Vicky Swanky Is a Beauty

by Diane Williams

  The last time I saw my friend’s crêpe de chine skin, her frizzy hair—her dark breasts that wriggle raw, I said to myself, “You had enough?”

  ONE OF THE GREAT DRAWBACKS

  He had just seen a rodent with such expressive eyes and he knows horses intimately, too. He carves horses and he paints a whole group on their points of hips, the throatlatches, on the tails, and so forth.

  His daughter and his daughter’s friend have stopped by briefly.

  If left to themselves, they fight like fiends or yell out the great news and one of these girls is entirely out of danger.

  The daughter hates her father and she says, “Dad, sorry, but you should keep trying me—”

  He knows a horse seems to be laboring when its legs are drawn up under it—he knows that.

  His daughter has a terrified pair of eyes.

  A Delta Airlines employee arrives to deliver his lost piece of luggage.

  The father blushes—congratulates himself for getting so much attention, is so stimulated, and ever since has felt irremediably shy when sexual subjects are discussed.

  COMMON BODY

  So, I’ve got good news, but I also felt so bad I was crying.

  She’s so wrongly old and I’m her daughter, but can she still have children?

  HUMAN BEING

  Now I have a baby boy and a five-year-old girl.

  Being married, I thought I’d always be married to Wayne because he tried to be perfect. What more could he ask for?

  I LIKE THE FRINGE

  They don’t need to get me more belts. I have enough belts. I like the fringe.

  This is to commemorate personal tastes—mine—the Durrants’. The Durrants are still here.

  Mrs. Durrant asks Gabor Mavor what she wants and Gabor says, “A watch.”

  I wish I had Gabor’s health and safety.

  However, I am encouraged by the spirit of invention. A man I see through the plate glass shovels a lot of snow and he doesn’t even have a shovel! He has one of those little brush scrapers on a stick.

  A man like this has self-confidence.

  Often life deals severely with me, and yet I’ll be wearing my nose.

  RUDE

  There’s a cloth to wipe clear her muscular organ with the foam or the scum on it. People were talking too loudly. “You can’t tell grown up people what to do,” someone said. One person had fever, pain in the abdomen that develops normally like a sixth sense, and he wasn’t careful choosing a marriage partner. He is noted for his humor and his favorite color is dark purple.

  The physician covering him called him to report: “I find myself shocked and deeply hurt by your condition.”

  MRS. KEABLE’S BROTHERS

  Her fate was being rigged for the rough surface. Nothing was omitted from her desirable world insofar as she likes Mr. Keable and other men in suits with short hair; patient service staff who smile; all the people with large, accurate vocabularies; big blossoms; logical arguments.

  If a poached egg, open and bleeding, could give us the color palette, let us color her home in with that.

  In the evening, Mrs. Keable’s brothers, arriving in a black Volkswagen, often visited. She had in the past been scared to death of them.

  As the sun comes up, it’s as if, for Mrs. Keable, there’s a slice of lime on any serving of her food.

  NEW LIFE FROM DEAD THINGS

  See how the kitchen spray looks when it’s turned into words?—white or buff and gray.

  The daughter leant over a hope chest to confirm the location of the electrical outlet.

  It doesn’t make my life worse to say that the mother seems to enjoy herself and that the daughter is fine. The previous autumn there’d been difficulties. The daughter fled and did not plan to return. The grave of the woman’s husband had been recently dug.

  The daughter’s dead now.

  The mother poured herself a cup of coffee and studied the meniscus and I sized it up, too.

  I tried to see how I could run off into my own words.

  Don’t hurt me!

  NONE OF THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN REMOTELY FEASIBLE

  I’m smart, I think, and I am always up for fun and games—jokes. So this is suitable for certain people. One day the police found me in a pile of snow and I said I don’t want to live anymore. Mother gave me a hot drink, a bath, washed my clothes, and ironed them. We had a long talk—she saved my life. I was going to find another snowdrift.

  This morning I walked toward a tree. A woman at a distance was standing in the snow, crying, “Melba! Melba!” That’s what I thought.

  “Do you want me to get her for you?” I called. I called again and I called again to the woman just to make sure.

  “What would I have done?” she said. “I would have had to go way over there and around, but I just can’t!”

  “Don’t let go of her leash!” I said, and turned away.

  After a pause, I looked into the world, but I never found them.

  TAN BAG

  The Almighty doesn’t spoil everything—for I saw sky-high things—a tan bag, paper. I woke up dizzy. Mrs. Billyboy said the room was going around. Took her to the doctor. She got examined and is OK now.

  It is my business to comfort the lady.

  Chasteness, more pampering, I must get married. I changed her sheets.

  But this is not a lamentation. In this way, her story is handed on to you.

  She had a good day; had dental done. Dinner is chicken winglets, pea loaf, and Peppermint Pattie.

  Spring is. Summer is.

  Madam used hibiscus, as a girl, to make her lips red, the soot of the candlewick to shadow her eyes, candle wax for her brows.

  Her winter coat waves all its arms at us! Her camel duffle makes the sound of matchsticks being struck—if that helps.

