It is a private Christmas Eve party: a formal banquet. The men are
dazzling in their hunting jackets and bright goretex caps, flipping
up the earflaps
casually as they enter the room and begin shaking hands. Life preservers
hang elegantly from the women, every strap perfectly adjusted and buckled.
They all wear pylons on their heads and beneath the square rubber brims
a few curls of cinnamon hair are plastered to foreheads and ears are
hung
with jewels the size of kumquats. On the wall hang elegantly framed
roadside signs—MEN WORKING, DANGER—and in the corner is a
barricade with stripes and a blinking safety light. There is a television
set whose chrome
knob is twisted all the way to the left displaying a crackling fire.
All of these objects are admired by the guests as they circulate.
The appetizers
are passed around: cheetoes impaled on fancy toothpicks. The guests
laugh delightedly and nibble their cheetoes, raised pinkies glittering
with
cheetoe-dust, commenting on their exquisite freshness and granular
texture. The squash and cheddar soufflé will soon be removed
from the oven. It has been left to solidify as the heating coils cool.
Its aroma
fills
the room. Guests sip their Grand Marnier or Absolut Citron Screwdrivers
and occasionally stop to admire the sun setting. In one corner a conversation
goes:
—I am having a problem with rabbits and donkeys.
—The rabbits keep coming into my garden and eating the carrots
I need to hang before my donkeys...
—I don't know how to keep the rodents out.
—I have set up a fence around my garden—electrified—but
for every six rabbits who electrocute themselves one will still manage
to
get in.
—So I have started to hang more and more of my carrots on rabbits
instead of donkeys.
—Rabbits are not the same as donkeys certainly—that is
like comparing apples with a different fruit altogether.
—My donkeys are malnourished and surly, but its worth giving
the rabbits the carrots, if only to keep them out of my garden.
It is time for dinner and they slowly shuffle out of the room leaving
half-finished drinks and cheetoes. Some of them move to set their drinks
down on the coffeetable but cannot bring themselves to stoop so low. They
moved in shuffling starts and stops towards the dining room.
Marma staggered elegantly a few steps towards the dining room in
her sharp heels and stopped before a hung reproduction of Europe After
the
Rain hanging beside a box of Tide which sat on a pedestal beneath
a glass dome. A Jack O’ Lantern flickered in the corner. She addressed
Tang who also paused midway to the dining room. She said:
—Isn't it beautiful?