Sunday, February 2, 2014

The Start Of Something...Maybe

The Merger.

By the time of the merger John Prescott had fallen in love, or whatever was close to it, with Margot Frieche'. He had fallen in love though it was only a guess, he had fallen in love though his family hated her almost as much as they did him, he had fallen in love in spite of himself. What a horrible thing. He had never forgiven the French altogether and Margot was so undeniably French. She ate pastries in tiny bites and sipped wine with vigor and smoked cigarettes so thin that the vice seemed pointless. Besides, he was now dependent. He had to watch her and be infatuated and spend money on the silly things that women liked and be happy to do so. It seemed to him that love or being in love, was something close to insanity.
But there he was, stuck in the mud, stuck with her. It turned out John Prescott was the only heterosexual man in county or country that was disappointed with an exotic knockout.
The day the merger began he was shopping for a night dress which Margot was set to wear to a dinner party with his family. It didn't really matter that the Prescott idea of a dinner party was toast or cereal to soak up the booze or booze to drown the toast or cereal.
She was eager to turn their image of her. She had never been anything but loved, adored, admired and wanted so badly for them to be enamored with her. John could have helped and explained that dress sense meant nothing in the Prescott good book. But he wanted to be rid of her and wasn't under his own power, so he had to let bad things happen.
Margot examined every dress in the store; holding them up to her bosom and pivoting. Then she examined them again, and again, excluding one or two with each rotation. He watched this routine and wondered what the fascination was to him, yet he couldn't deny there was one. All else that had excited him could be logically explained, yet this couldn't.
'Oooh dis one' she said with luster.
'Alright' he deadpanned.
The thing was a deep purple that did nothing for her or anyone. He painted the underside of his boat the same colour and was glad he didn't have to look at it. It was awful but he didn't know what made women look good; she was the only one that had ever looked good to him.
'That's four hundred and eighty-nine dollars' said the wide eyed woman behind the bench.
Prescott looked at her like she'd given him a life sentence. He never thought in dollars and cents, people who did were fools. Rather, currency was just the yard stick to improve his practicality or provide the tools to facilitate ones own self-sufficiency. It was a chain that began in a mans hands and ended when his dependency was at a minimum. There at the counter a decent rifle was being traded for a cloth sack and he would rally against it.
'No, that is ridiculous' he said.
'What is?' Margot laughed.
'The price, I won't pay it'
'Oooh....too late' she laughed again.
Prescott was standing outside the store holding the bag and the receipt. He had jumped an important pocket of time and thought this as clear a sign as any that love was dangerous. She was elated and sang in French until a thin cigarette occupied her lips.
She sang all the way to dinner, messes of words rounded off and smeared together. He maxed out the volume of a Christian country music station trying to drown it, but on she sang with defiance. She was overdressed; the purple sack, blood red lipstick, hair pulled into a modest behive beneath a tiara, long dinner gloves and the smell of perfume at war with that of stale tobacco. She reminded him of Audrey Hepburn and how he had never cared for her.

He was in sharp contrast; a contained mess of flannelette  

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