Two Stories

It was the worst possible thing that could happen at a bridal shower, and if any bride deserved a decent bridal shower, it was poor Lilith Antiman. Lilith had run away from Womyn’s Eden, the militantly matriarchic and exclusively lesbian commune where her mother had settled, at the age of 14. She came down from Shoutout Mountain a skinny and skittish little thing and she lived alone in a tent on the outskirts of town for weeks before the town librarian befriended her and convinced her to take the room above her garage. Her mother, Sister Pandora Antiman, made no attempt to bring her back to the commune, but she did come to visit when she made her monthly trip to town in the old pick-up truck which had a naked woman giving birth to a rainbow painted on its side. Sister Pandora would stand stiffly in front of the truck, clearly unused to wearing clothes, waiting for Lilith to come out and meet her. She was disgusted with her daughter’s choice to live under some man’s roof, ignoring Lilith’s quiet explanation that the librarian, a woman, owned the house herself. Sister Pandora spoke gruffly to her daughter, spitting every time she found it necessary to allude to a man. “So you’re in school now eh? Just can’t get enough Shakespeare eh? Pa-too! Just can’t wait to run back into the arms of the oppressors eh?? Pa-too! All these years I been bringing you up to the light of the True Mother, and you just a man-lover PA-TOO! Makes me sick!” Sister Pandora would eventually run out of saliva and leave.

In school Lilith was a bright and observant, but she was too shy and confused around the boys, who she had been taught from a young age were walking monstrosities, to ever fit in with the other students. She chose instead to work in the little pottery studio the kind-hearted librarian allowed her to set up in her garage. She also took to weaving, all stringed instruments, bird-watching, herb-gathering and woodworking. She graduated from high school with high marks, few friends, and no plans for the future. Then Jack March came to town, an orphan and high school drop-out who had been traveling for the last four years of his young life. He was tired, hungry, and desperately alone when he walked past her studio at a moment when all things were aligned to entrap him forever: she was turning the corner of her studio after an afternoon in the woods with the setting sun at her back, her long golden hair swimming wildly about her face and shoulders in the same breeze that caught a bunch of wild flowers from her arms and blew them into the road at his feet. They were inseparable ever after.

Word soon reached Sister Pandora and the rest of the womyn up on Shoutout Mountain that Lilith intended to marry a man. A great cry of despair went up from the fire circle, where the naked women gathered in the evenings for meals and meetings. They quickly fashioned a wooden effigy of a man and spent the better part of the evening stabbing and abusing it until they burned it completely in the Fire of Womyn’s Wrath. “Sister Pandora,” said Sister Gaia with a mighty shake of her fist, breathless with rage, “we must rescue her. She’s too young to know that she’s sacrificing her soul, that she’s shaming her body and the Great Mother.” And so, the very next day, Sister Pandora, with Sister Gaia, Sister Athena, and Sister Sappho crouched solemnly in the bed of the truck, descended the mountain in a cloud of dust and fury to kidnap her daughter and, if the Great Mother was generous, castrate a certain young man.

Meanwhile, the kind-hearted librarian had gathered a few of the neighbor women and some of Lilith’s schoolmates to a sort of bridal shower on her verandah. A few women offered a few small household items, knowing full well that Lilith and Jack probably wouldn’t be the type to keep house, if they ever had a house. They planned to head for a community farm that took in travelers who would work as soon as they could. Lilith was still overcome with the joy of being lied to about men and couldn’t even bring herself to say his name without blushing uncontrollably. The older women smiled but did her the favor of pretending not to notice. They sipped their tea and resumed the daily gossip.

Suddenly the Womyn’s Eden pick-up truck came rattling up the lane with four angry, naked womyn in it. Sister Pandora was the first to dismount [would you ‘dismount’ a truck?] slamming the truck door with a deadly bang. “Enough is enough, Lilith Antiman.” She barked. She and the others were approaching the verandah in a menacing formation, their aged, weathered breasts swinging with every step . Sister Pandora was carrying something in her hand. “You should be ashamed of yourself. I’ve respected your freedom for this long. But I must forbid this wicked thing. No daughter of mine will ever be defiled by a son of Adam. Pa-too!” The other sisters spat in agreement; Sister Athena went so far as to lift her leg and let rip a contemptuous fart.

“No Mother!” said Lilith, raising her voice ever so slightly above normal volume for possibly the first time in her life. “You leave me and Jack alone. We love each other and there’s nothing wrong with that. Go back to your mountain and become extinct since that is your choice.”

