1. Terrifying Tale of the Garden Rapist

          In the midst of a completely random day at work, my office phone rang. “This is Dr. Stiles.”

          “Don’t kill me.” It was my boyfriend, Thad. As he was capable of many, many things that could result in me murdering him, I was immediately afraid.       

          “Oh, good God, what did you do now?” I sat down in my old desk chair wondering how much this escapade was going to cost me, emotionally or fiscally.  

          “What made you think I did anything?” He scoffed. I heard him light a cigarette.

          “Are you smoking in the house?”

          “No,” He lied. He always lied. He considered it one of his charms. “And anyway I’m outside on the porch.”

          “So you are smoking?” We had both quit smoking last year; I having given it up after twenty years, and he about the same. But he had decided himself fickle enough to pick it back up.

          “No,” he exhaled. “Lookit, someone just came to the door and it was this weirdo lady and she wanted to know about the irises out in the front yard…”

          “The tall white ones?” I asked. As a stay-at-home husband, my dear Thaddeus was easily excitable.

          “I dunno. Let me talk!” Thad hated to be interrupted, but as I relished asides, I seldom provided him this peace. “Lookit, she said she liked them-the irises- and wanted to dig them up or something, or exchange plants-flowers-with you, something like that, but I told her she would have to come back after you got off work and talk to you, since they’re yours.”

          I pivoted my chair to look out my office window at all of the passing college students outside the English building. "So she didn’t just take any?”       

          “No,” he exhaled and I imagine the long beautiful plume of smoke and cringed in regret: I could still taste it, and it tasted good. “I just told her to come back after five. That’s it.”

          “So the house is okay?”

          “Yes! Why do you always think that I’ve burned it down or something?”

“Because you did set the kitchen on fire…”

“I did not!”

“You did.”

“It was just a singed tea towel!” he yelled, “And I should never have even told you about it! You never would have known!”

“I smelled it for weeks…”

 “I thought you said we weren’t going to bring that up again?”

“You said I wasn’t allowed to bring it up again. I never said anything to the effect.”

“Whatever, Mike! I just wanted to tell you some crazy gardening lady was going to be here after five to talk to you.”

          “Oh, well, that’s fine.” Once I realized he had not lost the cat or crashed the car or accidentally dropped the laptop in the sink (again), I was suddenly terribly amused with the thought that some random woman was so taken by my irises. As a middle-aged gay man who had recently settled down into non-state sanctioned matrimonial bliss, gardening was one of my few free joys. “What did she look like?”

          “A weirdo. Long hair like Crystal Gayle, but up in pony tails with little girl ribbons.”

          “You’re kidding?” I laughed.

          “No,” he chuckled, “She looked kinda like an insane German doll. I was afraid of her so I only talked to her through the screen.”

          “So she couldn’t kill you? You know that mesh screening saves lives. Did she have a knife?”

          “No. She just looked very, very intense, with these crazy eyes. Like she really wanted those irises…”

          “Well,” I sighed, “She can’t have them. They are heirloom. I bet they’re as old as the house…”

          “Whatever,” he exhaled and hung up.

          I held the phone and hated that he hung up before I could say goodbye. My step-father did that, and I hated it when he did it too.

          Once home I paced, straightening, in preparation for our guest.

          “What are you doing?” Thad said. “You’re not having her in are you? The insane crazy eyed German doll?”

          “Well, what if she wants to come in, we could at least tour her through the house. Do we have any lemonade?”

          “Lord! You’re the crazy one! ” He threw his hands up and left the room.

          I was very proud of the house: a 1925 California Bungalow in pristine condition. I had bought it in 2000, and Thad had lived with me since late 2008. The house was full of many antiques, mostly tasteful, but some questionable. The house was very much reflective of my whims, filled to the brim in a sort of decadent Victorian whirl. And Thad, God love him, humored me by allowing me to continue to collect old china pieces, odd bits of furniture, and the random taxidermied bird here and there.

          A car pulled up in the drive and I readied myself. Through the tea-stained eyelet lace curtains I watched a man and a woman emerge and walk up the big steps to the broad porch that hugged the entire front of the house.

          “There’s two of them,” I whispered loudly to Thad, who was back in the Den, clearly out of earshot.

          “Can’t hear you,” he called over the TV.

          “Come here!” I barked.

          “Can’t. News is on.”

          Flummoxed, I checked myself in the mirror and peered back outside to find them standing right on the other side of the glass.

