right arm in front of her, languidly grasping a clutch of flowers. In addition, Titian placed two figures in the background, apparently servants, looking through a large chest, perhaps for clothes for their reclining mistress. The tender modesty exhibited by Giorgione is retained here by a similarly delicately placed hand, but where Giorgion's Venus' fingers curled across her vulva in unconscious shyness, Titian's curls her fingers deliberately, less tender, perhaps, in her modesty than coy, her gaze a mixture of repose and invitation, a suggestion, perhaps, to draw close before her maids arrive with covering. Contrast this with Manet's Venus—a Venus, like Velàzquez's, only by implication: as literally interpreted, his painting is of nothing other than a contemporary prostitute—her link to myth exists only in her artistic lineage and the similarities of postures and placements. Titian's grasped flowers have multiplied; now her hair is adorned with an immense exotic bloom, and the woman behind her, instead of bearing clothes, carries a bouquet that we may assume has been sent by a client. More striking in its difference still is the disparity in gaze and attitude between Manet's “Venus” and her predecessors: Manet's Venus' look at the viewer is now unbearably direct, defiant, and bored; her covering hand is now not delicately curved but shown palm-open and finger-splayed, covering her vulva, not from gaze per se, but from gazes which have not paid the price of admission. The viewer is invited to inspect that which is available, but full and unmetered access comes only to those who reimburse for the privilege.
When I drop the preacher off at his house, he thanks me. I tell him I've enjoyed his company, and to keep up the good work. He gives me an odd look but in the end nods, smiles, and walks up the driveway to his front door without turning back to see if I'm still watching him. There was still grease on his face from his meal.
I have been debating with myself this entire time regarding whether or not I should include a note with the flowers. To explicate one's own deleterious acts of observation and recording seems not only counterproductive but acolastic, smacking of arrogant impenitence.
The critical difference between the Giorgione-Titian-Manet chain of Venus depictions and Velàzquez's (or rather, between the effects these paintings have had on their viewers) lies in the increasing capitalization of sex versus the conservation of it. While Manet represents the terminus of a slide into transaction and exchange, the reaction of Mary Richardson represents an attempt to halt this slide, an attempt that indicates a valuation of slide-halting over the actual objects risked in that slide; in short, Richardson destroyed the very thing she feared would be destroyed if she were not to take the action that she did. The journalists of the time, then, missed the mark in characterizing Richardson's actions as metaphoric murder; the cruel gashes were in fact a suicide.
I am placing the call. It is really happening. There is a metal plate affixed to the bottom of the payphone cabinet, the words on it white against a blue ground:
Need Cash Now Easy Quick Loans
Press *12
Need Help Finding a Job
Press *13
Receive God's Blessings Get Daily Prayer
Press *14
Need a Credit Card
Press *15
Joke of the Day
Press *16
I dial the number written on the piece of paper I carry. The woman's voice on the other end sounds familiar.
“Hey sexy,” she says, “where you goin' tonight?”
I stop walking and face her.
“'Sokay,” she says. “I won't hurt you.”
I come closer and see her face shining with grease in the streetlight. Her body disappears in an array of plastic shopping bags grouped around her.
“I don't have any money.” I say, fingering the piece of paper I still hold in my hand.
“'Sokay,” she says, reaching under her shirt. She pulls out a package of cigarettes and lights one.
“Where you goin'?” She asks again.
“Home.” I say.
“Gotcha home right here f'r tonight.” She says.
I continue to watch her as she smokes. She inhales and exhales as if she were trying to find something and retrieve it from the bottom of her lungs. When I had placed the call from the pay phone earlier that day, the voice on the other end was the voice of the woman in the thrift store, gathering up old roses for use in cemeteries. I asked her if she gave classes on decorating and she acted confused. Apparently she's moved up in the world since last we talked.
“How much do you usually charge?” I ask. This is immensely important to me.
“I don' charge, honey. Not for a nice man like you.”
“Is your home far from here?”
She stiffens. “My h--”
“Your place.” I say.
“Uh-huh. Real near.” She inhales and exhales again. “You comin'?”
She gathers up all her bags and stands. I offer to take some bags from her and she permits me. A bus pulls up and we both step inside. It is empty and brightly lit. We sit on a bench seat facing sideways and don't speak until she pulls the red cord to stop.
“Here we go.”
The building is an abandoned warehouse. Inside are immense machines, rollers and catwalks glistening with old oil. Printing presses. A newspaper factory.
She takes me down an aisle between rows of hardware sitting on concrete pads, leading me by the hand. The plastic bags we carry rustle and swing against our legs as we walk. At the end of the aisle is a door, and over the door is a light, as if this were an exterior door with some need to guide travelers to itself, as if the interior of this building were not (or had not been) illuminated.
“You gonna like this.” She says.
She opens the door and I step inside. There is no bed but an examination table, complete with fresh tissue paper looped over its surface. I get on the bed and she closes the door. Next to the table is a desk and counter, covered in jars, tools, and papers. I cannot decide if these are medical instruments I've seen before or not.
“You ready?” She asks.
I nod. She peels off her jacket, sways gently, reaches down, and lifts the hem of her baggy sweatshirt. She takes off the shirt and drops it gently to the floor below. On her body I see scars. When she turns away from me I can make out in the dim light the faint remains of a cruel wound to the neck. She approaches the table and picks up a sheaf of papers. She mutters to herself, consulting the columns of numbers that cover the sheets. Next she reaches for a jar and removes what looks like a moldy slice of bread. She breaks off a piece and holds it in front of me, at the level of my mouth.
“This is my body, purchased for you.” She says.
I lean forward and take a bite. I chew and swallow.
“Have you ever worked in radio?” I ask.
The library no longer contains archived copies of the newspapers from twenty years ago, but in a bookstore downtown there are stacks of print lying sleeping in disorganized rows in a corner of a closet in the backroom. Behind the closed door I pick through the stacks, looking for 1967, and there in a tinily-set column, back of the stories about rock shows and sex clubs, there are two inches of text devoted to the recounting of a murder of two spinster women by a “crazed” youth. It's enough. On my way out I notice a photo album on the shelves, but I don't pick it up.
American Paranoid Restaurant Page 12