Diane Williams - Fine, Fine, Fine, Fine, Fine

Her tiny skirt is much like a figure skater’s skirt that may — as she lets her legs fling forward to walk — flap.

Clap. Clap.

The girl — to get here — goes in the direction of the vanishing point, on up the steep grade.

These living quarters with the man, that she has entered, are bordered in the front by bluet and merrybells and by the myrtle and foam flowers at the back.

Her exit requires her to go through a door that shuts, ta-ta! — with those two little beats of sound.

Come along! — for wonderful it may seem that those hills are presenting themselves not just as technical details or as small regions near the tollway.

Did she see those birds that were falling like leaves? — the leaves that were flying like birds?

The girl will extend herself to travel and to sway beyond the sweepgate into somebody else’s household and she will hurry to meet up with somebody.

So when she arrives at the northern suburb, she finds a high house with a heavy gate. There is a seat near the door.

Whose house is this?

There is a tent bed, a hearth, and a sectional bookcase.

“At least I don’t keep people waiting. Am I doing everything?” the girl asks.

“Hey!”

“Now look at you.”

Then she was pulling her blouse together and she went to get a glass of water, a pot of coffee.

The brightly scaled moon was rising, but this girl never became a well-liked businesswoman with a growing family in the community.

Neither is she endowed with any remarkable qualities. We never spoke of her specialized skills or of her inclination to be otherwise. My fault. Go fuck herself.

Apology accepted.

A pastel portrait of the deceased Mrs. Meldrum senior, as a young girl, was placed over a console table with flared legs, and I stared at Mrs. Meldrum’s face and got to know her, for no purpose, for no benefit, none. But like a bird, I might have been eating out of her hand!

Her son, Melvyn, had forgotten he’d invited us. And thank you, Melvyn, for that. He suggested gin, rum, Scotch, rye, sherry, schnapps, Pepsi, cold tea, or beer.

And here I was in the company of a private detective and other pet owners. Some of them became scornful when the conversation centered on the next election or on Melvyn Meldrum’s unsympathetic mother and what was really so bad about her.

And even though I have no teeth — they’d all been pulled, because I was set to get implants and my dentures were just too painful to wear — I consumed a Diet Pepsi and some soft pizza topping.

This is not to say I am old. Far from it! Sometimes I just go to any lengths — and I had gotten started clearing out my God-given, skimpy, and in some cases, my diseased teeth.

So Melvyn had come to the door dead drunk and had told us we might as well come in for a drink. And where was his wife Yvonne, just then? She was upstairs getting ready for a different social event.

Yvonne Meldrum, when she appeared, brought in a tray of Limburger cheese, saltines, and Cheddar Goldfish.

And, I don’t forget what has happened to my pal Jack — he was there — a man I’d once had a fine time with — with my legs hanging up over his shoulders.

I wrote a note to the Meldrums after our return that it was so lovely to see you, so much fun. It was a joy.

Did Melvyn’s wife Yvonne leave him? Had she planned on finding somebody else to take her by the breasts? Because that night, while we ate, when June Hockett said, “Get Yvonne,” we discovered that Yvonne had left the premises!

I believe that this incident occurred before Vic’s and my son was born — soon after my divorce from Jack.

Had I been unhappy with Jack? Well, certainly Jack had been very woebegone.

One of the little girls at the party played a child’s version of a sad song on the spinet piano, while the other younger girl came up behind her to spoil it.

Vic said, as we went out for a taxi, “That was fun.” He stood just beyond the curb, stretching his arm out and by and by we arrived at our hotel.

Back in New Paltz, the next day, I needed to, but I could not go to the post office, but I could groom our dog Demon because it was Labor Day.

When I comb out Demon’s hair I may use a human comb and I always get under his belly. Sometimes I use an undercoat rake. I don’t ever use medicated shampoo for the genital area. And, I don’t need to imagine the pain of any teeth rotting out of Demon’s head! — so I let the vet tend to that.

But I have never had any discussion with Vic about whether he, Vic, is actually a jealous spouse — or about what happened to Yvonne.

I am unemotional about the abrupt ending of friendships and there’d be no purpose, no benefit, none, to exploring these subjects further — such as: have I come clean enough?

I am — yes — utterly at ease in the company of others, secretive, sexually active, quite adaptable.

And many have said of me, I hear — She’s very charming.

The following stories have appeared in Harper’s : “A Little Bottle of Tears,” “Living Deluxe,” “Girl with a Pencil,” “A Gray Pottery Head,” “With Red Chair,” “Head of the Big Man.”

These stories first appeared, sometimes in a slightly different form or with a different title, in the American Reader : “Try,” “How Blown Up”; in Granta : “Specialist”; in La Granada : “Gulls,” “Of the True and Final Good”; in The Lifted Brow : “The Mermaid Pose,” “Glimpses of Mrs. Williams,” The Skol”; in London Review of Books : “Lamb Chops, Cod,” “Perform Small Tasks,” “Removal Men”; in PANK : “Lavatory”; in Queen Mob’s Tea House : “There Is Always a Hesitation Before Turning in a Finished Job”; in Salt Hill : “Flying Things”; in Tammy : “Palm Against Palm”; in Tin House : “At a Period of Exceptional Dullness,” “A Mere Flask Poured Out,” “Sigh”; in Unsaid : “Head of a Naked Girl”; in VICE : “Cinch,” “Greed,” “Personal Details,” “The Thickening Wish,” “When I Was Old and Ugly”; in The White Review : “Love, Beauty, and Vanity Itself.”

“A Mere Flask Poured Out” was reprinted in The Best Small Fictions 2015 .

Diane Williams is the author of eight books, including a collection of her selected stories. She is also the founder and editor of the literary annual NOON, which is acclaimed both in America and abroad.

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