"Beauty is pain," she said as the brush pulled my knotted, thick, black hair back. My face was bright red and contorted, trying my hardest not to cry as the hairbrush got caught on all the tangles in the back of my head.
"Don't cry, do you want to show up to school crying?" I shook my head and focused all my attention on sucking the tears back into my eyes and imagining the pink blotches on my face fading.
"When I was younger," she said as she continued to brush the knots out of my hair. "Mi mamá would smack me on the head with the hairbrush if I moved and cried like you do." She lightly tapped the top of my head with the wooden brush, "Then I wouldn't cry."
She set the brush down and dug her fingernails into my scalp, dividing my hair in two. Then she began to braid. "We didn't use hairspray to keep our hair down," she explained calmly. I stopped my sniffling and I could start to feel my face cool down. She tugged on my hair gently as she plaited my long hair.
"Mami would take a lime, cut in half, and squeeze it on our heads. And our hair wouldn't move for the rest of the day." I couldn't see her, but it sounded as if she were smiling.
"There." She patted my shoulder and I stood up with two thick braids on either side of my head. "Muy bonita."
"Beauty is pain." I was sitting in a kitchen chair facing the window with my head tilted uncomfortably to the side. I grimaced as she pulled my hair through a plastic hook.
"You were the one who wanted curls," she reminded me. I couldn't argue with that, so I sat quietly, playing with the ivory skirt of my dress, hoping she wouldn't notice the spot of shimmery nail polish and wondering if I would look like Lucy from Narnia once my hair was done. She pushed my head so it was tilting to the right. I lifted my hand to my head to feel the smooth twists in my hair.
"No toces!" I put my hand down. She began to work on the left side of my hair. I could hear my father trying to get my little brother dressed and my grandmother setting things up in the backyard. My head was then repositioned upright. I felt a tug as the long white veil was tucked into my hair.
"Pictures," I remember her saying. "Hermosa."
I was sitting in front of the bathroom mirror, wearing a brand new dress. She had originally pushed for a different one, but she agreed when I put it on.
"It was her dress, " she would later say. But now, she was curling my hair, keeping the time by saying a Hail Mary for each strand. Sometimes she would switch to an Our Father, but it was always a prayer. It was the best way to curl hair, she said.
"What if we push it back, like this?" She took her fingers and pushed my curls out of my face for me to see.
"Yes!" She took the small elastics and got to work. She brushed the hair back and tied it back strand by strand. I made a face as she pulled.
"You know what my mother used to say to me?" She asked. She didn't need to; I already knew. "La belleza duele. Beauty hurts. Beauty is pain." I nodded gently, so as to not pull on my hair more.
"But it's worth it," she said as she smiled at me in the mirror.
I used to wonder why my mother didn't act like she loved me. I was confused by American affection I'd seen on TV, and I wondered why my mother didn't act like the blonde moms from my favorite shows. She was not gentle and soft spoken like I'd seen American mothers act. She did not constantly shower me with meaningless compliments, nor did she ever tell me that my best was enough.
I expected her to do all this, and I was hurt that she didn't. It wasn't until recently that I realized I had misjudged her. She is strong and opinionated and blunt. She will not pay a compliment when it is not deserved, and she has always pushed me to do better than my best. She is unlike the mothers I know because she tells me the truth. That is how I know she loves me. Any time she has ever sat down with me to do my hair, she has told me I am beautiful. And I know she meant it.