A knock and I jumped back with a small shriek, which is an unappealing thing for a large bald man to emit.   

          Clearing my throat in the most masculine way, I opened the door to find the couple. She was wide-eyed, short, with odd ponytails peaking off her head at strange and exotic angles. Thad was right: she had very crazy eyes. The man with her looked like a reformed hippy, calm from years of pot smoking, his pants pulled up too high.

          “Well, Hello. I am Angelique and this is my husband Paul. I came by earlier and your-friend-said I should talk to you about the irises out here.” She had the slight cadence of the country; clearly uneducated, but not deep country, so I was not too afraid.   

          “Yes, hello. My name is Michael. My friend told me you were coming by.” We were using ‘friend’ in that way polite Oklahoma people meant ‘homosexual counterpart,’ as we can’t use  ‘partner’  around here as people just think you’re talking about cowboys. But I was used to it, so it was fine.

          The woman continued, “I told your friend that I was interested in talking to you about your irises.” She said it in a very Jehovah’s Witness ‘May I talk to you about Jesus’ kind of way.

          As she talked I looked her up and down. Her crazy eyes had a rather odd LaToya Jackson slant to them. The man just smiled and nodded along, as if he was used to taking orders. But they were both clearly odd, and not in the good way. It was then that I decided I did not want to give them the tour of the house.

          “Yes, well, let’s go look at the irises you’re talking about…” I said, exiting out to the porch.

          We walked out into the front garden and made a few more general pleasantries before she got down to business.

          “I was just driving by. We live just around the corner some, and I work down at the Dairy, so I drive by here a lot. And I’ve noticed what a great garden you got, and I’ve just started gardening myself, and plants are real pricey at Wal-Mart, and I got me a lot of smaller irises and I was wondering of you might want to trade some of yours for some of mine?”

          “Why, sure,” I said without thinking. I was just mesmerized by the woman herself. She wore snug mom jeans, 3 or 4 sizes too tight. She had a sleeveless blouse on typical of the local folk, and was pretty enough for a 40 or 50 year old, but it was that hair that got me. It was the sort of hair that was highly prized in the 1970s: big and long and flowing free in those two majestic tails. The husband had still yet to speak.

          “So I brought you some of my irises in case. They’re out in the trunk.” She continued, “So, you want to do this?”

          “Well, sure. Sure. That sounds fine.” I said, again, without thinking. Beyond her appearance I was also taken up by the desire to be courteous to a neighbor, as well as charmed by the fact that she admired my garden, which I had worked so hard on. But she was moving this transaction faster than I anticipated.  

“Okay, then,” she said, and as I continued to be filled with that silly Sally Field, “You like me! You really like me!” feeling, she went out to her car and came back with a bucket and a giant three foot gardening fork. She dropped the bucket at my feet and brought the big fork up in front of her like a samurai sword. It was buffed to a fine shine, tipped with five, eight inch long tines. I saw her crazy eyes reflected in it, as she passed it between us, almost ritualistically.   

“There they are.” She said proudly, nudging the bucket with the fork.   

“Oh, yes,” I smiled, bending to inspect the bucket.  

What she had dumped before me were the withered carcasses of 5 or 6 limp, feckless miniature irises of the most commonplace colors. But as I looked back to her, what took me more was the fact that her Charles Manson eyes were now roaming my perfect lawn, zeroing in my gorgeous four-foot tall majestic heirloom beauties. My eyes narrowed and I realized I was cornered, as I had agreed to this swap.

It was at this point that the porch door slammed and Thad emerged.

“Hey,” he smiled at them, joining us, no handshake. “How’s it going?”

“Well, look,” I pointed down at her mean little bucket, “They want to do an irises exchange. Isn’t that neat?”

He peered into her bucket, and not one to be bothered by tact snorted, “Are those even irises?”

“Well, yes, they’re irises, you silly” the woman snapped, moving close to us, “They’re real pretty, they’ve just already bloomed.” She looked back to me, brandishing her giant shiny fork.

“Oh, I bet they are…” I said looking to Thad with that imploring look of

‘SAVE ME! THEY ARE TAKING ME HOSTAGE AND THIS IS MY ONE ATTEMPT AT FREEDOM!’ kind of way.

But he just smiled a chimerical smile and said, “Okay, just thought I would say ‘hi.’ Bye.” And he turned and went back into the house.

Coward! And just typical. He could beat rats off a burning ship if there was a couch and a TV remote somewhere in his eye line.

