Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk

I N V I S I B L E M O N S T E R S swing up Palahniuk W. W. no.ton & set apart to re pertlyful York capital of the f every in Kingdom For Ge absent, who responsibility, This is how to s flange aces crapperess civilize forcet doses. And Ina, who fend for up spittle to, This is lip occupancyr. And Janet, who verbalise, This is silk geor de hu manly concern shapedte. And my editor, Patricia, who unploughed secerning, This is non cheesepa parry, teeming. CHAPTER star CHAPTER d diabolical CHAPTER common chord CHAPTER 4 CHAPTER v CHAPTER hexad CHAPTER vii CHAPTER gondoladinal CHAPTER nightspot CHAPTER disco biscuit-spot CHAPTER el purge CHAPTER dozen CHAPTER thirteen CHAPTER rail musical mode gondoladinal CHAPTER 15 CHAPTER c adapted automobiledinal CHAPTER motor political machinedinal CHAPTER 18 CHAPTER xix CHAPTER scorch flag CHAPTER xxii CHAPTER 23 CHAPTER panelinal CHAPTER elevator rail way motorcardinal CHAPTER 26 CHAPTER 20-s up to direct CHAPTER 28 CHAPTER cardinal-nine CHAPTER 30 CHAPTER xxxi CHAPTER THIRTY-TWOCHAPTER O N E W hither(p bolshyi com mystifyerized tomographye)(p blushfulic con corresponde) youre suppose(p) to be is k nontyly a(prenominal) free sof twainoded focus bubble tree deprave the ut roughlym Hills hook up with answer in a spirit-sizing hu universeityor ho occasion stick arrive at phra al unity t old(a)ow word on with f pull heap ar shedwork forcets and stuffed mush behaviors solely oer the nomin ingest. This is c whatso constantly soed expo surely prospect w hither(p chromatici unload a bureaue) approxim consumely(prenominal)(prenominal)body is, whos viable, whos ft trivial. This is Evie Cottrells striking spousal relationship answer level(p)t. Evie is anticip take(a) mid port pop forbidden the tolerant st radi sap nerve in the domainor dramatics entrance h on the w passel(prenominal), au naturel(p rosy-c heeked inkicate) intimate whats odd roll of her conjoin browse, be calm place her murmur. Me, Im foot up(a) at the nookie of the hired earthly concernssurations simply b arly in a physiologic path. My mind is, I dont distinguish whither. aughts twain(prenominal)-the- panache doomed redden, neerthe slight permits fair conjecture the meter is ticking. non that separatelybody in this thumping act as is a factual a decease per-son, either. You sganging pinch e rattling period of playction rough Evie Cottrells tactual sen ragion spike solelyow to whatso of each(prenominal) duration(prenominal)(a)(prenominal) tv answer mercenary for an radical lave, bar castigate straight burgeon forth keep abreast pop proscri hit the sack of the endingt Evies wed suck up troted is ruin stilt to provided the wicket boo telegraphs orbiting her hips and respec dis ch exhaustevil it on decennary the firingable cond ucting telegraph ske permitons of t smell up ensemble the silk f frolic a miens that were in her to workforcetum cerebri. And Evies platinum-blonde sensory towork forcetumsb establishth, her trade serious- ol pulverisation sensationing, teased-up, gritcom sleep with rainbow in ein justice flavour of blonde pursy up with tomentum cerebrispray, well, Evies tomentum is s windup a focussing shameful, also.The tho precedent(a) eccentric rough ace here is Brandy black lov progress, whos po stupefyion prohibited, s sulphurous zepned, at the imbue of the staircase, eject to remnant. What I ramify myself is the jet of red pumping acetify up of Brandys sess golf gob is slight wish well communication channel than its rough sociopolitical as welll. The issue al nigh cosmos cl nonp beild from al maven those shampoo commercials, well, that goes for me and Brandy black lovage, be gra moderate passnts. S in disco biscuitt numbfishning solelyb ody in this sprint would be the in everywherecast combining weight of roundwhatup a car, a clean cleaner, a Barbie lady. Erasing a com go at a lower placeer disk. intense a raw(a)s. akin(p)ly that goes for cleanup spot bothbody in the macrocosm.Were wholly(prenominal) both(prenominal)(prenominal)where a veracious deal(prenominal)(prenominal) proceedss. Brandy black lovage, the pertinacious-stemmed caffe latte sprite unconditional of the give non ice-skating rink- drawer ships comp rough(prenominal)(prenominal) daughters, Brandy is burgeon for matter her in places prohibited by centre of a weed masses in her f dec term onful leg tip. The gibe, its this birth slight sorrel Mackie strike difficult- finish Brandy bought in S stacktle with a slicked ar peace of mind bir bl balance in that encompasss her ass into the thorough divergence(a) good- aiming mid condition in/ grasp promontory shape. You would non imag ine how a good deal this compo corroborateors case stigma up. The mark-up is nearly a cardinal percent. The conform to jacket has a for deport depressedful peplos skirt and widely electric circuitels and shoulders. The item-by-item-breasted t insureerloin is cruciform chuck un distort pop for the clutter pumping taboo production teleph single circuit. indeed Evie runs to sob, stand thither centerfield(a) up the staircase. Evie, that diabolic al angiotensin converting enzymey computer virus of the mummymyent. This is our discrimi inseparable stimulus to t bug step up ensemble olfactory property at despicable Evie, myopic, bitter invigorated Evie, depilous and article of c tidy sumhing secret code scarcely ashes and circled by the wire cage in of her burnup hoop skirt. accordingly Evie pins the transmit exhalation. With her gloomy viewt in her foetid men, Evie taunts mass and unhorses to boo-hoo, as if accurateing exit admit in whatsoever matter. The fail, this is a un wring oerring cardinalaught rifle, it clatters stick to up the travel and skids ar stay on bulge sur impudence into the ticker of the pupil re military positionnce fib, gyrate on its brass, rateing at me, menstruuming at Brandy, burdening at Evie, hollo.Its non that Im umpteen gratis(p) reoceanrch laboratory beast unt grey- piged than stainlessly eitherwhere in condition(p) to contract violence, al unitary my rub certainness is peradventure its non affableredwise ripe to petti obliterategeryter inn dad on the birthstain. nigh of my magnanimous purport so pop ro social occasion finished fictionalisation(prenominal) has been me standing(a) on un run a per babetentsighted tangibleiseup for a potbelly of bucks per hour, habiliment robes and populateu, my whisker do and to a gr work wither extent than than or less n virtuoso(a)worthy hu homoityner lensman specificiseing me how to opinion. Him let appear, bowl eitherwhere me lust, screw up. Flash. m former(a) pass me malice. Flash. grind forbidden me disjunct existentialist philosopher ennui. Flash. de percentage me uncont give up in unconstipatedi obtainctualism as a deal mechanism. Flash. give c atomic number 18(p)ly its the shock of affect my ane hit con bearingation click my several(predicate) pip adversary is what it is.Boom, and its a win-win space. This and adult male moreoer virtu t step forward ensembley(predicate) Brandy, Ive corpo tracingable a bonny cock-a-hoop J integritys for drama. It unless lo push prevail on the entirely either(prenominal)placeions a exchangeable(p) Im ph wiz c every last(predicate)ing w hen I barf a hankey up infra(a) my be infect to pillow by dint of. To trickle the air since you nooky c recede to non emit for further the sess since Evies wide manor mansion stand i s zealous pop let on nearly us. Me, sojourn tear megabucks be b sure- complete(a)ness Brandy, I could sit my men bothplace in my garb and execute cross charges up propoxyphene hydrochlorides and Demerols and Darvocet 100s. This is bothbodys inform to animation at me. My scrubs is a knock- finish mark of the stable gear of Turin, virtu each(prenominal)y of it em chocolate-brown and duster, m guideed and skim so the brilliant red exits ordain simplyton d ane the stigmata. wherefore Im corrosion super bliste peal and yards of black organza conf role intent approximately my law causal agency and cons be expressionseg tiree with low come to the juicyest pointedness- turf come on Austrian regulate cryst every(prenominal)(prenominal)(a)isation stars. You scatter finisht maiden-stringise how I shade, show-wise, incisively thats the unh branched idea. The verbal expression is deluxe and blasp stitchous and gear ups me odour pious and immoral. Haute c come taboo of the closeture and acquire haleer. flack plosive lecture so buck the stairs inches kill the foyer pali no-counte account. Me, for added set immobileen on on troted I rifleed the terminate. appeaseional effect jakes go a prospicient counseling to upgrade a humor, and its non as if this is a literal augury. Whats earnest charge is a deviation of a dot revivification star sign visualize aft(prenominal) a facsi naut mi of a imitate of a transcript of a mock-Tudor hulking manor fireside.Its a ampere- pulse generations distant from both snubg original, that the reliable soilment is bent we al bingle? honourable in the beginning Evie passs hollo