Beth was imagining it, how would she do it? How would she ask for it? Would Dotsy be mad? Maybe she’d be proud of her . . . ? She resolved, yes, we will give them a tree. To go with the boots. It’s the right thing to do.
“You want something to drink? We got eggnog, left over. Shauna got it.”
Still giving the tree to the Boggs house. Not hearing.
“Oh. Oh, no, I couldn’t. I should be going. It’s gonna snow soon, so . . . ”
“Aw, c’mon! Just one drink! For Christmas.”
Not wanting to seem rude. Not wanting to come off as better than.
“Okay, maybe some eggnog. Just one, of course. You know . . . snow’s coming up.”
“No, I know. Here . . . ”
Scurrying around to the kitchen, cupboards clacking, clack, clack, clack. Troy Boggs coming up with two mismatched mugs. One from Walter’s Tackle & Bait. One from Klucky’s, down on Third. Presenting each mug on the brown-top card table with a flourish.
“Here you go. One for you. And one for me. Cheers. Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas.”
Clinking mugs with Mr. Boggs, smiling up. Well, why not Merry Christmas. Why not? He was a human being, after all, flesh and blood, fellow mankind and all that stuff you were supposed to care about. This was supposed to be the season for breaking bread and clinking glasses and smiling jolly.
And now Troy Boggs is in a good mood. The good mood pouring down his throat in warm brown brandy mixed with eggnog. Not so much eggnog, but she didn’t need to know that.
She was quite a looker, you have to admit. This saucer-eyed friend of his daughter with her white-blond mop of hair and ice-crystal eyes. Christ, you could just look at her for days, couldn’t you?
Sitting down in his chair, sipping fast on his good mood, maintaining his good mood for Christmas. Christmas spirit. Christmas spirits. Brandy, rum, bourbon. The spirit of the season.
“You know . . . ” Shaking his head, smiling, magnanimous. “You just, you just keep getting better and better-looking every year, you know that?
And something in Beth shifting. Something crossing her legs in front of her.
“I mean. What’s your secret? I know! It’s Oil of Olay. Oil of Olay! HA-HA!”
Clapping his hands together, hard. Snap! Oh, this is gonna be good. His good mood getting bigger and redder and warmer, his good mood clapping his hands hard and slapping Beth on the shoulder, big-hearted.
“THAT must be your secret! Is that it, HUNH?”
Not a funny joke, but meant to be a funny joke. Laugh now, Beth, laugh now at the unfunny joke. Smile at least.
“May I use your bathroom, Mr. Boggs?”
“Call me Troy!”
“Urn, Troy, I’m just . . . it was a long walk over and—”
“Oh, no problem! Of course! Mi house is tu house!”
Make your way fast to the bathroom, scurry in, lock the door. A white-and-yellow linoleum floor, yellow-stained wallpaper, coming off at the corners, coming off near the ground, grout peeling. Jesus, how long since they washed this place? Mildew smell. Piss smell. Rust rings around the drain. Lime faucet, hoary glaucous chalk.
Beth wanting to click her heels and be home. Get me the hell out of here. Feeling suddenly caved-in, caught, claustrophobic. Quick pee and get out of here. Don’t touch anything, don’t touch anything in this place. No toilet paper. Of course. Why would there be toilet paper? Who would buy it? Christ, what a shit-basket.
Wishing she could adopt Shauna, get her out of here.
As she comes out of the mold bathroom, Mr. Boggs is moving fast. Moving fast but what for? From where? What happened?
“Mr. Boggs?”
“Uh-huh?”
“Are you . . . sorry, I just. Is everything okay?”
Nervous now. Mr. Boggs quiet now, staring at the floorboards. Not wanting to say it. Not knowing how to say it. Mister, what the fuck were you just doing? What the fuck are you up to?
“You know, I got something for you! Hold on!”
Now the dark mood has gone away and the good mood is back. The good mood is taking him up the stairs and the floorboards up above are squeak squeak squeaking.
And downstairs Beth, looking around, setting the present on the table, nice, a presentation, and poking around, inspecting, trying to figure it out. The walls, the sink, the table, the fridge, the eggnog, the painting.
The painting.
