DEATH OF A LEGEND
Fabula diBeaumarchais - October 2003
I thought that this month I’d give you all a little excerpt from my forthcoming novel, a collection of bedtime stories for children.
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 Hello Darlings! I thought that this month I’d give you all a little excerpt from my forthcoming novel, a collection of bedtime stories for children. Enjoy! Hoorah! Lovings, F DiB XXXXXXXXXXXXX DEATH OF A LEGEND She opened her eyes to the sensation of many pairs of hands strapping a plaster girdle around her hourglass torso. She yawned, her perfect pink mouth breaking its usual candy-smile into a grimace of exhaustion. Oxygenated, she swung her shapely, shiny, tanned legs out of the Dream Bed and into her precariously high baby-pink mules. She reached for her chiffon-and-marabou cerise negligee, and, tying the cord around her, rose from her bed. Standing up, she once again gave silent thanks for the corset she wore. It prevented her spine from snapping from the weight of her grossly distended breasts. The poison chalice of the life of a glamour model, she thought, and tottered across her bedroom, to her dressing table. Looking in the mirror, she surveyed the damage with a critical, blue-shadowed eye. Her hair, her one beauty left to her, lay in fuzzy disarray around her slightly square shoulders. Her face had taken on the appearance of something grotesque and surreal, vinyl-like now, from many years of laying about in the sun. ‘I look like a Pepperami in a cheap nylon wig. ‘, she mused, before remembering her actress’ training, and plastering on her smile-for-all-occasions, a vapid grimace of perfectly white teeth framed by baby-pink clam lips. ‘Today is the day, ‘, she thought. ‘Today is the End. ‘. In the Jacuzzi, as the hot water raged angrily around her, she remembered how it had been in the Sixties. She had been so in love with Ken then, she a promising secretary, and he, the clean-cut all-American college football hero. Throughout the seventies and eighties, while her professional life raged from career to career (she’d been a teacher, a doctor, an astronaut, a vet, a ballerina… how could she remember all of her short-lived jobs?), he had been her one constant. Ken, her love, her picture-perfect man to go with her picture-perfect life. Even with his horrible hair, even with his white plastic dress shoes, she’d loved him, and he had loved her. But now? Now there was nothing. He’d started drinking. He’d knocked her around a few times. She’d tried to get away, but had nothing to go to. She was trapped. She, the figurehead, the public face of a Multinational corporation ,with wardrobes of Fashion Avenue gowns, crates of tiny, custom-made shoes. She’d beaten off all of the competitors… the English one, Sindy something-or-other, and those young Bratz, with their collagen blowjob lips and huge feet, to remain the true Queen of Beauty. Hers was an unforgiving and exacting profession, and she’d remained flawless for long. ‘Dance like an Angel on the pinhead of success.’, was a quote she remembered. And what of her family? Her two sisters? She couldn’t go to them. Skipper’s marriage to Paul was long-since over; she was barely surviving on her tiny widow’s pension, and what she didn’t spend on cheap and nasty food for her two screaming brat children (she was certain the older one had a look of Ken about it), she poured down her throat in the form of Vodka. And Shelley, her youngest sister? She hadn’t heard from Shelley since the newspapers got hold of her life-story. She remembered the headline - ‘Sister of International Beauty Star Lives As Crack Whore - She won’t help me out, Says Shelley’. Of course, they were both out of the question. So it comes to this, she mused. She got the elevator of the Dream House downstairs to the walk-in wardrobe and selected her outfit. Pink satin bomber jacket, with candy-pink clingy minidress, pink wool tights and pink stiletto mules. And her handbag, pink PVC. If she tried another colour, she tended to get sudden nosebleeds and her head ached. She supposed it was psychosomatic, but when your company puts you in a certain colour for almost fifty years, you tend not to stray in the autumn of your life. She sighted as she surveyed her reflection. Perfect in Pink. She felt nothing anymore. She crossed to the kitchen and found it where she’d left it. Joe, her Joe, her little G.I. Who’d been so good to her lately, had done a marvellous job with the gun. A Beretta in satin-finish black rubber. Untraceable and indistinguishable from the scores of other loose guns laying about in this neighbourhood. She put it in her bag and closed it with a decisive snap. So this was it. She was going to see Ken. See him, and see to him. She crossed the garden to where Ken slept. In these later years he had flatly refused to share her bed in the Dream Bedroom, preferring instead to spend the nights in her convertible corvette with chrome detail, a bottle in one hand (usually marked ‘Cluedo’ - his favourite brand), and a syringe in the other. As her life-partner he was privy to such little pieces from all the major Company Boards, and ‘Operation Ltd.’ was one of his most-abused contacts. ‘If that fucker’s nose goes red one more time…’, he’d hiss, if the company’s president threatened legal action when more of his equipment went missing. ‘Ken.’. Her voice was hard, resigned. Nothing. He snored on. ‘KEN! ‘, she shouted, and he woke with a start, dropping the bottle and the syringe, where they joined the dog, the iron and the top hat, under the chassis of the corvette. ‘What the fuck… what d’you want? ‘, he growled. ‘To talk to you. ‘, she said, noticing that an edge of fear had crept into her voice. He sat up now, and his robe flopped open, carelessly. She shuddered to see what a mess of marks and bruises his body had become. ‘No need to fear it, babe, ‘, he smirked, grabbing his exposed crotch. ‘Time was when you couldn’t get enough. ‘. She looked at him. ‘Ken, this isn’t working. I don’t love you anymore. ‘. He threw his head back and laughed. ‘Who cares? Think I fucking love you? Christ, you’ve got an opinion of yourself, sweetheart. ‘. She felt a bubble of rage grow inside her, and went on. ‘I mean it, Ken. I don’t love you, and haven’t for a long time. I need this to be over. ‘. He looked at her now, properly looked at her for the first time. His expression was quizzical, but confident. ‘So what? So fucking what? I hate your guts, you hate mine, we fuck around… you get out of line and I smack you one… you know we have to be together for your company. ‘. ‘For my company’s money, you mean. ‘, she challenged. ‘I don’t see you champing at the bit to get a new job. ‘. He coloured at this. ‘What the fuck did you say? ‘, he hissed. ‘Never talk to me like that, bitch! You goddamned whore, that’s what you are, a filthy whore.’ . She smiled at him, that vacuous pink-and-white smile. ‘A whore who keeps you in booze and syringes. Never forget that, Ken. ‘. She knew then, as he rose to run at her, that she had pushed him over the edge. He ran at her with his fists raised. ‘I’ll fucking kill you for that, cunt…. ‘. Bang. She pulled the trigger and caught him square in the chest. As the bullet pierced his body, his chest shattered and shards of flesh-coloured material scattered everywhere. He fell backwards, a kind of ironic smile playing on his salmon-coloured lips, his hair, moulded and perfect. She considered the scene for a moment. ‘Maybe it would have helped if we’d been able to have sex. Too late for you now, my knobless Darling. ‘. She looked around her. Others would come soon. Joe, the G.I., who’d lent her the gun, was revving up his 4X4 in the distance. Squeak the dog was snapping angrily from his kennel. It was a matter of time before the Important Ones came, and she was taken away and locked up. That wouldn’t happen. She knew how it must end. She knew how she could make it all go away. She crossed the room and lay down in front of the giant 2-bar electric fire that dominated the neighbourhood. As everything turned softer and warmer, as her very life melted away from her quietly and quickly, she imagined the headlines: ‘Barbie Commits Suicide’. The End.
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