Oblivion_ stories - By David Foster Wallace Page 0,141
about the preparation of the displays, back at the Moltkes’ duplex. The pieces were not varnished or in any way chemically treated. They were, however, sprayed lightly with a fixative when fresh or new, to help preserve their shape and intricate detail—evidently some of the man’s early work had become cracked or distorted when allowed to dry completely. Atwater knew that freshly produced pieces of art were placed on a special silver finish tray, an heirloom of some sort from Mrs. Moltke’s own family, then covered in common kitchen plastic wrap and allowed to cool to room temperature before the fixative was applied. Skip could imagine the steam from a fresh new piece fogging the Saran’s interior and making it difficult to see the thing itself until the wrap was removed and discarded. Only later, in the midst of all the editorial wrangling over his piece’s typeset version, would Atwater learn that the fixative in question was a common brand of aerosol styling spray whose manufacturer advertised in Style.
Amber gave a brief laugh. ‘We’re not exactly talking the big time. Two bean festivals and the DAR craft show.’
‘Well, and of course the fair.’ Atwater was referring to the Franklin County Fair, which like most county fairs in eastern Indiana was held in June, quite a bit earlier than the national average. The reasons for this were complicated, agricultural, and historically bound up with Indiana’s refusal to participate in Daylight Savings Time, which caused no end of hassles for certain commodities markets at the Chicago Board of Trade. Atwater’s own childhood experiences had been of the Madison County Fair, held during the third week of each June on the outskirts of Mounds State Park, but he assumed that all county fairs were roughly similar. He had unconsciously begun to do the thing with his fist again.
‘Well, although the fair ain’t exactly your big time either.’
Also from childhood experience, Skip Atwater knew that the slight squeaks and pops one could hear when Amber laughed were from different parts of her complex foundation garment as they strained and moved against one another. Her kneesized left elbow now rested on the seat back between them, leaving her left hand free to play and make tiny languid motions in the space between her head and his. A head nearly twice the size of Atwater’s own. Her hair was wiglike in overall configuration, but it had a high protein luster no real wig could ever duplicate.
His right arm still rigidly out against the Cavalier’s wheel, Atwater turned his head a few more degrees toward her. ‘This, though, will be very public. Style is about as public as you can get.’
‘Well, except for TV.’
Atwater inclined his head slightly to signify concession. ‘Except for TV.’
Mrs. Moltke’s hand, with its multiple different rings, was now within just inches of the journalist’s large red right ear. She said: ‘Well, I look at Style. I’ve been looking at Style for years. I don’t bet there’s a body in town that hasn’t looked at Style or People or one of you all.’ The hand moved as if it were under water. ‘Sometimes it’s hard keeping you all straight. After your girl there called, I said to Brint it was a man coming over from People when I was telling him to go on and get cleaned up for company.’
Atwater cleared his throat. ‘So you see my point, then, which in no way forms any sort of argument against the piece or Mr. Moltke’s —’
‘Brint.’
‘Against Brint’s consenting to the piece.’ Atwater would also every so often give a small but vigorous all body shiver, involuntary, rather like a wet dog shaking itself, which neither party commented on. Bits of windblown foliage hit the front and rear windshields and remained for a moment or two before they were washed away. The sky could really have been any color at all and there would be no way to know. Atwater now tried to rotate his entire upper body toward Mrs. Moltke: ‘But he will need to know what he’s in for. If my editors give the go ahead, which I should again stress I have every confidence they ultimately will, one condition is likely to be the presence of some sort of medical authority to authenticate the . . . circumstances of creation.’
‘You’re saying in there with him?’ The gusts of her breath seemed to strike every little cilium on Atwater’s cheek and temple. Her right hand still covered the recorder and several inches of