The woman and her husband looked at me. I could tell she knew that her shoddy little crap flowers were crap, but  she was too caught up in getting her hands on my innocent heirlooms to care. Her lips pursed and slightly curled up one side, revealing cruel teeth.  

“They are really pretty when they bloom,” the husband said to break the silence, pointing to his wife’s bucket. He had finally spoken, to defend his mate’s insanity. 

I looked around and realized there was only one answer without looking like the worst neighbor ever: “Sure. No problem. But let’s get them from the backyard.”

“Ha!” She cackled, grabbing the bucket and handing it to me. “Here, now you go empty this and I’ll start getting me some.”

My stomach turned. I looked toward the house and saw Thad standing in the Study window smirking at me thought the eyelet lace curtains.

Bastard.  

The woman wanted the entire backyard garden tour now that she had victims to stalk. As we walked, I pointed to the native Oklahoma rose stand and the wisteria covered arbor, but her big crazy moon eyes darted from one iris bed to the next.

“Oh, you have so many. So many. I didn’t know you had them back here too…”

“Yes, they came with the house…”

“Is it okay if I start?” she jittered.

As looked like she might jab me with the giant fork of hers so I just smiled, “Sure…” 

With a laugh she began her harvest, thrusting that fork into the ground with more gusto that I would imagine from a small pig-tailed woman. She wailed on the end of it till a fat tubular root popped from the ground. Then she grabbed it, and massaged it with her fake French manicured nails to get the dirt off, and then tossed it in her bucket. Over and over this happened. The husband just following her silently, as she danced around, talking to herself, “Oh, here’s one!” and “I need a violet! Oh, yes, a violet!” and “Just one more yellow. They are so tall and so pretty.”

I stood transfixed: I was not a lenient sort, and she was messing with my OCD perfection.

“Oh! Look at these!” She headed straight for my Grande Dame irises.

“No, no," I stopped her. "Those are my favorite. I planted those special, right there next to the back door …” They were tall and sleek with an iridescent white flower, like no other in the yard.

“Oh.” She looked very hurt

I felt bad as compared to her I clearly had so much: nice clothes, an education, decent diction. But I stood my ground.

She slumped away and I watched her begin to dig in the back part of the yard. As I watched I realized that there was an uncomfortable passion to her progress. This led me to believe there had never been any children in her life, only odd periodic hobbies to fill that void, and this was her current one: terrorist gardening. And for that I felt for her, as gardening had often filled a similar void in my life over the years.   

Once she filled her bucket with 10 or 12 of my babies she asked, “Oh, but can I have just a few more? I can empty the bucket in my trunk and fill it up again.”

I had begun to sweat, although it was a comfortable spring day. I was beginning to feel that horror I felt when as a child I watched the Grinch slither after the last can of Who Hash.

“Well, it’s getting late…” I began.

“Ah, what do you say? It’ll just take a second!” She waggled her bucket at me and I realized that I was now standing between her and that which comforted her at night and whispered sweet things to her in her dreams, covering her childless hollow.
“Well, I have had a long day….”  I continued.     

“Oh, you silly!” she giggled, “It won’t take a minute.” And with that she skipped out to her car, leaving me completely aghast: I had just used the white polite suburban ‘no’ and she had just ignored it.

I looked over at her husband, who shook his head and snickered, “When Angelique gets an idea…she gets an idea” he said.

I wanted him gone too. I wanted them both gone. And I desperately wanted a cigarette.

The horrid woman returned with her bucket empty and fork at the ready. I was now determined to speak up for myself and tell her we were done here.

But I did not, could not be so rude, as she dug up some more tall yellow ones and I even stayed mum as she went after the brilliant violet ones, but then as she lurched near the Grande Dames again I blurted out, “Ok, that’s it-we’re done here!”

She looked stunned, as I guess I had bellowed it.

“Okay. Oh!” she said, sounding hurt. “What about just one more of these? You have so many…”
The Grande Dames appeared powerless next to her and her giant shimmering fork. Her look was one of crafty country guile.  

I cleared my throat and mentally total myself not to scream. “Well, like I said before, those are really my favorites.  So ‘no’ really does mean ‘no’ here…”    

“What if I bring you some more of my nice ones to make up for it?” she sing-sang like a little girl, twisting one of her braids in her fingers, in what I assumed was suppose to appeal to me in a come hithery coy way. Instead it just made me very, very afraid of her, like I had just heard her rattle snake rattle.     

