The Skin of Oneself


?My mom says it?s inappropriate to touch your vagina in Target. Is that true?? An unusual question froman eight-year-old dressed as a flower girl. Megan stands on top of a carpeted box, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. The dress, white and full, seems to fit her fine. I expect my neice to flounce around and relish in the excess of the dress ? the way her mother would. Instead she stands dull but obedient. She looks at herself in the three-way mirror.

This weekend, my brother is further alienating the family by getting married on a farm near Waupauca, Wisconsin. The father of the bride boasted to my mother that the reception will never run dry. He can get extra kegs at four in the morning if we need them; he is a man with connections.

I really don?t care that the bride plans to wear sandals, but my mom and my older sister Rachel share the view that everything in life should meet their extremely limiting standards. My brother shut everyone out of the wedding planning and left them with very little to manipulate.
My sister is currently at Mr. Neat?s Formalwear picking out new tuxes for her boys, the ring bearers. She decided that the bride?s suggestion for shoes, vest, tie and suits made her sons look like miniature blackjack dealers. She is looking for something more suitable.

I?m staying with Rachel while I?m back. She claims she needs me to ?help out? with the kids. However I?m fairly certain that she doesn?t trust me not to shave my head before we head up north. She?s still pretty sensitive about her wedding pictures ? which I think turned out fine. It?s hard to tell which junior bridesmaid woke up on the morning of the wedding and decided she didn?t like long hair anymore.

While Rachel?s out with the boys, I drove Megan over for the final try on and pickup of her flower girl dress. Rachel designed it and had it made by a seamstress she found in the church bulletin. She was in here a couple of days ago giving her final criticisms. All I have to do is supervise the final ?try on? and carefully bring home the only hope we have to save this wedding.

I am here for the dress ? elementary masturbation is not part of my job. Janet, the Pentecostal seamstress, is unflapped. She is a warm sensible woman. I imagine that she knows the community well ? having outfitted an entire congregation from christening, to Prom, and up to the altar. Janet fusses with a bow and looks up from the back of the dress.

?Well honey, it sounds like you and your mom talked about it.? IT! My sister talked about IT! in Target? Rachel?s never talked about IT! with me! Somewhere out there a security camera filmed my niece searching for the bull?s eye in Target and Rachel stopped her to discuss IT! What the hell?s happening to the northwest suburbs? I stare at Janet, amazed by her ability to work through this.
Megan shrugs a yes in the mirror. The subject has already been addressed in the aisles of mass merchandising, but wise Janet senses she needs more and channels a voice straight out of ?Our Bodies, Ourselves?.

?Well, Megan, you?re a girl. Your mom is a woman, and I?m a woman. Your aunt is a woman.? I give a subtle nod here. ?We know that exploring your body is a beautiful thing that is very relaxing. But it sounds like your mom has been talking to you about appropriate times and places. Touching your body can feel wonderful, but it?s something we should keep private.?

Megan looks over her shoulder at me. She seeks verification of the seamstress?s soothing words.

?Aunt Carrie, what do you think??

My god ? this is not a time for honesty. Megan is my sister?s child. Even at eight, she must have some idea of Rachel?s expectations. As soon as I arrived in town, my sister forced me to try on my bridesmaid dress. Rachel wanted to make sure that it didn?t need a final alternation. Neither of us expected the blushed material to reveal my nipple ring.

Rachel spent the rest of the night hissing at me. After a dinner of baked salmon and salad, she cornered me in the guest bedroom.

?You know Carrie, if you don?t respect yourself, no one will ever respect you. No one wants to marry someone who would do that,? she gestures vaguely towards my chest.

She won?t let me explain that not everyone leaves college hand-in-hand with an accountant. Rachel strikes too fast. ?You make mom and dad worry. Exactly what was wrong with all of in-state colleges? Why do you have to go so far away?? Rachel wasn?t interested in answers; she just wants me to be normal.

I wish I could be warm and forthcoming like Janet, but Megan has a nine o?clock bedtime - she?s not ready to become my deviant confidante. Instead I play the awkward father role in our mock family drama. I look at Megan in the mirror and begin.

?It?s like brushing your teeth. You only do that in your bathroom. You don?t walk around the neighborhood brushing them, and you don?t pack your toothbrush when you?re out running errands.?
Megan nods. She seems satiated. Janet moves around the dress snipping loose threads. I walk over and stand next to Megan. I smile at her in the mirror. I watch Megan standing so still, and I try to tell if she looks like me. It?s pretty obvious that she is Rachel?s kid ? her hair is smooth and her posture strong. I notice she has smears of chocolate on her small hands. That?s my fault. We stopped for ice cream before coming here ? Rachel has everyone on a pre-wedding diet.

