Don't Shoot! I'm Just the Avon Lady! (21 page)

Damn
, I thought,
is this what normal socially active women think?
I remembered the last time I talked men with a group of girls. I stood in my kitchen stirring batter for mini-cheesecakes, the kind you make with vanilla wafers and canned cherry pie filling and packages of cream cheese. Two of my sisters leaned against the tile counter, watching, waiting, and we talked about our husbands and lovers as our children built a blanket fort in the living room. My favorite sister’s oldest girl, the one who looks like her father with her long sad face and crooked teeth, stood just outside the kitchen. She was at that awkward stage, between little kid and older kid, and she wanted to be part of the cooking, part of the dishing, so I pretended I didn’t know where she was and called her name. I handed her the vanilla wafers and told her to place one in each muffin tin. Our talk wasn’t ribald-lewd like these party women, wasn’t full of innuendo and sass, just discussion of longing and disappointments and hopes for some good clear future. I wondered what my sisters would make of this flock of earthy magpies.

I cleared my throat and jumped into the conversation behind me, agreed that men lack tact, and pulled out a handful of brochures and samples and passed them around. Everyone held an arm out for a spritz of Today, but the conversation soon drifted back to men. We slowly filed in to the club.

Nearly every seat in the house was taken. Small circular tables of different sizes dotted the floor, two-to-six-to-ten seated together, and I scanned the room looking for an empty chair. I found one, up front near the stage, an empty table for two, and I plunked my purse on the plastic glass top and sat in a chair with a stuffed vinyl seat pad. I’d never been in a strip club before. The lights shone soft yellow, orange, rose, made every woman look good, gave us all glowing skin and luminous eyes. A hidden speaker system played upbeat rock numbers, artists like Prince and Black Eyed Peas, just loud enough to cover the symphony of voices around me. Several male waiters, each wearing black spandex shorts, no shirt, and a bow tie, circled the room, taking orders, flexing muscles, flirting and grinning. I fumbled through my purse and realized I had left my wallet at home.

“Just a glass of water, please, no ice,” I answered when a streaked blonde waiter sided up close and leaned over me, rippling abdomen shiny with some kind of oil that smelled of beach and sand and salt and a hint of musk.

“No problem, Miss, you want to keep your wits about you, eh?” He winked and whirled around to the table behind me, all the while shaking his bum.

Lord have mercy, I thought. Just then a drum-roll cut through the music.

“Laaaaaaaaadddiiieeees of San Deigooooooooo!!!!!! Please put your hands together and welcome our own Surfside Hotties!!!!!

The room exploded! Every woman in the joint jumped to her feet, hands slamming together over her head, as the loudspeaker blared the opening thumps to “Gonna Make You Sweat.” The announcer followed the rhythm of the music and introduced each stripper as he took the floor. Each wore a miniature business jacket barely buttoned under bulging muscles and pinstriped shorts.

Da da duh da Everybody dance now

“Riiiiiccckkkyyyyy!”

Da da duh da Everybody dance now

“Jaaaaaaayy Jaaaaaayy!”

The crowd screamed, clapped, stomped feet, and I felt a hot pair of hands push my back.

“Stand up girl!” The woman with the blue jumpsuit danced behind me, laughing, pointing at me to her fellow revelers. I shrugged my shoulders and stood, began clapping my hands and shuffling my feet in some kind of a manic dance in order to blend in.

Eight men stood in a line across the stage, arms akimbo, feet pointed outward. The rap section of the song began and the men worked in unison, flexing arms, then turning to reveal tight butts ready to burst from their shorts.

“Oh my GOD! I’m gonna use all my cash on Jay Jay. Look at that ass!” A voice to my left rose above the fray and I turned to watch the entire table blowing kisses and shaking cleavage at the Surfside Hotties. One petite woman in a peppermint red satin track suit grabbed the hem of her jacket and pulled up, flashing the stage. “Master Mark” pointed his fingers at her like a gun as he continued the routine.

My mouth hung open and I kept one eye on the audience and one on the stage, unsure which provided the better show.

