Which, of course, as she knew, meant: Toytown Assorted.
They were his favorite confection of all. Indeed Golly herself liked them very much too. They came in a family-sized cellophane bag. There were little houses and trees and even a church, all coated in the loveliest of tasty icing sugar.
—I can’t wait for my Toytown Assorted! cried Golly, clapping her hands. As Boniface scrunched his eyes, pushing out his lip—squirming and chuckling in a delicious self-cuddle of delight.
Peyton Place was actually on later. But you weren’t supposed to watch it—at church the previous Sunday, the parish priest had specifically singled it out.
—Any more of this and Ireland will be in ruins! he had said.
For this reason her hand was seen to twitch whenever it hovered over the dial. Just as she turned it to reveal a hovering of a different kind.
—You can’t come in here! protested the woman in the lounge suit—Golly knew it was a lounge suit, for she’d seen them advertised in Picturegoer—if anyone hears, don’t you know I’m married!
—I know you’re married! snapped the man who’d cast the shadow, but darn it to hell I don’t care. I’m through with caring, and I know in your heart that so are you!
He grabbed her fiercely as he pressed his lips to hers.
—Let’s get away from here—let’s go together! she cried.
But already the man had taken off his jacket—and was in the process of tearing at his tie. He was looking at the woman like some kind of wild animal. As he crossed the room and firmly closed the shutters.
—But there’s one thing that you and me have got to do first—something I’ve been longing to do all week!
—Oh, Norman! cried the woman, falling back before him on the bed, scissoring her legs around him as she groaned.
Patsy and Golly were both in bed now—reading. Her husband was inquiring as to whether she wouldn’t mind adjusting her position “just a little.”
In order that he might maneuver the bolster. She informed him she was more than happy to do so.
Patsy smiled and returned to his pools coupons—chewing thoughtfully on the end of his pencil.
Without thinking, he suddenly frowned and asked his wife did she think that Newcastle would succeed in holding Chelsea to a draw this coming Saturday.
Golly smiled—and, turning a page of her magazine, told him she didn’t know.
—I don’t really know anything about football, she said.
Patsy laughed.
—But of course you don’t. I got carried away there. I don’t know what I was thinking, Golly.
Golly returned to the Picturegoer article she had been reading about Miami, Florida. Once you have visited you will never be the same, it said. There was a great big photo of an electric blue sea, with an enormous stretch of white sand and some curtseying palms. The apartments were all painted aqua and seashell pink.
It was there that the author and “her lover” had met, she was informed. It was there she had been united with the man of her dreams. In a place which she described as an “Eden on earth.”
Golly’s nails were making indentations on the margins. She wished they were not—but those were the facts. An urge to switch off the wireless and its dreary monotony then compelled her. Instead she coughed and patted her chest.
—The Fosters are going to America, she told her husband.
But he didn’t reply—thinking, as he continued to chew on his pencil. Then, when some time had passed, he said:
—Good night.
—Good night, Patsy, he heard his wife reply.
As, with a soft click, the lamp on his side of the room went out.
As Golly lay there, she found herself not in bed or in Cullymore either but standing in the foyer of a plush hotel. With the bellboy close by waiting with her luggage. She knew that, as her husband, Patsy ought to have been with her—but he wasn’t. Patsy was at home.
—Will your husband be checking in with you, the Spanish-sounding desk clerk said with a smile.
—No, she replied, I’m on my own.
—Of course, Madam, she heard him say—handing her her room key, smiling again, even more broadly this time.
She remembered to tip the bellboy generously. Because that was the way they did things in the U.S.
When he had departed she kicked off her shoes and threw herself down on the bed with a sigh—flicking the television on with her toe. It was the biggest screen she had ever seen. And guess who was on it? Yuri Gagarin—grinning out from behind his helmet: CCCP. How happy he looked—away off there, out in the galaxy. Then Golly got up and went down to the bar. There was a foreign-looking gentleman seated at the counter, gazing into a tall, colored glass. In her own town you couldn’t approach a foreign gentleman. Indeed dare to go near someone who wasn’t your husband. Unless they were bent double and well over sixty. But this was America, not Cullymore.
