The Story Until Now: A Great Big Book of Stories Page 34

  I know I am the center of all eyes standing up here, I am the envy of millions, and I love the way the silver gown feels, slithering down over me like so much baby oil. I even love the weight of the twenty-foot-long red, white and blue velvet cloak, and every once in a while I want to reach up and touch the rhinestone stars and lightning bolts in my tiara but of course I can’t because I am still holding the American eagle floral piece, the emblem of everything I have ever wanted. Of course you girls envy me. I used to get a stomachache just from looking at the pageant on TV. I would look at the winner smiling out over the Great Seal and I would think: Die, and let it be me. I just want you girls to know it hasn’t all been bread and roses, there have been sacrifices, and Mom and Mr. Omerta had to work very hard, so if you’re out there watching and thinking: What did she do to deserve that? let me tell you, the answer is, Plenty.

  The thing is, without Mr. Omerta, poor Mom and I wouldn’t have known where to begin. Before Mr. Omerta we were just rookies in the ballgame of life; we didn’t have a prayer. There we were at the locals in the Miss Tiny Miss contest, me in my pink tutu and the little sequined tiara, I even had a wand; it was my first outing and I came in with a fourth runner-up. If it had been up to me I would have turned in my wand right then and there. Maybe Mom would have given up too, if it hadn’t been for Mr. Omerta, but there must have been something about me, star quality, because he picked me out of all those other little girls, me. He didn’t even give the winner a second look, he just came over to us in his elegant kidskin suit and the metallic shoes. We didn’t know it then but it was Mr. Manuel Omerta, and he was going to change my life.

  I was a loser, I must have looked a mess; the winner and the first runner-up were over on the platform crying for the camera and pinching each other in between lovey-dovey hugs, it was all over for the day, Mom and I were hanging up our cleats and packing away our uniforms when Mr. Omerta licked Mom’s ear and said, “You two did a lot of things wrong today, but I want to tell you I like your style.” I said, Oh thank you, and went on crying but Mom, she shushed me and hissed at me to listen up. She knew what she was doing too; she wasn’t just going to say, Oh, thank you, and take the whole thing sitting down. She said, “What do you mean, a few things wrong?” and Mr. Omerta said, “Listen, I can give you a few pointers. Come over here.” I couldn’t hear what he said to her but she kept nodding and looking over at me and by the time I went over to tell them they were closing the armory and we had better get out, they were winding up the agreement; Mr. Omerta said, “And I’ll only take fifty percent.”

  “Don’t you fifty percent me,” Mom said. “You know she’s got the goods or you never would have picked her.”

  “All right,” he said, “forty-five percent.”

  Mom said, “She has naturally curly hair.”

  “You’re trying to ruin me.”

  First Mr. Omerta pretended to walk out on Mom and then Mom pretended to take me away and they finally settled it; he would become my personal representative, success guaranteed, and he would take forty-two point eight percent off the top.

  “The first thing,” he said. “Tap dancing is a lousy talent. No big winner has ever made it on tap dancing alone. You have to throw in a gimmick, like pantomime. Something really different.”

  “Sword swallowing,” Mom said in a flash.

  “Keep coming, I really like your style.” They bashed it back and forth for another few minutes. “Another thing,” Mr. Omerta said. “We’ve got to fix those teeth; they look kind of, I don’t know, foreign.”

  Mom said, “Got it Mr. Omerta, I think we’re going to make a winning team.”