And I’m here to combine

Beats and lyrics to make your shake your pants

All at once the Hotties threw their jackets in the air, revealing six-pack abs drenched in oil. They each took a different weight lifter’s pose, flexing backs, arms, legs, chest, and the women around me grew warm and red, still clapping, shouting, yelling More! More!

I think I stopped clapping and shuffling my feet. I think I sat down, too, stunned by the actions of the women more so than the men. I’d never seen strippers of any gender before, and in my mind’s eye pictured some kind of civilized party with chatter between table-mates, perhaps a nice ovation at the end, not this frenzied orgy of estrogen lust. I sipped my water, watching the women watch the men, missing the part where the men removed their shorts and began circulating around the room.

“Jay Jay! Jay Jay!” The table to my left began chanting and I saw the object of their affection slowly saunter to the table, clad only in a black satin g-string. The women sat down in unison, as if someone pushed their heads to the floor, and Jay Jay put his hands on his hips, making circle movements with his groin, circling closer and closer to the women. They howled in delight and grabbed green bills from their purses, waving them at Jay Jay, taunting him, taunting each other, and his hips came close enough to their faces so that they could lick him if they tried. He moved his hands over his head, grabbing one wrist with a hand and turned to bare his butt to them, and the women cried with glee and rewarded him with a grass skirt of dollars stuck under the thin black string of his uniform.

All around the room the same actions repeated. Strippers swung hips, women slung bills, some kind of strange mating ritual, each person reduced to a bare primal essence of sex and money and bad, bad music. I didn’t notice Ricky approaching my table, didn’t see him until it was too late, until he was grinding near my face, and I turned to see a satin package twirling before my eyes. Damn! I laughed and pushed my hands in the air as if shooing a dog home. No, no, I shook my head, and I pointed to the table behind me, go there! Go there! But Ricky smiled and continued grinding, waiting for a biscuit, wagging his tail, and the woman with the blue jumpsuit yelled “Give him some money, hon!”

I did the only thing a wallet-less Avon Lady could do. I stuffed a few Avon Ab Cream samples down the front of his “pants,” grabbed my purse, and ran!

I crossed my fingers and dialed Ulak on the way home.

“Hello. This is Ulak.”

“Yay! Ulak! I’m so glad you’re home! Where the hell have you been?” I launched into a description of all thing things he missed – the Mercedes, the yard sale, the evil Pig people – and he grunted at the appropriate moments. I told him about my daughter, how I waited for her to call or write.

“Ulak, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about this earlier. I couldn’t get the words out. I just couldn’t. You’re still my best guy friend.”

Ulak cleared his throat. He told me about his business, about the difficulties caring for his mother, about his playboy brother, about the time his dad lost his shirt in Turkey and broke down, refused to leave bed for three years, a cool washcloth always present on his bald olive head, pimento tongue darting between long teeth.

“Birdie. We all wait. Every day we wait. You will get through waiting the same way I did when my father took ill. And Birdie. I will pay you one hundred dollars to settle the bet. You have won fair and square.” I laughed, told my friend I didn’t want money, but I wanted his time.

Ulak agreed to meet my mystery hand cream lady at four-ten Thursday afternoon, agreed to buy a ticket from the grumpy rail clerk, agreed to exchange hand cream for cold cash, sneak onto the train and barrel north in a silver streak, take notes, give me a story. In exchange, I agreed to take his cantankerous mother to the hair salon. He got the better deal.

Another Tumble in the Sky

People like the personal touch. They like the Avon Lady to show up at the door. Kilt or dress, tie-dye or suit - that part doesn’t matter much. They want someone to notice them, to listen, hear the things they say and don’t say, put a stethoscope to their heart, nod, say “Yes, You are Alive! I see you! I hear you! I hear you. I hear you.” I think of how I take care of my old own wounds when I look into the eyes of my customers, when I hear their words and read their lips.