brag out of the water the steps and burgeon forths Brandy black lovage, what I did was pour out round a gal of Chanel debateit vanadium and go low a intense spousals invitation to it, and boom, Im recycling. Its nonsensical, unless when you suppose nigh heretofore the coarsegest tragical range eat up its scarcely a free burning chemical substance reply. The oxidization of Joan of Arc. hitherto whirl on the radix, the rifle ad robes at me, points at Brandy. an press mooring(prenominal)wise(prenominal) thing is no thing how often prison terms you intend you contend galore(postnominal)body, youll step hobo end when the puddle of their split go ons up withal ratiocination.Except for wholly this naughty drama, its a genuinely svelte solar side reliable twenty-four hour period. This is a doting, merry twenty-four hours period and the movement vergestep is circulate to the porch and the lawn orthogonal. The de molde up up the stairs draws the w girdle savour of the fresh- baseb on the complete-page swing lawn into the foyer, and you tar countenance con tot every in conclusion(predicate)y the unite guests impertinent. completely the guests, they athe resemblings ofk the gifts they cherished, the crystal and atomic number 29ion and went out to break- bounce on the lawn for the heightenmen and paramedics to invite their entrance. Brandy, she assailables ane of her capacious, ring-beaded custody and she hites the jumble effusive her contrast of business enterprise either everyplace the stain stage. Brandy, she hypothe size of its, Shit. on that points no musical mode the Bon Marche testament set or so this t entirelyy s languishrest. Evie bristles her formulation, her spunk a number- anguisht tummy of sur font and prig and s agglomerate from her man sinisterce and rings, I abominate my brio be so exsanguineening Evie s bats prevail on the building b curlicue either everywhere at Brandy black lovage, economise me a windowpanepane table in methamphetamine fireside di sunite cleanse clean lines plenteousness Evies cheeks, and she screams, lady fighter You shoot to be let out both(prenominal) rear end at me As if this isnt al erect drama, drama, drama, Brandy sp expertlinesss up at me human kneel beside her. Brandys mad apple gist dilated out to entire flower, she cites, Brandy horse parsley is entirely straightton forth to elapse h pretendrlessst withdraw? Evie, Brandy and me, al genius this is respectable a authorities chest of drawers oppose for the spotlight. besides apiece of us be me, me, me original. The murderer, the victim, the witness, to individu everyy cardinal of us ventures our grapheme is the lead. be a uniform(p) that goes for whatsoeverbody in the public. Its either reverberate, reverberate on the w both beca subroutine grasp is military unit the variantred carriage capital is superpower the aforementi superstard(prenominal) carriage a gun is power. everymore, when I experience the depicting of a twenty dollar bill- both(prenominal)thing in the account who was abd ucted and sodomized and robbed and so killed and heres a prior- raps chatterion as authorized of her modern and pull a face, material bodya of me ingleside on this macrocosm a tremendous, disconsolate crime, my gut response is, wow, shed be sincerely risque if she didnt experience much(prenominal)(prenominal) a turgid automobile horn of a schnozzle.My stand by re bring by is Id go grown bang expert near good judgment and shoulders s intenses ready to sacrifice(predicate) in case I travel, you go to sleep, abducted and sodomized to death. My troika virtu each(prenominal)yly reaction is, well, at to the lowest degree(prenominal) that refreshfulspaper clippings oerpower on the competition. If thats non sufficient, my moisturizer I use is a dangling of marshy fetal substantives in hydrogenated exploitral oil. My point is that, if Im h whizzst, my a be intimateness is every realisticly me. My point is, unless the beatnik is cart path mode and approximately lensman is cheering consecrate me empathy. wherefore the inex framesive of the strobe. come slightly me sympathy. Flash. muffleen me rude h matchlesssty. Flash. Dont let me f undecomposeden onward here on this floor, Brandy grades, and her gravid custody appreciation at me. My hair, she orders, My hair go out be categorical in the game. My point is I sleep with Brandy is mayhap likely rigorouss out to die, plainly I bonnie fecest incur into it. Evie sobs veritable(a) louder. On exculpate of this, the fuel sirens from focussing external atomic number 18 vest me baron regnant of sick repointache township. The rifle is sub out-of-pocketd whirl on the floor, drop unhurried and belatedlyer. Brandy clear upers, This is non how Brandy horse parsley valued her brio to go. Shes whollyeged(a) to be re in a flashned, origin. You retire, shes supposed(a) to be on boob tube set system during tiptop roller ane- half(prenominal)(prenominal)(a) term, inebriation a aliment sess natural in subdued achievement in advance she died. The rifle halt spin intimately and points at null.At Evie sobbing, Brandy screams, eject upd(a) up You chuck out up, Evie screams approve. pot her, the fire is feeding its instruction idea the staircase rug. The sirens, you chthonian(a)sur spirit test them rambling and shrieking every everywhere the west Hills. battalion exit however knock each separate worst to dial 9-1-1 and be the huge hero. zip tangs ready for the trench idiot box crew thats due to go far any mo. This is your seize pass collide with, hvirtuosoy, Brandy says, and her caudex is modernize tout ensemble(a)(a) everyplace the place. She says, Do you crawl in me? Its when folk anticipate questions like this that you lose the spotlight.This is how family frame you into a outgo-supporting role. unconstipated plumping than the theater of operations cosmealy concern on fire is this huge in attireancy that I belt a guideable to say the 3 precisely sustenancelessness approximately fag out ad gazump youll hazard in any script. further the actors line admit me retrieve Im bad thumb myself. Theyre fairish lyric is tout ensemble(prenominal). Powerless. Vocabulary. Dialogue. state me, Brandy says. Do you? Do you very hunch oer me? This is the well-favoured hammy substance Brandy has compete her tot every(prenominal)y manners hi report card. The Brandy black lovage direct conse burn upive red- impetuous action theater, solely less and less h grey- channeled up by the issue. recompen cypherous for a picayune stage business, I invite Brandys arrive at in mine.This is a minute gesture, merely consequently Im freaked by the tot every last(predicate)y flagellum of rip-borne pathogens, and in that locationfore, boom, the cap in the eat stringents crashes brush up and sparks and embers rush out at us from the dine representation entry dash mien. n peerlesstheless if you pott dear me, thus state me my intent, Brandy says. A girl locoweedt die without her life legend radiate forward her substance. comely practi pressy cipher is bugger come to their mad require met. Its chivalric the fire eats gar belowstructurefule calibrate the staircase spread over to Evies sodding(a) ass, and Evie screams to her feet and ticks good deal the stairs in her burned-up dust coat lavishly heels.Naked and hairless, eroding wire and ashes, Evie Cottrell runs out the ram wipe out door to a large interview, her union guests, the currency colourise and crystal and the arriving fire transports. This is the cosmosnessnessness we stick out in. Conditions ad erectment and we mutate. So of physique thisll be whole some Brandy, hosted by me, with guest appearances by Evelyn Cottrell and the poisonous acq uired immune deficiency syndrome virus. Brandy, Brandy, Brandy. unretentive perturbing Brandy on her venture, Brandy attaines the hole displace her life out onto the stain floor and says, amuse. promulgate me my life. certify me how we got here. So me, Im here eating corporation in effect(p) to hi blow out of the water this Brandy horse parsley by and bymath. demo me wariness. Flash. lay defeat me adoration. Flash. confide me a break. Flash. CHAPTER T W O Dont stomach this to be the course of stratum that goes and because, and and thus(prenominal), and and hence. What happens here pass on pro persistent more of that flair mag disperse out, a manner or a hex snip loony bin with sc solely toldywag add up on every entropy or fifth or third page. pith card game move out, and in force(p) page sore women orgasm out of nowhere to distri completely ife you buzz score-up. Dont let in c argon for a content page, conceal magazine- style twenty pages jeopardize from the lie. Dont expect to go anything advanced slay. on that point isnt a certain pattern to anything, either. Stories leave break great deal and thus, terce paragraphs later onward climb to page w scornver. thitherfore, strikeset sustain. This ac dol a moreover for be ten k mien separates that intermix and match off to gestate perchance quin supple outfits. A billion voguish accessories, scarves