The Collected Stories of Diane Williams

by Diane Williams

  The fruits of the climate and of the surface sur­round us and it is all very gaudy.

  I have to get back inside of this house by 7:30 at the latest for human relations. I do not have time enough for my endeavors with the Hodson woman. She has a sad face now—at the mise-en-scène—that signals much pleasure, good fortune, and longevity for me.

  And, this is the type of flesh I just ate—I ate a steak and I drank a big glass of wine. Elizabeth ate a double-bone. Then again, she takes so many pills for her kidney.

  She wore her black sweater with the black buttons that buttons tightly and she wore a red flannel jacket with the rare green velvet collar.

  Hot water was prepared for tea and Dark Pfeffernusse were served.

  Looking up the cantilevered staircase, with its dopey newel animals, I think, Aren’t some animals so cute!

  Upstairs, I straddle Hodson and keep her lying down and warm. Then I get her into a warm bath and encourage her to try to void. I get her out of the tub and put a hot water bottle on the pain area.

  In this position I reach over her and bring my top arm over her shoulder and then place my hand over her breast head. My other hand grasps for her hip. I hunch and I hunch and I hunch. It is hard to lie here and struggle with something I had thought was finished.

  There’s such a thing as recalling some of our con­fidential fretting or exultation. I’ve required myself to preserve some of that in a greater number.

  A Dramatic Classic Leap

  Most of my romances are like this, so that I must conclude my behavior produces the poor result.

  I present my problem to nearly everyone I know well and there is no solution to my problem. They ask me, “How did that happen?” or they say, “This is not right.” They want to talk to me about sex, what I should know about fortune-telling, how to think logically, how to improve my conversation.

  I took to fluffing my speech with the details of the day, with some unrelated subjects about my health, my salary, with absolutely worthwhile questions on poetry and art.

  I learnt that being partially helpful and light feels as if I am a dear, and, that whatever else I do I expel this.

  A Thousand Groans

  To get back to my success, I am easily upset. They think I am afraid of this kind of thing.

  This shows especially in a few details. Later I give assurances or I am not brooding.

  I see a roundabout young man with relatively wide, entire segments and I embrace him. He is brisk and undecided. He embraces me. But I have the dis­covery of my success in the morning. To get back to my success, I am frantic and romantic.

  To get back to my success I warn the man when he unties—I warn the man when he makes the soup because he has not slept well. He does the work of four men. He permits happiness to raise him up and to revive him and he thinks he is the greatest enjoyer of all time. His desire to eat peelings and his desire to boil peelings and new vegetables—it is an act!—it is an action!—it is a seizure!

  I Hope You Will Be More Tip-Top

  Soon after we can have this feeling. Thanks so much for joining us. The room is a short, humid room. We have not told anybody not to go in. As far as exactly what happened when this broke out, I can tell you everything. This evening the room smells like high heaven, but this is not as coast-to-coast as it might be. At this point what I’d like to do is tell you who’s here. Two men are in the room. Unfortunately, as I’ve said over the years, we can spend a lot of time playing cards and yet everybody enjoys that. We want people to come forth and to show their colors particularly. Don’t be worried about me. I am worried about you. You’re the one who’s really in trouble. You need help. I can help you on all problems of life. Why don’t you get my help? One visit solves your big problem. Don’t be worried about me. I am worried about you. You’re the one who’s hospitable.

  Well, Well, Well, Well, Well

  She took the bellows from me and she told me if they didn’t work, she had bought them to have a practical function, but they didn’t have one.

  She said she wants to be around someone who isn’t unhappy and gnashing his teeth.

  “I am too late,” I said. And she said she liked the way I remembered details of her life—the other end of the expanse she’d lost track of.

  I trusted her rectally, but she did not trust me.

  This was clearly December. I had some sense of being excluded, given that everything around me was not mine. She inquired if I liked cheese.

  Sometime in January the meeting between us went well. She said she never discussed true or untrue sex with men, yet she consented. She said the charms of sensation depended upon so many things going well and the stakes were too high, that she is sexually unfit. I talk the way I walk, eager as I am to make sexual advances with my friends. I do not mean to suggest social life. (Another ineffective stimulant.)

  She said, “You can call my friend S., but she doesn’t speak English or you can call my friend A., but she isn’t nice.”

  Let me tell you about our organization. We have our mishaps. It’s a large team, but a necessary team—families and individuals.

  I came out into the street and searched for my connection to the easy future. I mean to suggest that anything else will ever happen, will introduce fresh air, will rise to the surface. She followed me in near racing condition. She caught up to me. An efferves­cent cab came by.

  Another sort of exquisite situation was drawing a crowd out and among the theories in town while we were busy.

  Everybody’s Syrup

  “She’s even prettier than you are,” the host says.

  “You really like this one?” Mr. German says.

  “Have an Anjou pear,” says the host. “Yes, I do.”

  “You didn’t like Marie?” Mr. German says.

  “Nope.”

