Ecstatic

by Victor La Valle

  –Now folks fom Lumpkeen gon recanize me, but yawl out-tatownas will nut. Jus’ call me Uncle. Lahk we was blood.

  Our Uncle raised his hands jubilantly and I wasn’t the only one to gasp.

  He was a small guy, I said that already. Could have been four foot eight; maybe he even had lifts in his shoes. Neither a midget or dwarf; a little person, but not clinically. Shrunk. But when he put his arms up they were as long as ski poles; that doesn’t sound like much but remind yourself how tall he was. It had a freaky effect because when he put his arms straight up it looked as though he’d flung a pair of hands high enough to touch the ceiling, but his body remained in place.

  –Now. Now. De reeson I struk up de tens an’ invited yo’ gurls an’ famlees heah is cause I don’ likes dat udda pagint. De Miss Inn-oh-sins. ’Cause ovah der dey’s plannin on tellin yo gurls whut’s wrong wit ’em. Dey gotta be dis tawl an’ dis skinny an’ if dey not, den fo-get it! Am I raht? Yes ah am.

  –De peeple of Lumpkeen been seen muh contes’ go on tree yeahs tuhday. But dis yeah we gots fotunate an’ had all yawl famlees fum out-ta town comin fo’ dat otha one an’ I wanned yawl to come ta mine. I’m jus’ glad ta know de flyas was put in yo rooms an’ dat so many parens was willin’ to bring yo gurls. Or was it yo gurls dat browght alla you?

  Lots of the parents laughed at that and it was probably true. Some girls go for the enjoyment; Nabisase was one of those, but most were pre-teen professionals. If their parents wouldn’t take them, I swear they’d charter planes.

  –We gonna start bringin in dese gurls thas jus so lubbly, sweet an’ fine. We not gon as’ dem ta weah a church dress or bee-keenees in fronna you lahk dey wus sides hung up fah sellin. Dey gonna come up an’ tawk. Tell whey dey frum an what dey been through cause hahd work make fo’ bootiful souls.

  I thought the crowd might be insulted, since he was telling them to forget the Miss Innocence format; that they’d feel he was chastising them in raising their daughters for beauty. But really he was making a deeper claim. That despite their splotchy skin or scrawny thighs this man, our Uncle, wanted to reward character.

  The first few girls were Miss Innocence transplants and they did badly because they hadn’t learned how to present themselves. Pageants were acting jobs, find the script and play that role. Most of them had the same heroine: pretty, firm, optimistic. That’s what those first girls did wrong.

  None were in gowns, but they wore cosmetics, hair made up all darling. Trussed up like this Uncle Arms (I heard others whisper the nickname) complimented the girls; he called them pretty, splendid, hellafine. Terms that earned tens on other judging sheets, but with Uncle Arms the wretched scored highest. The tenth girl was the first local to come along, wearing badly beaten Vans and a polyester sweatshirt.

  The parents of Miss Innocence girls stifled laughs, en masse, looking at the pitiful uniform. But she received applause from half the room. Effusive praise from our Uncle when she recounted how her father had been fired from the apple orchard six months ago.

  Soon as that act did well every out-of-towner changed strategies. Hair drawn into plain buns, blemishes displayed. And pitiful life stories for everyone. Those girls, the ones who’d traveled, were still in dresses (though not gowns), but they tried to compensate by slouching when they walked on stage.

  –And it’s ben hard to stay in school, said the nineteenth girl, because the factry closed and won’t reopin.

  –Well bless ya, said Uncle Arms to the teenage girl. Bless ya much. ’At’s whut I say.

  The young girl nodded then walked off the stage, out the tent and as the flap fell back I saw her go to the end of the line forming at that third tent, last point in the relay.

  Another girl, fatter but more cheerful, walked onto the stage.

  –Gi’ yo’ Uncle a peck!

  The old man flirted, as old men are allowed to do. She touched his dessicated cheek lightly then pulled back up to smile.

  –Now tayl yo’ Uncle ’bout de misfortoon an’ miseries.

  –My Daddy and I are here this weekend for the pageant, but my Momma is not.

  She paused as the tiny old man touched her hip. –Wha’ couln’ yer Momma be heah on such uh impotant weeken’?