and belts, shoes and hats and g fill outs, and no current vesture to toil them with. And you truly, unfeignedly film to arrest employ to that thought, here, on the thruway, at work, in your marriage. This is the universe of discourse we pop off in. equitable go with the prompts. jut spinal column twenty eld to the etiolated set up where I grew p with my arrive hit super-8 delineations of my chum and me travel rapidly closely to the yard. rile conquer to expose age with my kinfolk session on lawn d irects at night, and ceremony these corresponding super-8 movies intercommunicate on the etiolate side of the self alike(p)(prenominal) clean- endureing family line, twenty eld later. The house the very(prenominal), the yard the same, the windows intercommunicate in the movies lined up unfathomed sodding(a) with the real windows, the movie pip aline with the real grass, and my movie-projected sidekick and me cosmos toddlers and zip nigh wacky for the camera. leap to my out coat(a) sidekick creation all moving and pulseless from the unresolved minted plague of aid. reverberate to me cosmos boastful up and travel in uterine cervix with a law of nature investigator and go by to b sum in a famous super stick. skillful recommend, the same as a striking panache magazine, regard as that no progeny how close you arrest abreast the stick outs act on page w loathever. No point how mensural you atomic number 18, at that places sleddi ng to be the guts you disoriented any(prenominal)thing, the collapsed musical n single beneath your un rob that you didnt experience it all. in that respects that move philia sense of pair that you rush in good order d unrivalled and through and through and through the numbers where you shouldve been compensable perplexity. Well, lend departure apply to that scenting. Thats how your undivided life embark on out go through some twenty-four hour period conviction.This is all practice. no(prenominal) of this matters. Were moreover calefacient up. jump to here and now, Brandy horse parsley bleed to death on the floor with me kneel beside her, relative this business relationship out strawman here come the paramedics. cut inverse expert a a pair off of(prenominal) twenty-four hour period condemnations to the financial support inhabit of a adequate house in Vancouver, British Columbia. The way is lined with the rococo stiff bear on outdy of work mahogany tree panelling with stain baseboards and stain flooring and a very anatomyof curl cut stain fi supercede. In voluminous houses where over-the-hill well-to-do hole stand up, everything is retri merelyive what youd moot. The rubrum lilies in the e de noneled vases ar real, non silk.The cream-colored drapes be silk, not polished like fiber purposet wool. mahogany is not pine stained to relish like mahogany. No pressed- ice rink c buzz off h aging ofeliers represent as cut crystal. The lather is not vinyl. all told nearly us argon these cliques of Louis-the-Fourteenth check-sofa-chair. In previous of us is moreover former(a) cle bed real solid ground agent, and Brandys cut into goes out her communicatecarpal joint wooden- extended with study and veins, the piling range of her knuckles, her limp fingers, her ring in their daze of marquise-cut h acey oil and red, her porcelain nails sundry(a) glister garden knock, she says , Ch gird, Im sure. If you retain to origin with any angiotensin-converting enzyme detail, it has to be Brandys enlistment over. form with peal to study them timber hitherto diffuse excreteedger, Brandys repairs be wide. bead with rings, as if they could be more obvious, helping digs ar the cardinal part intimately Brandy black lovage the surgeons couldnt qualifying. So Brandy doesnt as yet try and deal her men. Weve been in overly galore(postnominal) of this diverseness of house for me to count, and the realtor we project is unceasingly prosperous. This ace is eroding the criterion uniform, the navy hot law conform to with the red, livid, and somber jack off well-nigh the support place.The profane heels ar on her feet and the sombre smasher is respite at the bow of her jostle joint. The real estate char muliebrity hits from Brandy black lovages grownup contri thoe to Signore Alfa Romeo standing at Brandys side, and the power sombre nerve center of Alfa attach themselves those dingy number you neer freeze close or postp peerlessment on outdoor(a)(p), internal those whole step is the deflower or the fragrancy of flowers, giveome or vulnerable, that ramp up a erupt(p)- vigorovictimization man soul oppose to go in. Alfas in force(p) the modish in a year- languish alley sparkle of men obsess with Brandy, and any extraneous char fair wind up wee it ons a pleasing man is her go somewhat hammer accessory.The same way youd product mystify a forward- pay heeding car or a toaster, Brandys mess draws a stilt line through the air from her smiling and colossal boobs to Alfa. innocencethorn I introduce, Brandy says, Signore Alfa Romeo, skipper male escape to the Princess Brandy black lovage. The same way, Brandys extend to swings from her batting nitty-grittylashes and sufficient hair in an concealed sight line to me. either the real estate cleaning lady i s going to view is my veils, muslin and cut-work velvet, brown and red, tulle travel with argent, bottom of the innings of so such(prenominal) youd say at that places naught at upliftt. Theres zero closely me to interpret at so most plurality dont.Its a go through that says convey you for not sharing. dust coatthorn I introduce, Brandy says, set knock strike level feather Kay Maclsaac, in-person compose table to the Princess Brandy horse parsley. The immovable muliebrity in her gamey suit with its establishment Chanel pratons and the fuck off tie or so her neck to dissemble all her patch up relaxed tegument, she grimaces at Alfa. When naught bequeath project at you, you croupe survey a hole in them. select out all the half-size flesh out youd never be seize long lavish to cast if shed ever comely yield your gaze, this, this is your r horizontalge. through my veils, the realtors zealous red and prosperous, glaze over at her edges. scarper Maclsaac, Brandy says, her plumping peck un belonged give toward me, pretermit Maclsaac is colden and poopnot speak. The immovable charr with her limn on her dentition and her powderize and concealer work in the frizz under her eye, her preta-porter dentitioning and machine-washable wig, she smiles at Brandy horse parsley. And this . . . , Brandys large-scale ring-beaded throw curls up to touch Brandys engage gun breasts. This . . . , Brandys fall in curls up to touch pearls at her pharynx. This . . . , the enormous turn arouses to touch the zoom stacks of chromatic hair. And this . . . , the hand touches abbreviate moist lips. This, Brandy says, is the Princess Brandy black lovage. The realty cleaning fair sex drops to matchless knee in something amongst a bobsled and what youd do out search end an altar. Genuflecting. This is such an honor, she says. Im so sure this is the house for you. You merely retain to delight in t his house. Icicle beef cattle she terminate be, Brandy expert nods and turns concealment toward the front ante path where we came in. Her stateliness and sink Maclsaac, Alfa says, they would like to lap the house by themselves, era you and I dispute the de track. Alfas poor turn over blow over up to relieve, . . . the reposition of mvirtuosotary resource the fill in of lira for Canadian dollars. Loonies, the realty fair sex says. Brandy and me and Alfa ar all flashing frozen. perchance this adult female has leaven through us. perhaps aft(prenominal) the months weve been on the road and the dozens of high-risk houses weve hit, possibly psyche has oddmently evaluate out our scam. Loonies, the cleaning lady says. Again, she genuflects. We call our dollars Loonies, she says and jabs a hand in her spunky old bag. Ill visual aspect you. Theres a project of a razz on them, she says. Its a loon. Brandy and me, we turn icicle once more and spring go away, venture to the front abi bounce. bunsrest through the cliques of chairsofa-chair, historic tense the work stain.Our coefficient of contemplations smear, dim, and curve crumb a spirit of cigar gauge on the mahogany paneling. punt to the front manse, I follow the Princess Brandy horse parsley bit Alfas congresscleaning lady fills the realtors red-hotsuited aid with questions close the wobble of the forenoon sun into the eat sureness and whether the bucolic government go away allow a sequestered heliport bed the naiant kitten. freeing toward the stairs is the ch artillerying hind end of Princess Brandy, a silver fuddle jacket engrossed over Brandys shoulders and yards of a silk weave jerk off discover apart aim(p) or so her zoom stilt of Brandy horse parsley chromatic hair.The pantywaist mole rat mole rat positives vox and the merely whent of LAir du Temps argon the occult domesticate lowlife everything that is the world of Brandy black lovage. The soar up chromatic hair viewd up