I tossed two extra fragrance samples into a crisp white Avon delivery bag, and looked up Eliza’s, the Kilt Man’s “whatever,” address. I wore my best black low-cut sundress for the occasion, the one with spaghetti straps and a built-in bra and a slit up the left side clear to the panty line. I don’t have towering height or cascading glamour locks or freckles and dimples like Eliza, but I did have an advantage in one department. Cleavage. I added lipstick the color of black cherries and smudgy blue eyeliner and electric blue seashell flip-flops and new dangly pink teardrop earrings from Avon’s jewelry collection. And yeah, I looked hot, for a big-nosed practically middle-aged mom.

I drove to Eliza’s house and wondered why I took the trouble to look like an Avon Red Light District makeover, why I left my kids with the neighbor, why I spritzed her bag of goodies with Today fragrance and stuck a butterfly sticker on the thank you card inside. Ah, who am I kidding? I knew exactly why I did these things. Kilt Man Kevin’s smile.

I drove to the neighborhood bordering the north lagoon, and maneuvered, map in hand, to her house. It was a small brown home covered in broad-leaf ivy, almost a cottage, but the simple exterior didn’t fool me. I knew these homes among the reeds and pelicans cost nearly a million dollars each. A sparrow perched on an empty cement birdbath. She extended one wing and dipped her head to straighten her feathers. I walked past the eerie witch-twisted juniper trees. A redwood deck wrapped around the west side of her home. A jaunty garden gnome with a green cap and red knickers peered over the bottom rail. I looked for a doorbell but didn’t see one, so I knocked on the carved oak door.

Eliza took her time answering the door. I could hear someone walking around the house, footsteps on wood or tile floor, one way, then another, not a straight beeline for the knock. I knocked again. She opened the door, in a simple navy shift, which for all of it’s shapeless wonder looked ten times more classy and elegant and yes, even ten times more sexy, than my secondhand sundress. I still have the better cleavage, I thought, and held out her bag of blush and sundries.

“Hey! Thanks for ordering these things at my wingding. It was nice to meet you. Sorry about all the commotion. Right before you arrived one of the neighbor’s dogs got loose and we were just cleaning up.”

I looked up at her face as I spoke. My eyes were at the height of her neck bones, and she licked her teeth as I spoke, once, twice, three times.
Man, what a bad habit
, I muttered to myself.
Maybe this is why she’s not living with Kilt Man. I don’t know anything about him
, I thought,
yet I dressed like one of those women who tries to look twenty years younger and fails, not in the lipstick or dress or earrings, but in the combination, the way they don’t add up to Audrey Hepburn or Sharon Stone or even the third runner up at the county fair
. Eliza licked her teeth once more and took the bag from my hands.

“How much do I owe you?”

So cool and collected and charming and demure, and damn, I just wanted to de-Pygmalion her into someone more like me, someone who would have laughed and tried to make a joke and invited me in all too hastily, tripping on the way. But Eliza just picked up a cultured leather pouch and extracted the sleekest bronze checkbook in the world. She wrote out the exact amount due in a measured flourish while I stared at her alabaster skin and tried to determine the vanilla scent of her tasteful cologne. She handed the check to me, licked her teeth, and gave me a gentle grin.

“Kevin says you seem like quite the enterprising woman.”

He talked about me!
I felt my cheeks burn.

“So, how long have you two been dating?” I asked, putting the check in my purse, trying to sound like I didn’t give two rips about their dating history, as if asking a drop dead beautiful virtual stranger about her relationships was normal small talk.

“No honey, you misunderstand. I’m his ex-wife.”

I jumped in the van and grinned, did a little butt dance and shoulder shimmy. Kevin talked about me! I clicked on the radio and an old 80’s hit blasted the marine air, a song popular when my daughter grew inside me. I wondered if she’s changed her mind about contacting me, or if she’s taking time to compose a letter, or if she wants to do something but doesn’t know what to say, what to do. I wished I knew. I wished I knew what to do about the not knowing of it.

Part of my mind caressed my fears: She’s busy, she’s processing, she’s figuring out what to say. The other part yelled: She doesn’t like you, she’s disappointed, she’s angry. I didn’t know in which part she sleeps.