There’s something weird about the painting. It’s a print of sunflowers on a brown background in a brown lacquer frame. But that’s not it.
See, the thing is, about the painting, is that it’s off. It’s off and there’s dust behind it in a rectangle. There’s a dust outline but the painting is off, off its dust outline, misplaced.
Upstairs the floorboards creak.
Moving, pulled, toward the dust outline, toward the sunflower print, pulled on a string. Beth did not want to see it. She did not want to see it but couldn’t stop the string from pull pull pulling her forward, dragging her forward into the face of that painting, the fate of those flowers.
Upstairs the boards go creak creak creak.
You can stand in front of that sunflower painting. You can stand there forever but you don’t have much time. You can take your light blue mittens up to the wall, shaking, careful, careful, don’t disturb the dust. You can pull the painting off sideways. Shh. Shh. Shh. Don’t let him hear. Shush. Keep it down. He could come down anytime. Make it quick. Hurry!
You could take the bright yellow sunflower painting off the nail on the wall. Shh. Keep it down. You could see something there. You could see a spot there, behind the painting. You could hold the painting, trembling, and you could lean into the spot. You could lean into the spot and look through the spot.
You could look through the tiny little hidden spot and see something on the other side. A looking glass! A looking spot! You could look through to the other side and see a yellow-mildew bathroom with yellow-and-white wallpaper, linoleum tile, and no toilet paper.
But the place you would be looking at, the place you would be aimed through from the looking spot, would be the toilet. You could look from the looking spot to someone on the toilet. Someone, say, like you, who was just on the toilet. You could be looking at you. Like Troy Trash Boggs was just looking at you.
Back up now, slow, listen for the squeaking. Put the print back now, hurry, put it back, don’t mess up the dust, back up now. Back up! Step step step out the door, step back now, Beth, don’t let him hear now, step back now, Beth, don’t fucking say anything just get the hell out.
It’s funny how, coming down the stairs, coming down in his good mood, piled high with old dresses, left-back dresses, now presents, present-dresses, he would give to her, it’s funny how Troy Boggs was thinking about how these dresses would for sure fit Beth and maybe even she’d try them on, for him, you know, to show him. In the spirit of Christmas.
THREE
Before Jeff. January 1976. Blah winter blank-canvas days. She tried not to think of it. What was the point? Nobody had to know about it. About those things she did. It wasn’t like anyone knew, not even miss Goody Two-shoes. If no one knew, it didn’t happen, right?
She could’ve called this guy a client. I guess. Shauna didn’t like to. No, they weren’t clients. They were friends. Friends she’d met at Dreamers. Friends she’d met at the Jewel Box. Friends she’d met at Captain Jack’s. Tall friends. Short friends. Old friends. Older friends. Balding friends. Rich friends. Married friends. Lonely friends. Just friends. Only friends.
Meeting them, sometimes at home. Or, if they were married, the Baymont Inn off Harvey Road, the Howard Johnson on 28th, the one with Holly’s Back Door Bar & Grill. One guy, a dentist, wanted her to meet him at his office, on the weekend. A Saturday appointment, four o’clock.
He told her over the phone to get ready, he “had a big one.” I get it. Act impressed.
The dentist office a study in beige and putty. Not too many kids’ poste
rs around. She’d thought there’d be kids’ things everywhere when she pictured it. She’d thought she’d be looking up at a happy happy tooth-cartoon declaring his passion, “Don’t forget to floss!” But, no, no jolly tooth-advice here. Only putty-colored tile, putty-colored counters, taupe reclining chairs.
Outside, the oatmeal sky in blotches, little bits of leaves smashed in the snow-sludge ground, she’d have to peel them off her boot. Shauna had an outfit she liked to wear to these little appointments. She’d seen it in Bonnie and Clyde last year. A full wool skirt in brown-black check, a maroon pullover, angora, and, the kicker, a pair of knee-high black suede boots, a present from little miss perfect. A Faye Dunaway shoot-’em-up getup. Sometimes she’d even wear a hat, a kind of berry wool beret tilted slightly to the side. A costume. A costume for a part she was playing. And this was a part. No question. This was not her. She was nowhere to be found.
