Luster

“As a rule, I try to avoid popping that dusky cherry. I cannot be the first black girl a white man dates. I cannot endure the nervous renditions of backpacker rap, the conspicuous effort to be colloquial, or the smugness of pink men in kente cloth.” 

Edie comments on the sense of discomfort that a White man often experiences when first dating a Black woman. With humor, Leilani draws attention to the awkwardness present in some interracial relationships. Edie notices these awkward tendencies within Eric as he navigates his discomfort as the lover of a Black woman and the father of a Black girl.

“‘Interesting,’ I say. Of course, it is not interesting that he has been allowed to live candidly. It is not interesting that he cannot conceive of anything else. He has equated his range of motion with mine. He hasn’t considered the lies you tell to survive, the kindness of pretend, which I illustrate now, as I eat this bacterial hot dog. This is the first time I sort of understand him. He thinks we’re alike. He has no idea how hard I’m trying.”

On their first date, Edie notices the differences that separate her and Eric along the lines of race, gender, and class. Here, Edie acknowledges Eric’s ignorance of the struggles that define her experience as a young Black woman. Eric’s ignorance is representative of the greater inability of White people to understand the additional pressure placed on Black people to thrive and survive.

“And so when we are alone, even as we look at each other through borrowed faces, we see each other. I see her hunger, and she sees mine.” 

Edie describes an interaction with her only Black coworker, Aria. The reference to “borrowed faces” connects to the performative ways in which both she and Aria attempt to adapt to their predominately White work environment. Despite their differences, Edie recognizes how she and Aria are similar in their hunger to succeed and find acceptance.

“And as you are wont to do—having always been the single other in the room, having somehow preserved hope that the next room might be different—she looked around, searching for me. When she found me, when we looked at each other that first time, finally released from our respective tokenism, I felt incredible relief.” 

Edie recalls the first time that she saw Aria. She portrays their first sighting of each other as a moment of great hope and relief. Here, Leilani explores the concept of tokenism and its burden. Upon seeing that they are not alone in their predominately White workspace, Edie and Aria feel a release of pressure.

“Because it is an art—to be black and dogged and inoffensive.” 

Edie and Aria’s connection upon first meeting does not last long as Edie realizes that they are fundamentally different from one another. While Aria is marked by her ambition and ability to assimilate, Edie struggles. These differences limit their ability to be friends and resources for one another.

“It is a foregone conclusion I will once or twice hurt someone’s feelings deeply because of something I say or a face I make, which I will of course think about when I ride the train home, and actually, forever, even though I tried to be merry and keep the conversation light, even though I can’t sleep and I can’t shit, and someone is dying but that one song tells you to slide to the left and you have no choice.” 

Edie feels deeply uncomfortable in social environments. She displays a total lack of agency as she feels unable to rise above the depression that at times overwhelms her. A product of her difficult past, Edie finds it difficult to engage in the present and forge connections with those around her.

“My biggest issue when I look into the mirror is that sometimes the face I see doesn’t feel like mine.” 

Mirrors serve as symbols of confrontation and reflection. Edie attempts to avoid confronting the reality of her choices, which have left her with no connections. She does not recognize herself in the mirror because she is not sure of who she is or what she desires.

“But when you have nights like those, anomalies where all the stars defer, and you are not faking, not even a little, the polite thing is to never mention it again.” 

Edie recalls the night she and Eric first have sex in his home. She comments on the complete loss of inhibition and freedom that defined that night. Despite these feelings, Edie restrains herself from communicating her feelings to Eric. This lack of communication remains intact throughout their relationship and adds to their inability to see each other clearly.

“But as I put my thermos of Tanqueray into the bag, I think of when I first arrived, Tom showing me how to clock in and declare PTO, and how at the end of the day I took the scenic route home, the sun in one borough, the moon in another, the desire in me to clap my hand over the lens of a tourist’s camera and say, Stop, there isn’t enough time.” 