  It turned out Mr. Omerta was more or less between things and besides, to do a good job he was going to have to be on the spot, so he ended up coming home with us. Dad was a little surprised at first but he got used to it, or at least he acted like he was used to it; he only yelled first thing in the morning, while Sal and I were still hiding in our beds and Mr. Omerta was still out on the sun porch with the pillow over his head, stacking Zs. We fixed the sun porch up for Mr. Omerta; the only inconvenience was when you wanted to watch TV you had to go in and sit on the end of the Hide-a-Bed and sometimes it made him mad and other times it didn’t; you were in trouble either way. Sal used to hit him on the knuckles with her leg brace; she said if you just kept smacking him he would get the idea and quit. He didn’t bother me much. I was five at the time, and later on I was, you know, the Property; in the end I was going to be up against the Virginity Test and even when you passed that they did a lot of close checking to be sure you hadn’t been fooling around. If you are going to represent this Wonderful Land of Ours, you have to be a model for all American womanhood, I mean, you wouldn’t put pasties on Columbia the Gem of the Ocean or photograph the Statue of Liberty without her concrete robe, which is why I am so grateful to Mr. Omerta for busting in on Stanley and me in Elkton, Maryland, even if we were legally married by a justice of the peace. We could have taken care of the married part, but there was the other thing; it isn’t widely known but if you flunk the Test in the semifinals you are tied to the Great Seal in front of everybody and all the other contestants get to cast the first stone.

  I cried but Mr. Omerta said not to be foolish, I was only engaging in the classic search for daddy anyway, just like in all the books. I suppose he was right, except that by the time Stanley and I ran away together Daddy had been gone for ten years. We were sitting around one night when I was eight. I had just won the state Miss Subteen title and Mr. Omerta and Mom were clashing glasses; before he put the prize check less his percentage into my campaign fund, Mr. Omerta had lost his head and bought us a couple of bottles of pink champagne. Then Daddy got fed up or something, he threw down his glass and stood up, yelling, “You’re turning my daughter into a Kewpie doll.” Sally started giggling and Mom slapped her and let my father have it all in one fluid motion. She said, “Henry, it’s the patriotic thing to do.” He said, “I don’t see what that has to do with anything, and besides …”

  I got terribly quiet. Mom and Mr. Omerta were both leaning forward, saying, “Besides?”

  I tried to shut him up but it was too late.

  “Besides, what’s so wonderful about a country that lets this kind of thing go on?”

  “Oh, Daddy,” I cried, but it was already too late. Mr. Omerta was already on the hot line to the House Un-American Activities Committee Patrol Headquarters; he didn’t even hear Daddy yelling that the whole thing was a gimmick to help sell the war. By that time we could hear sirens. Daddy crashed through the back window and landed in the flower bed and that was the last anybody ever saw of him.

  Well, we do have to go and visit the troops a lot and we do lead those victory rallies as part of our public appearance tour in behalf of the product, but it’s not anything like Daddy said. I mean, any girl would do as much, and if you happen to be named Miss Wonderful Land of Ours, it’s an honor and a privilege. I keep dreaming that when I start my nationwide personal appearance tour I will find Daddy standing in the audience in Detroit or Nebraska, he will be carrying a huge up AMERICA sign and I can take him to my bosom and forgive him and he’ll come back home to live.

  Now that I think about it, Stanley does look a little bit like Daddy, and maybe that’s why I was attracted to him. I mean, it’s no fun growing up in a household where there are no men around, unless, of course, you want to count Mr. Omerta, who did keep saying he wanted to be a father to me, but that wasn’t exactly what he meant. I was allowed to go to public high school so I could be a cheerleader because that can make or break you if you’re going for Miss Teen-Age Wonderful Land of Ours, which of course is only a way station, but it’s a lot of good personal experience. As it turned out I only got to the state finals. I could have gone to the nationals as an alternate but Mr. Omerta said it would be bad exposure and besides, we made enough out of the state contest to see us through until it was time for the main event. Anyway, Stanley was captain of the football team t
he year I made head cheerleader, and at first Mr. Omerta encouraged us because he could take pictures of us sitting in the local soda fountain, one soda and two straws, or me handing a big armful of goldenrod to Stanley after the big game.

  The thing I liked about Stanley, he wasn’t interested in One Thing Only, he really loved me for my soul. When I came in after a date Mr. Omerta would sneak upstairs and sit on the end of my bed in his bathrobe while I told him all about it: you would have thought we were college roommates after the junior prom. Stanley loved me so much I know he would have waited but I decided there were more important things than being Miss Wonderful Land of Ours so the night of graduation we ran off to Elkton, Maryland, and if Mr. Omerta had gotten there five minutes later it would have been too late.