“Where is this Jack? I want a word with him, the first word I’ve spoken to any man since the day I cursed your vile beast of a father in the face after I found him atop my own sister on the day you were born. I want to tell him exactly what I think of him.” With that she displayed a well-worn machete with grim ferocity.

“Now Pandora, you’re being ridiculous. I must ask you and your..er…friends to leave my property,” said the kind-hearted librarian. The guests of the bridal shower murmured similar protests while trying to avoid the sight of 8 droopy breasts. Just as it became clear that the gentle reasoning of Lilith and the kind-hearted librarian was going to be useless, Jack March came up the lane after a morning’s hard work at the neighbor’s farm, shovel over his shoulder and a whistle on his lips. He whistled slower as he passed the oddly painted truck, but choked on his whistle altogether when he saw the giant, muscular buttocks of four women at a stand-off with Lilith and the guests. The Womyn turned upon him with Cheshire cat grins. The befuddled boy reeled backward at the sight of the nude Amazons.

“So this is my supposed son-in-law,” Sister Pandora crowed. “Presumptuous son of a presumptuous son!” The other womyn made similarly obscure and hateful remarks. Lilith darted down the steps of the verandah and planted herself firmly between Jack and her mother.

“Get away you bitter old cow!” She shrieked, transformed in a moment from a gentle sparrow to a hawk. “I’m sorry my father was a bad man but you’re wrong about Jack and you’re wrong about life in general so just go away and become extinct on your lonely old mountain! I love Jack and I’m marrying him and you don’t have a say!” The womyn were so taken aback at the sight of an impassioned Lilith, who they had last seen as a twiggy child silently throwing stones into the river for hours, that they quite forgot their mission. Indeed, when they saw Lilith embrace the wide-eyed Jack in an act of defiance, they felt suddenly bereft of meaning. Sisters Gaia, Athena, and Sappho trickled back into the pick-up, each lost in thought. Athena calculated that she had left a son who would be about Jack’s age now. Gaia remembered what it was like to be in love when she was 17. Sister Pandora jabbed her machete into the ground, frustrated but speechless. After a few tense moments, she made as if to return to the pick-up, but took a sudden turn and flew fist-first toward Jack’s head. Always a quick thinker, Jack shielded himself with the shovel he had been holding, and his naked mother-in-law’s hand was brutally thwarted in its purpose. She howled and fell to the ground, cradling her shattered hand. Jack knelt beside her and apologized profusely as the womyn scrambled from the pick-up to collect their broken sister. Sister Pandora only glared at him, sputtering- mad.

As the sisters from Womyn’s Eden disappeared down the road in the rattling pick-up, Lilith took Jack’s hand and assured him that they need never see her mother again. Out of sheer gratitude, Jack kissed her. “Nevermind, my dears!” said the kind-hearted librarian, approaching them with two glasses of minty iced tea. “What’s a bridal shower without a homicidal mother-in-law in the nude?”



It was the worst possible thing that could have happened at a bridal shower. It started out innocuously enough. The bride, Celia, was radiant in the April afternoon sunshine as she walked into the garden with her mother, Janet. Thirty four of her very closest friends had gathered for one last day before Celia waltzed down the aisle on her father’s arm, where Craig would be waiting, Craig the man of all of her childhood dreams. She’d met him the first day of rush week freshman year, and he eventually pledged Kappa Sigma and she pledged Delta Kappa, so it was like they were meant to be right from the start. It was really going to be a fairy tale wedding. Celia’s Vera Wang dress had been delivered just that morning, right after she returned from a teeth-whitening procedure. It fit like a dream on her perfect waist, adorable hips, and enviable bosom. She’d had a practice run with the hairdresser the day before, and everyone in attendance agreed that they had never seen such an exquisite hairdo, accentuated by the Swarovski crystal tiara that had been an early wedding gift from Craig. The tickets for the honeymoon in Bali were in Craig’s top dresser drawer, along with an impressive array of edible body paint, and the only thing left to do before next weekend’s love extravaganza was a farewell party with her girls. There had been some talk of a bachelorette party, but Delta Kappas were far too elegant for such trash, and anyway, Celia couldn’t handle her liquor. No, a garden party was best.

And of course it all went smoothly as silk, as everything did in Celia’s charmed life. The only thing that could be called a snag was the fact that Celia’s best friend and maid of honor, Jackie, was MIA, but they received a call that she was stuck in traffic, but would they please get started without her? And so they did. There was a sumptuous spread of food- bite-size cheesecakes and airy puff pastries, champagne (just dainty sips for dainty Celia), and a delightful array of divine gifts – cushy towels, sheets of the highest Egyptian thread count available, sleek kitchenware, and some very expensive yet very tasteful lingerie. It was just as Celia was opening her last gift (a gorgeous pewter cake knife from her sophomore year roommate, Bunny Harrison) that Jackie breezed in, all apologies and perfume.