Edie packs up her belongings at her desk after being fired. She remembers the sense of hope she had on her first day. That hope has now diminished, and she is almost unrecognizable from that older version of herself. Edie’s desire to tell the tourist to stop taking photos exhibits her faded appreciation of the present moment. At this point in her life, Edie struggles to stay out of her ruminations of the past and fantasies of the future to avoid her painful reality.

“I have said goodbye enough times to know that departure has a way of gilding what are, at best, slow quotidian deaths, but still each time I think of everything I will lose.” 

Edie remarks on her experiences with grief and saying goodbye. She is pessimistic about the sentimentality of saying goodbye. However, Edie admits that, despite her pessimism, she recognizes her enduring sense of hope that there is greater meaning or significance to life. This tension between pessimism and hope defines much of Edie’s internal struggle throughout the novel.

“I interview well despite my nerves, and while I wish I could take credit for that, my ability to maintain human form and make a good impression is all about my skin. The expectations of me in these settings are frequently so low, it would be impossible not to surpass them.”

As Edie prepares to interview for new jobs, she comments on the impact of racism on her job-hunting process. Edie acknowledges the low expectations placed on her due to racist views of what Black women can accomplish. Edie highlights how adept she is at navigating these low expectations and preconceived notions.

“We enter corpse pose, and as we lie side by side, I hear her short, irregular breaths and understand the degree of her effort. It feels personal. The finite oxygen, the smell of yeast and salt, deodorant and shampoo, the body when it is most conspicuously an organism, a thing that can weep and degrade.” 

Edie joins Rebecca as she does yoga and comments on the body. She compares Rebecca’s comfort with her body with her own discomfort with her own. She is reminded of her mother’s own dissatisfaction with her body and her unrelenting attempts to change her body—even up until her death. Rebecca’s relationship with her body is one that Edie notes throughout the novel.

“[T]here is no fluffy alternative word for what I’m trying to convey, no way to effectively explain violations that are not overt. It is a rhetorical hellscape. A casual reduction so frequent it is mundane. Almost too mundane for the deployment of the R word, as with a certain sect of Good White Person the accusation overshadows the act. Racism! I should yell, because I’m sure Rebecca will receive it in the uppercase regardless, and already I feel her seizing on the drama of its implication, even though racism is often so mundane it leaves your head spinning, the hand of the ordinary in your slow, psychic death so sly and absurd you begin to distrust your own eyes.” 

Edie informs Rebecca about Pradeep’s aggression and racism towards Akila. Rebecca is resistant to what Edie is saying. Edie comments on the dramatization of racism that deludes White people from understanding how noxious and common racism is. Edie’s reference to uppercase refers to the ways in which Black women are perceived to speak in anger no matter their tone.

“As I claw my way up for air, I look around and realize I’ve lost her, though during my time on the ground someone stepped on the back of my neck with one of those four-pound platform Docs and I did not completely hate it, and though the music is bad—it is bad like a deviated septum, like acid reflux, like a monkey paw—damage is incurred for a necessary indulgence, which is to take a man by the ears and get him down and stomp on his open, consenting face.” 

Edie experiences the mosh pit at the concert with Rebecca. She emerges from the pit and looks for Rebecca. She enjoys the violence of the pit and fantasizes about committing a violent act on a consenting male. Edie’s desire for violence appears throughout the novel. She revels in the momentary pain she feels and demonstrates a true desire to release turbulent emotions she is feeling.

“There is a Nubian drawing of a man, and though the drawing has no perspective, the color of the water around him is carefully preserved, and I think about the resilience of that single pigment, the lapis lazuli, traversing time.” 

Edie observes a drawing of a Nubian man in the library where Eric works. She comments on the perseverance of the blue color. Leilani’s choice to highlight this particular drawing draws parallels to a greater commentary on the resilience and strength of Edie as a survivor of trauma. The specific detail of a Nubian man also appears to highlight the strength of Black people who have endured persecution and discrimination.

“He was afraid of her like I would one day be afraid of him, because children, like dogs, are attuned to the signs of an impending storm.” 