So I said nothing, but my face turned a dark crimson. 

“She’s real persistent.” The husband said, sidling up behind me.

I turned to him to say, “She certainly is…” and we exchanged a few meaningless words between strangers before I turned back and saw that devil of a woman depositing a huge forkful of my precious Grande Dames straight down into her grimy bucket. It was like they had been working in a team, he to distract me, and she to grab them.

 “Hey!” I began, stomping over to her.The Grande Dames were now half gone, a crater now gaping right next to the back door.  

“Oh,” she scoffed, dancing back away from me. “It’ll be fine. I’ll bring you some more of mine to fill that, and maybe we can do this again soon. Paul, come on!” And with that she smiled and exited the yard, her bucket bulging with my precious flower bulbs, her silent husband in tow.

I looked about, mortified, mouth agape: my perfectly manicured garden now had little dirt piles all over, as if mole men had attacked and sucked the plants down into their lair in the center of the Earth.   

In the Den, I walked up to Thad. He looked up at me and rolled his eyes, “What happened?”

“She just wouldn’t stop. I mean I asked her too. I mean I said ‘that’s enough,’ and  ‘no means no...’” I sat down dramatically, and continued, as if recanting a scene from The Accused. “And she just took and took, some of the prettiest ones, and it was like I couldn’t stop her…”

He lowered his magazine, “So she raped your garden?”

“Yes. Yes she did. She raped my garden.”
The fear in my voice was only half put on.   

        

2. Conquering Hero

        Covered in sweat, my heart pounding, I ran into the house panting, “Thad! Thad! Come here!”

          I leaned against the door frame to catch my breath.

          “What? What? Are you okay?” he ran in from the Study, where Oprah blared about Her Favorite Things. Thad, at 39, did not look a day over 30. He was, as he had always been, handsome and tall with sandy ringlet curls, well appointed, and completely  aware of the power of his looks.

          “I just saved a woman’s life!” I wanted to dramatically fall into the closest couch, but as it was the green velvet 1880’s East Lake piece, I swooned more to the left, past the antique German six legged coffee table, and then to the right to fall onto the easily cleanable, modern red velveteen couch. 

          “You did what?” Thad ran over to me, concern jagged on his face. “Are you okay?”

          “Yes, yes…” I panted, wiping my forehead with the back of a shirtsleeve.

          “You saved who from what?”

          “I saved...a woman...from a dog,” I loosened my tie and wiped my hands on my khakis, letting out a long ‘whew…’

          “A what? A dog?” he stood upright and arched an eyebrow like he does when he wants to convey ‘pissy.’ It always worked.

          “Yes! A dog.”

          “You saved a woman’s life from dog?” He repeated. “Was it a big dog?”

          “Well, no, but it was a barking dog.” He apparently didn’t understand the deed I had accomplished.

          “You just saved a woman from a small barking dog? And now you’re about to die of a heart attack from it? ” He said with as much contempt and snide as he could muster, which was quite a lot even by homosexual standards. “I thought you had been hit by a car or something the way you were screaming when you came in here…” He put his hands on his hips, a stance I hated.

          “Oh, hush-up.”  I took a deep breath.

          “Look, Oprah is just about to announce…”

          “Don’t you dare walk off! You listen to my story.”

          He frowned and folded his arms, “Fine. How did you save this woman’s life from a small yapping dog?”

          “Well,” I began dramatically, after a deep breath, “I was just walking home from campus after teaching my Shakespeare's Tragedies class, and I heard this cry for help. It came from one of the side streets right along the main road. Anyway, I looked and saw a pretty little sorority girl in tiny shorts trapped up against a tree with this awful barking feral dog lunging at her.”

          “Oh, Lord…” Thad said, rolling his eyes.

          “Shut-up and listen,” I snapped. “Anyway she was making these little girl ‘eeks!”’-it was here I stopped to make the ‘eek’ sounds, which he did not seem impressed by at all, so I continued, “and  when she saw me she screamed ‘Help!’ So I did what anyone would have done. Without even thinking I ran over and started screaming at the dog and waving my arms.” I paused for effect, for which he also did not seem impressed, “And then the dog stopped and seemed scared- but it didn’t run off. Oh, no. Then it ran at me! And I screamed to the girl ‘Run!’ and she ran off the other way in her little shorts and I looked down and now this horrible little thing is launching itself at me, and I am just terrified, as you know I hate dogs, so I just screamed, and I don’t know where this came from, but I just screamed,  ‘I will fuck you up, dog!’ while waving my arms above my head dramatically and the dog just turned and ran right off.”

