Beautiful Enough

I.

As a young woman, Emily felt as if she had been blessed with all of life’s available gifts. From a very young age, her mother had taught her that the possession and maintenance of beauty was to be valued above all else. Growing up, she was continually told by those surrounding her that she was the most beautiful girl around and so it was no surprise to Emily when, in college, a handsome man fell head over heels for her flowing auburn curls, full lips, large eyes and ample breasts that pushed against her shirt in a subtly inviting manner. He was a drama major and therefore prone to spontaneous declarations of love in theatrical tones and he made her feel as if she were the star of the world’s movie.

She forgot her dream of becoming a fashion designer when their daughter Beth arrived. She immersed herself in motherhood, enjoying all the power it gave her. Though she considered herself and Mitchell to be the perfect couple, she never let herself dwell too long, for if she did she could undo years of convincing herself they were happy and so very much in love. She saw him staring at her greedily still, and that was enough. She did not need recognition or acknowledgement of her other attributes – she was beautiful and that was all that mattered.

Still, she was a jealous and suspicious woman at the best of times and though she had never allowed herself to ask, she had taken it into her head that Mitchell had betrayed her on many a previous occasion. His charm was irresistible, she knew and he took advantage of that whenever possible.

She sat alone now, having had it blatantly pushed in her face for the first time. Her fingernails drummed against the table as she waited. She waited for Mitchell to come home.

II.

Her glass was almost empty when the front door closed with a soft click. A floorboard creaked beneath Mitchell’s foot and he cursed. In the kitchen, she gulped the last of the cheap white wine, winced as she swallowed and waited. She got up and walked to the sink, placing her glass gently on the rusting surface. Her gaze rested upon a patch of metal eroded with repeated use as she heard him trip up the single step and stumble into the room.

“You’re home,” she said with her back to him.

“I am!” he said with a lofty air and when she turned to him, his arms were outstretched and he was smiling. She could feel her frown as it began and saw his face register the change.

“How was the rest of the party?” she asked, her voice hard. He sighed and sat heavily in a chair at the table.

“It was fine,” he said dismissively with a wave of his hand.

“And Marian? You two seemed pretty cosy.”

He said, “What of it?”

She looked down at her feet. She remembered Marian touching his arm as they giggled like school children. How they had left together, saying they needed more whiskey. She had tried to slip out of the party inconspicuously, but Heather Gainsworth had pointed at her as she stood and said in her high, obnoxious voice, “And where are you going without that lovely husband of yours?”

“I’m going home, Heather.” Her voice was quiet.

She looked at Mitchell from where she now sat across from him.

She said, “I know how you get. Especially when you’re drunk.”

What was left of his brown hair covered the dirty fingernails that rubbed his forehead. His eyes were squeezed shut in concentration.

He said, “We just went and got whiskey.”

She counted to ten and tried to breathe. Then she said, “And? For Christ’s sake, Mitchell, just spit it out.”

She watched his face consider this. Then his eyes left her for a moment. Lost, in the memory of Marian, she thought. He sighed again.

He said, “When I got back to the car she was already in the backseat. I was, am drunk. It was just so...easy.”

Emily could see it now, could hear her voice. Every muscle in her body tensed and she tried in vain to force it to relax. She should not have asked. She should have let it be. He was still talking.

“It only lasted a minute or two. We were both drunk.” Mitchell’s voice was muffled and slurring from beneath his hands.

She said, “What? What only lasted a minute or two, Mitchell?” He lifted his head and looked at her. And she knew then, had always known. She felt something inside her shatter.

“Christ, Mitchell!” The words hit the air with the sound of glass breaking. “Did you get her off? Did you? Did you come inside her? Oh, Jesus! Did you enjoy yourself, then?” She could hear herself screaming. She suddenly thought of Ralph, Marian Wyman’s husband; she wondered if he knew. What would he say to his wife? What would he do?

“No, I didn’t. She didn’t. It just...I don’t know, Em.”

Her chair screeched as she pushed herself from the table. She found herself standing beside him before she knew how she got there. She hit him, only once, the blow landing on his nose. Then she was on the floor, his weight bearing down on her.

“Please, Emily,” his breath was hot on her face, her arms pinned behind her

head. “Don’t let this...just don’t.”

