Veronica by Mary Gaitskill

the cover in bright colors. At the top of the stairs was a large room with two men in it. They wore beautiful clothes and they whirred like little machines that somebody wound up every day.
    “Where’s your book?” asked one.
    “Book?” Confusedly, I glanced at the girl with the paperback.
    The whirring stopped. A human head popped out a litde shuttered hole in his mechanical head and glared at me in disgust.
    “She’s one of Gregory’s,” whispered the other.
    “Oh.” He mildly rolled his eyes and withdrew back into the mechanical head. The whirring continued. “Walk a little; then turn to face me,” he said.
    I walked a foot and he said, “Thank you. Next!”
    The next week when a roommate yelled up the stairs that “somebody model agency” was on the phone, I said, “Tell them to fuck off!” and he did, loudly.
    Weeks passed; it got cold and the park emptied. The smell of flowers was gone and by itself the pot was a thin and ragged wrap. Even in the dark, you noticed garbage. You saw shadows running out of the corner of your eye. Gangs of bikers came, huge men with a feeling of piled-up corpses inside them. One of them had a puppy with a dirty rope around its neck. Its eyes were full of misery, and when I petted it, it felt dead inside. It was like it had been killed while it was still alive. The guy holding the rope smiled maliciously. Very slowly, I turned and walked out of the park.
    It got too cold to sell flowers outside. Lilet went to Las Vegas with a guy who had bought her an orange fake-fur coat. I got a dress at the Salvation Army and interviewed to be a file clerk. I still sold flowers, but instead of going to the park after, I went to my room and wrote poems. I was going to go home, go to community college and learn to be a poet. I fantasized about becoming famous, but I couldn’t picture what famous poets did. I could only imagine walking around while people photographed me. I could imagine Gregory Carson’s tiny hands clutching the glowing rim of my world, and his tiny, longing head peering over it. I imagined that over and over when I lay in bed at night.
    I was going to call my family and tell them I was coming home, but before I could, Daphne called and said our mother had just moved out and gone to live with a guy from the car repair place. “Daddy feels like everyone’s leaving him,” she said. “He cries at night, Alison. It’s horrible.” I asked her to put him on. I felt like a hero, telling him I was coming home to go to school. He asked when. I said in a few weeks—when I had the airfare. He said he’d send me the money, and I felt proud refusing it. I didn’t wonder how he felt offering it. He was quiet and then he said, “Just get here as quick as you can. I love you a whole lot.” When Daphne came back on the phone, I asked her if he’d really cried.
    “Just once that I heard,” she said. “But I think it’s been more.”
    She waited for me to say something, but I didn’t know what to say.
    “I think maybe if you come back, Mother will, too,” said Daphne.
    I still didn’t say anything. I was remembering something that happened when I was ten. I was walking with my parents in an underground parking lot and my mother tripped and fell on her face. She went straight down on the concrete, then lay there with her mouth wide open, arms bent and palms flat, like she wanted to push herself up but couldn’t. She lifted her head and made a long, low moan, like a cow. Her body had protected her face, but her breath had been knocked from her. I didn’t know what to do. I turned to my dad, who was just behind us. He was smiling, like it was really funny to see my mom fall on her face and make a stupid noise. When he came close, he hid the smile; it amazed me how fast he hid it. “Lord,” he said. “Are you all right?” He helped her up, and it turned out she was okay. But I still hated him for smiling. I remembered it now, and I tried to work up anger at him again.