This was her character, in this heather wool outlaw outfit, her character doing these things . . . walking up the steps, knocking on the glass-frosted doors, waiting outside in the 4 PM drizzle, the last light fading through the trees.
This was her character, pretending to be pleasantly surprised to meet the new friend, the dentist, a thin-hair in khakis, as memorable as cement. Her character, smiling, demure, and stepping inside this empty bland beige office, walking down the hallways, being led into a room with a dentist’s chair, reclined, at the ready. She wondered if it’d been left that way or he had adjusted it back.
This was her character, leaning back in the dentist’s chair, pulling up her plaid wool skirt, spreading her boots apart and looking like all this was the best thing in the world ever, best-kept secret, best Saturday afternoon, most-wanted kiss.
This was her character, letting him kiss her, letting him grope her, letting him remark stupid guy words about his too-big dick, his monster cock. (Yeah, right, it was just average, but that’s not part of the scene, those lines aren’t written here.)
This was her character, making those noises, acting like she couldn’t get enough of his oh-so-big dick and letting him grunt grunt grunt and fuck fuck fuck her not-there body.
This was her character, letting him gasp and goop and spasm, this stupid-face dentist, all over her belly and lay on top and get up and put everything back together and say some stupid thing, some ice-breaker non-joke, and laugh an embarrassed laugh and hand her six twenties.
This was her character, taking the six twenties, counting them out and looking up at the cement-face nothing-man dentist, telling him, “I thought we’d said two hundred. That’s what we’d talked about. On the phone.”
This was her character, freezing her face in a pleasant, never-there smile and taking the six twenties after the fuckface dentist, buttoning up his khakis, tucked in his shirt and said, “That’s all I have. And anyways, I thought you’d be better looking.”
FOUR
Now. Ever since Jeff. Now, that she had Jeff. Now, that she had to keep Jeff.
These union workers coming into town, thank fucking God. They might as well have had a ticker-tape parade. Like soldiers coming back from war, they had saved her.
He had saved her.
It was a ritual she had every morning. Well, it started in the morning and then she thought maybe another one in the afternoon, just to be safe. And now, lately, she’d added a third, at night. All bases covered. Three times, each day, every day without fail, even Sundays.
If he knew, she’d be mortified. But he would never know now, would he? It’s just a piece of writing, a note she’d grabbed off his desk, a shirt left at her house, and a couple of locks of hair . . . these were more difficult to get . . . but Shauna Boggs got what she wanted.
Put them down, the note, the shirt, the lock of hair. Seal it in an envelope tight. Write his name, Jeff Cody, in loving, flowering cursive on the side. Light a candle, shut the lights. And pray.
“Dear God, Dear God, please make Jeff Cody love me more than anything else in the world make him think about me day and night, night and day, make him lust after me, want to fuck my brains out, until it kills him, make him madly, passionately, deeply, crazily in love with me.”
Shauna Boggs would repeat this over and over, ceaselessly, fearfully, desperately until she reached a pitch of exhaustion and then, spent, she would snuff out the candle, keel over on the ground, stare at the ceiling, and think of him. Their wedding, the next time he would see her, the last time he saw her, the things he’d done to her, the things he would do to her. She couldn’t wait.
Her very heart and soul a sudden frenzy, a panic passion, almost too much for her paste body. Ceaseless. A pacing, ranting, pining, coursing through her head, her heart, the deepest bottom of her belly, between her legs.
All she is, all she ever was, began and ended with him. No more was she the sad little case, the left-for-dead dad’s daughter, the welfare girl, the secret child-bride of her father, the wronged piece of meat.
No, no, now she was Jeff Cody’s girl. Soon-to-be wife. Maybe. Whatever happened, she would be his. She couldn’t fly in front of the bullet quick enough. Oh I love you! I love love love you!
The daggers stabbing through her heart. More prayers! Just this once! Light the candle. Maybe I’ll add a fourth prayer a day. Yes! Four is better than three!
Away from him, reaching for him. Always reaching for him, the space never close enough. Jealous of anything near him. Jealous of the buttons on his shirt. Jealous of the cigarette that gets to be between his lips. Jealous of his shirtsleeves. Jealous of his pockets. Jealous of the sheets underneath his chest. Jealous of his pillow. Lucky, lucky pillow. And when he sighs his last sigh, and grins his last grin, she’ll be jealous of the box he’s buried in.