I smiled with huge self-satisfaction at the absolutely astute description of my feat of courage.

          Thad laughed, which was not the reaction I neither expected nor wanted. “You said ‘I will fuck you up, dog’?”

“Yeah, so?”

“So you said it like that so the dog would know you were talking directly to him? And not just screaming it at, say, the trees?”

          “Well, yeah. I guess. I didn’t want the girl to think I was screaming it at her, or any of the other neighbors.” I hadn’t really thought about it until that moment, what with the testosterone still coursing through me and all. I was just glad to be alive, and not dog food on some sully side street where they don’t even mow properly. 

          “So you addressed it-this weird little profane war cry of yours-directly to the dog. Like, ‘I will fuck you up, Cat,’ or ‘I will feed you now, Grandma!’” He outright laughed in my face.

          “I think you’re missing the whole point to this,” I said wiping my brow with the back of my hand, “I saved a damsel in distress. I defeated a foul creature and saved a princess. I am a hero.”

          “Ha!” He spat, “It was a dog, a small dog. You do not get to claim ‘hero’ here.”

          “But it was a barking dog….and I did save her….”

          “Fine. Whatever. Oprah needs me,” and Thad turned to leave.

          I was flabbergasted. He was not treating me like the conquering warrior that I was. “I am a hero.”

          “No. No, you’re not, Michael.”

          “You should be proud to be with me!” I yelled, “They will write songs about me! About my heroism!”

          “You’re not a hero.”

“I am. And this hero wants Hamburger Helper for dinner.”

“Well, Mr. Hero, you can make it yourself, or maybe get that little dog you defeated to make it, because I am busy.” And with that Thad left the room.

          I frowned and called out, “Don’t you come screaming to me next time you need saving from some random beast!”  

          “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he called back, “And you’re getting sweat all over the new silk pillows.”

          “Oh!” I jumped up, seeing that I was.

 Even conquering heroes have to respect fine Chinese silk.    

3. The Blue Stuff

          One evening while in Homeland Grocery Store doing our weekly shopping, I heard Thad gasp from the next aisle. I ran over, afraid he had hurt himself, or more importantly hurt someone else, as he was a hapless shopping cart driver. I found him standing, staring up at the end rack display of Blue Willow china, his lips quivering.  

The store had brought in the china as a promotion a few months ago. Each week they ran a special where you could get a different piece at 25-50% off, depending on how much you spent at the store. Each week he would moon over whatever new pieces were on special, running his fingers along the delicate navy blue and white lines, tracing the Chinese inspired pattern, mumbling sweets things to the covered boxes. And thus far I had talked him out of forcing me to buy any of it by citing that “even at  half price, it’s too much, especially on one professorial salary-plus we already have formal china, daily china, and, don’ t forget, that Christmas china you had to have last year.”     

          But now, I could just tell by the look in his eyes, this was going to cost me.

With thrilled, thrilled eyes he pointed to the sign that said, “CLEARANCE-80% OFF!” And before I could take a breath he grabbed me and screamed, “We have to get it! My Grandmother has this same pattern and I have always wanted it! Always! And I haven’t felt complete since I saw it here! Please! We have to! It’s almost all gone!  And I only want four place settings!”

“Sure…sure, whatever,” I said, prying him off of me, as the polite passing heterosexuals tried not to stare at the middle age homosexual having a complete God-damn hissy fit melt down right in the middle of aisle five over decorative dishware.   

“Oh, thank you! Thank you!” He gushed, as if I had just promised him a lung, or cashmere. He grabbed the cart and began filling it with boxes of the china, singing a joyful muttering chant to himself as he did.

I stood back, afraid if I got in his way he might take my arm off. It was a good deal on the dishes, and it was pretty china, but I’m not sure it was worth hyperventilating over. But at this juncture, I decided to keep that observation to myself.  

As we left the store, we were now in possession of four dinner plates, four tea cups with saucers, a large serving platter, a large salad bowl, two fruit bowls, six dessert plates, and a covered sugar bowl. 

In the car he tore into one of the boxes, pulling out a gleaming new dinner plate. He held it like it was gold, pure gold.  

“Isn’t it beautiful?” He flashed the plate at me. “It’s the oldest china pattern still in production.  The design is based on a story of two lovers, see here they are…”

He shoved the plate in my face.  