  The girl let her shoulders drop lower. –Well, you know we’re just reglar folks from Tennessee.

  – Go on an’ tell it gurl, we all jus’ good folks, we unnastan’.

  –Well, my Momma was plannin’ to come along, but then she was forced to work on the weekend. She already put in five days, but they told huh she had no choice.

  Audience women nodded, familiar with tyranny.

  –An’ whut r dey makin her do? Dem people she wuk foh?

  The girl dug her nails into her palm which might have been a tactic for producing tears.

  –Momma had . . . she had . . . she had to go to Singapore to meet with the Minister of Trade and Industry.

  The girl did cry at least. A third of the room felt compassion based on performance alone, but the rest of us held our applause. Even the old man looked at her crossly. He couldn’t muster up some closing homily so he just pushed her out the tent. –Let’s us git anutha gurl up heah.

  You know who stepped out next, so why should I even say her name? It was going to happen, I knew this, but when my sister walked out I covered my face.

  Nabisase still had Grandma on her back, but didn’t look exhausted. Grandma weighed little and my sister was probably so excited she was strong. Nabisase could have untied her grandmother before now, but my sister must have wanted to win.

  Nabisase undid the sheets from around them then Grandma climbed off her grandchild gingerly. Already the gathered group was sucking the inside of their collective cheek with a curiosity that could be turned to sentimentality with a flick.

  – Come ovah ta yer Uncle, said the man.

  –Good afternoon everyone, Nabisase said.

  Manners were smart.

  –An’ who’s dis heah wif ya?

  –This is my Grandma. She’s ninety-three.

  – R ya heah foe da pagint?

  –Yes sir.

  Sir! The only sir I’d ever heard Nabisase use before was the first syllable in the word service.

  –An’ where’s de res’ of yo kin? Yer Maw and Paw and sech?

  –I don’t have no other family, Nabisase whispered into the microphone. It’s just my grandmuvver and me. We’re orphans.

  15

  Even after Nabisase left the tent under a blush of hearty applause with Grandma hitched on her back again, even while the old man bent to pray for the poor child, I didn’t move except to take the wallet out my pants and check the name on my driver’s license.

  The band came and left the block three times while other girls told their woes. Regardless of race, culture or where they’d come from, Ohio, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, the out-of-town girls really exaggerated their local accents, but still ended up using the same pitiful Southern-Fried pitch. As if suffering was in the nature of only one region.

  Whereas Miss Innocence demanded beauty and virginity this little carnival was a desolation pageant; in the testifying tent subjugation brought about our rapture.

  The winner got a modeling contract.

  Girls were in competition for print work in local advertisements. Nothing national, the contest just wasn’t that big. Maybe there’d be some catalogue work for the Grand Prizee.

  Uncle Arms would announce the winner on Sunday afternoon to accommodate the many new participants who’d need the night free for that other, bigger pageant.

  –Now I’s so prowed tuh help dese gurls cause I know what de bad days is. Am I lyin? I am not. But lemme tell of sumpin good which is dis heah Oonited Stetes dat we lib in.

  –I know der ben tubles, look at me an tel who know dat betta. But I ben to Aingland. Iss funny ta tink about, ain’t in? Me. Uncle Allen, in Aingland and Frans too.

  –An ova der dey got de rish peeple an po’, but you know dey poor peeple cai
n’t neva get rish? Not neva? Dey got class ova deah, dat’s whut some peeple say. Well dey got class ova deah awlraght! Po class, workin class an uppa class.

  –Den I come back to Amerrca an eben dough I seed us fightin wif eash otha I know dat if one a y’all git money den yous livin rich. We got no classes in de States an I’m prowed of it. We got dem peeple borned rish an dem othas dat becum it, but boff gets ta buy a fahn house. Am I lyin? No I am not.

  Even I was feeling proud as Uncle Arms went on. I believed him because I could see him. Uncle Arms was his own billboard for striving.

  –We not gonna hab just one oh two winnas an pack up dem otha gurls. Naw. We gonna hab many gurls workin cause I wan plenny of ’em ta git a chans. Dis heah is abou oppoitunitee.

  The people applauded happily but nobody gave up their ghost; if you think he sounds like a preacher then you’ve just never met a man who works on commission.

