Read Online The Beautiful Room Is Empty by Edmund White - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Edmund White
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sticking out his ass, hand on hip, and looking back over one shoulder like a wartime pinup.
We piled into a car with some friends of his, all a few years older than I, and as we passed a policeman directing traffic, the driver lowered his window and shouted, “Love your hat, Tilly!”
“Hush, you’re a caution,” someone in the back seat said, “don’t upset Lily Law, she be bad , that girl.”
In my middle-class way, I tried to show interest in my neighbor by asking him where he lived, what he did, but he peered right into my face and licked his lips slowly like a silent movie vamp. “Hey, it’s cute, this one, it’s real cute,” he announced to Morris in the front seat, pointing at me.
“Like it?” Morris asked, bored. “You like anything in trousers, shameless hussy,” he added, stifling a tiny meow of a yawn with a fluttering palm. Morris’s hands, I noticed, were huge and ropey with veins, strangely ill-suited to the frivolous gestures he liked to sketch in.
“Look, bitch,” my neighbor growled at Morris, “don’t get me started, or your mother will claw your little red eyes out—I’m on the rag tonight.”
“Certainly,” Morris said, smartly turning around and deliberately staring at the other man’s crotch, “you’ve certainly been ragging something; I never saw a white woman pack such a big box, I don’t mind if you tuck in the odd hanky coyly stuffed just to provide a little front interest, don’t you know, but Mary you’ve pushed a double bed sheet up that cooze of yours—not that you feel anything down there anyway, stretched out as it! must! be!” he said, ending his aria on an upbeat. He snapped his fingers and turned away.
“I’ll read you if you wreck my nerves, girl,” my neighbor said. Then he added a loud wailing “Oo-eeh!” just as Mahalia Jackson might have done after an all-out gospel hymn.
We were all smiling. I was mute and ponderous beside my new companions. I assumed each bit of repartee had been coined on the spot. Only later did I recognize that the routines made up a repertory, a sort of folk wisdom common to “queens,” for hadn’t Morris recklessly announced, “Grab your tiaras, girls, we’re all royalty tonight, why I haven’t seen so many crowned heads since Westminster Abbey—”
“I know you give head, Abbie, but the only crowns you’ve seen are on those few molars you’ve got left.” The speaker turned to me, nudged me in the ribs, indicated Morris, and said, “Can you fathom a slut pulling her teeth just to give a smoother hum job?” and then pulled his lips back over his own teeth to demonstrate. “She covers the waterfront, poor dentureless crone, looking for seafood trade.”
We stopped at a gay coffee shop. As the youngest and quietest, I was pushed to the aisle, just beside the next table of straights, two couples on dates, slumming, I guess. I prayed for the guys in my group to calm down. But the presence of hostile, if mesmerized, heterosexual spectators made them hysterical. Morris leaned across the table and asked a “sister” huskily, “Like my lashes? Ronnie dyed them, said it’d give me definition.”
“Honey, the only definition that fits you starts with Q and rhymes with—waitress, beer , please,” he shouted at an old tattooed man in white shirt-sleeves who worked the lobster shift. He looked at the waiter more closely. “Oh, you’re a waiter, not a waitress. Sorry, Dearie, I thought you were a Fish for a moment, there’s such a strong smell of Fish in here tonight, wouldn’t you say?” He was staring aggressively at the two girls beside me. “Can’t bear Fish or Fisheaters, smell like cans of old tuna.”
The girls had stopped chewing their gum and were noisily sucking the ice melt in their Coke glasses. I smiled conspiratorially at them, as if to say, Aren’t these guys weird, but I noticed that they were looking back at me with open disgust. One of their dates said, “Some people are sick, real
We piled into a car with some friends of his, all a few years older than I, and as we passed a policeman directing traffic, the driver lowered his window and shouted, “Love your hat, Tilly!”
“Hush, you’re a caution,” someone in the back seat said, “don’t upset Lily Law, she be bad , that girl.”
In my middle-class way, I tried to show interest in my neighbor by asking him where he lived, what he did, but he peered right into my face and licked his lips slowly like a silent movie vamp. “Hey, it’s cute, this one, it’s real cute,” he announced to Morris in the front seat, pointing at me.
“Like it?” Morris asked, bored. “You like anything in trousers, shameless hussy,” he added, stifling a tiny meow of a yawn with a fluttering palm. Morris’s hands, I noticed, were huge and ropey with veins, strangely ill-suited to the frivolous gestures he liked to sketch in.
“Look, bitch,” my neighbor growled at Morris, “don’t get me started, or your mother will claw your little red eyes out—I’m on the rag tonight.”
“Certainly,” Morris said, smartly turning around and deliberately staring at the other man’s crotch, “you’ve certainly been ragging something; I never saw a white woman pack such a big box, I don’t mind if you tuck in the odd hanky coyly stuffed just to provide a little front interest, don’t you know, but Mary you’ve pushed a double bed sheet up that cooze of yours—not that you feel anything down there anyway, stretched out as it! must! be!” he said, ending his aria on an upbeat. He snapped his fingers and turned away.
“I’ll read you if you wreck my nerves, girl,” my neighbor said. Then he added a loud wailing “Oo-eeh!” just as Mahalia Jackson might have done after an all-out gospel hymn.
We were all smiling. I was mute and ponderous beside my new companions. I assumed each bit of repartee had been coined on the spot. Only later did I recognize that the routines made up a repertory, a sort of folk wisdom common to “queens,” for hadn’t Morris recklessly announced, “Grab your tiaras, girls, we’re all royalty tonight, why I haven’t seen so many crowned heads since Westminster Abbey—”
“I know you give head, Abbie, but the only crowns you’ve seen are on those few molars you’ve got left.” The speaker turned to me, nudged me in the ribs, indicated Morris, and said, “Can you fathom a slut pulling her teeth just to give a smoother hum job?” and then pulled his lips back over his own teeth to demonstrate. “She covers the waterfront, poor dentureless crone, looking for seafood trade.”
We stopped at a gay coffee shop. As the youngest and quietest, I was pushed to the aisle, just beside the next table of straights, two couples on dates, slumming, I guess. I prayed for the guys in my group to calm down. But the presence of hostile, if mesmerized, heterosexual spectators made them hysterical. Morris leaned across the table and asked a “sister” huskily, “Like my lashes? Ronnie dyed them, said it’d give me definition.”
“Honey, the only definition that fits you starts with Q and rhymes with—waitress, beer , please,” he shouted at an old tattooed man in white shirt-sleeves who worked the lobster shift. He looked at the waiter more closely. “Oh, you’re a waiter, not a waitress. Sorry, Dearie, I thought you were a Fish for a moment, there’s such a strong smell of Fish in here tonight, wouldn’t you say?” He was staring aggressively at the two girls beside me. “Can’t bear Fish or Fisheaters, smell like cans of old tuna.”
The girls had stopped chewing their gum and were noisily sucking the ice melt in their Coke glasses. I smiled conspiratorially at them, as if to say, Aren’t these guys weird, but I noticed that they were looking back at me with open disgust. One of their dates said, “Some people are sick, real
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