—I’m looking for Blossom Foster, she told the man.
—I’m afraid I don’ know, lady, he said.
How lovely that was, to be courteously addressed as “lady.”
—But while you wait, yes—maybe you like a drink?
—Who’s offering? astoundingly, she heard herself say. With eyes twinkling.
—Pedro Gonzales, she was told, as the smallish man in the Hawaiian-print shirt treated her to a gentlemanly bow. Why, of course, she told him—she would be delighted to accept his generous offer.
—You’re from outta town, no? snapping his fingers as the swarthy barman spread his hands on the marble counter.
—Sure am, she said, again with a twinkle, from waaay outta town.
—Me too, said Pedro. In the Siesta Motel on Biscayne Boulevard ees wher’ I stay. Every time I come by, that is where I go. They take care of me there. So what’s it gonna be? You look like a lady who could use a daiquiri.
—That’s exactly what I was going to order.
He made two rabbit’s ears of his fingers as she glided effortlessly onto the stool. It was tubular chrome.
—The Siesta Motel, huh? she said.
—Over on Biscayne Boulevard, he replied—and this time it was Pedro’s turn to twinkle.
The following day when she woke up, Golly made up her mind to, one way or another, go to Miami. It was to become an imperative—and this was the reason why. It had all begun while she had been blackleading the range. Thinking yet again about what Blossom Foster had been saying about bridge. Her and her stupid cards. What sort of a stupid idea had that been anyway, she asked herself—a bridge session, for God’s sake, in the early afternoon. Another stupid plan of Blossom’s, what else.
Of course it being the Fosters you were duty-bound to become all excited, as if it was the most original and fascinating idea ever. “Oh, but yes!” you were expected to say. You had to declare yourself privileged because of the invite.
—What a splendid idea! you were expected to squeal.
Then Golly heard the front door closing—it was Boniface, arriving home from school. Which was why she listened with affection as she heard him skidding across the floor. Before bursting into the kitchen with a yelp—tossing his schoolbag into the corner as always, calling out “Babbie! Babbie! Where Babbie!”
He had never been capable of pronouncing Mammy properly.
It was a pity about his speech—of course it was, as Blossom Foster had remarked on a number of occasions.
—But I’m sure you have the resources to deal with that, Golly, she had observed.
In spite of herself Golly hated it when Boniface did it—called her “Babbie.” Almost immediately becoming overwhelmed by feelings of guilt and shame.
She wondered, did Blossom ever experience such sensations—of abject worthlessness and self-loathing? No—of course she didn’t. And if she did, she could always go off to Florida and forget them.
—We can’t make up our minds, she had told her, we’re such sillies, Bodley and I. One minute it’s Miami then the next it’s California. Prut! What a pai
r of old sillies we are, Geraldine!
* * *
After dinner, Boniface ate his rice.
—Do you like it, Bonnie? she asked him as she stood there above him, her son beaming, bright-eyed, from ear to ear.
As he spooned big dollops of the dessert into his mouth. He loved rice almost as much as his favorite biscuits. Which, of course were:
—Toytoon Torted!
Then it was time for his game with his “shooter.”
She assisted him with setting up the cardboard box. This was his target. He liked, more than anything, to pretend he was Joe Friday. Joe Friday played in Dragnet on the telly. All the men in the barbershop loved it.
—Just the facts, ma’am—that was Joe’s catchphrase. That was what Joe was fond of saying.
But Boniface Murray couldn’t say that. All he could do was shoot with his shooter, clutching it in a hapless two-handed grip. Scrunching his face as he did so, yelping:
—Whee! he clapped, as the marrowfat pea hit the target, clapping his hands as he squealed: Whee—hooey! Fuck!
Up until now his mother’s voice had been a model of restraint.
—Please stop saying that, be a good boy, won’t you?