  Whatever you might think about what he did to Stanley, you’ve got to give him credit for doing his job. He was my personal representative, he got me through the Miss Preteen and the Miss Adolescent with flying colors, and saw me through Miss Teen-Age Wonderful Land of Ours; he got me named Miss Our Town and it was all only a matter of time, I was a cinch for Miss State, and once I got to the nationals, well, with my talent gig, I was a natural, but here I was in Elkton, Maryland, I was just about to throw it all away for a pot of marriage when Mr. Omerta came crashing in and saved the day. What happened was, I was just melting into Stanley’s arms when the door banged open and there were about a hundred people in the room, Mr. Omerta in the vanguard. I could have killed him then and there and he knew it. He took me by the shoulders and he looked me in the eye and said, “Brace up, baby, you owe it to your country. I will not let you smirch yourself before the pageant. Death before dishonor,” Mr. Omerta said, and then he yelled, “There he is, grab him,” and they dragged poor Stanley away. I’ll never know how he managed to tail us, but he had the propaganda squad with him and before I could do a thing they had poor Stanley arrested on charges of menacing a national monument, they threw in a couple of perversion charges so Mr. Omerta could push through the annulment, and now poor Stanley is on ice until the end of next year. By that time my tour as Miss Wonderful Land of Ours will be over and maybe Mr. Omerta will let bygones be bygones and clear Stanley’s name so he and I can get married again; after all, that’s the only way I will ever be eligible to become Mrs. Wonderful Land of Ours, and you can’t let yourself slip into retirement just because you’ve already been to the top.

  But I haven’t told you anything about my talent. I mean, it’s possible to take lessons in Frankness and Sincerity, but talent is the one thing you can’t fake. Mr. Omerta told us right off that tap dancing alone just wouldn’t make it, but every time I tried sword swallowing (Mom’s idea) I gagged and had to stop, but the trouble with fire eating was that the first time I burned my face, so naturally after that they couldn’t even get me to try tapping and twirling the flaming baton. We thought about pantomime but of course that would rule out personal charm and just then Mr. Omerta had an inspiration; he got me an accordion. So I went into the Miss Tiny Miss contest the next year tapping and playing the accordion, but there was a girl who sang patriotic songs and tapped the V for Victory in Morse code, and that gave Mr. Omerta an even better idea.

  To make a long story short, when I got up here tonight to do my talent for the last time, it was a routine we have been working on for years, and I owe it all to Mr. Omerta, with an extra little bow for Mom, whose idea it was to dress me in the Betsy Ross costume with the cutouts and the skirt ripped off at the crotch, our tattered forefathers and all that, and if you all enjoyed my interpretation of “O Beautiful, for Spacious Skies” done in song and dance and pantomime with interludes on the accordion, I want to say a humble thank you, thank you one and all.

  I guess not many of you wonderful people know how close I came to not making it. First there was that terrible moment in the semifinals when we went back to find that my entire pageant wardrobe had been stolen, but I want you to know that Miss Massachusetts has been apprehended and they made her give me her wardrobe because between the ripping and the ink she had more or less ruined mine, and I have begged them to go easy on her because we are all working under such a terrible strain. And then there was the thing where they wouldn’t let my mom into the rehearsals but they settled that very nicely and she is watching right now from her very own private room in the hospital and they will let her come home as soon as she is able to relate. Thanks for everything, Mom, and as soon as we get off TV I’m coming over and give you a great big kiss even if you don’t know it’s me. Then there’s the thing about Mr. Omerta, and I feel just terrible, but it had to be done. I mean, he just snapped last night, he got past all the chaperones and came up to my hotel room. I said, “Oh, Mr. Omerta, you shouldn’t be here, I could be disqualified,” and the next thing I knew he had thrown himself down on my feet. He said, “Vonnie, I love you, I adore you.” It was disgusting. He said, “Throw it all over and run away with me.” Well, there I was not twenty-four hours from the big title; it was terrible. I said, “Oh, come on, Mr. Omerta, don’t start that now, not after what you did to Stanley,” and when he wouldn’t stop kissing my ankles I kicked him a couple of times and said, “Come on, all you’ve ever thought about is money, money,” and when he said there were more important things than money I started screaming, “Help me, somebody come and help me, this man is making an indecent advance,” and the matrons came like lightning and carried him off to jail. Well, what did he expect? He’s spent the last thirteen years training me for this day.