  “Remember,” Mr. German says, “you said she will slip onto your plate like syrup?”

  “Like syrup. Now the question before the house . . .” the host always says.

  “What are you doing?” says Mr. German.

  “I’m trying to get the food out of my teeth with my tongue and I can’t.”

  From the storyteller, an endnote: That’s a Butter Nuttie in the host’s mouth and his Irish water spaniel is licking grains from a pan, and, finally, squared cooled build­ings, in the square, fresh and moist, intrigue townsfolk. Serves 1.

  The Easiest Way of Having

  They are not like you.

  This is what occurs. Fancy work.

  Under no circumstances is sexual contact per­missible.

  They use smooth knitted bath towels at home, smooth knitted hand towels, washcloths. They move their bowels twice daily if they can. The husband eats very slowly. Although, I thought last night he did very well with the sandwich!

  These two work alongside one another the way the pharmacist and his wife do—day in and day out—and the way Stella and Harvey did, day in and day out. It is judicious to defer intercourse with persistence.

  From a card table on the sidewalk they sell neck­laces, earrings, brooches for the throat, or for near the face, for on the chest—bracelets and sometimes a bibelot. Everybody’s got about eight. They are all wrapped up in tissue paper, although everybody didn’t figure on being so tired out, so hungry, and so sad, and so lonely.

  You see the wife has permitted a sensible and complete entrance of air into the vagina.

  She has a large bosom and otherwise is a small, narrow person.

  This is what shall occur—a complete new set of prohibitions—because there is pretty much wrong with practically everything that they have ever put onto their table for their enemies, come to think of it.

  The Life of Any Cook

  The cook verges on spooning food into a bowl as the evening flows into a glass. The cook holds out the glass.
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  This really thrills her. She cries, “It’s the prettiest; it’s the best-looking one, Mom!”

  There’s something else to tell and I will coordi­nate it.

  Now in the bowl, the contents where she put them are copulative—I mean it’s the finish for a raw meal—salt and vanilla, the egg yolks, and hot milk.

  She baked, dressed, ate one tiny Snickers and an Almond Kiss that she had had to fish out of the trash. Made supper and now it’s ten o’clock. Think she slept for an hour and a half.

  A cup, a dog, a knife, a cook, a cat, a very earnest cook can get into trouble for slipping. Then there is just one more, just a moment, a sigh of relief as the light of dawn almost pours itself back into a six-cup, paper-lined ring mold.

  Rice

  “That doesn’t matter to me if you do not trust me,” she said. “That doesn’t matter. Is that okay with you?”

  “Of course you know now that I will never trust anything you say ever again about anything,” he said.

  Her voice got baby-small, so faint that it was no longer the most beautiful sample in existence. He could not have heard her. She had to have a baby, she said. Had to.

  He put his open hand on her breast. His parents had been childhood sweethearts.

  The woman had the chops arranged neatly in the pan and there’s a small television on the counter. She had been cooking long slender grains of roughleg when he arrived, so he hadn’t smelt the perfume of the paper whites in the clay pot on the sill of the window which was a lookout onto the little bog and accumulated plant sphagnum.

  She had put on her red skirt for his arrival and possibly a brassiere and there’s definitely the motley ring of troubles and the deafening ring of troubles in the air because someone once said, “I have so appre­ciated serving you. I look forward to many years of giving you the highest standard of excellent service.”

  Stronger than a Man,

  Simpler than a Woman

  “Take it easy, Diane,” Jacques said. “What do you want to fight with me for?”

  I was embarrassed. It was like appearing in broad daylight. Even in those days I worried myself for nothing. Marie-Rose ate a few pieces of the corned beef with her fingers, not showing warmth or enthu­siasm. She took a dish and emptied the contents into the sink. “Do you have any sour pickles?” she said.

  “No,” I said.

  Jacques was vexed. I will describe Marie-Rose to you. She is tough. Tough getting tougher. Very tough. Hard. I’d say hard.

  I had never met Marie before this. Fran had inter­viewed her.

  Marie-Rose put her hand on her chin, then on her neck. Jacques was embarrassed by our women’s breasts, I think. Jacques stood to one side. His nipples were ignorantly abused.

  He threw me off balance. I had to catch my fall. I braced myself against the plate of beef, which tipped. Then I saw a rib of bread, picked it up and it was in my left hand, the knife in my right. I licked my lips, scared of what might happen next.

  To give a time limit, six weeks have passed since. It’s not unusual to see older people get aggravated. But this happens among every age group.

  Am taking this in steps—as I was telling you—Jacques (thirty-two) and Marie-Rose (thirty-six) came over in the morning and brought corned beef. I got Marie-Rose a fork and the knife. I motioned for them to sit down. Then Jacques had Marie by the wrists. Hurry up! As you mature you ought to have control of your emotions (all yummy and delicious—satisfactions). A thrill. I go through the material balance in my rational capacity.

  Oh, is it Wednesday?

