Trouble & Attitude 1/Trouble and Attitude - Issue 01.iso/pc/pctext/wienera.txt

Text File | 1995-06-02 | 20.1 KB | 418 lines

THE HOUSEWIFE'S HAREM ROOM
by Evelyn Wiener

        There is no blue in the sky. It is white like
the walls in the house when they'd just moved
in--drywall covered once over, plain white. White like
this might mean a storm, if it turns grey and angry.
Or, if it stays, thinks Colleen, it might just mean no
sun. An empty day, blank as a wall.
        There is a load in the wash and breakfast to
clean up and the bed to be made. Colleen goes to their
room where the sheets lie on the floor in a twisted
ball. Sometimes John has sex with her before work--to
rev up, he says, laughing. He tests cars for GM, just
like on the commercials. Wet conditions, dry
conditions, stopping on a dime, zooming around neon
cones as if they were mountain curves--like a chase
sequence in a movie, only the mountain curves are
imaginary. Really they are just spaces between neon
cones.
        John had wanted to be a race car driver. He
tests cars and watches the races on TV and sometimes
takes Colleen to a race. They place bets on his
favorite car. Actually, thinks Colleen, it must be his
favorite driver they place bets on. It must be the
driver that makes the difference. If it was just a
matter of the car, John could be a race car driver.
        Colleen lies on her stomach on the bed. The
elastic edge of the sheet has popped off the corner on
one side. She presses it between her fingers. The tiny
folds of cloth remind her of little girls' shirred
dresses. When Colleen was a little girl, she was the
most beautiful girl in the world. When she was sixteen
and John started coming in to Denny's and sitting in
her station, he told her she was the most beautiful
girl in the world. Girl made sense then because she
was only sixteen and he was thirty-one; and because
she was the most beautiful girl in the world.
        Now she is old--twenty-four. Way too old to
start her modelling career that she never got to
start. She practically has
wrinkles. John still calls her a girl, but she knows
she is not the most beautiful girl in the world
anymore because John doesn't tell her she is.

        Colleen puts the laundry in. Above the washing
machine is a cabinet where she keeps the All and the
Snuggle and where John keeps a box of Playboys. One
for every month they've been married. That makes
twenty-seven. John's friends gave him a subscription
at his bachelor party with a card that said, "Now
you'll need to fantasize about getting around.
Three-year subscription--renewable if you last that
long." Colleen takes the box out and sits cross-legged
on the cement floor of the basement. She spills the
Playboys out and stacks them up in chronological
order. There's Miss September. It's still August, but
the September issue has already come and John has
already read it, studied it, done whatever he does
with it, and put it in the cabinet.
        Colleen flips to the centerfold and studies
Miss September's breasts. They are much bigger than
Colleen's, and with huge nipples. Colleen's nipples
are flat and smooth like skin except for when she is
cold or, before, when she used to get excited. Miss
September's stomach is fuller than Colleen's, too, but
a flat stomach is desirable, thinks Colleen. Hard and
flat like a girl's.
        Really, I am still very pretty, thinks
Colleen. Even if I am not the most beautiful girl in
the world anymore, and getting old. Miss September
looks even a little older than Colleen, and her hair
is that fly-away dry that dyed blonds get. Colleen's
hair is thick and brown, long to the small of her
back. Miss September may look glamorous with all her
blue eyeshadow and sparkly jewelry, but she was
certainly not the most beautiful girl in the world
when she was younger. And Colleen was.
        Colleen leaves the box on the floor and goes
to the kitchen. She takes out her "Mr. and Mrs. John
Almot" stationery that she got for her wedding.
         Dear Playboy,
          I am writing to tell you to do a feature
          on housewives. Men forget that women do
          not lose everything just because there is
          a band on their finger. I think I still
          have it and I would like to show it to you.
          Please write me back at the return address
          on the envelope.
               Yours truly,
               Colleen Almot

She reads it over and then takes out one of the blank
sheets on the bottom of the box and rewrites the
letter. She adds, "I am enclosing a nude photo to give
you the idea," and changes the last line to "Please
contact me immediately if you are interested." She
takes the envelope downstairs and copies the address
from the first page of the September issue.