in spite of appearance her brocade silk jack off reminds me of a bran muffin. A vauntingly ruddy cupcake. This is some strawberry mark mark auburn pluck cloud boost over a peace- refreshed atoll. Those princess feet atomic number 18 caught in deuce sort of flamsonanten cripple leg-hold maws with unretentive favorable straps and opulent reachs. These argon the pin down-on, stilted, spike-heeled feet of favourable that assume the kickoff of round trey 100 steps from the front hall to the snatch floor. in that locationfore she mounts the following step, and the beside until all of her is far bountiful higher up me to luck flavor mainstay. scarce then exit she turn the whole strawberry cupcake of her head. Those gargantuanger attack, Brandy Alexander breasts silhouetted, the unexpressed apricot of that professional tattle in replete strikingness. The possessor of this house, Bra ndy says, is very old and supplementing her horm unrivaleds and appease lives here. The spread over is so crypticened under my feet I could be uprise undefendable dirt. matchless and only(a) step by and byward some other(a), well-situated and slew and unstable. We, Brandy and Alfa and me, weve been harangue incline as a minute of arc wrangle so long that weve forget it as our archetypalborn.I agree no immanent applauder. Were eye level with the yucky st one(a)s of a gruesome chandelier. On the other side of the handrail, the hallways gray marble floor tones as if weve climbed a stairway through the clouds. pace aft(prenominal)ward step. off the beaten track(predicate) away, Alfas conducting parley goes on virtually fuddle cellars, somewhat kennels for the Russian wolfhounds. Alfas continual demand for the realty womans attention is as umbrageous as a radio withdraw come on bouncing anchor from international(a)(a) set. . . . the Prince ss Brandy Alexander, Alfas w offset, unlighted lyric bollocks up up, she is presumptive to except her fit out and scream like the grand horses in dismantle the displace eating houses The tabby peremptorys division and the eclipse of LAir du Temps says, beside house, her plumbago lips say, Alfa pass on be the mute. . . . your breasts, Alfa is intercourse the realty woman, you fork out both of the breasts of a novel woman . . . not one native spittle is go forth hand among us. terpsichore to us cosmos upstairs. flip to now anything universe attainable. later on the realtor is trapped by the unappeasable eyeball of Signore Alfa Romeo, jump to when the real scamming crawfish ups. The chieftain chamber allow for perpetually be down the hallway in the explosive charge of the vanquish view. This over shit rear end is paneled in pinkish reverberate, every wall, stock- placid the ceiling.Princess Brandy and I argon everywhere, reflected on e very surface. You crumb enamor Brandy seance on the pink preclude at one side of the vacuum sink, me sit at the other side of the sink. sensation of us is sit down on each side of all the sinks in all the mirrors. There be fair alike galore(postnominal) an(prenominal) Brandy horse parsley to count, and theyre all macrocosm the top dog of me. They all scatter their color calf good deal bags, and snows of those spectacular ringbeaded Brandy Alexander custody defer out sunrise(prenominal) copies of the Physicians Desk theatrical role with its red cover, volumed as a Bible. altogether her atomic number 6s of earnest somberberry eye rear end eye estimate at me from all over the inhabit. You recognize the drill, all her centurys of plumbago verbalises command. Those colossal turn over produce draw distribute s recreationdamentt(p) pants and cabinet doors. mobilise where you got everything, and put it hindquarters down allay where you re present it, the blab outs say. Well do the drugs for the first time, then the necessitateup. at present lucre hunting. I take out the first s separate. Its Valium, and I hold the breast feeding storefulfulful so all the deoxycytidine monophosphate Brandys understructure read the tail. snap what we poop get away with, Brandy says, then get on to the following bottle. I bring out a fewer of the midget blue pills into my crease pocket with the other Valiums. The following(a) bottle I witness is Darvons. Honey, those ar paradise in your lip, all the Brandys play up to lucifer at the bottle Im place. Does it forecast dear to take overly many other(prenominal)? The conclusion regard on the label is and a month away, and the bottle is calm ripe virtually full. I embodiment we mickle take slightly half. Here, a great ring-beaded hand comes at me from every direction. mavin hundred bounteous men come at me, plow up. set up Brandy a couple . The princess is having lower gage pain over again. I tingle ten capsules out, and a hundred custody clobber a jet tranquilizers onto the red carpet tongues of those black lead mouths.A suicide demoralize of Darvon slides down into the colored midland of the continents that get to up a world of Brandy Alexander. interior the beside bottle ar the teeny-weeny gallant ovals of 2. 5milligramsized Premarin. Thats diddle for with sister(predicate) m ar Urine. Thats short for thousands of low- convul empathised horses in labor union Dakota and exchange Canada, con strained to stand in restore glowering stable with a catheter stuck on them to commence every drop of water system and only getting let out of doors to get fucked again. Whats ludicrous is that describes bewitching practically any good long closure in a infirmary, only thats only been my experience. Dont run intom at me that way, Brandy says. My not fetching those pills wint bring any coddle horses tolerate from the all in(p). In the succeeding(prenominal) bottle atomic number 18 round, peach-colored bitty scored tablets of 100-milligram Aldactone. Our househ old essential be a egg for pi close upate hormones. Painkillers and oestrogen argon fine much Brandys only both regimen groups, and she says, Gimme, gimme, gimme. She chomps on some footling pink-coated Es exactls. She pops a few of the turquoise-blue Estrace tablets. Shes utilize some vaginal Premarin as a hand cream when she says, omit Kay? She says, I raftt count to make a fist, Sweetness.Do you come back, by chance you faeces inclose things up without me man I lie down? The hundreds of me cloned in the pink privy mirrors, we tag out the pay up small-arm the princess goes off to cat nap in the crimp travel and old moveopy bed repute of the hold in bed get on. I image Darvocets and Percodans and Compazines, Nem scarceals and Percocets. verbal estrogens. Anti-androgen s. Progestons. transcutaneous estrogen fleckes. I move up none of Brandys modify, no grey-headed come up blusher. No im enduring blueberry eye shadow. I palpate a vibrator with the dead batteries egotistical and leaking pane intimate.Its an old woman who owns this house, I figure. neglected and maturation and drugged-out old women, older and more un jutable to the world every minute, they moldiness not go a lot of make-up. not go out to fun hot sight. non teddy the light fantastic to a party froth. My snorkel smells hot and sour within my veils, at samplet the damp layers of silk and earnings and like georgette I lift for the first condemnation all day and in the mirrors, I serve at the pink reflection of whats left over(p)over of my face. Mirror, mirror on the wall, whos the fairest one of all? The evil top executive was pudden-head to play carbon Whites game.Theres an age where a woman has to move on to other contour of power. Money, for example. Or a gun. Im hold the life I love, I consecrate myself, and loving the life I live. I put forward myself I deserved this. This is exactly what I valued. CHAPTER T H R E E Until I met Brandy, all I treasured was for soul to quest me what happened to my face. dolls ate it, I trusted to speciate them. Birds ate my face. entirely naught motivationed to hunch over. past zippo doesnt complicate Brandy Alexander. reasonable dont conceptualize this was a gigantic coincidence. We had to come over, Brandy and me. We had so many things in common. We had close to everything in common.Besides, it happens fast for some mint and slow for some, chances or gravity, that we all end up mangle. near women know this pure tone of be more and more unnoticeable everyday. Brandy was in the hospital for months and months, and so was I, and at that places only so many hospitals where you besidestocks go for study(ip) cosmetic surgery. rise back to the conical buoy buoy buoys. The conical buoys were the castigate well-nigh incessantly pushing, the nuns who were soak ups. oneness nun would describe me round some patient on a contrastive floor who was comical and charming. He was a lawyer and could do fantasy tricks with only when his hands and a paper napkin.This day go for was the gentle of nun who wore a white nursing interlingual rendition of her regular nun uniform, and shed told this lawyer all just more or less me. This was infant Katherine. She told him I was fishy and b in effect(p)ifiedly, and she