  ARM UNDER THE SOIL

  It might seem to me that Chuck and I have a very happy marriage, which I cannot, I cannot believe I believe that.

  I had gone out to look at what Chuck calls the dot plants—things out of proportion with the ground for which they are intended.

  They’re a focal feature to form the centerpiece among the many plants that are not valued. In the house, he has his cascade bonsai tree on a high stand.

  I could not get between him and what he was in front of and I found myself waiting on some joyous occasion.

  By the close of the day, I had no idea how to be practical. I’d lost control of my life.

  Chuck tapped me, saying, “Who is that woman? What did she want?”

  It had been our neighbor. I wish she had been thinking highly of me, while her husband looked on, forlorn in the car. “Your quack grass!” she had cried. “Why don’t you just let me kill it for you?”

  They have a rock garden, steppingstones, a perennial border, and then I could see that our weeds were menacing those.

  The suspense in that moment had drawn me in and I was fascinated to hear my answer to her that was delivered in a weepy form.

  In addition to the quack grass, we also have plantain, chickweed, thyme-leaved speedwell—curiously green and brown.

  I understand. Hunks and slabs of weeds are not enjoyable to view.

  Pressing the heel of my hand against my trowel, with a quick motion of the wrist and forearm, I repeat the motion. I am jabbing side to side. The tissues attached to the stem are softened enough for the root to be slipped out, so that I may remove my muscle section.

  BEING STARED AT

  I was ready during the reunion back at his house in April and I had a feeling he was present.

  Most curiously he had asked us to call him Uncle Chew and I’d been fond of him.

  The elderberry lemonade reminded me of when we were young inductees to the religious world and we sat around here. I was very impressed by the box lunch.

  They handed out sheets with the lyrics to the song we’d written as a farewell for Uncle Chew. A part was missing.

  When we arrived at this reunion it was chilly. The next day wa
rmer. The next day chilly. The day after, I had a speech to make. We had hiked a certain distance past the church doorway, the hearth, the courtyard, along the village lane, the rough brick wall. I saw the same backdrop more than once so that I got my bearings. I was a woman in a fur collar and false hair, reminiscing.

  They handed out lunch-box sandwiches as I came slowly down the length of my time, which I have become very attached to, and my memories and my remarks—hurt my pride.

  EXPECTANT MOTHERHOOD

  I don’t like them or my brother. My children don’t like me.

  I count the affronts, mindful not to give up all my views. I’d rather contort my guts. Conditions are somewhat unfavorable, despite strengths. I’d feel so much better if Brucie influenced me.

  There is a side to me they have not been exposed to. I mention this. They take up their tasks. In short, my daughter told me to wait a minute, that she’d join me.

  I said, “No!”

  She put her head back and closed her coat at the neck. “I wonder if you realize…” she said. It took me a moment to.

  Everyone else was hurrying. We stood. She was leaning against the mantelpiece. “Why are you so unpleasant?”

  I answered, “I don’t wish you well.”

  I threw my gloves on the floor and my hat. I had been wearing my dark blue coat. Drops of moisture were on our windows, and fog. We are a family. There’s a point to it and to the dimmer switch in the foyer. The next thing—my daughter was stepping along the corridor and out the door. I seriously did not think I was in the state I describe as reserved for me.

  COMFORT

  She made assurances that satisfied her ambitions—saw the body interred, spent the rest of the week asking questions, suggesting action. She visited with her family and reminisced.

  Getting routine matters out of the way, she headed home after buying a grounding plug and ankle wrist weights.

  She fed the dog and put the boys to bed. Allen didn’t go to work.

  She received a call from a woman whose sister had died.

  She made some of those unequaled assurances, was escorted with the family to the grave. People seem to respond to her. She talked with them, gave a woman a played-out peck on the cheek.

  Getting routine matters out of the way, she attained riches, social position, power, studied for an hour or so, cleaned up, took the family to a movie, after which she forecasted her own death with a lively narration that gave her gooseflesh.

  She felt raw, pink and so fresh!

  THE STRENGTH

  “I am going to cough,” I said. “Cough, cough.”

  I left Mary, my mother, to experience that by herself and went to get the dish—a lion couchant—with a slew of nuts in it, and I served us wine, and I coughed.

  Mary put her hand on the top of her head, as if she could not rightly rest it there.

  “Mary, how are you, Mary?” I said. “Now, Mary.”

  “Not so good,” she replied. “I’ve just been lying around.”

  Then she changed into the shape she pleased—an upright, independent person.

  My father, her husband—we were surprised—walked in, buttoning himself to depart. I had thought he was dead. His bad foot had killed him.

  My mother and my dead father provide strength for me. They recklessly challenge their competency.

  It is senseless to prevent them.

  THIS HAS TO BE THE BEST

  It isn’t until a Bengal cat comes by—the Sheepshanks’ cat Andy—that I can see my way in the dark so to speak.

  This flame design decorates almost all of his body and the brilliancy demonstrates exceptional technique.

  When I pet the cat, I rough up too much of the detail, and the cat is yelling at me.