Janet?s workroom is clean, but there are bolts and piles of fabric everywhere. I feel bundled and am thankful that I?m not being examined up on the carpeted box. Megan fidgets. She swings her arms and crosses them around her. Her fingers brush the sides of her ribs, and I watch a small smear appear on the whiteness of the dress. Janet is busy examining the hem at the bottom of the skirt. She doesn?t know that the dress is soiled.

I have to pretend it didn?t happen. Rachel will notice it when we bring it home and I will act surprised. I will blame the seamstress. Rachel will probably refuse to pay full-price for something tainted.

?What is this material?? I ask. ?It looks so smooth.?

Unsuspecting Janet responds, ?It?s called peau de soi ? it?s a matte satin.?

?What does that mean??

?Skin of oneself. Touch it,? she says, extending the edge of the gown. ?Doesn?t it feel wonderful??

crit on PLAID BOYFRIEND (working title)
Hank, this is a strong piece. You're a bastard. You should have won that best story hing in the literary magazine back in college, it shouldn't have been a tie. You know why? Because of this right here. You're like a constipated man, Hank. Constipated. You don't write anything for what seems like years and then you finally do and it's solid and powerful. And I just loosen me bowels on whatever tickles me fancy and it has no substance.

You might want to call the store something else besides a "shell" since the girl's face is a sea shell and that's a better use of the word.

"plowing his palm across his forehead". Dynamo.

"Like that explained it, she added, as if it had just occured to her." Superb.

"The use of world like 'percentage' at a time like this." Nice, given the dialogue, which is nice, too.

Overall the story bleeds voice, giving Robbie's character through the narration without being a first person work, which is impressive. The dialogue is convincing, without too much meaning but enough to carry the themes of the story. I think you ought to work in some kind of conflict somewhere that overts itself beyond the mean things people think about each other, whether it be between Robbie and his manager, Shitbreak, or the odd girl in the story which is an Alicia Silverstone-fallen-on-hard-times type.
In fact, you should make it Alicia Silverstone who has indeed fallen on hard times.

"Alicia Silverstone just stole a box of Trix," Robert said, working the knot in the back of his neck with a practiced thumb.
"I told you that bitch would burn out early," Sally muttered, flipping through the scented pages of an old Vogue magazine. "Aerosmith videos don't exactly promise a bright future." Robert moped while he mopped, wondering if Alicia would eat the whole box in one sityting, a giant bowl and plastic ladel bringing little colored corn puffs to her slurping mouth.

Something like that.

But if you don't, well, so be it. At any rate it has the elements of good stuff. Your writing is particularly good. Put a little edge to the relationship between two of the people and you've got yourself a bona fide story.

Excelsior!

PLAID BOYFRIEND (working title)
The girl came in and Robert noticed her. He was ringing up a dubious coupon and he saw a flash of blonde hair, and then the girl, sliding into the white shell of the store. She had a pale, open face, like a seashell. He punched the register. The girl walked slowly along the front of the store.

His customers were gone. He was staring at her. He’d been warned not to do this.

She was talking to herself. Her jaw sprang open with a slight thrust of the full lower lip. She had one hand on Aisle 15, shampoo, soap and other toiletries—except for toothpaste, a surplus hastily cached around the corner on Aisle 14.

-That girl’s talking to herself, Robert whispered.

Sally looked up from her magazine.

-That girl! he hissed. Sally frowned at him.

-No! he said. She’s talking to her self.

Sally turned around to look and Robert sighed, plowing his palm across his forehead.

-OhmiGod, Sally said. Yeah, she is.

The girl wore a plaid jacket that was too big for her, draping to her waist in squares of green or red and lines of brown. Threads dangled around her thighs as she walked further into the store.

-What does she want? Sally said, a screw in her voice. What’s she doing?

Robert searched the store her for from behind his register. He swept his eyes from one end to the other, his shoulders clenched together.

A woman, decorated with a necklace of colored Christmas bulbs, planted one hip against her faded green skirt and said, -Ya’ll open?

-Right here, said Sally.

The woman stood patiently, her back to Robert’s writhing, and she hoisted one eyebrow when Sally said,

-That girl’s talking to herself. He’s looking for her.

-So he can ask her out? the woman said. She had a thin, graying head of hair and her eyes hung cool behind her old-fashioned glasses.

Robert had gone to get Max, but he wasn’t in his office. It was a big, hollowed space with an enormous desk against one wall. He checked the seat, flattening it with his palm. The fabric was warm.

He saw the plaid girl walk by the office door, her eyes on the floor. She was holding a box of cereal, her arms clasping it to her chest. Her mouth was still moving, although she didn’t seem to be thinking about what she was saying. Robert stared at her face. He said, -What? Murphy? Mor-f-No.

He followed her but he was moving much faster, hurrying by her to return to his counter. He could see dark rims beneath her blue eyes. She stared at the floor, her hair cutting off her face, as she walked out of the store.