“Driving!” I screamed, swerving the car.  

“Oh, sorry.”  He pulled it back, “I’ll show you later. But the pattern tells the story of a rich girl who falls in love with a poor boy, but the girls’ father wouldn’t let her marry, so she runs off with her lover. But the father chases them-see, that’s the evil father there on the bridge.” He held up the plate and pointed to something I could not make out.  

I glanced over and said, “Uh huh,” while trying to also keep my eye on the road.

“And them something happened, and they get killed or something and the gods turn them into birds, and the whole time the blue willow tree watched over them, or something like that. See the birds.” He held the plate back up, again pointing.

I wanted to backhand him, but did not as I had not seen him this excited about anything in a while. Since we had really started to settle down recently, things had been more, shall we say, staid. So, when happiness came and alighted upon us, I figured we should embrace it, no matter how ridiculous it seemed to me at the time. So instead I said, “Uh huh. That’s neat.” 

          “Whenever we eat at Ma'am's, she pulls down her Blue Willow china and tell the story and point to the little people on the plates. I always thought it was so romantic. She has a beautiful collection.” His wide eyes innocence always made me happy.  

          “Do you think the other Homeland stores have their dishes on clearance too?” he asked.

          “Probably,” I answered before I realized the implication.

          By the end of the day I had to drive us to the other three Homelands in Norman, where, indeed, they each had a motley hodge-podge collection of clearance Blue Willow china. He collected four more dinner plates (as he had changed his story and now wanted eight place settings, not four), three salad plates, six soup bowls, two large serving bowls, a creamer, and two more tea cups with saucers.

          As we drove, he held the boxes to him as if they continued life-giving forces from the unknown.

          That night he sulked until I promised to take him up to Oklahoma City the next morning to check out their Homeland stores. He swore he only needed a few more pieces before he could die happy.   

          The next morning we went to four Oklahoma City Homelands before noon, and only one store had some of its collection left. He found 3 more salad plates and treated the finding like he had discovered radium. Between stores he tried to sweeten the pain by going on and on about what beautiful luncheons we would have on the china, but I was tired and just wanted to done with dishware for the day.    

          As we drove out of the parking lot of Oklahoma City Homeland #4, heading to Homeland #5, he sighed, “Dinner plates, dinner plates, dinner plates? What about salad plates? Why not a tea cup? How hard is a tea cup? I mean, you can't serve a proper high tea with enough tea cups...”

          And I lost it. “Do you know how you sound? You sound like a crazy old woman. You sound like the Garden Rapist! You need to get a hold of yourself.”

          “What?” He seemed genuinely taken aback, as I had so far faked having a nice time. 

          “I mean, all of this. It just seems silly. Don’t you have enough yet? You’re just obsessed. For God’s sake this is our second day out on a dish run! It's like you're addicted to decorative china!”
             His face tightened and his bottom lip quivered and I knew I was in for it. 
          "Oh, and this coming from a man who pushed a woman with a metal leg over to get to a piece of Wedgwood?”

          My mouth fell open. I paused and took a breath to regain my composure, to belt, “Well, that was Wedgwood! Now that’s completely different, and you know it!” I had loved the jasperware pale blue and white china since I was a child, and now finally had a decent curio collection of them. “And I didn’t push her down, I just nudged her and she happened to fall.”

          “You pushed her down! A woman with a metal leg!”

          “Well, what the Hell? It was the first day of the estate sale. If you have a metal leg you should learn to just get out of the way when they first open the doors! I mean, Lord have mercy!”

          “And I need to get hold of myself?” He sneered.

          We frowned at each other, both holding our own.

          I loved Thad because he was one of the only people I had ever met that could stand up to me, one of the only who didn’t back down from my bullying. But I hated when he bested me. And I had the distinct feeling I had just lost this argument.

“Okay, Fine! But just one more store.” I sighed. “What more do you need?”

          He chuckled triumphantly looking down to his little list, “Two tea cups, two soup bowls, and two salad plates. Then I’ll have eight complete place setting. That’s all. Just those pieces and I’ll quit.”

“Good.” I said, “Now where are we going?”

“Head north.” He showed me where to go the little map he had printed up just for the occasion.

“Okay,” I said pulling out on to the main road. “And that’s all?”

“That’s it. No more. I swear. Oh…” he exclaimed. “And a tea pot. I have to have the teapot. I mean what’s the use of all the tea cups and saucers without the matching tea pot?” he tittered like a confined maiden aunt.   