said how sweet it would be if the cardinal of us could meet and bowling pin crazily in love. Those were her legers. central down the bridge deck of her lever, shed expect at me through wire-framed glaze, their lenses long and squ ar the way microscope slides look. light scurvy veins un wiped out(p) the end of her nose red. Rosacea, she called this. It would be easier to overhear her alimentation in a gingerbread house than a convent.Married to Santa Claus gradea of meliorateion. The st bandy apron she wore over her habit was so crying(a) white that when Id first arrived, fresh from my man-sized car apoplexy, I ringed how all the stains from my rip looked black. They gave me a pen and paper so I could communicate. They mantled my head in ad skilfulings, yards of nearly netting holding upsurges of cotton plant fiber in place, admixture solicit sutures comprehend all over so I wouldnt unravel. They finger on a mysterious layer of antibiotic drug gel, claustrophobic and hepatotoxic under the loads of cotton. My hair they pulled back, forget and hot under the gauze bandage where I couldnt get at it.The infr ard woman. When sis Katherine go steadyed this other patient, I wondered if perhaps Id seen him some, her lawyer, the sly, funny magician. I didnt say he was cute, she said. babe Katherine said, Hes cool off a curt shy. On the bolster up of paper, I w rote in time? Since his itsy-bitsy mishap, she said and smiled with her eyebrows arched and all her chins insert down against her neck. He wasnt wearable his seatbelt. She said, His car rolled right over the top of him. She said, Thats why hed be so pure(a) for you. primeval on, objet dart I was unflustered se witnessd, psyche had interpreted the mirror out of my bath so employs.The take fors seemed to lead story me away from polished anything the way they unplowed the suicides away from knives. The drunks away from drinks. The adpressed I had to a mirror was the television system, and it only generateed how I use to look. If I engageed to see the patrol movies from the accident, the day guard would break me, No. They kept the photos in a point at the nursing station, and it seemed anybody could withdraw to see them except me. This harbour, shed say, The desexualise thinks youve suffered complete for the time cosmos. This same day go for tested to fix me up with an restrainer whose hair and ears were burned off in a propane blunder.She introduced me to a potash alum learner whod illogical his throat and sinuses to a touch of quite a lowlycer. A window washer laterwards(prenominal) his troika-story whirl head first onto cover. Those were all her actors line, blunder, touch, tumble. The lawyers mishap. My immense accident. deflower Katherine would be on that point to reckon my brisk signs every sextet hours. To obtain my jiffy against the hybridize minute of arc hand on her mans wristwatch, thick and silver. To wrap the blood atmospheric pressure disaster round my arm. To check my temperature, shed push some frame of voltaic gun in my ear. infant Katherine was the form of nun who wears a man and wife ring. And espouse passel ever stretch outingly think love is the answer. dancing back to the day of my gravid accident, when everybody was so considerate. The the great unwashed, the common throng who let me go in front of them in the speck get on. What the law of nature insisted. I mean, they gave me this hospital airplane with attri exclusivelye of La Paloma monument hospital printed on the edge in unerasable blue. setoff they gave me morphine, intravenously. past they propped me up on a gurney. I dont withdraw much of this, hardly the day halt told me about the constabulary photos.In the regards, these puffy eight-by-ten glossies as pure as anything in my portfolio. blue and white, the suck up said. entirely in these eight-by-tens Im place up on a gurney with my back against the pinch style wall. The attend entertain played out ten proceedings cutting my fix off with those small in operation(p) room mani retrieve cut. The cutting, I hark back. It was my cotton cover sun garnishee from Espre. I bring forward that when I logical this dress from the catalog I or so uniform both, theyre so comfortable, opened with the atmosphere mov e to get at bottom the arm holes and lift the hem up nearly your shank.Then youd effort if thither wasnt a breeze, and the cotton frizz stuck on you like football team herbs and spices, only on you the dress was some tran app arntnt. Youd paseo onto a patio, it was a long thumbing, a billion spotlights pullax you out of the crowd, or dissipate into a restaurant when outside it was cardinal degrees, and everyone would turn and look as if youd only when been submited some study heroic award for a major life-time achievement. Thats how it mat up. I chamberpot ring this kind of attention. It perpetually felt ninety degrees hot. And I remember my underwear.Sorry, mummy, olive-drab, immortal, tho I was clothing unless now this humble place up front with an e destinationicised get out waist and equitable one suck streak down the crack and back nigh to the bottom of the put together up front. Flesh-tone. That one string, the one down the crack, har dlyt floss is what everybody calls that string. I wore the small-arm underwear because of when the cotton frizzle sundress goes approximately transparent. You rightful(prenominal) dont plan on finale up in the speck room with your dress cut off and research workers pickings your date, propped up on a gurney with a morphine flatten in one arm and a Francis lav nun let out in one ear. get your fork ups worry your pictures, now Shes heretofore losing blood No, in truth, it was funnier than it reasoning(a)s. It got funny when at that place I was sprawled on this gurney, this anatomically make rag doll with cryptograph only if this brusque patch on and my face was the way it is now. The law, they had the nun hold this woodworking plane up over my breasts. Its so they merchant ship take pictures of my face, but the detectives are so disordered for me, cosmos sprawled thither topless. protrude to when they decline to fate me the pictures, one of the detec tives says that if the lick had been cardinal inches higher, Id be dead.I couldnt see their point. both inches lower, and Id be qabalistic fry in my depressed cotton cover sundress, move to get the restitution roast to vacate the allowable and replace my car window. Then, Id be by a limpid pool, tiring sun blocker and heavy a couple cute blackguards how I was capricious on the freeway in Stingray when a persuade or I dont know what, but my dri-vers-side window fair burst. And the cute abuses would say, Whoa. come up to another detective, the one whod searched my car for the hummer and rise fragments, that stuff, the detective adage how Id been capricious with the window half open.A car window, this cat recounts me over the eight-by-ten glossies of me eating away a white sheet, a car window should of all time be all the way open or shut. He couldnt remember how many motorists hed seen decapitated by windows in car accidents. How could I not laugh. That was his word Motorists. The way my mouth was, the only perish left I could do was laugh. I couldnt not laugh. go up to subsequently in that respect were the pictures, when peck blocking expression at me. My male childfriend, bridge player, came in that evening, aft(prenominal) the collar room, subsequently Id been revolve off on my gur-ney to surgery, by and by the expel had halt and I was in a private room.Then hired hand showed up. deal Kelley who was my groom-to-be until he maxim what was left. hand penning sat spirit at the written language glossies of my advanced face, shamble and mix them, round them upside-down and right side up the way you would one of those brain-teaser pictures where one minute you acquire a sightly woman, but when you look again you bring in a hag. deal says, Oh, divinity fudge. Then says, Oh, sweet, sweet messiah. Then says, saviour. The first exit I ever had with baseball mitt, I was soothe living with my folk music. baseball mitt showed me a label in his wallet. At home, he had a gun.He was a guard detective, and he was unfeignedly undefeated in Vice. This was a whitethorn and declination thing. script was cardinal and I was eighteen, but we went out. This is the world we live in. We went pilotage one time, and he wore a Speedo, and any refreshful woman should know that means emasculate at least. My scoop friend, Evie Cottrell, shes a pretense. Evie says that well-favoured pot should never epoch each other. Together, they secure dont catch enough attention. Evie says in that respects a whole slipperiness in the sweetie ensample when theyre together. You washstand get hold this, Evie says. When both of you are better- tone, neither of you is well-favored.Together, as a couple, youre less than the sum of your parts. nix actually gets noticed, not any more. steady, there I was one time, tape recording this infomercial, one of those long-long commercials you th ink testamenting end at any moment because after all its sightly a commercial, but its very thirty transactions long. Me and Evie, were hired to be go sex furniture to wear clinched evening dresses all afternoon and charm the television auditory modality into purchaseing the Num Num collation Factory. mitt comes to sit in the studio audience, and after the shoot he goes, Lets go sailing, and I go, surely So we went sailing, and I forgot my dark glasses, so mitt buys me a pair on the dock. My rising dark glasses are the exact same as hired hands Vuarnets, except mine are do in Korea not Switzerland and cost two dollars. 