Vicky Swanky Is a Beauty Read Free Page A

Kevin said, was peace, prosperity, and freedom.
    And I more or less respected Cynthia Crosstick. I didn’t like her at first. She is not very nice. She’s odd, but that’s the whole point.
    I didn’t like my fly brooch at first either. It’s fake. You can’t
get it wet. It’s very rare and the colors are not nice and I get lots of enjoyment from that.
    I picked up Glad Steaming Bags and Rocket Cheese.
    “It’s very cold. Do you want some lemonade?—” said a child at a little stand, “we give twenty percent to charity.”
    “No!” I said loudly, as I exited the emporium, although there might have been something to enjoy in swallowing that color.
    “Why is she crying?” the child had asked an adult.
    Why was I crying?
    I had tried to hear the answer, but could not have heard the answer, without squatting—without my getting around down in front of the pair, bending at the knee, so that the proverbial snake no longer crawls on its belly.
    I should have first stooped over.
    The lemonade girl hadn’t mentioned the gumdrop cookies they had hoisted for sale.
    Just the mention of cookies brings back memories of Spritz and Springerle and Cinnamon Stars—party favors—attractive, deliciously rich, beautiful colors, very well liked, extra special that I made a struggle to run from.

GIVE THEM STUFF
    I ate everything I had and had cramps that somehow fitted together. PIE was on the sign. This was well beyond where the poor people live in their hamlet. PIES VEGETABLES. A woman who took orders there popped a lozenge the color of bixbite into her mouth.
    She wore a hat, tasseled magnificently.
    In the style of a train trip, we take other trips or a car trip or we go away in a fictitious form.
    We’re not sure how many parts or places can be put past us—but all this I slyly enjoy.
    I think of intimate friends from days gone by and how exquisitely my pie has been traveled.

THE DUCK
    I am a disappointment, so I drank the milk. I finished the milk quickly, and then took a low dosage of the tea. I lit a lamp—nearly blushed in the company of myself.
    With this sort of blow, I am very unpleasant. Delmore and Constantine know how unpleasant I am.
    On such a night, I normally display figurines on the table—a bear holding a staff; a man holding a house; a man holding a house standing on another man—you know, how birds sit on each other.
    Constantine—one of the finest men I’ll ever know—walked in my direction like a duck who’s wrung himself out. My recommendation to the duck would have been—don’t fly alone and why fly so high. Do the other ducks know you’re out here on your own? Do you even know where the other fucks are? Are you looking for the other fucks?

IF YOU EVER GET THREE OR FOUR LAUGHING YOU WEREN’T SOON TO FORGET IT
    Marg Foo had been flirtatious with me once. Now she sits in her Avenger as if it were an upright chair and tells me, “What could you do so that I would forgive you?”
    So, now it’s show time. In the best of times we are nibbling. Fix your mind on the sweep of the action—on the swish, on the smash, and the bang.
    Marg left, perhaps for the rest of her life.
    Tim kept to himself. Gertrude married again.
    I am going to pick up Mr. Reed in the basement.

PROTECTION, PREVENTION, GAZING, GRATIFIED DESIRE
    Vera Quilt knows the princes she says. There was some big event—a horse with plumes, and soldiers with ruby buttons, shiny helmets, and swords—when she met them.
    If there had been any doubt about my feelings for Vera, now there was not. I looked at her warmly.
    The air was cold and I mention this because this is a miniature world with levels of experience where people may starve to death.
    At some distance from us there was a mob of people—they’re wonderful people—and broad-leaved evergreens, and a flock of birds behaving normally.

    “Hoo!—hoo!” Vera began again.
    “Now, what do you want, Vera?” I said. Vera and I—we resolve everything in under an hour. She