Aimee Bender: The Girl in the Flammable Skirt

At work: your boss has died. Really, you find out your boss has died of a heart attack, yesterday, in his shower, and your first thought is if you’ll still have a job and your second thought is mean, like you wanted him to die anyway. He was a bad boss. At your desk, you feel guilty and not sure what to do; you have no boss, what are the rules? Who can you ask? You make a few lists of things to do and then sit still and do none of them. You think about the bowl and wonder if it has to do with your boss dying, was it some kind of message. You decide it is not a message, but mere coincidence.

At lunch you order steamed vegetables because you’re remembering that you have a heart too. You feel humbled by your heart, it works so hard. You want to thank it. You give your chest a little pat. When the vegetables arrive, they are twelve on the plate, high green and matte yellow, sliced into fancy ovals and diamonds to disguise the fact that they taste so bad. You pour lemon butter all over them but feel like a big cheat. After several broccolis, you leave the restaurant with your plate still half full and shiny with grease to go visit your brother. He works in the fire department and is handsome in his outfit. You tell him your boss is dead, and it freaks him out. He wonders if he could’ve saved him, had he been there, you know, he knows CPR. Your brother has your face, but a better version, you look better as a man. You think about the women who have loved him and looked into his face while he entered their bodies, and how that’s your face, almost, but also definitely not. You feel gypped.

“Andy,” you ask him, “will you set me up with a fireman?”

He laughs. “Sure.” You’ve never asked this before, you wonder if he thinks you’re kidding.

You go home early because your boss is dead. The fruit bowl sits there, some strange reminder of something you can’t remember. You put the bananas back on the counter and fill the bowl with warm water. You let your hands soak in it, this feels really nice. You sing a little song to yourself, about fruit and bowls and warm water, a song you just made up. You wonder if you’ll go out with the fireman after all, and if you do, will he kiss you? Does a fireman kiss slow or urgent? Will he lift your shirt or run off to water things down just when it’s all seeming better?

You lie down flat on the orange carpet and close your eyes. You are feeling very lonely. There is a knock at the door, and at first, you wonder if you made it up because you are so lonely. But then there’s another knock, and this one is too emphatic to be part of a fantasy. This one is not a nice knock.

You look into the peephole. There’s a man in a suit. You wonder if he’s here to investigate if you killed your boss or not. You open the door.

“I’m here,” he says, “to retrieve a bowl.”

“What?” His eyebrows stick out from his face, adding great depth. He is an older man, he looks as though his life is not making him happy.

“I’m here to retrieve a fruit bowl. I think one of them was delivered to you this morning by accident. All wrapped up? A green fruit bowl?”

You are stunned and confused, it was not for you after all? You empty out the water, and hand him the fruit bowl and he nods. He drips the remaining drops of water onto your welcome mat. The man seems very displeased, and you think it’s something you did, but then realize it has nothing to do with you which is depressing. He tilts his head down slightly in apology, and leaves with the bowl. You shut the door behind him. You want it back. You want the bowl back. You open the door to yell after him, sir, that’s my bowl, it came to my house with my name on the wrapping, that’s my bowl, sir, give me back my bowl. But he’s gone. You go to the sidewalk to look down the street, but he’s gone. All you can see are three kids on bicycles, circling their driveways, seven years old, turning tight circles in their driveways because they’re too scared to go where there might be cars.

One week after his father died, my father woke up with a hole in his stomach. It wasn’t a small hole, some kind of mild break in the skin, it was a hole the size of a soccer ball and it went all the way through. You could now see behind him like he was an enlarged peephole.

Sharon! is what I remember first. He called for my mother, sharp, he called her into the bedroom and my sister Hannah and I stood outside, worried. Was it divorce? We twisted nervously and I had one awful inner jump of glee because there was something about divorce that seemed a tiny bit exciting.

My mother came out, her face distant.

Go to school, she said.

What is it? I said. Hannah tried to peek through. What’s wrong? she asked.

They told us at dinner and promised a demonstration after dessert. When all the plates were cleared away, my father raised his thin white undershirt and beneath it, where other people have a stomach, was a round hole. The skin had curved and healed around the circumference.

What’s that? I asked.

He shook his head. I don’t know, and he looked scared then.

Where is your stomach now? I asked.

He coughed a little.

Did you eat? Hannah said. We saw you eat.

His face paled.

Where did it go? I asked and there we were, his two daughters, me ten, she thirteen.

You have no more belly button, I said. You’re all belly button, I said.

My mother stopped clearing the dishes and put her hand on her neck, cupping her jaw. Girls, she said, quiet down.

You could now thread my father on a bracelet. The giantess’ charm bracelet with a new mini wiggling man, something to show the other giantesses at the giantess party. (My, my! they declare. He’s so active!)

My parents went to the doctor the next day. The internist took an X ray and proclaimed my father’s inner organs intact. They went to the gastroenterologist. He said my father was digesting food in an arc, it was looping down the sides, sliding around the hole, and all his intestines were, although further crunched, still there and still functioning.

They pronounced him in great health.

My parents walked down into the cool underground parking lot and packed into the car to go home.

Halfway there, ambling through a green light, my mother told my father to pull over which he did and she shoved open the passenger side door and threw up all over the curb.

They made a U-turn and drove back to the doctor’s.

The internist took some blood, left, returned and winked.

Looks like you’re pregnant, he said.

My mother, forty-three, put a hand on her stomach and stared.

My father, forty-six, put a hand on his stomach and it went straight through to his back.

They arrived home at six-fifteen that night; Hannah and I had been concerned — six o’clock marked the start of Worry Time. They announced the double news right away: Daddy’s fine. Mommy’s pregnant.

Are you going to have it? I asked. I like being the youngest, I said. I don’t want another kid.

My mother rubbed the back of her neck. Sure, I’ll have it, she said. It’s a special opportunity and I love babies.

My father, on the couch, one hand curled up and resting inside his stomach like a birdhead, was in good spirits. We’ll name it after my dad, he said.

If it’s a girl? I asked.

Edwina, he said.

Hannah and I made gagging sounds and he sent us to our room for disrespecting Grandpa.

In nine months, my father’s hole was exactly the same size and my mother sported the biggest belly around for miles. Even the doctor was impressed. Hugest I’ve ever seen, he told her.

My mother was mad. Makes me feel like shit, she said that night at dinner. She glared at my father. I mean, really. You’re not even that tall.