-The—things didn’t go off, Sally said, almost immediately.

-The sensors, Robert said.

-They never go off, she added, with a rub of familiarity in her voice. Now THAT was unusual.

-It was something else, Robert said as he refilled the lip balm display at her register. He sighed.
-I mean—it’s not that unusual for people to wander around talking to themselves, he said. I do it all the time.

-No you don’t, she said. She’d been working at the Walgreen’s for three months.
-I’ve been here a while and I’ve never seen anything like that, she said. There was that old man who said he was a college student, and then he tried to tell me he was really a firefighter.
Like that explained it, she added, as if it had just occurred to her.

Max didn’t say where he’d been. He usually didn’t. Robert had come to accept this, and not grudgingly; it made sense to him that the manager was the least important person in the store, at least when it was someone like Max. Robert hoped to make it to manager in a couple of years.

-What is it? Max asked when they entered the office. He had stock listings in one hand.
I was looking at the numbers.

-No. 1 or No. 2? Robert thought to himself. Then he told Max the story.

-Were you staring? I told you not to do that, Max said. I thought we talked about that.

-I didn’t stare that much, Robert said. I never really stared a lot.

-It’s not a question of how much, Max said. It’s not a percentage issue. We needed to do something.

Robert looked away, his hands on his hips, and idly tapped one foot on the floor. That’s what got to him, he decided. The use of words like “percentage” at a time like this.

-What kind of cereal was it?

-Uh—Trix, I think.

-Yeah, said Max. It’s on special. She must’ve seen the display outside.

Max was a few years older than Robert, but just out of college. He had his B.A. framed above the desk, with his transcript hanging underneath. He’d been manager at the 15th street Walgreen’s for four months, coming right out of a company training program.

-Did you confront her in any way? Max asked.

-Well—no, Robert said. I didn’t want to, uh, provoke anything. I mean, the last time we had something like this—you know, with Sally and that black guy, coupla months ago.

Max was looking at the opposite wall now, his papers on the desk. The wall had a painting of a beach stocked with umbrellas, women in bathing suits and children building sand castles. He did not seem to recall the incident Robert was referring to, although he’d worked hard to control it. He still had copies of the memos he’d received about what action to take.

-We never did have those classes you said we were gonna have, Robert said. All that diversity training, the conflict resolution.

-Well I’ve had ‘em, Max said. I know all of it. So don’t worry about it.

-O-kay, Robert said. He was ready to get back to work. Sally wasn’t supposed to be alone at her station, anyway, or so Max had told them.

-I’ll close up tonight myself, Max finally said. Don’t worry about it. You can leave right after we close. You live near here, right?

Robert went back to work. He didn’t really live near here. He lived ten minutes away on city streets. That’s far enough, he thought to himself. Just because Max lived half an hour away on the interstate, he thought Robert lived in the ‘hood.

-What’d he say, asked Sally.

-Aw—nothin’. He asked what kinda cereal. Robert looked back at the office. -Man, he’s not doing anything in there.

Sally looked at the office, too, where Max was reading again. She cast a worried look around her eyes and showed it to Robert, who suddenly had customers.

-That’s what happens when you get stuck in this kind of area, he muttered. -How’d I end up here? I’m a get out of here.

His customers waited patiently as he rang up their items. They kept their eyes above and to the left of him.

-I can get someone over here, Sally said brightly. No one moved.

Zack Morris and Kelly Kawpowski sit in Zack's car up on Bayside Bluff (a.k.a. make-out point) where they overlook the city lights. Unidentifiable early 90s soft rock fills the car as Zack's privileged, scheming, upper-class fingers find their way into the poor, Polish, yet popular burgundy panties of Bayside's favorite cheerleader.

Kelly looks up into the rearview mirror and checks her enormous poof of bangs. Zack anxiously frees up one hand to grab the mirror back in his direction, as he sends the audience a knowing glance and wink. This date is going very well indeed. He returns his attentions to Kelly who is struggling to remove her cheerleading sweater without flattening her hair. After wedging his fingers somewhere within her ample thighs a shriek (not be confused with a Screech) fills the car.

"Zaack! Oh my God - that like hurts!" Zack ceases with his current technique. There appears to be a snag in his plan and an extremely large erection in his pants.

"Christ, Kelly, what the hell is wrong with you? You had to get up and go to the bathroom constantly during our date tonight at the diner. And now I can't even touch you. I don't know if this is your attempt to set up rules and boundaries or what. I think you've been spending a little too much time with Jesse Spano. Do I look like AC? He's one of my best friends and I have no idea what his ethnic makeup is, but I swear to God he is not blond and blue-eyed like me."

Tears begin to fall on Kelly's chubby cheeks. "Zack - I'm so sorry. I don't want to lose you, but I have to pee." Zack reaches across her and opens the glove box. He hands her a wad of napkins from The Max.