Edie is reminded of her father as she explores the library’s exhibition on war. She recalls her father’s difficulties as the child of a mentally ill mother. Like her father, Edie, too, feared her parent and observed him closely for fear of a mental break. This point highlights the patterns of struggle and fear throughout Edie’s family. As an adult, she continues to grapple with this fear.

“I have learned not to be surprised by a man’s sudden withdrawal. It is a tradition that men like Mark and Eric and my father have helped uphold. So I endure Eric’s silence, even as our paths cross in the morning and in the middle of the night. I don’t attempt to break it, though the longer it persists, the more it mutates. For a day or so, it becomes hilarious, and then a little erotic, a seething, suffocating thing that makes me aware of how long it’s been since I’ve been touched.” 

In the aftermath of his early return from his business trip, Eric withdraws from Edie. Edie comments on her familiarity with such behavior, which originates with her father’s abandonment of her from a young age. Accustomed to this neglect, Edie does not speak up for herself and lingers in the isolation.

“I tell him more about the Polaroid camera I received from my mother, how for weeks I took photos of trees and telephone wire before I turned the lens on her. How she was a willing subject, until she saw what she looked like in the photos and asked me to stop. How I thought her resistance was petty and vain, a boring thing I’d seen less interesting adult women do, then I looked at the pictures and knew that she was right. She wasn’t simply unphotogenic. She was bare in a way that film betrayed so dramatically that she became grotesque.” 

Edie shares intimate details of her family life with Eric after they reignite their relationship in secret. She recalls her mother’s resistance to having her photo taken for fear of being exposed. This moment reflects Edie’s struggle with vulnerability, which originates from her mother’s fear.

“Within my paintings, there is always a half-articulated form of a woman, too mobile to be opaque, craned over the body with forceps in her hand. If she sees herself there, she doesn’t mention it. But there are moments when she looks over my shoulder and hums her approval, which of course I resent, but also, a little bit, love.” 

Edie works on her craft under the guidance of Rebecca, who pushes Edie to improve the accuracy of her depictions. Edie alludes to the influence Rebecca has on her art as she imagines her form imposed over the paintings. As Rebecca is a mother figure for Edie, her approval invigorates Edie.

“I am inclined to pray, but on principle, I don’t. God is not for women. He is for the fruit. He makes you want and he makes you wicked, and while you sleep, he plants a seed in your womb that will be born just to die” 

Soon after learning she is pregnant, Edie reflects on why she does not pray. This excerpt reflects the influence of Edie’s upbringing in the Seventh-Day Adventist Church. The tone is resentful of any notion of deliverance from what she perceives to be an apathetic God figure. Here, Edie’s past trauma with pregnancy and her abortion is clearly seen.

“The women in my family maybe should not have been mothers. This is not so much a judgment as a fact. They were dying inside their own bodies, and now all these dead components are my inheritance.”

Thinking of the legacy of failed mothers within her family, Edie reflects on her fears of inadequacy. She views her failure as a mother as inevitable. Edie uses the word “inheritance” to capture the lack of agency that paralyzes her from action. Despite this pessimism, Edie questions whether she wants to have an abortion and contemplates the possibility of having her and Eric’s child.

“It is not so bad to be an incubator. Everything I eat and drink feels like it amounts to something. Oysters, chocolate, mangos drenched in chili oil, all for a purpose and all excused, an education for the palate I am building with the most acute iterations of sugar and salt. But conversely, it is terrible being an incubator. Everything I do feels like it should amount to something.” 

Edie is ambivalent towards her pregnancy. As the pregnancy progresses, she feels a sense of purpose and can paint more freely. Conversely, Edie feels the pressure to accomplish for her future child. Edie’s pregnancy allows her to begin contemplating a new future separated from her traumatic past.

“If I’m honest, all my relationships have been like this, parsing the intent of the jaws that lock around my head. Like, is he kidding, or is he hungry? In other words, all of it, even the love, is a violence.”

After Akila hugs her, Edie observes her own resistance to embracing Akila fully. She contemplates how the paranoia she feels defines most of her relationships with men. Edie equates the love she may feel to a violence that threatens to harm her. Unable to trust others, Edie struggles to feel at peace enough to be herself.