Two Glasses of Spanish Sherry
Mildred Munch has a skeleton in her closet. His name is Mr. Blevins.
On chilly fall evenings, after the sun casts long shadows on the ground and then retires for the night, she pours them each a glass of Spanish sherry (even though he never touches the stuff). She lights two candles on the dining room table and arranges two place settings opposite one another, each with a crisply pressed napkin and a full complement of flatware. She sits and waits for him as candle wax pools on the tablecloth, her despondence compounding with every quarter-hour chime of the grandfather clock.
To combat the creeping paranoia that tells her he might not walk through that door, she fondly recalls his kind and ever-present smile. His long, sturdy limbs. She remembers what it feels like to be held in those arms as he silently sits with her on the divan, his embrace somehow gentle and secure at the same time. She pictures the erect posture he adopts when he sits down at the grand piano, the way he cracks his knuckles as he contemplates which étude he’ll play for her this time. She hears in her memory the faint tap of his fingers as they play across the keys. He really is a most accomplished musician, she sighs to herself.
Most nights, when the clock has struck midnight and the candles have burned to stumps, Mildred ascends the grand staircase alone, downing Mr. Blevins’ sherry in one grimacing gulp before she goes, her own glass long since empty. On most nights, she makes his excuses for him: He must have had terribly important business. He must have found it impossible to get away. Must have encountered an unavoidable delay — the kind accompanied by profuse apologies and expensive flowers in a leaded crystal vase. He would have joined her, most certainly would have joined her, if it were possible.
Most nights, she forgives him for his absence.
But there are also those nights when her need for his companionship and her white-hot desire for his touch override her ability to release the bygones. On those nights — and tonight is one of them — she pauses at the base of the staircase. She burns with indignation, and sherry, as she asks herself: Am I not deserving of his company? (She is.) Will I not hold and cherish him the way he wants to be held and cherished? (She will.) Do I not have an attractive physique? (She does, a little, with the correct lighting.) And having received those affirmative responses, she will allow the indignation to settle in the pit of her stomach, where it will transform into a righteous determination. With clenched fists and through clenched teeth, she will spit out a How dare he!
She will march to the cupboard beneath the stairs. She will throw open its door and stand there, backlit, while she allows her eyes to adjust to the dark. She will push aside the furs and the camel hair coats to reveal his steamer trunk, and she will reach past her neckline for the key she keeps on a chain, next to her heart. She will unlock the trunk, the clasp popping up on its spring like a mousetrap being sprung. She will lift its lid and endure its squeaky hinges. And there in the dark, she will see him — grinning, perhaps a touch remorseful, obviously happy to see her.
She will lift him carefully out of the trunk, letting gravity straighten his articulated joints as he unfolds. She will stroke his bald skull. Trembling with feeling, she will lean in to where his ear ought to be, and she’ll whisper Mr. Blevins, I’m so glad you came to see me tonight.
She will wrestle his arms into the silk smoking jacket she keeps for him in the closet, specifically for nights like this, the smell of frost hanging in the air. She will hum the Waltz of the Flowers (Tchaikovsky, her favorite) and they will dance together, slowly, sensually, his phalanges clacking lightly against the hardwood floor.
She will tell him about her day, giving a full accounting of its slights and injustices, and he will listen raptly without interrupting. He will gaze into her eyes with longing and affection and she will remember, for at least as long as the dance lasts, what it feels like to be truly loved.
When it comes time to part, she will stroke his cheek before lowering the lid of the trunk. She will climb the staircase slowly, mostly sated, but also haunted by a ghost of disappointment from the many times he’s let her down or stood her up.
At the top of the staircase there hangs an exquisite portrait of Napoleon Bonaparte. It was painted by one of her ancestors and passed down through a matrilineal line. She’ll happen to notice the twinkle in the General’s eye. She’ll notice that while he’s not handsome, exactly, he is quite a distinguished-looking gentleman. Military men are punctual, reliable, imbued with an innate sense of honor. Perhaps, she muses, he would prove more dedicated than Mr. Blevins.
She resolves to ask him for dinner sometime. She hopes he has a taste for sherry.