          “Fine” I boomed, hoping to the bottom of my heart of hearts he would find the tea pot of his dreams so then he would just let me go home and sit in silence.       

4. Frankie Goes to Home Depot

           In the drawer pull aisle, I am always confused.

          “Do they have milk glass?” Thad asked.

          “I don’t see any.” I answered.

          “Why are they so hard to find?”

          “I don’t know.”

          Thad walked off and I continued to stare at the myriad of pulls. Who needs so many varied drawer pulls? Just give me a basic antique white- milk glass-farm house drawer pull, and I’ll be happy. But no dice.

          I looked around and sighed. There was no one to help me.

It is a sad lot when the highlight of a weekend is a trip to look at drawer pulls at Home Depot. What happened to the excitement? The verve? The 80’s and 90's dance clubs with their pulsating, pulsating lights and the smoke machine belching out vicious soap-smelling fog? The drinks and the people laughing, me the center of all of the attention, spinning, spinning, spinning.  

          It’s my age. Forty is a horrible, horrible thing indeed, and 41 was wearing on me like a pair of ill-fitting underpants. I was finding that past 40, you were just looked on as a hop, skip, and a jump away from demented oblivion. Forty is the final bell that says “Wake up! You’re an adult! Now start acting like it.” And 41 is a damn, damn mean age, petty, full of whiny pomp and back pain, and necessitates having to get up in the middle of the night to pee.

          I saw Thad pass at the end of the aisle, talking to himself, as he does, and  realized: this was all his fault.

 We had dated on and off for twenty years now,  more off than on, but he had always been my only real boyfriend, the only one I would stop dancing for long enough to take seriously. So when we got back together three years ago, I think we both realized that we were finally old enough to take ‘us’ seriously. That and the stank of old age was creeping into our sock drawers in ominous whiffs and neither of us wanted to die alone.

          So we merged, much more successfully than we had ever before. It was the fourth or fifth time, but we have yet to settle that argument. Whatever the case, we merged in much love and commitment, in a thrill of dancing and drink and parties and an explosion of confettied happiness. The first two years were like New Years Eve: we were dressed-up, it was fun, we were out, we were drunk, then there was a misunderstanding, someone cried, someone took a swing at the other, we fought and then passed out, and then woke up the next morning not remembering everything, but feeling terribly ashamed by all of it. But it was such fun, yet after about a year-so emotionally draining and tiring on our aging bodies, that we had to slow down. So once the ‘new dating’ smell had worn off, we decided we needed to get ourselves in order… and began abandoning of all the childish things we loved so dearly.

The first things to go were the cigarettes as they were expensive and we knew they were killing us. I still miss them every day. And now he has started back up, but  pretends I don’t know, running off to smoke in the backyard, like I can’t smell it on him. But I allow it, as it was the least terrifying of his multitudinous panoply of vices.

The liquor went quickly after the cigarettes, as what was drinking without smoking? It was like nachos without cheese; and nobody likes just a damn plate of hot chips. Plus we would just get loaded and fight, so it was for the best.

But with the loss of drinking, came the loss of our drinking social circle, i.e. friends, as well as all the bars and clubs, as who wants to be around drunks when you’re sober? Drunks always want to touch your face, which was great while you were drunk too, but sober it’s mortifying.

And with those sacrifices, the fun rather died, all by our own conscious murdering hand. 

          So here I now stood on a Saturday night, two years cigarette free and one year alcohol free, looking down the aisle at the man who ruined my life.

          Obviously oblivious, Thad walked off.

 “Are you finding everything?”

I turned. It was a Home Depot employee I recogonized. He who looked like the handsome plumber from Desperate Housewives, and  had worked here a while. Being the jealous type, Thad had informed me a number of visits ago that I was no longer allowed to speak to him, and that I could, “just go find a helpful lesbian if I really needed advice on which edger to buy.”  

“Antique white-milk glass-farm house drawer pulls?” I said plaintively, looking around to make sure Thad was gone, so he couldn't launch himself on us like some sort of trap door spider.

“Huh, let me see.” The guy turned and bent down, to start digging around the drawer pull bins. He was very handsome, probably about my age, but very rugged in that Americana kind of way that is so popular in these parts.            

“I’ve been looking around, but haven’t found exactly what I want. I found some peacock blue ones at Lowe’s, and Target has clear glass, but I want the milk glass.” At this point I was just blathering. I was sillily loquacious around handsome men, not knowing when to hush up.