"Here. Go out in the woods." Kelly smiles through her tears and exits the car.

Zack turns around to address the camera crew in the backseat. "Ok. Time out. This calls for a plan. First of Kelly has to piss every two minutes - and that's not cool. Second of all, her tits are not nearly big enough. You'd think with all of the extra weight she's carrying it could go somewhere productive. I could make an obvious related joke referencing the size of pompoms, but lets face it - I got a 1500 on my SAT and am capable of so much more." The audience laughs in approval. "If only she could look more like Lisa Turtle without the whole black thing - that girl is stacked! There's got to be a way out of this. I know…" Zack begins fishing around in his pants. The pressing protrusion spotted earlier is unveiled. Just as he pulls it from his pants and as the audience gasps - it is revealed to be a cell phone the size of a brick. "I'll call my dad. I'll bet he'll pay for a boob job."

Zack dials and the multiple rings can be heard. The look of a wealthy boy with everything but love crosses his face. He contemplates calling Principal Belding for some surrogate fatherly advice just as Kelly leaps in the car and quickly locks the door.

"Oh my God Zack! I was totally out there crouching in the woods when Screech jumped from behind a bush. I don't see what you have in common with that kid. He's up here collecting used condoms for a science experiment." Kelly tilts her dimpled face and continues, "I told him to come by here in a few minutes and we might have something for him." She snuggles up to Zack and begins kissing his neck. Zack remains momentarily detached long enough to flip down the visor mirror and wink once again at the cameraman in the backseat.

Kelly soon works her way down to Zack's pants and removes something far too small to be an early 90s model cell phone. The camera pans over to Zack's left hand grabbing the lever under the seat that allows him to slowly and stealthily move his seat closer to the dashboard, effectively trapping Kelly between the steering wheel, gear shift and console. He adjusts the side mirror to again convey his enthusiasm via eye contact with the camera crew.

A muffled Kelly attempts to surface, "Umm Zack. I'm like stuck. I think my bangs are caught in your keys. And I've got to pee again. Ouch Zack! It's starting to burn."

Zack laughs as he finds a piece of dull scrap metal, breaths on it, and rubs it to create a brilliant shine. He then uses the shard to reflect his face again to the back seat. His eyes twinkle as he gives the thumbs up sign in the warbled reflection. The audience's conspiratorial laughter confirms that the plan is back on track.

"He's not moving," Sydney Matthews said, knuckles white from gripping the table. "We're dead in the water. We've lost the momentum. He's not fucking moving!"
Sydney, 33, was one of the top game show producers in the business. She prided herself on her ability to go through in one take. She believed it kept the game moving, kept the rogue elements (the contestants) genuine. A break in the momentum of the show was a cardinal sin and the primary sinner, Regis, sat motionless, staring up at the lights.

"Raise the house lights," Sydney barked into the microphone. "Get somebody out to the studio audience. Somebody grab the guest and get his ass to the green room."
David was Sydney's assistant producer. He was more well-liked than his boss, but partly because he was only the bearer of bad news and never the judge. He efficiently dispatched the appropriate people and caught up to Sydney, who was straining against her business suit to get to Regis, attended to by a few members of the crew. David's assessment of the situation was unsure. Three episodes of going blank, staring into the house lights. Completely catatonic, motionless. And then, as quickly as it starts it passes and he's back.

"Get those damn lights down!" Sydney screamed. "Get those lights out of his eyes!" The lights dimmed, and Sydney pulled the other crew away from Regis.

"This is the last time, Philben!" she was foaming at the corners of her mouth. "I don't care if you're more popular than God, you don't pull this shit on my show!"
Regis didn't move, his eyes wide and vacant and staring up and... through? Sheila suddenly got the chills and turned away.

"Call the doctor. Get him together. We have a show to do."

Sydney began walking back to the control booth. Another long night, she muttered.
"We'll get through it," David said, appearing just behind her left side with two cups of coffee.

"Well, yes, but what the hell is wrong with him? I thought they said this wasn't going to happen. His heart medication or something."

"Don't know," David said. "He wasn't talking about it. Unfortunately the chiefs aren't going to pressure him. He is, you know."

"Is what?"

"More popular than God. At least right now."

"I still don't care." Sydney sighed. "Okay David, let's get prepped for another run at it. I'll be back in fifteen."

"Right."

Sydney went to her office. She was promoted recently, and the office was one of the perks. A large mahogany desk, a view of the Empire State building, plush carpeting. She studied herself in the mirror. Brown hair falling shoulder length, light foundation to enhance her slightly brown skin, brown eyes bloodshot. She hadn't been able to sleep well the last few weeks. Her doctor had recommended St. John's Wort. She had angled for Vicoden. At thirty-two she wasn't the oldest producer, but she was already considered a senior among much of the crew. David was a good assistant, but he was green. Twenty-four, fresh from UCLA film school, he was in his prime in the business. Sydney grabbed a slug from the flask kept in her desk, reapplied her lipstick and made a call. Her therapist, Dr. James Green, had been seeing her since the episodes with Regis started.