  Like most others I left the tent. Those who remained only wanted to speak with Uncle Arms. At first he obliged them from the stage, but even with that extra foot he was shorter than a number of the men and some of the women. When he finally stepped down for handshakes he disappeared.

  I walked over to the third tent although I wasn’t looking for my sister anymore. Is it fair for me to have been insulted? I was a wart that been dissolved. Good that I didn’t see Nabisase or Grandma because I would have thrown my last two malapees at those foundlings. I would have screamed that my sister had lied. I would have ruined her chances. That’s how angry I was.

  In the third tent blue or yellow tickets had been distributed to the teenage girls, but I’ll bet it didn’t take long for the women with the yellow ones to realize they might as well be in the deli line at a supermarket. When I left the second tent it was five o’clock and the third tent already looked like an OTB at closing, with losing tickets covering the floor.

  When he walked outside I tried to bump into old Uncle Arms myself, but kept missing him. Misjudged the angle of his head versus my elbow. When my sister publically crossed me out of her record book it made me wonder why they’d wanted me to come down here at all. I thought I’d be needed during the pageant, but I guess I really was only the driver. And they didn’t want to leave me in their Rosedale home in case I’d rub my dirty, naked buns across their pillows.

  After the third try to bump him I just introduced myself. – I’m a reporter, I said.

  His first reaction was to recoil. – No no, I promised, I’m here to write three thousand words about the other pageant.

  This calmed him. –Where fum? he asked.

  –When did they start calling you Uncle Arms?

  He made a scouring face. –None eva do, ta ma face.

  –I’m sorry.

  He smiled showing two gold capped front teeth. – I saw ya in dat suit an’ I taught dat you had mannas, Brass Ankles.

  –I do.

  – Well whut ye did wit ’um? Et ’um?

  –Look, I don’t want to get into an argument. My fault. I’m sorry.

  I followed him past the third tent, where a woman swept the yellow tickets away.

  – How long ya ben in town?

  – Since yesterday night.

  – Fine anythin’ ta tern yer nickel yet?

  – Only that some of your girls have been lying about their circumstances.

  We went off Braddock, right on Louden. A pawnshop one block away advertised a sale on weapons. This meant handguns as much as knives. Rifles more than nun-chucks.

  Along the wall of this corner pawnshop there hung a white banner showing Uncle Arms’s grinning picture. Not a painting, but a professionally digitized photograph. The caption read: Your Uncle has got just the place for you. For home loans call.

  –Mm hmm, Uncle Arms replied.

  –I’ve got proof of one contestant in particular who’s falsified her family history. My editor says it’s a much better story. The depths to which people will sink just to win. I’m very excited about it.

  – Wha paypa it wuz you workin wit?

  –The New York Observer. We’re mean-spirited.

  I expected him to question me. Maybe even yell. Instead old Uncle Arms pushed me into these bushes. He sacked me amid some Canadian Hemlock.

  –What you claim to have heard you shall not speak again, he whispered.

  He crouched on the balls of his feet. The back of my head was against the shaded earth.

  I asked him, –Where’d your accent go?

  16

  By six o’clock that Saturday evening I was back outside the Hampton Inn next to vomiting from fear as I walked to the front desk. I poured myself coffee from a silver urn on a table.

  The clerk was a pencil-shaped woman in green vest with a white long-sleeved shirt underneath. She waited for me to speak but my coffee was so hot that I was concentrating on keeping my mouth shut to keep from spitting it on the floor.

  So she finally asked me, –Are you 603?

  – 350 at the most!

  She hesitated, but I wasn’t trying to be cute.

  – Did you leave your bath running when you went out today?

  – No?

  – Sure?

  – I’ll have you know that I haven’t bathed once in twenty-four hours.

  She believed me, which solved the problem of my guilt, but she stepped backward and covered her nose with one hand.

  –The maid came to take up your sheets, she explained from her distance. The whole room was flooded up in there.

  – I’m sorry about that.

  She stepped forward quickly. –Why apologize?

  –No one likes to see bad things happen to good hotels.

  She didn’t step away again, but did keep her hand over her face. I reminded myself to find time for soap this evening.

  –You don’t have to worry, the clerk said. The maid put down towels. It was about sixty of them. We’ll find you another room.

