harper’s travels, he preferred to mail letters and postcards rather than emails. He preferred to travel from January through August, as he preferred to be in Boiling Springs for the fall and holidays, in part to ensure that DeAnne wouldn’t be alone. DeAnne, however, initially refuses his invitations, as he hosts with Cecil, meaning DeAnne is unable to ignore his sexuality. Harper also invites Linda every year, but Linda also declines, albeit for different reasons.

George Moses began selling his poems to young white suitors in Chapel Hill. The young men would give George a name, along with some other select information, and George would compose a poem that the man would then write down and give to the object of his affection. George’s master kept most of the money, but he would allow him to keep a nickel from each transaction. Before bed, he would compose a new poem for whomever would come by the next day.

In 1998, Baby Harper’s plane crashes off the coast of Colombia, killing everyone aboard. She receives the news from her mother, with whom she hasn’t spoken in 11 years, and who is at a loss for what to do. DeAnne begs Linda not to fly down, but to drive instead; Linda tells her she’ll talk to Leo and make arrangements as soon as she can. Linda delays calling Leo; later in the evening, after he calls her, she returns his call and tells him the news. She also tells him that she is going to drive down, and that she wants to leave tomorrow. Leo tells her that he’s scheduled every day for the next week and a half, so he won’t be able to leave with her.

The next morning, she wakes up to the smell of pancakes in the kitchen; Leo returned from the hospital early and is making her breakfast. When she sits down, he hands her an engagement ring and explains that he had been intending to take her away for two weeks and propose; he asks that she wait two weeks, and then they’ll drive south together. He also asks that she get a full medical exam prior to announcing the engagement: “Leo had made me a conditional offer. If the conditions weren’t met, the offer would be void” (196). Cecil left his estate to his nephew and his nephew’s life partner, in addition to setting up generous scholarship for students who wish to travel and study funerary customs in other cultures. Harper left no will, and so his estate went to DeAnne.

Linda takes the photo albums Harper sent to her to work so that Leo doesn’t look over her shoulder while she peruses them. In addition to the photographs of her father, the albums contain numerous photographs of Harper himself, who had rarely appeared in the rest of the albums. Linda had believed Harper “was uncomfortable in his own skin,” but “As it turned out [he] was uncomfortable only in his day-to-day clothes” (204).

The albums contained photographic documentation of Harper’s development wearing women’s clothing. Linda believes that Harper began with shoes because they are easy to throw off if surprised, then “transformed himself step by step into a woman” (205). Linda realizes that Harper likely always wore long pants and shirts not out of modesty, but rather because he shaved his legs and arms to more fully complete the look. Initially, someone else takes the photos of him, but never appears; later, the photographs are solo shots taken using a cable release. The fourth and last of the albums that Harper sent to her contained Harpers final evolution and new life, one in which he was out and in love with Cecil, engaged in world travel, and living in “a different South” (206). The album contained the inscription, “If you are lucky, you are born not once but many times” (206).

Linda makes plans to return to Boiling Springs six months later than intended. By that point, she had undergone and mostly recovered from surgery to remove her ovaries in response to ovarian cancer. As a result of her cancer, though, Leo had ended their relationship due to her inability to have biological children; further, she had been removed from the partnership track at her law firm due to her extended sick leave. Following this, she requests and is granted another extended, unpaid leave of absence, which she intends to take initially in Boiling Springs. However, she hides much of this from DeAnne, instead allowing Kelly to make up a story about a big Supreme Court case that she had been assigned to, despite that Linda was a trademark lawyer and had never seen the inside of a courthouse (208).

Rather than driving, Linda takes a Greyhound bus from New York to Boiling Springs. In part this is because she hasn’t driven in a long time and because her doctor told her she was likely still exhausted and recovering; in part, though, her purpose is to “slow down time” and collect her thoughts (209). More than 16 hours later, she arrives in Boiling Springs, having written only two questions which she intends to ask DeAnne.

Linda discovers her nationality at 14, by accident, when she comes across a name like hers, Nguyen, in a history book. She knew what her name sounded like, but she had never seen it printed in a book before, “so while it belonged to me, I didn’t recognize it” (216). In reading about the Vietnam War in her book, she learns that the war was in progress when she was born, in 1968, and that it ended in 1975, the year she was adopted by Thomas and DeAnne.

Much later, while still living with Leo, she has a similar experience when she encounters a television program about synesthesia on PBS. Although she quickly grows frustrated by the dismissive and condescending tones of the interviewer and narrator, she is nevertheless fascinated by the show. However, she quickly shuts it off when she hears Leo come home, still concerned how he might react to her condition even though she now has a medical term for it. She later orders a copy of the video and a transcript. She also attempts to get in touch with the people featured on the show, who had all used pseudonyms; the producers promised to pass along her contact information, but she never heard from any of the subjects.