"There's been another one" she said. "He's staring at it again."

"Did you see it this time?"

"No."

"Well, I'll confirm you appointment with your secretary. Don't worry Sydney."

"How can I not worry? I mean, angels for Christ's sake, James."

"Aptly, put," Dr. Green said. "We'll see you Thursday."

"Right. Thanks."

Sydney smoothed out the creases in her suit and returned to the studio. Regis was drinking coffee and joking with a few members of the crew, exaggerating so the studio audience, who had become uncomfortable, would be put at ease.

To Sydney's relief, it seemed to work. Murmurs began to subside into giggles, blank looks washed into smiles. They could finish the taping today. David and other assistant producers were coaching the next round of contestants, assuaging fears of a similar interrupted shot at a million bucks. She grabbed David.

"Looks good. Okay, where's our paralegal from Cincinnati? Bring him out of the green room and let's try this again."

"Syd, there may be a problem. He doesn't want to do the rest of the show. In fact, he's contacted his lawyers."

"What? Fuck that guy! He signed a disclaimer..."

"Sydney, he said Regis told him when he was going to die. And then started speaking in tongues. It's on tape, through the mic. He told the guy he was going to die on October 11, 2014 and then he started mumbling something. Sounded like Chinese."

"What the hell? What the hell is going on? I want Mr. Hughes down here now."

"He's on his way. The veep and our attorneys are on their way. We can probably settle with this guy."

"God damn him." Sydney pulled her hair back and sighed. David reached out and touched her shoulder. He had nice hands, and Sydney momentarily felt better before pulling away sharply and giving him what the rest of the staff referred to as "the look"-- similarly attributed to wounded predators. Sydney had worked on "the look" for months. It was the most confusing and dangerous gesture she could make. And it always worked. David backed away immediately, stammering.

"We start in twenty. I want Philben in the office now. When Hughes gets here, page me. She grabbed David radio and took off.

"Bitch," David muttered.

Regis strode in the office and shut the door behind him. Sydney had already arranged herself behind her desk. She was holding a pen and had put her reading glasses on, sharp black frames. She had been working her mouth into a grimace, psyching herself up. But when Regis entered, she realized why the studio had placed so much bank in him. The way he moved, carried himself, even now when he knew he was walking into an ass chewing, was done for viewer effect. He smiled and crossed his hands against his lap.

Sydney found herself struggling to speak. Her tongue felt swollen in her mouth and her palms sweated. Finally, meekly, she cleared her throat.

"What's wrong, Regis?"

"I don't know." His face softened and he looked at her earnestly. His eyes searched her face and she felt uncomfortable, almost naked in front of him. The uncomfortability turned to anger.

"You told a contestant he was going to die! For Christ's sake, Regis!" It was no use. Regis just looked at her, smiling softly. She had no punch against him, he was beyond her reproach. "Mr. Hughes is on his way. I guess he'll deal with it."

Regis nodded and stood.

"I'm not crazy," he said. "You saw it too."

"All I see is the hottest show on television now going down the shitter. And you are crazy if you think I'm going to let you drag us all down with you."
It was well after midnight by the time Sydney was ready to go home. The show had been a fiasco, nowhere near the energy needed for a top-rated show. Sydney had changed into blue jeans and a white t-shirt, pulled her hair up, and washed her face. David appeared at the door, timidly peering around the corner, into the office.

"Chief, you okay?"

"Fine. Yeah. Look, I was on edge and I was trying to take care of the business at hand, so don't get your feelings hurt..."

"Forget it," David said. "A few of the other producers are getting sushi. You interested?"

"No, thanks." Sydney looked at David, drawing him into her office. "David, do you believe in angels?"

"What?" David said.

"Angels. Heaven. God. The devil. Do you believe in that?"

"I guess so," David said. He dug his hands deep into his pockets. "I mean, I don't know." His voice lowered. "Do you really think Regis saw..."

"I don't know what I think," she sighed. "I just don't know. Look, I'll see you tomorrow. We have a producer's meeting. Hughes wants to keep Regis on provided he goes in for psychiatric treatment."

"No shit," David whistled. "Well, ought to be interesting. Okay, see you tomorrow."

Sydney sat down at her desk and rubbed her eyes. It had been a hell of a day, she conceded to herself. I can be tired. It was an extraordinary amount of stress. someone walked into the office.