  So when the big moment came tonight I was the one with the perfect figure, the perfect walk, the perfect talent, I wowed them in the charm department and … I don’t know, there has just been this guy up here, the All-American Master of Ceremonies; you thought he was kissing my cheek and handing me another bouquet but instead he was whispering in my ear, “ok, sweetie, enough’s enough.” There seems to be something wrong; it turns out I am not reaching you wonderful people out there, my subjects. You can see my lips moving but that’s not me you hear on the PA system, it’s a prerecorded speech. He says … he says I’m perfect in almost every respect but there’s this one thing wrong, they found out too late so they’re going to have to go through with it. I guess they found out when I got up here and tried to make this speech. I am a weeny bit too frank to be a typical Miss Wonderful Land of Ours, he says I have too many regrets, but just as soon as I get down from here and they run the last commercial, they’re going to take care of that. He says I’ll be ready to begin my nationwide personal appearance tour in behalf of the product just as soon as they finish the lobotomy.

  —Bad Moon Rising, Thomas M. Disch ed., 1973

  Songs of War

  For some weeks now a fire had burned day and night on a hillside just beyond the town limits; standing at her kitchen sink, Sally Hall could see the smoke rising over the trees. It curled upward in promise but she could not be sure what it promised, and despite the fact that she was contented with her work and her family, Sally found herself stirred by the bright autumn air, the smoke emblem.

  Nobody seemed to want to talk much about the fire, or what it meant. Her husband, Zack, passed it off with a shrug, saying it was probably just another commune. June Goodall, her neighbor, said it was coming from Ellen Ferguson’s place; she owned the land and it was her business what she did with it. Sally said what if she had been taken prisoner. Vic Goodall said not to be ridiculous, if Ellen Ferguson wanted those people off her place, all she had to do was call the police and get them off, and in the meantime it was nobody’s business.

  Still there was something commanding about the presence of the fire; the smoke rose steadily and could be seen for miles, and Sally, working at her drawing board, and a number of other women, going about their daily business, found themselves yearning after the smoke column with complex feelings. Some may have been recalling a primal past in which men conked large animals and dragged them into camp, and the only housework involved was a little gutting before they roasted the bloody
chunks over the fire. The grease used to sink into the dirt and afterward the diners, smeared with blood and fat, would roll around in a happy tangle. Other women were stirred by all the adventure tales they had stored up from childhood; people would run away without even bothering to pack or leave a note, they always found food one way or another and they met new friends in the woods. Together they would tell stories over a campfire, and when they had eaten they would walk away from the bones to some high excitement that had nothing to do with the business of living from day to day. A few women, thinking of Castro and his happy guerrilla band, in the carefree, glamorous days before he came to power, were closer to the truth. Thinking wistfully of campfire camaraderie, of everybody marching together in a common cause, they were already dreaming of revolution.

  Despite the haircut and the cheap suit supplied by the Acme Vacuum Cleaner company, Andy Ellis was an underachiever college dropout who could care less about vacuum cleaners. Until this week he had been a beautiful, carefree kid and now, with a dying mother to support, with the wraiths of unpaid bills and unsold MarvelVacs trailing behind him like Marley’s chains, he was still beautiful, which is why the women opened their doors to him.

  He was supposed to say, “Good morning, I’m from the Acme Vacuum Cleaner company and I’m here to clean your living room, no obligation, absolutely free of charge.” Then, with the room clean and the Marvelsweep attachment with twenty others and ten optional features spread all over the rug, he was supposed to make his pitch.

  The first woman he called on said he did good work but her husband would have to decide, so Andy sighed and began collecting the Flutesnoot, the Miracle Whoosher and all the other attachments and putting them back into the patented Bomb Bay Door.

  “Well thanks anyway …”

  “Oh, thank you,” she said. He was astounded to discover that she was unbuttoning him here and there.