“Milk glass is white, right?”

“Yeah, yeah…” I launched into a long and pointless story about the Venetian origin of milk glass as the man shifted around the floor in front of me. He had a very expansive back, wider than most. Thad was clearly more handsome, as I had always found him to be, but this man’s back was very interesting to me. It appeared wide enough that it might have settlements, borders, hemispheres, even an equator.    

The man rose, “Well, I don’t see any.”

“Okay,” I smiled, looking into his eyes, looking to the floor, looking back into his dreamy Plumber from Desperate Housewives eyes, then looking back to the floor.

 “No problem,” the guy said, then “This might sound weird. And I’ve seen you in here before, but did you use to work up at clubs in Oklahoma City in the late 80’s, early 90’s?”

 “Why, yes. Yes, I did.” My face lit up with fireworks: I loved it when my past societal notoriety flared its fabulous head. I looked right at him, taking a super hero stance there in the drawer pull aisle. “I worked the door at Roundelay, that dance club up in the Paseo in the City, and I hosted some raves up there, and even worked a few clubs down here in Norman, back in the day.”   

“I thought that was you! The guy laughed. “I went to that old Paseo club two or three times with a fake id! And I thought I recognized you before, but you were the doorman, weren't you! You wore some mean outfits! That’s so cool that it’s you. That was a great club.”

“Yeah, it was totally great.” I laughed loudly, like an imbecile. “It was really, really fun working there.” My entire world was now again full of cigarettes and liquor and dancing and laughing girls and sunlight and sassafras and everything else that was good and pure in the world, as I was once more magnificent.  

Then I saw his face go dark, like all the happiness in his life had suddenly been extinguished, like a Harry Potter Dementor had just stuck a finger in his ear. And I knew Thad was behind me. He must have sidled up and seen me talking to the big backed Plumber from Desperate Housewives. I could now even hear him breathing, a ragged crazed in and out, in and out.

“What you doing?” Thad said in a voice of possession. 

I turned quickly. “Nothing. Just asking about drawer pulls…” was all I could eak out, red faced. The little golden vision of myself was gone with a ‘pop.’

Thad’s bright blue eyes narrowed to slits and his full lips were pulled crazy  small, like he wanted to stick his hand right through my chest like a Wes Craven villain. I always found his jealousy to be endearing, right up until the point he caught me flirting with someone. I would never cheat, and he knew that, but he still could not control his anger over even the slightest hint of a possible flirtation. And now, right here in the drawer pull aisle, I was not finding it terribly cute at all.

“Sorry we don’t have them,” the worker said, “You might try back in a month or two to see if any come in.”

“Thanks,” Thad said snappishly, inserting his body between me and the man.

“Yeah, thanks,” I said, turning. I wanted to shake the worker's hand, to introduce myself, but knew Thad would eviscerate me if I even attempted flesh to flesh contact.  

“Come.” Thad said, and we turned to sulk down the aisle.

Thad didn’t speak until we were in the parking lot. “So, did you make a new friend?” The word ‘friend’ dripped with acidic alien blood.

“No. I just asked him about drawer pulls…”

“Just stop it!” He cut me off, hands up in full diva attack, “I heard what you were talking about! And I don’t want to hear it!”

“Oh for God’s sake, nothing happened. He came up to me and asked me if I needed help…and then he brought up the clubs I worked at in the 90’s. He recognized me from Roundelay.”

“You’re kidding. He really recognized you from back then?” Thad said with a tone that I took as an implied stab at my impressive weight gain since I was 22.

Hurt, I continued anew, “I wonder which of my outfits he saw me in? The blue fun fur Cookie Monster Cossack?  The vinyl bell bottoms?  The giraffe pile overall short shorts?”

“Stop it. That was, like, twenty years ago.”

“I know,” I frowned. “But still…”

“But really.” Thad said decisively.  

“I used to be fabulous. I used to work clubs…I used to work fabulous.”

“’Used to’ ” he snorted.

I frowned, feeling less than less, and hating Thad for ruining me.  

Ruining me.

We walked to the car in uncomfortable forty year old silence and drove for a few minutes before he said, “Want to go to Marble Slab? I’ll buy. ”

“Oh, can we?” I giggled and clapped my hands. And with that my sadness and hatred slid away, as ice cream mixed with candy made any night Saturday night a real Saturday night.  Even with the horrible boyfriend who ruined my life.