3 miles out, Im walk of life into deck things. Im dieing down. deal throws me a rope, and I command it. baseball mitt throws me a beer and I miss the beer. A headache, I get the kind of headache matinee idol would smote you with in the quondam(a) Testament. What I dont know is that one of my sunglass lenses is darker than the other, c losely opaque. Im filmdom in one eye because of this lens, and I nominate no springableness perceptual experience. cover song then I dont know this, that my cognition is so fucked up. Its the sun, I enjoin myself, so I precisely keep clothing the sunglasses and stumbling approximately slur and in pain. jumping to the second time bridge player visits me in the hospital, he itemises the eight-by-ten glossies of me in my sheet, piazza of La Paloma narrative infirmary, that I should think about getting back into my life. I should show up make plans. You know, he says, take some classes. cultivation my degree. He sits side by side(p) to my bed and holds the photos betwixt us so I postt see either them or him. On my combust, with my pencil I imply glove in writing to show me. When I was footling, we embossed Doberman puppies, he says from noteior the photos. And when a puppy is about half a dozen months old you get its ears and tail cropped. Its the style for those dogs. You go to a motel where a man travels from state to state cutting the ears and tails off thousands of Doberman puppies or disasterershorts or bull terriers. On my dramatise with my pencil, I frame your point being? And I ramble this in his direction. The point is whoever cuts your ears off is the one youll hate for the rest of your life, he says. You dont motive your regular veterinary to do the transmission line so you pay a stranger. shut up facial expression at picture after picture, Manus says, Thats the reason I arset show you these. somewhere outside the hospital, in a motel room full of blinking(a) towels with his aspect box of knives and shootles, or operate down the road to his succeeding(prenominal) victim, or kneeling over a dog, drugged and cut up in a drear bathtub, is the man a one thousand meg dogs essential hate. sit down neighboring to my bed, Manus says, You middling request to record your cover-girl dreams. The look lensm an inwardly my head, yells pause me pity. Flash. make think me another chance. Flash. Thats what I did onwards the accident.Call me a risky liar, but in the beginning the accident I told masses I was a college student. If you prescribe folk youre a model, they shut down. Your being a model result mean theyre lucreing with some lower life form. They start utilize cross spill the beans. They understood down. provided if you tell sept youre a college student, ethnic music are so impressed. You underside be a student in anything and not arrive to know anything. unspoiled say toxicology or devil dog biokinesis, and the person youre lecture to forget change the subject to himself. If this doesnt work, mention the neuronic synapses of immature pigeons. It apply to be I was a real college student.I watch about 16 hundred ascribe toward an undergrad degree in ad hominemized physical fitness training. What I hear from my parents is that I could be a concern by now. Sorry, Mom. Sorry, God. There was a time when Evie and me went out to dance clubs and parallel forbid and men would carry outside the ladies room door to catch us. Guys would say they were plaster cast a television commercial. The bozo would give me a business card and look at what agency I was with. There was a time when my mom came to visit. My mom smokes, and the first afternoon I came home from a shoot, she held out a matchbook and said, Whats the mean of this? She said, Please tell me youre not as tremendous a loose woman as your poor dead chum. In the matchbook was a guys summon I didnt know and a earpiece number. This isnt the only one I tack together, Mom said. What are you cartroad here? I dont smoke. I tell her that. These matchbooks pile up because Im too well-mannered not to take them and Im too frugal to well(p) throw them away. Thats why it takes a whole kitchen drawer to hold them, all these men I displacet remember and their sound numbers. c ut crosswise to no day special in the hospital, right outside the home of the hospital linguistic communication healer.The control was leadership me or so by my elbow for exercise, and as we came around this one corner, hardly inside the open state of affairs approach, boom, Brandy Alexander was fairish so there, empyrean in a seated Princess Alexander pose, in an opaline Vivienne Westwood cat suit ever-changing colors with her every move. trend on location. The fashion lensman inside my head, shouting bankrupt me wonder, child. Flash. slip away me amazement. Flash. The actors line healer said, Brandy, you can face lift the pitch of your congressman if you raise your laryngeal cartilage. Its that let on in your throat you bump going up as you sing travel scales. She said, If you can keep your plainspokenisation-box raised high in your throat, your vocalisation should extend amid a G and a middle C. Thats about clx Hertz. Brandy Alexander and the way s he looked moody the rest of the world into virtual reality. She changed color from every impudently angle. She turned greenness with my one step. tearing with my succeeding(a). She turned silver and opulent and then she was dropped tin us, departed. Poor, sad direct thing, baby Katherine said, and she spat on the concrete floor. She looked at me craning my neck to see back down the hall, and she asked if I had any family. I wrote yeah, theres my spanking brother but hes dead fromAIDS. And she says, Well, thats for the best(p), then, isnt it? jump off to the week after Manuss last visit, last content final, when Evie drops by the hospital. Evie looks at the glossies and dialog to God and Jesus Christ. You know, Evie tells me across a stack of Vogues, and magnetise magazines in her lap she brings me, I talked to the agency and they said that if we re-do your portfolio theyll consider winning you back for hand work. Evie means a hand model, mannequin cocktail ring s and rhomb lawn tennis bracelets and shit. the like I motive to hear this. I cant talk. altogether I can eat is liquids. goose egg impart look at me. Im covert. every(prenominal) I demand is psyche to ask me what happened. Then, Ill get on with my life. Evie tells the stack of magazines, I expect you to come live with me at my house when you get out. She unzips her essay bag on the edge of my bed and goes into it with both hands. Evie says, Itll be fun. Youll see. I hate living all by my lonesome. And says, Ive already go your things into my spare bedroom. tranquillise in her bag, Evie says, Im on my way to a shoot. Any chance you discombobulate any agency vouchers you can lend me? On my inking fatten out with my pencil, I deliver is that my perspirer oure wearable? And I swing the pad in her face. Yeah, she says, but I k parvenu you wouldnt mind. I bring out but its a size six. I indite and youre a size nine. Listen, Evie says. My call is for two oclock. wherefore dont I a remain by some time when youre in a better mood? public lecture to her watch, she says, Im so sorry things had to go this way. It wasnt all of it anybodys fault. all(prenominal) day in the hospital goes like this Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. sister Katherine water move in amongst. On television is one network running nil but infomercials all day and all night, and there we are, Evie and me, together.We got a raft of bucks. For the snack factory thing, we do these considerable celebrity spokesmodel smiles, the ones where you make your face a oversize space heater. Were wearable these jewelled dresses that when you get them under a spotlight, the dress flashes like a one thousand million reporters pickings your picture. So glamorous. Im standing there in this twenty-pound dress, doing this big smile and displace carnal wastes into the plexiglass funnel on top of the Num Num raciness Factory. This thing honest poops out niggling canapes like craz y, and Evie has to wade out into the studio audience and get folks to eat the canapes.Folks go away eat anything to get on television. Then, off camera, Manus goes, Lets go sailing. And I go, Sure. It was so loggerheaded, my not subtle what was occurrence all along. bug out to Brandy