“Darling, I am so sorry I was held up. I had the teensiest bit of trouble with your gift, and I simply couldn’t show up unless it was perfect,” Jackie crooned in her Southern drawl that fairly dripped with honey. She flounced into the seat of honor and handed Celia a massive yet oddly light box. Celia had the good grace not to blush as she secretly hoped the box would contain the one thing she’s truly hoped for, a rather intricate, er, marital toy that one blew up with a hair dryer. She had discussed it one night over margaritas, well, one margarita, with Jackie, but knew that Jackie would never be so gauche as to give it to her in front of her mother, a Delta Kappa alum of their very chapter. Jackie gave Celia a wink. “Go ahead Celia, I bet you’ll never guess….”

Celia delicately undid the curling ribbons and crisp wrapping. She opened the flaps to reveal….an envelope at the bottom of the box. Celia’s heart began to pound. A gift certificate? She adored gift certificates, and Jackie always picked such good ones, with such large amounts. She cheekily slit open the top with her new cake knife and pulled out a blurry black and white photograph. She stared a moment, head cocked at a precious angle. She said nothing.

“Dear, what is it?” Janet leaned in over her daughter’s shoulder, pen and paper at the ready to record the nature of the gift next to Jackie’s name in her excellent penmanship.

Celia’s voice came out rather robotic. “It’s an ultrasound picture. Of a baby.”

A decided hush fell. Was Celia pregnant? Janet cleared her throat. “Whose…whose baby, darling?”

Celia stood and let the picture fall to her side. “Jackie’s. “ Audible gasps were heard around the garden. “And Craig’s.”

That’s when all hell broke loose.

Janet shrieked and fainted. Roughly half of the Delta Kappa sisters froze in their seats, some in mid-chew. The remaining half turned to their neighbors, eyes agape, and immediately began to enumerate the reasons that they just knew that something like this would happen. And that’s why no one noticed when, with her customary grace, Celia, without so much as a shiver, plunged the beautiful pewter cake knife into her heart. As she slumped back into her chair, head at an impossible angle and spurting blood simply ruining her tasteful grey Dior sheath, Jackie reached over her to the puff pastries with a hint of a smile. “Don’t mind if I do.”

Poppycock Goes Gothic

“Emily, I say, are you alright? You’re looking terribly peaked, didn’t you sleep well?” Professor Molly P’ohlig looked at Professor Emilia DeBusque with no small measure of alarm, for Emily was well known for her reliable circadian rhythms.

“I don’t think I slept at all, actually. Oh, thank you,” Emily smiled weakly as Molly slid a piping hot bowl of oatmeal just under where Emily’s wan visage was drooping over the kitchen table. “It’s the strangest thing, I know, and I would think I was dreaming, but I was most decidedly awake. All night it sounded like, and I know this is ridiculous, but it sounded like there was an elderly man in my closet singing “La Marseillaise”.”

Molly very nearly choked on a raspberry.

“I know, it’s ridiculous, but the fact is that that is what it sounded like.” Emily glumly poured an extra helping of maple syrup which Mr. Periwinkle had brought with the morning post, direct from John Irving’s Vermont farm, hand-tapped by Mr. Irving himself. Normally, Emily would have noticed the addition. Normally, Emily would have gotten up before noon. “Where’s Maude?”

“Here, I think,” Maude shuffled in with uncustomary slowness, her fuzzy bunny slippers, a gift for helping with Rupert Everett’s first play, positively dragging their ears. As Molly ladled up some more oatmeal, Maude said, “You’ll never believe why I couldn’t sleep last night.”

Molly and Emily simultaneously said “An elderly man singing “La Marseillaise” in your closet?”

Maude’s puffy eyes widened considerably.

“Emily heard it too, you see, and I, well, I thought it was just one of my dreams. And I’m always tired when I wake up anyway, so I generally feel just the same as if I didn’t sleep at all.” Molly skittered about the kitchen finding the biggest coffee mugs available. “Something very peculiar is afoot. Listen, I think I can actually sing “La Marseillaise” – A…Allons enfants de la Patrie,…le….Le jour de gloire est arrivé !”

Emily raised her eyebrows as Molly looked about triumphantly. “That’s true, you never could do that before.”

“Do we even know any elderly men?” Maude said off-hand, more intent on rubbing her bloodshot eyes.