"David, another thing. Don't tell..." Sydney froze. Standing in the center of the room was, for lack of a better word, an angel. A faceless, robed figure bathed in a soft and intense white light. Sydney felt her heart race and her muscles lock. She couldn't move, speak or take her eyes off the figure in the middle of the room. The figure didn't move either, and stood in the center of the room for a good five minutes before fading slowly away. Sydney collapsed on her desk, weeping uncontrollably.

¡SALUD¡

Drugs, he thought. Never stopped sniffing glue after the third grade. Or cough syrup maybe. Downing bottles right in the supermarket, hiding his head behind a jumbo box of Corn Flakes. Probably thinks he's some kind of artist, but his shit still looks like the shit he did in the third grade. Lots of fighter planes and fire and big headed soldiers shooting at balls of colors he calls monsters.

Yeah, Woody had seen this type before growing up back in Indiana. In school, the kid you loved to give wedgies to. They'd laugh the whole time. Didn't know enough to get angry or sad, could never walk straight, and even had fucked-up names like Boyd or gave decent names like Doug or Ricky a bad smell to them.

This one at the bar sipping a Shirley Temple in his rainbow suspenders and perma-grin, fit the mold alright. Except this guy made it sound like he had actually gotten laid sometime. He'd claim to be drunk after three Shirleys--"Shazbot! I am toast!"--and start sniffin and snortin about some dame named Mindy back in Boulder, Co. For Woody, it was hard to keep up the gosh, gee, golly-Wally act around this nimrod. Woody had put up with all sorts of shit in his six months bartending at Cheers. From that bitch, runt waitress, Carla, to the owner's non-stop game of grab ass with anything that bends at the waist; but nothing compared to the slow, early afternoons at Cheers when Mork saddled up to the bar all gum-smack and cheerful.

Woody lost his cool with Mork when nobody was around. Told Mork he was going to shove a frying pan up his ass if he opened his trap about that wench Mindy one more time. Woody didn't have a frying pan, didn't know if he could find one in Cheers, but at the time he meant it, and Mork knew it and shut up about Mindy. Woody realized immediately his mistake. This joker could run off and complain to Sam. Chances are Sam wouldn't believe sweet old Woody was capable ot it and would pin this guy for the glue sniffer he is, but it still wasn't good. He'd lost his cool back in Indiana. Shot his best friend in the knee cap and once in the ear with a bee bee gun. That wasn't cool and he had to leave town because of it.

And he hated Boston, but he had an uncle here who owned a successful chain of furniture stores in the North East. He set Woody up when he got to town. Let him stay in one of his warehouses until he got a place of his own. It wasn't bad. It was spacious, and Woody got to sleep on a different couch every night.

Now he had a job, his own place, and his eye on Ms. Chambers...Diane. Diane. His world, his anger, had never been soothed as the moment they met and those two syllables crossed her lips. Diane, the Oxford educated waitress at Cheers who quoted Homer and wrote poetry on cocktail napkins about honor, forgiveness, and rose pettles parting to gather the morning dew. When no one was looking, he'd gather up her scribblings. He had been handwriting them in a leather-bound journal that he planned to present to her when the moment was right.

But the moment wasn't right. The owner, Sam Malone, had started to melt the ice between himself and Diane. This filthy, ex-relief pitcher, who had probably given jock itch to half the women in Boston proper, had now begun to make a serious play for Ms. Chambers. The night before his blow up at Mork, Diane came into Cheers tearful and holding another rejected manuscript. Woody had wanted to console her, but she ran right into Sam's arms and he held her, kissed the top of her head, and stroked her hair. All the while, winking and smiling at Norm and Cliff.

It made Woody sick. More than that, it made him want to kill. And kill he did. That night he crept to the roof of his building with his bee bee gun slung over his shoulder. Quietly opened the door and peered at the pigeons sleeping beneath the ledge. Popped off three rounds...Piff Piff Piff...before they rose in a flurry into the still Boston night.

All but two. They vigorously flapped their wings, but couldn't lift. Woody, though, wasn't seeing pigeons flapping for their lives. All he saw was Sam Malone's fat head chewing on beer nuts and winking. He moved in for the kill.

Then Woody heard something behind him. He swung around, pumped the rifle three times and lifted it to his face, all in the time it takes to sneeze. For a moment, Woody saw Sam standing there arrogantly popping beer nuts in his mouth. Then he blinked and saw that it was a bum alright, but not that bum Sam. The bum just stood there, arms raised, holding a brown-bagged bottle in one hand and a nudie mag in the other. The centerfold had flopped open and gently swayed in the breezed next to the man's pensive face.

Woody knew what he was thinking: What will a couple of rounds in the face from an air rifle at ten feet do? Not much, but if it caught you in the eye...

Woody couldn't help it and snuck a peek at the nudie mag. That was all the time the bum needed to hurl the bottle at Woody. It glanced off his shoulder and caught him on the temple.