He kissed her neck and she felt something flicker deep within her. She wanted to feel him inside her but the simple thought of it provoked her knee to connect with his groin. He curled into the foetal position. She ran to the door.

III.

Jack poured her the fifth double shot of whiskey. She drank it down in one gulp and waved for another, the ice tinkling lightly against the glass. He smiled at her and simply sat the bottle next to her on the bar.

“Go nuts,” he said, his voice sympathetic. He’s patronising me, Emily thought, he can see it on my face. She picked up the bottle aggressively and filled her glass to the brim.

“Thanks,” she said sarcastically. Her fingers traced words carved into the wood in front of her by many a past patron as she scanned the room. It was almost empty, dimly lit and cold. A man and a woman stopped talking and stared at her, their stillness taking on a surreal quality that began to frighten her. Deer in headlights, she thought. The room suddenly seemed to grow smaller as she looked back down at her hands.

Mitchell had not apologised. He was not sorry. Emily saw his rough hands pulling at Marian white cotton briefs, heard her gasp as he entered her. She shut her eyes so as to starve her mind of the light it needed to conjure such things but they were still there, vivid and sickening.

A man sat down beside her at the bar. His black hair resembled that of someone who had just fallen out of bed in shock, his broad shoulders outlined against a grey shirt.

She lit a cigarette and looked sideways at the man. He was looking at her.

“What are you drinking?” he asked, his voice low and unhurried, one that could be mistaken for someone lacking a few too many brain cells.

Indicating the half empty bottle, she said, “Whiskey. Straight up.” The edge in her voice was gone, replaced by a sly and suggestive tone.

There was not much more to be said. He locked the door to the cubicle of the toilet, pushing her up against the wall with gentle force. He lifted her so her legs wrapped tightly around his waist as she reached for his belt buckle.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered. She wanted to push him away then but instead she shut her eyes and felt his lips press against hers.

She sat there for a long time after he was done. The toilet was freezing and she felt tired, her head heavy. She heard the door slamming in the main bar, Jack wandering, clearing tables. She looked at herself in the mirror. She made faces at herself, going through all the fazes of innocent smiles, sultry pouts, sexy glances and furtive invitations. Then she was crying and so she turned away. Jack knocked at the door and she was still, hoping he would leave her be. The door opened slightly and his arm held the bottle of whiskey through the crack. She took in with a sad laugh, touched his hand and then he was gone.

The tiles made her shiver as she hugged her knees on the floor. Her throat felt like fire and ice colliding every time she took a sip but it seemed to help. Numbness set in and she sagged against the wall, her eyes wandering upwards to the cracked and peeling roof. There was a pay phone outside, she remembered and thought of her mother, drunk and watching infomercials at this hour of the night. She stood and wiped her eyes, stepping out to see that Jack was already looking at her.

“I just have to make a call. Will you still be here when I come back?” She sounded like a small child, pleading desperately for candy.

“Yeah Em, I’ll be here all night. Take your time.” He watched her walk to the door.

“Mumma?” she said in the ensuing silence that followed the click as her mother picked up.

“Who’s that?” Her voice was rough.

“It’s Emily,” she could hear her voice breaking.

“What do you want? I’m trying to watch my shows.”

Emily paused for a moment, considering the stupidity of this decision and its consequences on her fragile state of mind. She watched a moth flutter against the light, beating itself repeatedly, trying to gain the unattainable. That’s me, she thought.

“Em?” her mother growled, interrupting her contemplation.

“He cheated on me, Mumma.” There was silence so she continued. “I found out tonight. Mitchell...he-”

Her mother said, “Yeah, and? Why did you call me?”

“I thought, I thought you might know what to do. What I should do. Why he did it.” She knew it was hopeless, but she was hopeful nonetheless.

“Well, I don’t know what you should do. You’re a grown woman, work it out for yourself. Why did he do it?” Emily heard her sigh. “Maybe you just weren’t beautiful enough. I don’t know; ask him for Christ’s sake.” She hung up.

Emily stood there a moment, frozen, until an angry beeping noise assaulted her ear. She put the phone down. She walked back inside.

IV.

“Men?” Jack was smiling at her as she looked up at him.

She said, “What?”

“Men. Is that what’s wrong? We can do a lot of damage.”

