![]() And so I left, stumbling over the legs of a wicker rocking chair and waving back at her like an idiot. She gave me her business card and smiled falsely. I was scared I’d mispronounce the words chaise longue. “I’m definitely going to think seriously about the couch,” I said. But I could e-mail her photos in the meantime and let her know what I had in mind. “Any custom work would have to wait until after the New Year,” she told me. “The springs are all new,” she said, not bothering to turn around. “Oh, okay.” She scratched her head and started to walk away. Her mouth, as she waited for my answer, was a heavy, wilted rose. I’m thirty-three,” I added, as if this explained something. Apparently they’re attracted to it, to your energy and, like, the vibrations in your brain. “But there’s a new book about hunting by this guy in Montana, I think, who says you should smoke weed when you hunt because it attracts the animals. ![]() “Oh, are you a hunter or something?” Again, her face like someone had farted-fragile and strangely condemning, like a queen’s. And then, “Field dressing?” I looked up at her face for some kind of validation. I broke out in a sweat as though I was about to vomit. She fingered the coils with long, chipped black nails. A tiny key hung from a coiled loop of white telephone cord wrapped around her left wrist. I turned back around to face her crotch-a tender triangle swollen and divided by the thick protuberance of her zipper fly, thick thighs pulling at the weave of the red wool. She told me she had reupholstered the chaise in leather from an old armchair she’d stripped on the side of the road. Mother-of-pearl would look chintzy, I think, with this shade of leather.” I could only clear my throat and nod. “But I like it without the mother-of-pearl. Only that panel has the inlay missing.” She pointed. “King Edward, home on the range” is the first thing I ever heard her say. I took out my cell phone and pressed some buttons, pretending that I wasn’t staring at the girl. ![]() I lay down like a patient in analysis, then sat up again. I pushed at the springs with the palms of my hands. While she was busy with customers, I sat on a chaise longue for sale and pretended to be fascinated. It was that look of revulsion that awoke something in me. Her face was pinched, as though she’d just smelled someone farting. Her hair was frizzy, bleached blonde, and she had a lot of makeup on-too much, I’d say. She wore tight red trousers and a black shirt that looked like the top of a ballerina’s leotard. ![]() This was 2006, and she was selling refurbished antique furniture, which she’d placed around her taped-off space like someone’s fancy living room. I met her two days before Christmas at a holiday pop-up market on the Lower East Side. ![]()
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