When Woody's eyes fluttered open, it was dawn and he could see two dead pigeons five feet from his head. A rat the size of a six-inch sub was circling the pigeons, plotting. Woody stood up and brushed the gravel and debris off his face and walked, like a just punished boxer after the bell, to his apartment.

When Woody arrived later that day to open Cheers, there was Mork outside waiting for a flood with his pants hitched up and that dumb-ass "Aliens are people, too." t-shirt, bouncing from leg to leg. After Mork's Nanu-Nanu bull shit, it was scary to Woody how close he came to wrapping those rainbow suspenders around Mork's neck, his slacks riding higher and higher until he found death: the ultimate wedgie.

Yep, Woody was a killer alright. "Natural born" was how he put it to Mallory, his girlfriend back in high school in Indiana. Told her one day he felt he'd ride across the midwest with a double-barrell and a hunting knife ridding the country of every piece of garbage he came across. She had laughed saying that she pictured him in a prison chain gang picking up trash along the interstate. That remark had ended their relationship.

Some days, though, Ms. Chambers would look at him with her blue, crystal eyes, politely ask for two bloody marys and a screwdriver, and he'd feel that impulse to kill lift out of him like a hang-over after a quick beer in the morning, and he'd spend the rest of his shift daydreaming of the time when Diane would invite him into her chambers.

The day after the frying pan threat, Mork didn't show up, or the next day. He hadn't missed a day since his first appearance a month ago. If his presence grabbed attention, then his absence was as conspicuous as the Pope stopping in Arby's for a Jamocha shake and a small order of curly fries. Diane began to worry. She said that everybody had driven him away for having the courage to be exactly who he was.

The remark instigated a flurry of giggles among the boys. Sam was the first to begin drowning in waves of heavy laughter, followed immediately by Cliff and Norm. Diane stormed off and Sam was going to follow her, but he began choking on a beer nut. Norm played Heim, and Cliff played Lich and together they used some very unorthodox methods involving a pillow and a broomstick to send the offending nut flying out of Sam's mouth only to hit Woody square in the eye, causing him to drop a full pitcher of Michelob on his left foot.

Diane's remark had been a reference to everyone's belief that Mork was as gay as snow is white. One day Mork came to Cheer's wearing a tight, red pajama-looking shirt with a large silver triangle on the front. Cliff's favorite joke was to ask Mork if he was having a "gay" time at Cheers. That would send everyone into laughter and Mork would laugh, too. That line always got a laugh for Cliff, so he always said it.

Diane tried to put a stop to it. She said that Mork, by hanging out at Cheers, was clearly in an intense, internal struggle between wanting to be one of the boys and wanting to be with one of the boys, and that they should be ashamed of themselves for capitalizing, for their own amusement, on Mork's attempt at self-reconciliation. This just led to more laughter.

Woody's broken foot required surgery to insert two pins, and following the surgery everyone from Cheers came to wish well.

Diane, the heavenly creature, wrote a poem about Achilles on his cast. Cliff brought him his mail. Sam told him the bar would pay for everything and give him an extra two weeks paid vacation. Even Carla embroidered him a little sign that said: "I almost lost an eye from some nut at Cheers."

After everyone left, Norm hung back to tell him he'd come through with his gift. See, Woody had noticed something his two days in the hospital. He thought he would have to muster all his restraint not to pull out his I.V. and stick it in the neck of the first person he saw, but he didn't feel that way at all. Soon he came to realize that something in that I.V. was keeping him from doing just that. That's when he called Norm.

Norm had revealed a few months ago that beer had stopped numbing the reality of Vera a long time ago and that he needed a little something extra. And it was a fat bag of that sticky, green, something extra that Norm passed into Woody's hand that day and helped rid the world of a sure Natural Born Killer.

He lifted up the toilet seat. Outside the bathroom people stood against the wall. When Randy gave her a light she leaned over to fetch it and a turquoise necklace hung over her cleavage. He saw a lie jump from her to him.
He was standing with his head leaned back. They slept together, he said to himself. Maybe it was the night we all stayed at John's. That was a week ago.
As he watched the flame curl and her lips puckered around the cigarette the band was setting up. They wore black t-shirts and cowboy hats. Hope ya'll like gospel, one of them said.
In the bathroom he lowered his head and shook for a moment, flushed the toilet. His stomach trembled as he turned to leave.
It may have been after that party, he said. We went swimming and she kept watching him dive in the pool. She was drinking out of her big plastic cup with the tiger on it.
He could see his drink on the table. She wasn't around but Randy was sitting there, watching the band. We're The Chandeliers, said one of them. Then the bassist kicked over his amp and they started playing.

