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The Mailer Review/Volume 13, 2019/Silent Night: Difference between revisions
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He seemed unsure, flustered. I felt that my bringing Paul to the party had | He seemed unsure, flustered. I felt that my bringing Paul to the party had | ||
changed his opinion of me—not the new little receptionist but a woman with a man, his arm thrown over her shoulder. Matt gripped his glass and shook the ice, and the sound reminded me of an afternoon playing Yahtzee with an old friend in middle school, her beagle asleep by the fire, the snow falling beyond the sliding glass doors onto the railings of her back deck. The contrast was disorienting. I didn’t know which scene I fit. | changed his opinion of me—not the new little receptionist but a woman with a man, his arm thrown over her shoulder. Matt gripped his glass and shook the ice, and the sound reminded me of an afternoon playing Yahtzee with an old friend in middle school, her beagle asleep by the fire, the snow falling beyond the sliding glass doors onto the railings of her back deck. The contrast was disorienting. I didn’t know which scene I fit. | ||
“Nice to meet you,” Paul said, reaching a hand out. | |||
Beneath all the chatter was music—that Bing Crosby holiday fare, the kind even your parents called classic. It lent a strange sort of feeling to the event, as if we’d been caught in a version of a party that had played out in the room for years. At some point servers delivered food and maybe I ate chicken cutlet and mashed potatoes, and maybe Paul kept lighting my cig- arettes and holding my hand, and maybe Matt Carpenter brushed his fingers down my back. I didn’t leave any impression of myself behind that night. If you’d asked Cassandra, she might have remembered me in my peach halter dress, my hair long to my waist. “She was a little girl trying to act like a grown up,” she might have said. “She was with that boy, the one who ate lit cigarettes.” | |||
Paul became the center of attention. Everyone gathered around and watched as he did his party trick. I stood to the side, humiliated, the magi- cian’s assistant handing him lit Marlboros. Matt came up and slipped his hand along my waist and leaned into my hair and sighed, the sort of sound you make when you have taken a bite of something delicious. I didn’t wear a bra. He could have untied the bow at the back of my neck and the dress would have dropped to my waist, exposing my breasts. I suppose if I had suggested this someone might have remembered me, and I would later learn that this was the way you made an impression—offering yourself up, fear- less and bold and without shame. | |||