        John's mother gave them a Polaroid camera for
their first anniversary. "For instant pictures of my
grandchildren," she said. Colleen goes out to her car
to get it. John keeps it there for when they go to
races because Colleen and John don't have any kids
yet. That's what John says--"yet"--but Colleen isn't
so sure they'll ever have them. They've been trying
for two years now. John doesn't know that Colleen can
have kids for sure; she was pregnant back in the days
when he called her, "the most beautiful girl in the
world," and she gave it up, along with the boy who
made it, when John started asking her out. She thought
if she went with someone so old and sophisticated, she
wouldn't have to do that whole housewife thing. She
could be a model, they could travel the world and
leave Deep Falls forever--even leave Ohio.
        But after they'd been married a while, John
said it was time to start having little Johns and
Colleens, future race car drivers and most beautiful
girls in the world. Colleen had just started beauty
academy--three times a week up in Cleveland--and she
told him she thought she should give it a try first.
        "Okay," John said, and he went to his dresser
where they kept the bills and took out the envelope
from Fulfillment Beauty Academy, and handed it to her.
        "Okay, honey," he said. "Then you give it a
try on your own check book."
        "Why are you angry?" she asked him.
        "I'm not angry," he said, and kissed her
shoulder. "I just want you to learn responsibility. If
you want to sacrifice your job as a wife, then you
need to do it on your own. I don't go to work every
day so you can put on makeup and stop being a wife."
        "I didn't think of it that way," she said.
        John laughed. "Of course you didn't, puddin'."
He took the envelope out of her hands and put it in
his pants. He said, "Now come and get this silly old
bill," and he took her hands to make her do it.
        It was that time that something strange
happened, like she got numb inside. She couldn't feel
him, couldn't feel anything he did. She was suddenly
embarrassed that he would even look at her, her ugly,
ugly face, her tiny weak body, that he would smell her
living smell and taste her breath, but her stiffness
and her crying turned him on. "Mmm, I hurt you baby?"
he said after, rubbing her stomach until he fell
asleep.
 She will never get pregnant, even though she
never went back to F.B.A. so she could. She used to
scream and moan to fool her body into thinking it was
the real thing. Now she does it to fool John because
she knows that the problem is her. You have to be full
inside to make a baby, so she never will.
        But there is no way to stop feeling empty,
empty like the sky, white over her head as she opens
the trunk of the white Mustang John gave her for her
twenty-first birthday. Endless flat emptiness bearing
down over her head. She can feel the wind starting and
she pictures the empty sky filling up, giant swirls of
black and grey above her, her flowered blue housedress
sucking her skinny body with the wind. She leans over
her white car and pictures it like a photo, brown
tones like an old-time picture, skinny little girl
with thick long hair blowing up into the wind, long
tendrils lifted up on hot wind, the outline of her
body (leaning in a soft S-shape) so erotic with the
dress blown against her and the storm on the horizon
beyond. She imagines the photographer there under his
black sheet, his hand held high with the flash that
will bring the image of her to that Viewer. She lifts
her eyes to the black circle whose shutter eye will
open on her for just one second and she says through
her eyes that she sees you, you especially, you,
Viewer, and she feels the heavy ache in the Viewer's
chest when he turns the page and sees her, at the
moment that he turns the page to the picture of her
there with the dress blown against her and the storm
on the horizon beyond, her eyes saying I see you, I
wish you, and he cannot breathe for a moment and he
stares forever into the picture thinking "God, God,
God," at the sight of her, wishing, wishing, wishing
she were real.

