My Best Man by Andy Schell (unputdownable books .txt) 📗

ticking along. And if there were ever a woman who was meant to have a nice flashy watch, it’s Amity. Besides, I just can’t stand to see the saleswoman man treat her with such contempt. I use the credit card with the five-thousand dollar limit. I figure I’ll have a couple thousand dollars to spare. I sign the credit slip, and Amity digs her nails into my arm and says, “Thank you, Harry. Thank you!” She presses her nose against mine and kisses me slowly on the lips. I feel not only her lips, but the sales clerk’s tension. She unlocks our lips, smiles at the clerk, and says, “It is so wonderful you’ve devoted your life to helping others. I just know there’s a special place in heaven for you.”

The clerk rolls his eyes. “What about this?” he asks, once again holding up the tail of the barely ticking dead rat.

“Good Lord, Aunt Stephanie, just throw that piece of shit in the trash,” Amity chimes, grabbing me by the arm and leading me

out. “I’ve got my Rolex back!” And as we leave the store, Amity mutters, I’ll bet his mother lives with him and his wife. And when his wife goes out, his mother puts him in a diaper and spanks him and feeds him apple sauce.”

“Hell’s bells!” Amity says, pounding on the steering wheel her old Granada. It won’t start. The engine turns over, but it make a horrible noise, as if there are shards of glass in the starter. ‘ Lord baby Jesus loves to fuck with me! He knows I got a watch today, so he trashed my car.”

“Do you have AAA?” I ask her.

“No. Couldn’t afford the membership. You?”

“Nope.”

“Well,” she says, slumping down into the seat, “I’m sure to pay for it now, Bubba. Five times more than that AAA

ship would ever cost.”

We have the sexy Maxwell-Grey valet boys call us a tow, we wait an hour for the guy to show up. We ride in the pulling the old Granada behind us, and when we get to the shop, the mechanic tells Amity it needs a new starter. I pull out different credit card to pay the tow guy and the repair man. Amity keeps fussing about how we’re going to pay off the and insists on taking the Rolex back, but I tell her not to Somehow we’ll get by.

“This is the third time in a year that this piece of shit has down on me,” she sighs. “Oh, well. Now this gorgeous watch my wrist will tell what time it is when my car breaks down. didn’t you get yourself a watch, Harry? Huh?”

“Because I’m happy with my Timex,” I tell her factly.

I’ve been plugging along since I was seventeen, making my in the world and knowing that it’s possible to survive on my I really am happy with my Timex, my casual clothes, my old car. But I have to say it’s a kick to meet someone who

the opulent things my family likes and who actually gets excited about ownership rather than feeling it’s an inalienable right.

Amity, Jackie, and I have just finished eating dinner at the Highland Park Cafeteria a large cafeteria that caters to the kind of families I’ve been running from my entire life: white, conservative, suburban clans tri bed out in Ralph Lauren and Laura Ashley ensembles. The place was loaded with parents whose children were miniature versions of themselves. Absolute clones in penny loafers and espadrilles, their wee hands folded while saying grace, their tongues orange from smuggled sips of fruit punch. The food was great, but there was something disturbing about seeing three-year-old girls with hairdos and makeup, and four-year-old boys who look like investment bankers, asking Jesus Christ, their Lord and Savior, to bless their squares of Jell-O.

We climb into Jacqueline’s old silver-colored Volvo. “Let’s drive through Highland Park!” Amity suggests.

Ever amiable, Jacqueline steers toward the money.

“Can you believe that woman thought her husband was choking?” Amity asks, referring to a woman who began yelling out for a doctor in the cafeteria.

“He just didn’t want to talk to her,” Jackie offers. “He wasn’t choking. That’s why she threatened to do the Heimlich maneuver on him to get him talking.”

I laugh, rolling down my window to invite the cool spring air into the car. “I thought she was saying Heinrich.”

“I’d love to do the Heinrich maneuver,” Amity answers. “Ja jato those German boys!”

“They wear dark socks and sandals over their dirty feet,” Jackie complains. “They have dirty feet that smell.”

“So suck their dicks, Jackie, not their feet,” Amity answers frankly.

Jacqueline looks disgusted and lights a cigarette.

As we roll into Highland Park, Amity shakes and shivers over

the wealthy neighborhood full of old-money homes. My have friends who live here, and my family visited one when I was twelve, but I let Amity think I’m seeing it for the first i time.

Amity’s stomach is full but her eyes are hungry. She claims affinity with the tasteful, venerable properties of Highland Park the families who go with them. It makes me nervous to see her attracted to the world from which I came. I know that her is not from the same station, not with the way she views it.

are we ever going to live here? Girl, we’ve got to get ourselves right guy.”

“I don’t want a boyfriend,” Jacqueline declares.

“Who would? After Arthur!” Author.

“Who’s Arthur?” I ask.

“My old boyfriend,” Jacqueline yells above The Motels, are blasting on the radio. “Arthur was an asshole. He was asshole.” She pronounces his name as Author also.

“He wrecked Jacqueline’s Jaguar,” Amity says, lighting

“He has no conscience.”

“You ought to know,” Jacqueline tells Amity.

I wait for Amity to explain herself, but she raises the joint her lips and sucks in without a word. It’s a pretty cavalier to someone who’s accused you of having no conscience. “What was that about?” I ask.

Amity ignores me, looks out the window.

“You guys have a secret?” I pry.

“Arthur was an asshole,” Jacqueline repeats for the