She knew the other boys would make fun when they heard him swearing.
—Fuck! Fuck! Whee—hooey!
The pea went “pop.” As down went the target and her son shrieked ecstatically—before skidding across the floor to go and retrieve it.
—Fuckity! Whumph! Me good—pea!
—Stop it, do you hear! Stop it now, Bonnie!
Suddenly the dessert spoon had leaped into her hand. All went quiet in the room.
—Boniface, now listen. There’s a good boy. Boniface, love—do you know you’re so good, said his mother.
But Boniface, unfortunately, was staring at her, quivering in disbelief. With his face the color of the rice he’d just been consuming. As the enormity of what his mother had just done began to seep into his slow-witted brain. What had she done? She had pressed the spoon’s handle quite severely into his arm. Into the soft flesh of his hairless upper forearm. It hadn’t actually hurt him—at least not all that much. But Boniface Murray had already begun to whimper—and the more he inspected the faint abrasion which the piece of cutlery had occasioned he began to sob, helplessly. Before flinging his peashooter away in disdain.
For just a fleeting moment a shadow passed across the lace curtain and Golly could have sworn she had just apprehended the outline of her neighbor—Blossom Foster, attired in her leopard print and stole.
She then approached the television—it was time for Peyton Place—but all of the sudden heard, or thought she did, the parish priest calling:
—Don’t you dare watch that filth, Golly Murray!
And then wept as she retreated, with cries of passion being released by murky figures at the back of her mind. As the woman in the lounge suit swung wild-eyed on her heel, before crying:
—The hell with my husband, he’s never understood me! It’s you I love, Norman—you! You, and always have! Do what you want to me, anything—just do it!
Once, in the shop, she had seen a countryman with red hands as big as shovels. She wondered was that what Norman’s were like, as the woman whimpered and he tore wildly at her flesh—scooping up great big handfuls in the afternoon ecstasy of that shadow-shuttered room.
—Give it to me! she heard her plead, Give me your body, Norman, give it to me until, until I’m ready to die!
As Golly’s hands covered her face, her engagement ring briefly scratching her cheek, now fleeing shamefully from the room.
The next day, making their way home from Mass, Golly Murray left her husband at the corner—he was going down to the pub for a drink. Then, all of a sudden, she heard: Coo-ee!
Blossom Foster was already making her way across the road.
—I’ve had this idea, she said, arriving up breathlessly. A fashion show—with Miami as the theme.
—A fashion show about Miami?
—Yes, that will be the subject, if you will. I really do think it’s the most marvelous idea, don’t you, Geraldine? We’ll have it in the hotel over Easter. And maybe we could give the proceeds to the handicapped.
—The handicapped, replied Golly, puzzled—her dry throat rasping a little.
—Yes, to those who are less fortunate. I really think it’s the least we could do. Your little fellow—I mean, it’s not fair. They need all the help they can get, poor mites. Little fellows like—whatyoucallhim?
—My son? choked Golly.
—Yes! Little Boniface—what age is he now, eleven? Or is it twelve?
—Twelve, choked Golly, he’s twelve.
—But of course maybe it’s not for me to say. Maybe you mightn’t have the time to become involved. I mean he must be difficult …
—He’s not difficult! snapped Golly, he isn’t difficult!
—We could even invite Coco Chanel—we’ll be the talk of the place. Well—tottybye, must be off to make the arrangements. Hello, Florida, the Sunshine State! Here we come!
The BBC shipping forecast was just finishing as Golly Murray climbed into bed. Her husband was already busy with his pools coupons. She put on her glasses and began turning the pages of her magazine. If you had the money, it read, there was no problem at all in getting yourself an air-conditioned room, one that was steam-heated to keep you comfortable. On top of that there was a foam rubber bed in every room, with a seventeen-inch television and a Frigidaire ice cube machine. That’s if you stayed at the Siesta Motel. With someone like Pedro Gonzales, perhaps. When she went to the motel with him, it turned out that he was the most gentle and lovely man—whose hands, far from being like shovels, were small, in fact, and more like girls’. But which, maybe for that reason, could relax and make her feel things of which no countryman’s hands ever have been capable. At first when he had kissed her there—on her “ickle brown nub,” as they’d used to call it when they were kids—she had been prompted to laugh. Mischievously, even, like Lounge Suit Woman, to cry out:
—Oo Norman!
