Read Online Postcards by Annie Proulx - Free Book Online Page A

honey. I hate to say it, too. “Prosthesis.” Sounds like a nasty poison snake. “He was bit by a prosthesis.” That’s how come I been so long without doing anything about it. Couldn’t say it. Atta girl, big sweet smile for the mutt. I’ll tell you, little girl, a couple months after it happened I hitched down to this place in Rhode Island where you can get fitted for something, the hook, I think, but I couldn’t go in. I was too embarrassed to go in. I could see the girl sitting there at the desk, and I just couldn’t go up to her and say—’
    ‘Dub. How you doin’!’ Big old Trimmer, beefy and wide, long Johns sticking out of his filthy red-checkered shirt. He stank of gasoline and oil, of horse and BO and roll-yer-owns. He winked at Myrtle with his heavy eyelid and made a sound with his tongue, the same sound he made to his team of skid horses.
    ‘Trimmer. How goes?’
    ‘So goddamn good I can’t stand it. Here I am lookin’ for some grief to tone down my joy and exuberance, and I look across the room and there the two of you sit, made to order, glarin’ at each other. That’s it, true love, I think, only a question of time before she throwshim out the door on his ear. Dub, I wanna talk to you later, you got a minute.’
    A spot at each end of the stage went on, the beams pooling in the center, lighting up the dirty microphone cords, the blue drums. A man with receding hair and the devil’s pointed teeth came out, dressed in a powder-blue jacket. He held a dented saxophone. Two other old men, the gimpy one with his Red Pearl accordion, the fat shuffler with a banjo, both in grimy powder-blue jackets, sidled onto the platform. They looked disgustedly toward the anteroom at the side of the stage. Smoke eddied. In a minute a teenaged boy wearing brown slacks and a yellow rayon shirt loped to the drum set, a cigarette still burning in the corner of his mouth. He rolled the snare for a hello and the saxophonist’s hollow voice came out of the microphone. ‘Good evening, ladies and gents, welcome to the Comet Roadhouse. Gonna have some fun tonight. The Sugar Tappers for your dancing and listening enjoyment. Starting off now with “The Too Late Jump.” ’
    ‘Back in a couple of minutes, my boy. First Miss Myrt and I got to show the yokels how to do it.’
    Didion shouted as they walked onto the dance floor. ‘Watch out, sparks gonna fly now!’ Howard came down to the end of the bar to watch. The drummer began with a barrage of hard, shattering sound, and one by one the men in the powder-blue jackets straggled after him, the saxophone hollow at first, but working up into a set of squeals and shrieks.
    Myrtle and Dub stood hunched like herons, facing each other, only Dub’s upheld hand moving, shaking, fluttering like a strip of cloth in a gale. With a Zulu leap he sprang at Myrtle, spun her under his arm until her skirt stood out like a dark cup, and began to snap her to and from him. Her patent leather shoes like ice. The other dancers stood away, giving them the floor. Dub kicked as hard as a horse. The bright sweat flew from his face. A rain of hairpins behind Myrt, the cascade of crimped hair tumbled loose, their feet thudded.
    ‘Save yer peanut butter jars,’ screamed Trimmer.
    ‘Deer meat! Deer meat!’ Didion, with the highest accolade he knew.
    When Dub came back to the table where Trimmer sat in a cloud of pipe smoke he carried the two-quart glass pitcher of beer. His sidesheaved, runnels of sweat glistened in front of his ears, hung in bright drops under his chin. Myrtle leaned back in the chair, panting, her legs opened wide to let the cool air move up in under her skin, her damp blouse unbuttoned as far as was decent. Dub first poured her a glass of the cold beer then drank thirstily from the pitcher. He set it down in the middle of the table and lit a cigarette for Myrtle, then for himself. Trimmer hauled his chair closer in to the table.
    ‘That was some dancin’. I couldn’t do