The Gospel Truth

You walk in the restaurant holding her hand and the two of you begin scanning the prices on the menu. At this point you don't care. You've circled the plaza three times already looking for the right combination of price, atmosphere, and selection. You're ready to buy a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, find a clean bench and a clean finger and have at it. Just sit there staring dumbly at the passing people snickering at your gringo barbarism and sticky mouth.

But she came 3,000 miles to visit you and that simply won't do. 3,000 miles--you can't forget it. Before you left for Mexico you thought it silly that she didn't think she'd be making a trip to visit you before she went to Peace Corp it in Tunisia. If you still had reserves of love-sick cheese, you would've told her then that the few hundred dollars she'd spend would be worth the few thousand tongue-lashing you'd strategically administer somewhere between the part in her hair and the alien curves and indentations of her pleasantly-deformed toes. Now, a week into her visit, the only thing you've had your head between the last few nights is a folded pillow, selfishly hoping that a well-placed yawn or two will keep that hand on your buttocks from sliding around the bend.

She continues to scan the menu, but you stop, satisfied that there is no way your walking out that door and back into the plaza on an empty stomach. So, instead you start staring at her ass and think: no complaints there. You've been an admitted ass-man for some time and recently forgiven yourself for it, having discovered that, regardless of what you're dick may tell you, you spend the majority of your time with the head upstairs and that, above all, you're a brains-man. You remember how a comedian once delicately put it: the most liberating moment of his life was when he came to realize that the dick don't care what the pussy looks like.

Now she turns to you and asks you what you think. You tell her you think your hungry. She raises her eyebrows and nods in agreement.

The host is tall, light-skinned and sports freshly-trimmed black hair. He seats you next to an open window and as he hands you a menu you run your eyes up his arm and take notice of his belt buckle--silver and flashing. It's of a bulls head with eyes made of turquoise with two red gems for pupils. You wonder for a moment what a strong virility symbol so close to your crotch would do for you. If you couldn't find true love, then maybe you could find an unbridled bull-ride love affair with sex. Then five to ten times a week, head whipping back and feet gripping mattress you could pretend that your heart beats 160 times per minute only for her. Put out to stud.

But no. And instead of taking a chance that this woman--who no more than two months ago you'd kiss gently behind the ear as she narrated her past and her secrets--might actually want to hear, however dismal, the thoughts, the doubts and the fears that you let drip from your brain and into your gut, numbing you from the waist down...instead of offering her the chance to show that her love is strong enough to try to understand and assist or at the least listen and then be on her way...instead of all that you put down your menu, stare dumbly at the ceiling, comment blandly on the chandelier, and hope that the television in your hotel room has a movie on in English, anything, god forbid, anything but a romantic comedy.

arial is in the shower, thinking of ways to kill me. i am on the bed, fingers spread against the turquoise bedspread, balling it up in my hands. we have decided not to separate because of the dog. because we haven't finished a jigsaw puzzle started a month ago, a picture of a jar of pennies spilled across a glass table. we are not breaking up because. because we have been drinking. because it is not an auspicious day to break up. arial needs the insurance money, paid in drops of copper for drops of blood, tear drops. she's plotting my death each second.

the empty wine bottle on the ledge catches the late afternoon sun, breaks it up, drops it slowly across the desk, bed, stucco green wall in perfect and small packages. the poor man's chandelier. arial finishes her shower.

she wants to go dancing and the water drips from her hair down her back in tiny streams and i want to go dancing now too. she wrings out her hair and we both watch the carpet darken, soap hitting her toes which wriggle with the remaining energy she seems to have these days. we're together to conserve power. because we can take the other in a bar brawl.

two more bottles are on the ledge now. the moon lacks the punch of the sun. the bottles shimmer, but remain, at their heart, opaque. arial rolls over and i smell her body-- thick scent enveloped in sweat, breaking across her belly and slowly filling my head with ideas, small sparks of electric blue with each bead of sweat, each hair standing in the cool air, each tensed nerve from the liquor-thick, sweet breath whispered across her shoulders. because we still need something from the other. not because she cried herself to sleep.

when the phone rings i jump. it’s 2 a.m. the phone rings again, unafraid of the dark, louder. three rings, distinct, shocking my body rigid and still, staring at the phone. then silence. arial is at the window. she walks to the bed. moonlight across her broken face. broken not from being broken but being unable to smile. she runs her fingers through my hair, they smell of smoke and regret. because we still need the other. because we are scared.

arial calls the morning paper "the gospel of the modern world." she is wearing a skirt i bought her years ago. it is faded, but still falls apart above the knee the way i had wanted it to when i bought it, froze it in memory. her hair is pulled back, her glasses straight on her face. she looks at me, green eyed and expectant. the newspaper talks of a plane crash and a stock market crash and a birth and a new school in rochester. there are things happening now. in bali- in this hotel room- that will need to be spoken of in the modern gospel. in tiny pieces we still fit.