Be All That You Can Be
Susannah lay on the floor immobile, afraid to move, afraid he'd see she wasn't unconscious yet. She slowly tongued her front teeth, using the tongue tip to wiggle them back and forth, finding them incredibly loose. She could feel the blood seeping out of the corner of her mouth and she absurdly found herself thinking that at least maybe the dark bloodstain wouldn't show against the ancient burgundy shag carpeting beneath her ruined face. She was glad she was facing away from him, facing instead the dingy, water-spotted wallpaper, reflecting twenty years of transient military wives who knew the wouldn't live there long enough to care about redecorating.
"G-get up, whore," Vaughn stuttered in his drunken stupor. He always stuttered when he drank, which was lucky since it gave Susannah a heads-up that danger loomed ahead. "I know you can hear me, bitch. You th-think I'm st-stupid, doncha? You think you can fool me by l-layin' there and pretendin' but I ain't finished with your sorry ass y-yet." With the last stutter, he toed her quizzically with his left foot, booted with the steel-toed, black-shiny standard Army issue footwear. "Hey, slut, move or somethin'," he muttered, already losing interest. "Where's my f-fuckin' dinner?" He stumbled towards the swinging door leading to the kitchen mercifully now lost in his Jack Daniels haze. Susannah heard the swish-swish of the door as it swung open and shut, open and shut, leaving her alone in her misery and relief.
She knew he would be in there for a while, staggering around in the meager pantry for something to eat. Violence always made him hungry. She imagined him choosing the last remaining jar of home-canned peaches his witless mother had sent them last summer. He wouldn't notice that it had already been opened, that he wouldn't sense the x1080, a highly toxic, odorless, tasteless poison the Army used regularly to rid the post of its bothersome rat problem.
It had been easy enough to get, using the supply sergeant's juvenile crush on her to its full advantage, and equally easy to mix in with the peaches. She had placed it in a prominent position among the tomato sauce and lima bean cans, knowing Vaughn loved his mama's peaches. And there he was now, rattling around, then silence. There wasn't much to choose from on the shelf as she visualized the golden peaches tempting him, offering their sweet promise of juicy relief. She heard the quiet whirring hum of the fridge as he got the milk. He never could eat his peaches without cold milk. Still lying in a broken heap, Susannah felt her clock-wound muscles begin to relax as she imagined him gulping bite after sweet bite in that wolf-like way he inhaled his food. A smile teased through her jaw pain as she waited with closed eyes for the sounds to come from the next room. "Be all that you can be, asshole." she reflected as she slipped into her first happy sleep in years.
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Quote of the day: Night would settle in like slow blindness, sucking the color from the trees and the low sky and the rocks and the frozen grass and the frost-white hydrangeas until there was nothing left in the window but her own reflection. Anita Shreve - "The Pilot's Wife"Chosen because I love the description of day turning to night. I think it beautifully captures those fading last moments that happen every day. But when was the last time you paid attention? I can really visualize the daylight disintigrating into her reflection, the moment taking me from the outside to the inside. I love the "slow blindness" metaphor. Gives the moment just the right bit of chill, to match the obvious winter outside the window. This woman's twilight is a lonely one.
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