  Saved; not liable; excused from small-claims court; I should have felt lucky. Instead I stood in the lobby with dirt on the back of my neck and sweat stains darkening the inseam of my slacks, indignant.

  –The maid did all that did she?

  Room 414 and room 603 were like identical lamps. One lit, one unlit. I stood inside the new room.

  Needing that shower I went to the bathroom but found I was scared of the nozzle. I turned the knob, but as soon as the water ran I imagined another mishap. Two ruined rooms would snuff the last of Hampton Inn’s goodwill. I had a panic attack, that’s all. Like a grief counselor I soothed myself, saying, –It’s fine. Take a shower in a little while. Do something else. Not just yet. Soon. Turn off the water.

  With the receiver of the hotel phone to my ear I listened to the dial tone stutter: a signal there were messages for me. They were transferred from room 603. Two were Nabisase’s, at nine-thirty and eleven that morning. The first was the sound of annoyance, asking where was I. The second just dejection; –I guess you and Mom are busy.

  The third message was from Mom, but hardly recognizable. Her voice was a bouncy trill. I’d have thought it was a teenager, not a middle-aged woman. At three-eighteen PM she said. –I need to get the dogs from the car, but I’ll send them to you later. Don’t worry, Anthony. I will reach you in my own way.

  –Walk over there, I said out loud to myself. Get up and find your folks.

  I called our answering machine in Queens, but for what? Nabisase had more friends than the rest of us and she only had two. Checking home messages was just a way to avoid getting up.

  To my surprise we had five. Five for Anthony. Which, I don’t know why, made me feel handsome.

  The first was one of the managers at Sparkle asking again if I’d like some weekend work. The other four were from the same man, one who clearly hadn’t listened when I said we were leaving town:

  –Hello, this is a message for Anthony. Give me a call. You know who this is?

  –This is Ledric, I’m sorry if it’s late and all.

  –Nabisas
e, could you pick up and let me talk to Anthony?

  – (groaning) I am the dumbest motherfucker on two feet.

  17

  The Dodge Neon’s trunk was broken open. Its lock looked attacked by claws. Chips of white paint on the Hampton Inn parking lot. My duffel bag was still inside, but Mom’s eighteen figurines were gone.

  I forgot about Ledric like lickety-split, opened my bag to make sure my clean suits were there. It’s possible that there was a gewgaw thief in Lumpkin, but I doubted it. I unfolded one suit, shook it out and changed in the backseat of the broken car. Though I tried a few times to slam the trunk closed, it wouldn’t shut.

  Stepped out then walked the eighty-five feet back to Comfort Inn. A girl in the employee uniform, jacket and smile, walked me back outside and pointed southwest to a huge carnation-red building where ceremonies were to be held.

  The Blue Ridge Theatre.

  –I think that’s what you’re looking for, sir.

  Preliminary events, like casual and athletic wear, were going to run at eight o’clock.

  –That’s a half hour, I said.

  –We have a bar inside, if you’d like to pass some time.

  –I shouldn’t start drinking, I told her. I’ve got to drive somewhere tonight.

  – Is your daughter in it?

  –My sister. Did you see that other contest this afternoon?

  –Uncle Allen’s? Oh sure. A lot bigger this year. My cousins were in it ’93 and ’94.

  –Why not you?

  –My life’s been pretty good, she said.

  I borrowed twine from the clerk to tie the trunk of our Dodge Neon closed. How sad the sight made me. Just a day before, on November 10th, Mom brought this car home; it made the block seem brighter because it was unspoiled. Now with the white string looped through the trunk this car looked like any of the duds double-parked up Hillside Avenue.

  I started the car and left Lumpkin, Virginia, at seven-forty-five.

  Miser’s Wend was an even smaller town forty miles south of Lumpkin. The two were separated by the larger city of Winchester, Virginia. Miser’s Wend would never have an exit on I-81 today if not for the Quakers who came in 1773. These facts, the year of founding and who did it, were stamped on plaques every eight feet within town limits. Declaring stones, curbs, cigarette butts as historic Quaker landmarks. But by 1995 the Quakers were aged right out of importance. When I drove into Miser’s Wend I entered an extinct society.