        The Polaroid has a delayed timer so you can
take your own picture, but Colleen doesn't know how to
use it. She hadn't thought of that--who would take the
picture? She is down in the laundry room where she has
hung sheets from nails in the ceiling. It will be a
picture of her sitting naked on the washing machine
with the colored sheets all around and she will write
"Housewife's Harem Room" on the little white edge of
the photo. She is standing there naked in the
basement, her hair soft against her back all the way
down to the little hollow above her ass. She has given
her hair one hundred strokes from a natural boar
bristle brush. Shadow (brown, copper, silver) and
liner and mascara (black) that define, not defy, like
they said at F.B.A. before she had to leave. She has
left her cheeks pale and her lipstick is dark red--her
body will take second place to her lips and her eyes;
those are what will get them.
        Colleen can only think of one person to take
the picture who won't tell. She leaves her makeup on
and puts on the blue housedress to go next door,
leaving the letter on the front hall table, ready to
go. It's after three so Owen will be home from school.
        Owen's family lives in an old house with a big
wrap-around porch and peeling green paint. It was his
family that sold land to make the development. Colleen
knocks on the front door, which has a huge window so
she can see Owen coming down the hall from the
kitchen. He must be seventeen by now, lean like his
dad, but not stooped. He smiles when he sees her and
opens the door.
        "Hi, Colleen." His eyes dart back and forth
from her eyes to just above her shoulder. He takes a
bite from his sandwich.
        "Sorry to bother your eating."
        He shrugs. "'S'awright."
        "Listen, I gotta ask you a favor. Could you
take a picture of me?"
        He nods and flips his blond hair away from his
eyes.
 "But you can't tell anyone about it because
it's a surprise for John."
        His mouth is full of sandwich. "'Kay. Now?"
        They walk together across the porch, down the
stairs, across the grass to her house. The wind blows
her dress against her back, and she feels air rushing
up from under the hem to tickle her stomach. Owen
takes quick bites from the sandwich so he can finish
it by the time they reach her front stoop. She turns
to him at the door.
        "It's gonna be in the basement--it's all set
up kinda weird, but it's sort of a private joke
between me and John. I don't want you to think we're
nuts or anything. It's just this joke we have."
        In the basement, Owen wipes his hands on his
jeans before he takes the camera in his hands.
        "It's alright," Colleen tells him. "It's been
tumbling around in the trunk of my car so I don't
think you could break it if you tried."
        Owen lifts the camera and looks through it at
the ceiling, the whole left side of his face squinting
his eye. "I love your car."
        "It's nice," says Colleen. "I'm gonna take off
my dress, okay?"
        Owen looks down fast at her and then faster
away, back into the camera at the ceiling. "No
problem," he says loudly.
        She pulls her dress off over her head and lays
it down on the floor. "I wanna sit on the laundry
machine, I guess," she says. She stands with her back
to the laundry machine. "Do you think that would be
good?"
 Owen is still looking through the camera at
the ceiling. "Yeah," he says. "Yeah, I think that
would be cool."
        She lays her hands on the machine to hoist
herself up to sitting. "Oooh, that's cold."
        "Colleen," says Owen.
        "I guess I should sit sorta sideways and like
lean back. Can you see the sheets?"
        Owen moves the camera from the ceiling to her
without taking it away from his face. "Yes."
        She twists her legs sideways and arches her
back, one hand on her ass, one on her right thigh,
twisting her shoulders in opposition to her legs,
leaning her head back until she can feel her hair
brush her leg. She lifts her eyes to that shutter eye,
opens her mouth just slightly.
        "Don't snap it yet," she says. Owen doesn't
move, steadying the camera against his face.
        "I see you," she says. "I wish you." Her
nipples harden.
        "God," Owen breathes.
        Colleen clenches her teeth and opens her lips.
Owen clicks the shutter.

        Colleen picks at her big toe while Owen stares
at his watch.
        "D'ja say two minutes?" says Owen without
looking up.
        "Yeah--but let's wait two and a half to make
sure it really looks good."
        "Seemed good." Owen is still staring at his
watch, and the photo in his other hand is shaking.
"'Kay--that's two and a half."
        Colleen's stomach flips over. "You look. I'm
afraid."
 His fingers are pressed together on the
edge over the little yellow triangles. "I don't know
nothing about photos, Colleen," he says slowly and
raises the photo to her without looking up.
        "Why are you shaking, Owen? You cold?" She
takes the photo. "God, I'm so nervous over some dumb
picture." She peels back the covering--the image
shines wet and she blows on it as she looks. It seems
bluer than real life, the sheets dark and mysterious.
Her hair almost blends into the darkness. Her body is
blue white like a ghost. Her lips are blood red, her
eyes the darkest points in the picture. It hurts her
inside her chest to look at it, like it's part of her
deep inside that she doesn't know--a her that she
doesn't know. The erotic blue ghost of an ancestor, an
image from a dream captured. She holds it out to Owen.
"Whatcha think?"
        Owen takes the picture quickly. After a second
he says, "I never thought a picture could look like
more than what real life looks like."
        "That's neat, Owen. That's a neat thing to
say." Colleen jumps off the washer and takes her dress
from the floor. "I'm gonna call it, `Housewife's Harem
Room.'"
 At the door, she puts the photo into the
envelope, and Owen thanks her.
        She laughs. "Owen, it's me that thanks you."
        "Oh. Yeah."
        "Now you go do your homework and eat your
sandwiches." She stands on the front stoop to watch
him walk slowly across the grass, looking down at his
feet. It will surely start raining soon. What it would
be like to have a son?
        Halfway across her lawn, he turns. "You know,
Colleen, that's not all I do."
        "What, Owen?" she yells.
        "Homework and eat sandwiches," he yells back.
"That's not all I do."
        Colleen leans against the screen door. He
faces her from across the yard. The wind blows his
hair up in ridiculous spikes that rise and fall with
the gusts. She doesn't know what to say, so they just
stand there for a moment looking at each other.
        "I know," she shouts suddenly. "And I am not
the most beautiful girl in the world anymore." She
whips around and back into the house, screen door
slamming behind her.
        Owen doesn't move. He feels the wind lifting
his hair, and he hears the growing of the grass scream
in his ears. He whispers, "Yes, you are."

