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Doesn't Rock |
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by Theodore McDermott
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2:00 |
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I wore a welding helmet to the Halloween party (I was dressed up as my father, as only my brother identified), so it was like watching the world on widescreen. When she walked into the frame from stage left dressed as a Slutty Pilgrim (puritanical everywhere except the hemline of her black mini-skirt), I knew that I recognized her from somewhere, though it took me a minute to realize that a few days before I had moved her out of the two-bedroom apartment she’d been sharing with her boyfriend (her ex-boyfriend) and into a studio apartment that smelled like the KFC it was above. At that time, in my early thirties, I operated an uninsured and unlicensed moving company that advertised only through free Internet classifieds, and I spent the money I made on the slot machines in Gary and on rum drinks in Chicago. Everyone we moved was desperate; if they weren’t, they wouldn’t have hired such disreputable help. So, though she was radiant and reserved in her simultaneously dour and coquettish disguise, I thought I might have an outside chance.
I stubbed out my cigarette in a bowl of mixed nuts and followed her out onto the balcony, where she was going alone. She said something about how I was like a horror movie antagonist when I lifted my visor and revealed my scarred face. I didn’t tell her that that part, the scars, wasn’t part of the costume. Instead, I said something about how these new aluminum bottles were the worst of both worlds. I asked her if she remembered me, that I had moved her. She remembered. “You broke my rocking chair,” she said. “It doesn’t rock anymore.” I denied that we had, couldn’t bear the idea that she would resent me. She left at a decent hour with a guy who was the goalie on my brother’s men’s league soccer team. I lingered until dawn on the couch beside a girl who lived there, who was dressed as a bear but who had removed the head due to the heat and had placed it between us, as a barrier. Around seven, I went home to my girlfriend.
Theodore McDermott has work featured in various publications, including The Believer, The Minus Times, and McSweeney'’s. He was nominated for the 2009 Essay Prize and attends the MFA program in Missoula, Montana.
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