But when he had finished—if he was ever going to finish—laughter was just about the last thing on her mind. Because what Golly Murray wanted—she wanted him to do it all over again—circle that ickle nub with the tip of his tongue. And then suddenly—aha!—leaping on it as he had done—giving it most delicious and unexpected bite.
—Ees so sweet, he told her, I could eat it!
—Do it, Norman! Golly had heard herself plead, do it, will you—until I die!
—I not Norman, Pedro had laughed, but believe me, Miss—yes, you will die! I, Pedro, know how to make you do thees.
Then he had proudly presented her with the handle of his stomach, as some of Patsy’s pals often called it.
—You like? he had said.
As he set to nibbling her nipple once again. Even when the police’s suspicions were made public, she refused to believe it. The Miami Herald ran a story claiming he was “the vampire.”
The Palm Beach killer the authorities had been searching for for months. And who was reputed to have dispatched fifteen or more victims, most of them women. As the facts filtered out they were accompanied by the most appalling rumors—that the suspect had derived pleasure from actually consuming the nipples of his victims. The detective in charge said that in all his years of experience it was the worst case he’d ever come across.
—We found human hair—and, I regret to say, a female nipple, in the Frigidaire, he was reported as having said.
As she pressed her nails into the magazine’s margins, Golly had to remind herself that what she was reading was no more than a story. So incensed did she find herself becoming at the sheer crassness of the detective’s lies. But Pedro, of course, had warned her that would be coming.
—For years they try to pin sometheeng on me, he had told her—before breaking down in her arms as they danced.
After which they stood together, gazing out through the Fre
nch windows.
—Those buildings are so beautiful but I know you’ll laugh when you hear what I’m going to say.
—I will never laugh, you know that, Golly. Never will I laugh unless it is something that you, as a woman, intend.
—They remind me so much of Toytown Assorted. With the moon’s soft light on the greens and pinks and blues.
—I no understand, please, said Pedro.
But he didn’t laugh.
—Toytown Assorted, she smiled as she clasped his hand. Boniface loves them. I guess over here you probably call them cakes.
—Toytown Assorted, he smiled, pulling her to him, pressing his tongue inside her mouth as he chuckled.
—Thees the on’y cake that Pedro like right now, Golly cake—yes?
—Yes, replied Golly, tugging at his glossy jet-black curls as she scissored her legs Peyton Place–style and cried aloud:
—Tear off my lounge suit, Pedro! Tear it into ribbons, do you hear me!
When she looked up and saw Pedro, baffled, with both arms extended:
—But Golly, you not wearing lounge suit!
As she took it inside her—the handle of his stomach. Trying not to laugh as she thought of the parish priest. Or of Pedro’s face as she squealed anew:
—Norman! Do it, will you—until I die! You can even bite it off, if you want to—my ickle brown nub—I don’t care!
Golly was in the best of humor when she happened to meet Blossom by chance two days later—this time in the bakery.
—That’s a nice dress, Blossom had said with a smile, picking at a full stop of fluff with her finger. It had been located, almost invisibly, underneath the collar of Golly Murray’s coat.
—I’m searching for a nice surprise for Bodley’s tea, she said, maybe a cream cone or, who knows, even a nice fairy cake.
—A fairy cake, yes, that would be nice, replied Golly.
—With icing, beamed Blossom, with some nice pink icing.
—Like Toytown Assorted, said Golly, without thinking.
As Blossom made a face.
—O no, she said, they’re just for children. Much too sugary and sweet for my husband. He likes proper cakes.
—Yes, of course. Bodley would want proper icing.
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