She nodded, “You sure can.”

He said, “My wife died four years ago.” Her eyes locked with his in surprise.

“I’m so sorry.” She thought how overused and underrated that statement was, how inappropriate it was in this context. It was not her fault, but it seemed the obvious response.

“It’s okay,” he sighed. “Two weeks before she...passed away,” he continued, choosing his words carefully. “I was with another woman.”

He saw her wince and said, “Ah, I hit a raw nerve, did I?”

She nodded again.

“I never told her. She was so sick and I felt so terrible. I was weak and she deserved better. But my sister, my sister decided to tell Janette, in her state, simply out of spite. Caroline told me at the funeral. Janette never said a word.”

Emily wondered at the phenomenon of near strangers willing to share their lives with others but was grateful for it at the present moment. She and Mitchell had never spoken like this.

He reached above him and took a photo off the shelf. He put it in front of her. The woman’s face was sunken and devoid of colour. Her red hair was frizzy and wild, her eyes half closed and her buck teeth biting her peeling lips. Emily visibly cringed at the sight.

He continued, “I loved her so much. She was the most beautiful woman.” Emily’s face could not hide her disbelief. “Yeah, yeah, I can see you’re not with me on that one.” He smiled again. “She was amazing: kind, caring, honest, intelligent – we could just talk and talk forever – and most of all, she was forgiving. She could have tortured me with the knowledge, God knows, I deserved it. But she didn’t. She knew I would torture myself enough for the both of us. She spent her final time here just loving me, and that, that is what made her so beautiful. So perfect.”

He stopped then and looked at her. She was watching the tiny droplets cascading down her face slash upon the wooden bar.

She said, “I have to go.”

“Okay.”

She took the final sip of whiskey and placed a fifty on the bar.

“Thanks, Jack.”

V.

She wandered aimlessly for some time. The streets were brightly lit and focussing only produced more stumbling. Trying to think felt as if she were attempting to rearrange blocks of coloured smoke inside her head. She felt better, but worse. She touched fences, trees, lamp posts; their texture reassuring her. Then she was outside her house and she stood for a moment. All the leaves had left the trees and their silhouettes stretched towards the sky in the darkness. She thought then that she would like to remember this moment forever, the breeze hitting the warmth of her face like a wall.

She leant her against the front door for a brief amount of time. Trying to find the lock to insert her key proved to be more difficult than first anticipated, the mass of alcohol depriving her of her depth perception, balance and sanity. The door handle groaned as it turned abruptly and she fell into a hallway as if gravity was only a myth, cursing at the amount of noise she made. The carpet smelt of gritty warmth and wet dog. With great effort she pushed herself from the floor.

“Emily, is that you?”

She flinched at his voice and stayed silent. She crawled from the hall to the lounge, finding the cabinet along he way. She pulled out a bottle, three quarters full of brown liquid with a green label covered in indecipherable lettering. She lit a cigarette and inhaled severely. They had agreed not to smoke in the house after Beth was born, but she considered this occasion an exception to the rule. She crashed to the couch ungracefully and put the bottle to her lips.

Later, she stood in the bathroom, staring at herself in the dirty mirror once again. Her face was blank and sallow. The only light came from the slowly rising sun in the window. Emily opened a drawer and felt among the cough medicine and cotton buds for the scissors she knew were there somewhere. She looked intently at herself for what felt like an eternity, as she was for the final time.

“Emily?” Mitchell was at the door.

She chose a piece of hair, raised the scissors and before she could think anymore about it, snapped the blades shut. Her brown hair fell lightly into the sink. She smiled and repeated the motion until all but a centimetre or two of hair remained on her scalp.

“Em? What are you doing in there? Where have you been?”

She leant on the sink and let her head fall forward.

“I need to talk to you. I just...open the door, Emily. Emily? Come out. Come out and talk to me.”

She touched her hair, feeling its newness and freedom. She considered using the scissors to dissect other unnecessary parts of her anatomy but felt this, for the time being, was enough.

“Emily, please. Let me in. I want...just come out, won’t you?” He would not leave. She heard him pacing quietly.

She said, “Mitchell, just hold on a moment, okay? Just wait.”

She picked up her severed hair from the sink and dumped it in the trash can. She put the scissors behind her back. Then she opened the door.