        Colleen runs from the front door to her
bedroom and as she runs she pulls off her housedress
and when she gets to her bedroom she rolls the closet
door so hard sideways that it slides off the bottom
runner, leaning against the top rail like a drunk. She
pulls out all her housedresses, all five of them, and
throws them on a heap with her blue one. She does not
want to get dressed, to stop feeling her body defined
by the air on her skin, she hasn't been able to feel
her body, but then she remembers an outfit she used to
wear before she was married. She never got rid of it,
even though she couldn't wear it in front of John.
It's up on the top of the closet--black leggings and a
black V-neck top with silver dots all along the V. She
puts this on and she puts on her black high heels and
more lipstick and she grabs the pile of dresses and
the letter from the front table and she runs out the
door without even looking in the mirror. Owen is still
standing there on the grass and she looks at him as
she runs down to the car.
        "I have to go to the A&P," she screams,
throwing the car door open and jumping in. He watches
her ripping her purse apart until she finds her keys.
The car bellows and coughs and roars off screeching
and stops just past his house. She leans out the
window to look back at him.
        "Owen--I'm sorry I hurt your feelings, Owen."
        Owen doesn't move. "Where you goin', Colleen?"
        "I don't know," she says, and he takes off,
racing for the car. "I'm gonna come, I'm coming," he
says, throwing open the door just like she did,
sliding in beside her--not too close--checking to see
if she fastened her seatbelt (she had) before
fastening his.
        They have gone down Elm Road to Sunnyvale
(where Colleen drops the letter with the photo into
the mailbox and the dresses into the dumpster behind
the Dairy Mart) and up the hill around the cemetery,
down into the little valley that marks the end of
their development and the beginning of farms again.
Colleen doesn't say anything so Owen just watches her.
She is so mature and so sophisticated, such a fancy
lady with her sexy black outfit and made-up eyes. She
seems to know so well how to be in a car, the way she
switches on the radio and finds just what station she
wants without ever turning her eyes from the road and
the mirror, accelerating fluidly as she bellows out
the chorus--"Who could hang a name on you"--and with
an absent touch of her index finger, the roof of the
car groans and folds back and the two of them are open
to the sky where angry black clouds gather.
        He is afraid to speak. He won't speak, not for
anything. "Goodbye, Juicy Tuesday," Colleen sings into
the wind, and Owen sits back (he'd been leaning
forward, shoulders tightly hunched, watching Colleen
sideways) and lets the cool sweetness of her voice
settle over him. There is Colleen's voice and there is
the cool wind rushing on them to blow the heat off his
skin, his red, red face. He turns to the fields of
corn and soybean that rear up into hills up and down
across as far as he can see or imagine and thinks of
sitting in the bath when he was a boy with a fever so
high his mother had to call the doctor. The bath was
filled just a few inches with cold water and alcohol;
he could feel the line of water trace a horizontal
line from his thigh down to his knees and there the
water covered his whole calf down to his feet where
the line crossed above his arches, below his toes. His
body pulsed heat into the water. There was his
mother's hand, cool and wet, on his shoulder, and in
her other hand, a cool cool cloth that she squeezed
over him. Cool rain on his back. Magic rain that
pulled the heat out of him in a steady wave, drawing
the pulsing beats of heat into a slow wave out into
the air.
(continued as next chapter)