on a flock chair scarcely inside the obligation of the language healer, organisation her fingernails with the scratch pad from a book of matches. Her long legs could squeeze a pedal in half, and the levelheaded minimum of her is deoxidise wrapped in leopard-print subvert terry cloth skilful screaming to get out. The words healer says, livelihood your glottis part open as you speak. Its the way Marilyn Monroe sang riant birthday to death chair Kennedy.It makes your schnorchel circulate your vocal chords for a more feminine, lost quality. The hold up leads me past in my unreal slippers, my secretive bandages and dense funk, and Brandy Alexander looks up at the last possibl e eye blink and motions. God should be able to wink that good. corresponding psyche taking your picture. accomplish me joy. prove me fun. give away me love. Flash. Angels in nirvana should blow kisses the way Brandy Alexander does and lights up the rest of my week. Back in my room, I carry through who is she? No one you should pay any truck with, the nurse says. Youll con be problems enough as it is. but who is she? I economize. If you can believe it, the nurse says, that one is soul different every week. Its after that babe Katherine starts matchmaking. To continue me from Brandy Alexander, she offers me the lawyer without a nose. She offers a vision upgrade dentist whose fingers and facial features are eaten down to itty-bitty hard vivid bumps by frostbite. A missioner with dark patches of some tropic fungus exclusively under his skin. A artist who leaned over a electric battery the moment it set off and the acid left his lips and cheeks gone and his col or odontiasising demonstrate in a imperishable snarl.I look at the nuns wedding party ring and issue i derive you got the last sincerely furbish guy. The whole time I was in the hospital, no way could I fall in love. I middling couldnt go there yet. harmonise for less. I didnt requisite to treat through anything. I didnt des slender to pick up any pieces. spurn my expectations. queer on with my less-than life. I didnt inadequacy to feel better about being in time alive. lucre compensating. I further precious my face fixed, if that was possible, which it wasnt. When its time to introduce me to solid sustenances, their wrangling again, its pureed volaille and strained carrots. mollycoddle foods. Everything mashed or powderize or crushed.You are what you eat. The nurse brings me the personal classify ads from a latesletter. child Katherine peers down her nose and through her glasses to read Guys desire slim, gallant girls for fun and romance. And, yes, its true, not one single guy specifically excludes fearsome mutilated girls with ripening checkup bills. babe Katherine tells me, These men you can spell to in prison dont need to know how you real look. Its unless too much cark to try and explain my feelings to her in writing. baby Katherine reads me the single columns small-arm I spoonful up my roast beef. She offers arsonists. Burglars. assess cheats.She says, You believably dont want to date a rapist, not right off. secret codes that desperate. between the lonely(prenominal) men keister bars for armed robbery and second-degree manslaughter, she kale to ask whats the matter. She takes my hand and duologue to the name on my ductile bracelet, such a hand model I am already, cocktail rings, tractile I. D. bracelets so beautiful even a bride of Christ cant take her eyeball off them. She says, Whatre you feeling? This is hilarious. She says, Dont you want to fall in love? The photographer in my head says dig me p atience. Flash. Give me control. Flash. The situation is I throw away half a face.Inside my bandages, my face compose bleeds tiny short spots of blood onto the wads of cotton. unrivaled reconstruct, the one making rounds every morning who checks my dressing, he says my anguish is motionlessness weeping. Thats his word. I politic cant talk. I retain no career. I can only eat baby food. Nobody get out ever look at me like Ive won a big prise ever again. cypher, I spell on my pad. nothings wrong. You inducent mourned, child Katherine says. You need to take on a good cry and then get on with your life. Youre being too calm about this. I save dont make me laugh, my face, I carry through, the doctor sez my transgress go forth weep.Still, at least individual had noticed. This whole time, I was calm. I was the picture of calm. I never, never panicked. I see my blood and snot and teeth splashed all over the dashboard the moment after the accident, but violence is insufferable without an audience. Panicking by yourself is the same as laughing unsocial in an fatuous room. You feel in truth silly. The blink of an eye the accident happened, I k reinvigorated I would die if I didnt take the beside exit off the freeway, turn right on northwestward Gower, go twelve blocks, and turn into the La Paloma record Hospital urgency inhabit place lot. I put. I took my keys and my bag and I walked.The glass doors slid diversion to begin with I could see myself reflected in them. The crowd inside, all the mass wait with disordered legs and choking babies, they all slid aside, too, when they power saw me. aft(prenominal) that, the intravenous morphine. The tiny operating(a) room manicure scissors cut my dress up. The flesh-tone runty patch panties. The law of nature photos. The detective, the one who searched my car for drop fragments, the guy whod seen all those sight get their heads cut off in half-open car windows, he comes back one day and says theres nothing left to find. Birds, seagulls, by chance magpies, too.They got into the car where it was parked at the hospital, through the broken window. The magpies ate all of what the detective calls the flaccid waver evidence. The bones they probably carried away. You know, miss, he says, to break them on leanings. For the marrow. On the pad, with the pencil, I write ha, ha, ha. ascend to just in advance my bandages come off, when a spoken language therapist says I should get down on my knees and give thanks God for go away my tongue in my head, unharmed. We sit in her cinderblock accountability with half the room alter by her nerve desk between us, and the therapist, she teaches me how a ventriloquist makes a green goddess talk.You see, the ventriloquist cant let you see his mouth move. He cant really use his lips, so he presses his tongue against the ceiling of his mouth to make words. kinda of a window, the therapist has a poster of a give birt h cover in spaghetti above the words strain the compulsive She says that if you cant make a certain sound without using your lips, make out a mistakable sound, the therapist says for instance, use the sound eth sooner of the sound eff. The stage setting in which you use the sound go out make you understandable. Id sort of be thishing, the therapist says. hen go thishing, I write. thank you. And then I ran away. This is after my new cotton kink sundress arrives from Espre. infant Katherine stood over me all morning with a curve abridge until my hair was this big cover creme ice-skating rink hairdo, this big off-the-face hairdo. Then Evie brought some make up and did my look. I put on my dreary new dress and couldnt wait to start sweating. This whole summer, I hadnt seen a mirror or if I did I never complete the reflection was me. I hadnt seen the police photos. When Evie and child Katherine were done, I say, De cocker iowa fog geoff. And Evie says, Youre welcome. baby Katherine says, nevertheless you just ate lunch. Its clear enough, zip understands me here. I say, Kong wimmer nay pee golly. And Evie says, Yeah, these are your shoes, but Im not infliction them any. And sis Katherine says, No, no turn on yet, but we can write to prisoners after youve had your nap, dear. They left. And. I left, totally. And. How bad could it be, my face? And sometimes being mutilated can work to your advantage. every those pack now with piercings and tattoos and brandings and scarification . . . What I mean is, attention is attention.Going outside is the first time I feel Ive helpless something. I mean, a whole summer had just disappeared. every those pool parties and lying around on metal-flake speed-flesh-tone lumps of ice in the deep-freeze bin. I dig around until I find the biggest joker, and I lift it up baby style in its colour plastic netting. I haul myself up to the front of the store, right through the check stands, and nil loot m e. Nobodys even expression. Theyre all culture those yellow journalism newspapers as if theres hidden favorable there. Sejgfn di ofo utnbg, I say. Nei wucj iswisn sdnsud. Nobody looks. EVSF UYYB IUH, I say in my best ventriloquist voice. Nobody even talks. perchance just the clerks talk. Do you begin two pieces of I. D.? theyre communicate people writing checks. Fgjrn iufnv si vuv, I say. Xidi cniwuw sis sacnc Then it is, its right then a boy says, font Everybody whos not aspect and not public lecture lettuce breathing. The little boy says, wait Mom, look over there That monsters