  Marie squeezed my arm. Her eyes blinked as if I didn’t have a chance. The side of my right leg felt a kick. Her hair is long. She has a small thin bumpy face and thin lips. Hitting, kicking, hitting and push­ing. She scratched me.

  I noticed blood on me. My groin hurt.

  Those are the quarrels with Jacques and Marie. I told you about them because you interest yourself in what happens when men form part of the goods exchanged between strangers. I mean the weird, old-timey men, under all sorts of disguises, who’ve not been heinously altered.

  These Blenches Gave My Heart

  Life is fair I must confess. I am indebted to Erika Amor for the years 1946 and 1947 which were marked by the full flowering of the fairness. It can be expressed thus—that she did not imagine me a shy person, determined not to disobey. I had an idea she liked me and I chose her.

  Her father said, “Stay with my daughter.”

  I agreed to, not impolitely. Lots of times it was a pleasure to be with her and I was frightened. (Some days they tell you what you said and that makes the blood flow out of your face so that all of the color goes out of your face.)

  She accepted a glass of liquid and I took her to the window where she talked.

  “Bring me the towel,” I said. “You can lie down here instead of there.”

  Arms folded up over her torso—being thoroughly stretched through the torso—her hips are stuck. Her hips roll finally. From the excitement I rub her under-lip. I spank the girl flat. She is near now.

  The green chair under the phone?—that was hers and the dark wood chair under the window?—that was hers—untouched by the sex, the ax.

  Across the way is a cozy Hungarian restaurant with its Kugelhopfs and sausages and The Roving Finger Barber Shop which has been there since 1930. Much of the shop is going to be demolished to make way for Malaysian Crafts.

  I feel that my only big problem over the past year has been to trim myself with enough devils, beauti­ful women, owls, and hooded figures that will be of more interest than anything else I can make clear. Blank.

  The Lesser Passage Room

  The voices, as if we rubbed them with our palms, reassured me. I don’t formally know the place of ori­gin for our voices.

  A container for holding liquids stood on a mar­quetry table by the bed. The room had darkened some. The curtains were closed. My Pearl Spar col­laborated and lustered.

  I got up and turned off the faucet and released the water from the basin into the drain. It’s all set.

  The room we are in runs ultramarine underneath the main block. In the main block a girl crosses the brook. Two seated humans embrace. A child offers fruit to a woman. Many vessels sail. The laurel is obtained. I’ve heard all about it here.

  Here as elsewhere one is refreshed.

  The Facts about

  Telling Character

  Against the wall opposite, she sat with her bread and her soup, which were both of them grained, strong flavored, and the best or better than there is. The effect was cosmopolitan.

  Oh, he loves her so much. He loves her so much. He loves her. He loves her so much. He unlocks the door and pads into the back garden in his silk body.

  By the time he is neither too ashamed nor too peculiar to answer her question, she has finished her daily intercourse and she is—this much must be conceded—that she is forward moving with—I don’t think I have ever seen such vigorous smirks.

  Here we come to the horrible part. It is pretty hor­rible for Steve throughout last night and into tomor­row. It doesn’t look as if he paid much attention to this book, to its advice, and to its instructions. You have got to have boots on the ground for this. I know he sleeps a lot and he eats a lot. That’s probably very healthy.

  I think he will pad back and have grapefruit. He is hungry. Have grapefruit. It’s the size of a clock radio. Do you mean it’s the size of a shoebox? You can’t be certain without precision measurement.

  One needs a more professional atmosphere. The information minister and the people are very much against that, so that didn’t happen. Everything went smoothly as silky.

  Flower

  “He is the only one you will sleep with and you two will consult with each other about everything!” her father said. “Go live with him. He will welco
me you. I am certain. Do you want to be rich?” her father said.

  “Yes,” she said, “I am sure.”

  “Susan,” said the father.

  “Yes?”

  He said, “To get that nipple to stand up, squeeze it.”

  Doodia

  By day I see the fine future—the ordinariness of fes­tivals, the house, gulping wine.

  By day I dream of a real and good dog.

  This is not the unknown and neither is a preg­nancy, a miscarriage, durableness.

  It has been raining and the houses are up on stilts.

  There are a lot of stray dogs and there is a sweet one we call Bride and we fed him and he went to the bathroom and I rushed to get some paper. “He’s all dirty. Clean him!” I said.

  My mother laughed and she said, “They clean themselves on the grass!” I wanted her to clean him up the way she cleans me. It would have been hope­ful enough for me.

  I do not know what to do. I do not know who to trust.

  Handy-Dandy

  “I feel fine today, actually.”

  “When you grow up are you going to marry some nice girl and have children? Of course you are, and are you going to make your children eat food that’s good for them? Of course you are! I know that you are! Just put on the coat and go outside.”

  “Even if the coat will get dirty?”

  “Yeh-es.”

  Mom and Buzz—both of whom have gossiped this week—had been sitting down to their lunch. After what seemed a long wait, Buzz, holding his side, complained of an ache.