October 31, 2012

The Costume Party

     I was 24.
     Bob dressed me, his long arms forming a thousand slender, firm bridges between us, his forehead wrinkled in concentration. I concealed my inhalations of his scented breath, the hibiscus oil of his shoulders and chest. (I concealed everything.)
     I was at last a mannequin, starved down and petite in my pale yellow Sahara Club polo shirt and jeans like powder blue leggings—and I collected and memorized every stare, every approving, longing glance as I walked in the city.
     The first outfit—whatever it was—had to be scrapped. Ruth insisted the skirt was an important item in her wardrobe. Her jaw became more set as I was transformed. Bob's decoration of me was for Ruth the gold leafing of an annoying, inferior object recently being paraded into their apartment.