FIVE
What a party! That late, late summer, dog days, that sticky August heat—even the trees are sweating. The hackberry trees growing out of the limestone, the other side of the quarry like a cliff. Underneath, the water a pine-green blue. An abandoned inner tube bobbing up and down near the sand.
Yeah, so, it’s not Malibu, Jeff thought, but who the hell cares . . . everyone is here. There’s Shauna over there, Billy and the boys. Skinny rodent Billy with those ghost eyes and rat-brown hair. And what about over there, even little miss Goody Two-shoes Beth Krause came. Look at that, who does she think she is, wearing that white bikini? A string bikini! I bet you ten bucks her folks don’t know she got that suit.
Well, cut-off jeans and a halter for Shauna, lusty, available—hair like she slept on it. Yes, she’s been spending nights with me alright. Looks like she’s been fucked thirty ways ‘til sundown with her peach-fuzz skin and her flushed rosy cheeks and her easy, oh so easy, laughter. I made her that. I did that. Pabst Blue Ribbon in a can, might as well be diamonds.
This quarry is a no-no and that’s what makes it fun. That chain-link got torn down last June, grass swallowing it now. They say it’s dangerous, but it’s easy to dive. All you gotta do is push out enough, off the jetty, and you’ll clear the rocks below. Don’t be scared. We’ve done it a million times.
Billy and the boys been here since ten. These guys know how to drink. “Union reps.” That’s a laugh, all that’s been repped since we blazed into town is low tongues and lower morals. Billy with his face stoned off. Perpetual. And the pills. And the beer. And the lines, always, cut-up white razor runways. Rampant. Union reps. That’s a good one. From all over descended, swooped in, in concert shirts and jeans. Billy, from Ohio. Russ, from Waco. Terrance, from Pittsburgh. Randy, from Detroit, Cass Corridor. Rough place. They knew each other, these guys. You just cross paths on these gigs. Factory workers in town, need some extra muscle, something about overtime, wages. Who cares anymore? You wouldn’t think these guys would represent anything—looking like that—except maybe beer in a can and no shirt.
They got Kiss playing on the radio. Leave the car doors open and blast it.
“I-I wanna rock-and-roll all ni-i-ight . . . and party ev-er-y day!
“I
-I wanna rock-and-roll all ni-i-ight . . . ”
You can sing along, too, if you want. No one’ll notice. These bastards are loose, and getting looser. Look at Billy! He’s pretending to fall off the jetty! Look at Russ! He’s pretending to push him! Oh, yeah, Shauna is not wearing much. They’re asking, who’s the new girl? The girl in the white bikini. Yeah, her. Man. Oh man. I could show her a few things . . .
Shauna is showing Beth how to jump off the levee. It’s better if you take a running start. See. Now Shauna is running and flying off the cement, out off into the air and over the rocks. A sprawl into the hot-glare sky. She made it!
Now it’s Beth’s turn. Don’t be nervous. Show her where to start.
“See. Just go from here, take off and just go for it. Don’t slow down. Whatever you do.”
Beth looks up, now she’s a saucer-eyed baby girl, but tuck her hair behind her ear. Make her soft. Melt her.
“You can do it. I know you can.”
That plate face looking up. Eyes like an alien.
“Hey. I know!”
An idea now, running back to the green Plymouth, fast-forward the cassette.
“Just hold on. One second.”
Pause.
“Okay, now. Here it comes . . . ”
Blasting out of the Plymouth, turn that dial up. Crank it up!
“Beth, I hear you calling
“But I won’t be home right now
“Me and the boys . . . ”
What a hoot! They’re all gonna sing now. Everybody loves Beth (the song) and now everybody loves Beth (the girl). Go, Beth, go! Jump off the levee! You can do it! They’re playing your song!
And Beth takes her mark, salutes, takes a running start and flies off the levee. SPLASH! Down below into the green murk water.
Applause. Whistles. Hoots.
The sun blazing white through the trees.
Here she comes now, out of the water. Look at her. She takes a bow. Ha. That’s a good one. That’s a real good one in the white string bikini. White string bikini see-through wet, see-through now, see-through nipples.
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