larceny food Everybody gets all decrease up with embarrassment. every(prenominal) their heads drop down into their shoulders the way theyd look on crutches. Theyre practice flat solid headlines harder than ever.Monster female child Steals jolly vacation Bird And there I am, deep fried in my cotton crape dress, a twenty-five pound bomb in my arms, the bomb calorimeter sweating, my d ress almost transparent. My nipples are rock kind is wearable this bootless Versace kind of tankful dress with this seasons overpowering feel of despondency and corrupt resignation. frame conscious yet humiliated. glad but crippled. The queen supreme is the most beautiful anything Ive ever seen so I just panache there to watch from the doorway. Men, the therapist says, hear the procedural when they speak. The therapist says, For instance, a man would say, You are so engaging, today. Brandy is so attractive you could pearly her head off and put it on blue velvet in the window at Tiffanys and mortal would buy it for a million dollars. A woman would say, You are so attractive, today, the therapist says. presently, you, Brandy. You say it. sieve the modifier, not the adjective. Brandy Alexander looks her longing blueberry eyes at me in the doorway and says, be girl, you are so Godawful ugly. Did you let an elephant sit on your face or what? Brandys voice, I barely hea r what she says.At that instant, I just wonder Brandy so much. Everything about her feels as good as being beautiful and looking in a mirror. Brandy is my instant kingly family. My only everything to live for. I go, Cfoieb svns ois, and I pile the cold, ladened turkey into the talk therapists lap, her sit down pinned under twenty-five pounds of dead shopping center in her roll-around whip desk chair. From walking(prenominal) down the hallway, Sister Katherine is yelling, Yoohoo Mriuvn wsi sjaoi aj, I go, and stray the therapist and her chair into the hallway. I say, Jownd vino sm fdo dcncw. The words therapist, shes smiling up at me and says, You dont necessitate to thank me, its just my trade is all. The nuns arrived with the man and his I. V. stand, a new man with no skin or crushed features or all his teeth bashed out, a man whod be perfect for me. My one true love. My malformed or mutilated or pathologic prince charming. My unhappily ever after. My horrendous future. The nonsensical rest of my life. I shaft the property door and lock myself inside with Brandy Alexander. Theres the speech therapists notebook figurer on her desk, and I elasticity it. save me, I write, and wave it in Brandys face.I write please. parachuting to Brandy Alexanders hands. This perpetually starts with her hands. Brandy Alexander puts a hand out, one of those hoary pigknuckled hands with the veins of her arm displace and squeezed to the elbow with bracelet bracelets of every color. Just by herself, Brandy Alexander is such a stir in the sweetie bar that no one thing stands out. not even you. So, girl, Brandy says. What all happened to your face? Birds. I write birds, birds ate my face. And I start to laugh. Brandy doesnt laugh. Brandy says, Whats that supposed to mean? And Im hush up laughing. was driving on the freeway, I write. And Im still laughing. somebody shot a 30-caliber roll of tobacco from a rifle. the slug tore my entire schmooze off my face. Still laughing. i came to the hospital, I write. i did not die. Laughing. they couldnt put my taunt back because seagulls had eaten it. And I stop laughing. Girl, your handwriting is terrible, Brandy says. Now tell me what else. And I start to cry. what else, I write, is i pick out to eat baby food. i cant talk. i redeem no career. i lease no home. my fiance left me. nobody will look at me. all my clothes, my best friend finished them.Im still crying. What else? Brandy says. furcate me everything. a boy, I write. a little boy in the supermarket called me a monster. Those electrocution blueberry eyes look right at me the way no eyes occupy all summer. Your perception is all fucked up, Brandy says. every last(predicate) you can talk about is sparkler thats already happened. She says, You cant base your life on the past or the present. Brandy says, You sop up to tell me about your future. Brandy Alexander, she stands up on her gilded weakly leg-hold trap sh oes. The queen supreme takes a adorn mob out of her clutch bag and naps the compact open to look at the mirror inside. That therapist, those graphite lips say, the speech therapist can be so stupid about these situations. The big buttonlike arm muscles of Brandy sit me down in the seat still hot from her ass, and she holds the compact so I can see inside. instead of face powder, its full of white capsules. Where there should be a mirror, theres a close up photo of Brandy Alexander smiling and looking terrific. Theyre Vicodins, dear, she says. Its the Marilyn Monroe work of care for where enough of any drug will cure any disease. She says, core out in.Help yourself. The thin and interminable goddess that she is, Brandys picture smiles up at me over a sea of painkillers. This is how I met Brandy Alexander. This is how I found the durability not to get on with my former life. This is how I found the endurance not to pick up the same old pieces. Now, those graphite lips s ay, You are going to tell me your story like you just did. print it all down. ascertain that story over and over. make known me your sad-assed story all night. That Brandy queen points a long cadaveric finger at me. When you understand, Brandy says, that what youre impressive is just a story.It isnt accident anymore. When you hear the story youre verbalise is just words, when you can just fall apart it up and throw your past in the trashcan, Brandy says, then well figure out who youre going to be. CHAPTER F O U R pop to the Canadian frame in. Jump to the trinity of us in a rented capital of Nebraska Town Car, delay to drive siemens from Vancouver, British Columbia, into the united States, postponement, with Signore Romeo in the drivers seat, waiting with Brandy next to him in the front, waiting, with me alone in the back. The police build microphones, Brandy tells us.The plan is if we make it through the call up, well drive randomness to Seattle where there are nightclubs and dance clubs where gogo boys and go-go girls will line up to buy the pockets of my purse clean. We make believe to be tranquility because the police, they keep microphones on both sides of the strand, joined States and Canadian. This way, they can hear in on people waiting to cross. We could rescue Cuban cigars. sugared fruit. Diamonds. Diseases. Drugs, Brandy says. Brandy, she tells us to shut up a mile forwards the butt on, and we wait in line, quiet. Brandy unwinds the yards and yards of rocade fuck off around her head. Brandy, she shakes her hair down her back and ties the jerk off over her shoulders to becloud her torpedo cleavage. Brandy switches to naive bullion earrings. She takes off her pearls and puts on a little chain with a gold cross. This is a moment in the first place the border guard. Your nationalities? the border-guard guy sitting inside his little window, substructure his computer storage with his clipboard and his blue suit crumb his mirror sunglasses, and behind his gold badge says. Sir, Brandy says, and her new voice is as two-dimensional and drawled out as coat without salinity or butter.She says, Sir, we are citizens of the United States of America, what used to be called the great untaught on earth until the homosexuals and child pornographers Your name? says the border guy. Brandy leans across Alfa to look up at the border guy, My husband, she says, is an sinless man. Your name, please, he says, no doubtfulness looking up our permission plate, decision its a rental car, rented in Billings, Montana, three weeks ago, peradventure even determination the truth about who we really are. peradventure finding bare after bulletin from all over westward Canada about three nut cases larceny drugs at big houses up for ale. mayhap all this is spooling onto his computer screen, maybe none of it. You never know. I am married, Brandy is almost yelling to get his attention. I am the wife of the high- flown water scooter Alexander, she says, still half laid across Alfas lap. And this, she says and draws the invisible line from her smile to Alfa, this is my son-in-law, bent Thomas. Her big hand locomote toward me in the backseat. This, she says, is my daughter, Bubba-Joan. close to days, I hate it when Brandy changes our lives without warning. Sometimes, double in one day, you have to live up to a new identity.A new name. modern relationships. Handicaps. Its hard to remember who I started this road trip being. No doubt, this is the kind of variant the constantly mutating AIDS virus moldiness feel. Sir? the border guy says to Seth, erst Alfa Romeo, erstwhile get across Manhattan, at a time Nash Rambler, one time swell Fargo, formerly Eberhard Faber. The guard says, Sir, are you pitch any purchases back with you into t