“Maudie, we hardly know anyone who ISN’T an elderly man. But how did this chap get into our house? And even if he did, how could he have been in all of our closets at once?” A sticky silence fell over the kitchen, followed by a cartoonishly loud thunderclap. The girls looked at each other ominously.

“Ladies,” Molly said theatrically, “I believe Poppycock is being haunted.”

* * *

Quite an industrious day began for the three young ladies who had only lately risen. They dispatched Mr. Periwinkle to the Poppycock offices with a sign that read CLOSED TO DUE PECULIAR CIRCUMSTANCES, PLEASE CALL AGAIN. He also had the excellent foresight to bring back take-away from the Indian restaurant on the corner that always gave them free naan bread, the proprietor being helplessly in love with Maude. The girls threw themselves into a tizzy of research as to how to best lure a ghost from one’s rafters, the better to exorcise any unfriendly spirits. Well, at least that was the aim when they entered Poppycock’s well-established library.

Emily struggled through at least ten pages of an early 19th century ‘academic’ work on the spirit world, but soon abandoned it in favor of a small book of Poe. Maude went for roughly the same era, and ended up poring over a collection of ethereal Julia Cameron photographs. Molly didn’t even pretend to be researching, she just cozied up with a copy of “The Shining” and quickly dropped off to sleep. After two hours of reading, Emily did the same. Thoughtful Maude decided to look up more on Julia Cameron on her laptop (the only computer allowed in Poppycock, although Maude was strictly forbidden to have a Facebook page), and, as one thing often leads to another, soon made an enlightening discovery….

“I know who it is!” Maude shouted, causing Molly and Emily to wake with tiny shrieks. “I know who our elderly gentleman is! Look, I’ve just read that Edward Gorey’s mother had a bit part in “Casablanca”, playing the guitar and singing ‘La Marseillaise’!”

All shrieks of being woken in fright turned into shrieks of delight as the girls celebrated Maude’s excellent discovery, climbing over the comfortably overstuffed leather chairs (from the gentlemen’s club frequented by one Mr. Charles Dickens, bought specifically for Poppycock at auction by one Mr. Simon Callow), marching up and down on top of the stately library table (given to them by the Board of the British Museum for, as they said, ‘admiration’), and participating in a general air of merriment until Emily shouted,

“But how do we get him out of our closets?” The large handful of library cards that Molly had just flung skywards from the card catalog drawer tumbled awkwardly over her head and shoulders.

“Well….he always drew very fancy but very small parties,” Maude offered hopefully, and was rewarded with grins from both professors, and before another word could be said, all three were racing towards their rooms to find the most appropriate apparel available for an “Edward Gorey Outing”.

* * *

It was three hours later and approaching late evening before anyone emerged from their rooms. Professor DeBusque was resplendent in a dress of dark green crushed velvet that threatened to fall from her alabaster shoulders at any minute. It had once belonged to Dorothy Parker, and she accessorized it with a headband made from albino peacock feathers. She also had on a great deal of diamonds.

Molly slunk out of her room in a slinky white gown that threatened to trip her up at every step, especially since her stiletto heels were made of actual stiletto daggers, rumored to have once belonged to a Templar knight. Her short hair was tightly slicked back, the better to see the lashings of velvety black kohl liner around her eyes.

Mr. Periwinkle had popped in to do Maude’s hair (he was a man of many hidden talents) and her luxuriant black tresses were elaborately curled and pinned. Since it was a special occasion, she was allowed, just this once, to wear three petticoats under her pale pink party dress.

Everyone looked just like they’d stepped out of an Edward Gorey lithograph. The evening was lit only by a variety of antique wall sconces, they dined entirely on cucumber sandwiches, and drank from the most delicate chinoiserie teacups, which had been purchased from the estate of a Russian nobleman who had murdered his wife in 1927. Maude had tea, the professors drank champagne cocktails. It should be noted, no one spilled a drop.

Even though the party was small, they had a simply marvelous evening after Mr. Periwinkle had locked up for the night and gone home. They sang every gloomy song they could think of, they took turns tying each other’s hands with silk handkerchiefs and trying to undo them, they spoke in rhyme, and they practiced sounding distressed in a manner most befitting a Gorey maiden. Indeed, they were having such a jolly evening that not one of them noticed a tall, older man in a floor length fur coat and white Converse at the doorway of the dining room. If they had, they would have seen a wistful smile play about his faded features before he drifted slowly out of sight.

Since that night, the inhabitants of Poppycock Manor have slept exceedingly well, although it is said that on those famous nights when a dazzling literary party is in full swing, if you quietly in an empty bedroom, you can just hear what sounds like an elderly gentleman, sweetly singing ‘La Marseillaise’.