Diary by Chuck Palahniuk (classic fiction .txt) 📗

them they heard a bell ring. Somebody'd walked into the shop. Another shadow fell over the workbench.

Without looking up, Peter went, “Hey.”

And this new guy said, “Hey.”

The friend was maybe Peter's age, blond with a patch of chin hairs, but not what you'd call a beard. Another student from the art school. He was another rich kid from Waytansea Island, and he stood, his blue eyes looking down at the painting on the workbench. He smiled Peter's same half smile, the look of somebody laughing over the fact he had cancer. The look of someone facing a firing squad of clowns with real guns.

Not looking up, Peter buffed the glass and fit it into the new frame. He said, “See what I mean about the picture?”

The friend looked at the house wrapped in porches, the picket fence and blue birds. The name Misty Marie Kleinman. Half smiling, shaking his head, he said, “It's the Tupper house, all right.”

It was a house Misty had just made up. Invented.

In one ear, the friend had a single earring. An old piece of junk jewelry, in the Waytansea Island style of Peter's friends. Buried in his hair, it was fancy gold filigree around a big red enamel heart, flashes of red glass, cut-glass jewels twinkled in the gold. He was chewing gum. Spearmint, from the smell.

Misty said, “Hi.” She said, “I'm Misty.”

And the friend, he looked at her, giving her the same doomed smile. Chewing his gum, he said, “So is this her? Is she the mythical lady?”

And slipping the picture into the frame, behind the glass, looking only at his work, Peter said, “I'm afraid so.”

Still staring at Misty, his eyes jumping around every part of her, her hands and legs, her face and breasts, the friend cocked his head to one side, studying. Still chewing his gum, he said, “Are you sure she's the right one?”

Some magpie part of Misty, some little princess part, couldn't take her eyes off the guy's glittery red earring. The sparkling enamel heart. The flash of red from the cut-glass rubies.

Peter fitted a piece of backing cardboard behind the picture and sealed it around the edge with tape. Running his thumb over the tape, sealing it down, he said, “You saw the painting.” He stopped and sighed, his chest getting big, then collapsing, and he said, “I'm afraid she's the real deal.”

Misty, Misty's eyes were pinned inside the blond tangle of the friend's hair. The red flash of the earring there, it was Christmas lights and birthday candles. In the sunlight from the shopwindow, the earring was Fourth of July fireworks and bouquets of Valentine's Day roses. Looking at the sparkle, she forgot she had hands, a face, a name.

She forgot to breathe.

Peter said, “What'd I tell you, man?” He was looking at Misty now, watching her spellbound by the red earring, and Peter said, “She can't resist the old jewelry.”

The blond guy saw Misty staring back at him, and both his blue eyes swung sideways to see where Misty's eyes were pinned.

In the earring's cut-glass sparkle, in there was the sparkle of champagne Misty had never seen. There were the sparks of beach bonfires, spiraling up to summer stars Misty could only imagine. In there was the flash of crystal chandeliers she had painted in each fantasy parlor.

All the yearning and idiot need of a poor, lonely kid. Some stupid, unenlightened part, not the artist but the idiot in her, loved that earring, the bright rich shine of it. The glitter of sugary hard candy. Candy in a cut-glass dish. A dish in a house she'd never visited. Nothing deep or profound. Just everything we're programmed to adore. Sequins and rainbows. Those bangles she should've been educated enough to ignore.

The blond, Peter's friend, he reached one hand up to touch his hair, then his ear. His mouth dropped open, so fast his gum fell out onto the floor.

Your friend.

And you said, “Careful, dude, it looks like you're stealing her away from me . . .”

And the friend, his fingers fumbled, digging in his hair, and he yanked the earring. The pop made them all wince.

When Misty opened her eyes, the blond guy was holding out his earring, his blue eyes filled with tears. His torn earlobe hung in two ragged pieces, forked, blood dripping from both points. “Here,” he said, “take it.” And he threw the earring toward the workbench. It landed, gold and fake rubies scattering red sparks and blood.

The screw-on back was still on the post. It was so old, the gold back had turned green. He'd yanked it off so fast the earring was tangled in blond hairs. Each hair still had the soft white bulb where it pulled out at the root.

One hand cupped over his ear, blood running from between his fingers, the guy smiled. His corrugator muscle pulling his pale eyebrows together, he said, “Sorry, Petey. It looks like you're the lucky guy.”

And Peter lifted the painting, framed and finished. Misty's signature at the bottom.

Your future wife's signature. Her bourgeois little soul.

Your future wife already reaching for the bloody spot of red sparkle.

“Yeah,” Peter said, “fucking lucky me.”

And still bleeding, one hand clamped over his ear, the blood running down his arm to drip from his pointed elbow, Peter's friend backed up a couple steps. With his other hand, he reached for the door. He nodded at the earring and said, “Keep it. A wedding present.” And he was gone.

July 9

THIS EVENING, Misty is tucking your daughter into bed when Tabbi says, “Granmy Wilmot and I have a secret.”

Just for the record, Granmy Wilmot knows everybody's secrets.

Grace sits through church service and elbows Misty, telling her how the rose window the Burtons donated for their poor, sad daughter-in-law—well, the truth is Constance Burton gave up painting and drank herself to death.

Here's two centuries of Waytansea shame and misery, and your mother can repeat every detail. The cast-iron benches on Merchant Street, the ones made in