  I went to the sex shop after. I know the saleswoman there very well.

  And yet Brenda said, “I have never seen you before in my whole life!”

  This must be on account of the harsh light.

  A MAN, AN ANIMAL

  At the cinema I watched closely the camels, the horses, the young actor taking his stance for the sexual act.

  He started up with a pretty girl we had a general view of.

  I felt the girl’s pallor stick into me.

  Another girl, in pink swirls alternating with yellow swirls, intruded.

  The girls were like the women who will one day have to have round-the-clock duty at weddings, at birthdays, at days for the feasts.

  Unaccountably, I hesitated on the last step of the cinema’s escalator when we were on our way out, and several persons bumped into me.

  An ugly day today—I didn’t mention that, with fifty mile per hour winds.

  But here is one of the more fortunate facts: We were Mr. and Mrs. Gray heading home.

  It has been said—the doors of a house should always swing into a room. They should open easily to give the impression to those entering that everything experienced inside will be just as easy.

  A servant girl was whipping something up when we arrived, and she carried around the bowl with her head bowed.

  We’ve been told not to grab at breasts.

  Before leaving for Indiana in the morning—where I had to clean up arrangements for a convention—I stood near my wife to hear her speak. So, who is she and what can I expect further from her?

  What she did, what she said in the next days, weeks and years, addresses the questions Americans are insistently, even obsessively asking—but what sorts of pains in the neck have I got?

  Please forgive our confusion and our failures. We make our petitions—say our prayers. It’s like our falling against a wall, in a sense.

  On a recent day, my wife gave me a new scarf to wear as a present. It’s chrome green. Her mother Della, on that same day, had helped her to adjust to her hatred of me.

  I’d have to say, I’ve given my wife a few very pleasant shocks, too.

  SHELTER

  Derek is somebody everybody loves because everybody loves what Derek loves and he is handsome. I’ve left Derek behind on the veranda, in the vestibule, in the passage. He is fifty-two years old and behaving properly. Every day he thinks of what to do and wonderfully he tries to do it. I can make out his force, his shape. He sits at a shrewd distance from the dining parlor, now.

  I poured myself a cup of coffee (none for Derek), bad tasting, that satisfies my hunger.

  Oh fine—pretty rooms, opening out on either side. I am refreshed, filled with sweet feelings, enjoying a revival, long and looping, and I pull a door shut and take slower steps, as if walking to my bus stop.

  I’ll be unmanageable at the back stair’s spiral.

  Not a correct use of this residence.

  But how odd it is—I recorked a bottle and stowed a jar of mayonnaise and Derek came in here for a particular reason.

  Derek’s task is to provide continuity room to room—thoughtfully—consistent with ensuring that no violent breaks occur and shouldn’t I appreciate this?

  Also, the recent calming wave of walls and ceilings has helped me very much.

  However, the shovel and tongs, upright against the mantelpiece, you could argue that they just don’t belong!

  I make every effort not to crack or to split and to fit in, albeit, fitfully.

  ENORMOUSLY PLEASED

  Like this—leaning forward—she spit into a tulip bed within a block of Capital One—with her head like this.

  Passing Rudi’s, she saw the barbers in their barber chairs—four, five of them—in royal blue smocks—they had fallen asleep.

  There are so many more things like that. She had spent the morning with the problem of sex.

  Now she was making her progress into town. The sun was low. In any case, the weather—there are so many more things like that.

  The woman made her progress as if she were an ordinary woman who was not aware of all her good fortune. The pear trees in bloom looked to her like clusters or fluff. She saw more things like that, that were complete successes.

 
She had spit into the tulip bed, as so often happens in life, with verve, and that was fun. Neither was the sun too low or too cold.

  The documents she signed at Capital One glittered like certain leaves, like some flowers. That bending, that signing had hurt her back. She had more money as of today in her everyday life and she was tucking her hair and bending her hair as she had so often planned.

  When she awakened that morning, she had smoothed her hair—when semi-alert—but she was still capable of adventures and their central thrust and with some encouragement, the penis of her husband had been leaning its head forward and plucking at her.

  The barbers in their smocks, in the town, had awakened and were busy with their customers. And, she’s a doctor!—or a lawyer!—with only a few griefs to her name. She’s great!

  If we trace the early years of her life, the intricacies, the dark years, the large middle zone, the wide-spacing between the fluctuations, as between her progress and her verve—the balanced tension—we see that the woman turns everyday life into daydreams, trusts in the future, is gullible and has some emotional immaturity.

  HELLO! HI! HELLO!

  My association with Moffat was the luxury of my life or a decorative keynote—a postage stamp.

  On Moffat’s recommendation I took a meal alone at Cheiro’s Café. I drank ginger ale with my black cherry linzer. I ate one fried egg and that felt as if I was eating a postage stamp—with its flat ridges.

  I had begged Moffat, to be completely fair, to keep on with having what he called fun with me. Although, I have a respectful attitude toward the public status of the person addressed, he had become, he said, disentranced.

  There is a reasonable code of conduct concerning Moffat.

  I found I was a bit cold-pigged—drained, not dried entirely.