The Auction

A selected story from “Thirteen Views” (Senior Honors Thesis)

“A seventeenth century Tigerwood sideboard, starting at six-hundred. Six-hundred. Six-hundred. Do I hear six-hundred? Six-hundred to the young lady in the back. Six-fifty, six-fifty. I see six-fifty in the front. Seven-hundred, seven-hundred to the woman in the hat. Seven-eight-hundred on the phone. Eight-fifty. Do I hear eight-fifty? Nine-hundred on the phone, nine-nine-fifty to the lady in the back.”

The auctioneer continued.

Ginger sighed loudly. “I wish he’d get tongue-tied just once,” she said, leaning over her husband.

“Shhh…,” he said. “I’m trying to concentrate.”

“Oh, you’re not really going to buy it, are you?” and Ginger slumped in her seat. “We have so many sideboards. I wouldn’t know what to do with another one.”

“Shhh.”

“This is a fine piece, really a steal at – One-thousand-two-hundred,” the auctioneer continued. “A good move from the woman in the front. Now, one thousand, three-four-hundred to the young woman in the back. Fifteen-hundred. Do I hear fifteen-hundred? Fifteen-hundred. Fair warning. Fair warning.”

“Are you going to get it?” Ginger asked. “I really wish you wouldn’t.”

Her husband raised his number.

“I see fifteen-hundred to the gentleman in the back. A good choice, my man. Sixteen-hundred. Sixteen-hundred. Do I hear sixteen-hundred. Sixteen-hundred. Fair warning, fair warning. Sixteen-hundred. And SOLD to the gentleman in the back for fifteen-hundred. Really, what a steal.”

Ginger groaned. “What am I going to do with another side table, darling?”

“It’s a sideboard,” he said. “And I’ll handle it.”

The auctioneer rapped the gavel on the podium and moved on to a selection of fine nineteenth century Chinese shrimp bowls. “Starting out at three-hundred.”

“I’m bored,” Ginger said and applied another layer of bright red lipstick to her already plump and lacquered lips.

“My dear girl, you’re always bored,” her husband said. “Just sit still, why don’t you.”

“Lately, you’re always telling me to sit still,” she said, running her hand through ruddy curls. “You didn’t use to do that.”

They used to take long road trips, mapping out their route late the night before and getting up early to start. They’d stop at roadside diners and make up weird and grand lives for the people eating around them. Now they just bought sideboards.

“Why don’t you pick something out you like,” he said. “And I’ll buy it for you.”

“It’s all old stuff,” Ginger said. “Horridly old and boring.”

“It’s called antique,” her husband said.

“Whatever.”

Ginger caught her husband’s eyes roving the room. “What are you looking at?” she asked.

“A woman with taste.”

“Hah!” but she followed his gaze.

The woman was quite a bit older than Ginger, with her hair starting to gray, elegant streaks running through the brown. A small green feather hat perched over one ear. It bobbed up and down as she looked from the auctioneer to her catalogue, scribbling copious notes beside each item for sale.

“What a bore,” said Ginger.

“What a lady,” said her husband.

Ginger turned to her husband. “Are you just saying that to bother me or do you really mean it?”

He didn’t say anything, and Ginger couldn’t keep her eyes off the woman in the green hat, who suddenly raised her arm for a bid. She wondered what the woman did for a living.

“What’s the sale?” Ginger asked her husband.

“It’s a seventeenth century Japanese screen.”

Cherry trees blossomed around the yellowed screen, with a golden pagoda rising in the background. Where would she put a screen like that?

“I wonder if she’s ever been to Japan,” Ginger said.

The woman in the green hat bought the screen for $2,300. The man beside her squeezed her arm slightly, and her face flushed. She scrawled the price next to the catalogue item and then refocused her attention on the next bid.

Another screen went up for sale. After a few bids, the woman in the green hat raised her paddle. 

“Nine-hundred to the lady in the green hat,” the auctioneer said. “Do I hear one-thousand? This is a state-of-the-art silkscreen, fine condition and – yes, I see one-thousand in the front. One-thousand, one-hundred? One-thousand, one-hundred to the woman in the center. One-thousand, two-hundred. One-thousand, two-hundred. Fair warning. One-thousand, two-hundred. How about it?” He eyed the lady in the green hat.

She nodded slightly.

“One-thousand, two-hundred to the lady. One-thousand, three-hundred. One-thousand, three-hundred.”

“I think she’s going to buy all of them,” Ginger said to her husband. “She’s won everything she’s bid on.”

“Did you want one?” her husband asked.

“Of course not,” Ginger said. “It’s just the principle of the matter.”

“I’ll get you one if you’d like it.”

“What would I do with an Asian screen?” Ginger asked. “I don’t even know how to use chopsticks.”

Her husband raised his eyebrows and stared straight ahead.

The woman in the green hat won the screen. Ginger imagined the woman returning home with a dozen screens. Maybe she’d barricade herself from her husband. There was an idea.

The auctioneer introduced the next item – a set of cut-glass cordials – and the woman in the green hat walked out of the room.

Ginger stood and followed her.

The woman turned at the bathroom door. “Are you coming in?” she asked and raised her pencil-thin eyebrows.

“It’s a public bathroom, isn’t it?”

This was the first opportunity Ginger had of seeing the woman in full. The woman was quite striking and thin. Her cheeks were stretched over high cheekbones, brightly rouged. Her eyes were gray and arresting.

“My husband finds you interesting,” Ginger said and studied her own reflection in the mirror. She seemed comparatively small and un-colorful, except for her nest of red hair.

“I’m a very interesting person,” the woman said and then extended her hand. “Zhee, and you?”

Ginger stared.

“My name is Zhee,” the woman repeated. She had a British accent.

“How exotic,” said Ginger.

“And yours?”

“Ginger,” and she took the woman’s outstretched hand. It was damp and her grip was quite loose, like shaking a dead fish.

“Very original,” said Zhee.

“Not really,” said Ginger. “Lots of redheads are called Ginger.”

“I was being sarcastic.”

“My mother had no imagination.”

Zhee raised her eyebrows again, and Ginger had the distinct impression that the woman’s eyebrows were connected to puppet strings. They lifted impossibly high.

“So why are you here?” Ginger asked. “Did your husband drag you along, too?”

Zhee dug through her purse and took a swig from a flask. “I’m a collector,” she said. “And as for that husband business, I’ve never married Art. He proposed many times, but after two failed marriages I said, ‘never again.’”

“Oh.”

“You haven’t been married long.” It wasn’t a question.

“Six months.”

“And?” She did the eyebrow thing again.

“Like I said, he finds you interesting.”

“My dear girl, he’s a man,” Zhee smiled and took another sip from her flask. “He’s going to find other women interesting. Your job is to be more interesting.”

Ginger turned back to the mirror.

“You won’t change that quickly, dear girl.”

“I know.”

“I mean, not without work,” Zhee amended, and she shuffled through her purse a second time. She emerged with a pair of scissors shaped like a bird, with arched, winged handles and the blades firmed into a beak.

“Pretty,” Ginger said.

“Antique,” Zhee said and snapped the air a few times. And then, “How attached are you to your hair?”

“Quite,” said Ginger, putting her hands protectively over her scalp. “It’s my best feature.”

“Because, you see, if you were willing to change it up a bit, it might do something for your overall experience. Make you seem more exotic.”

“We don’t all have accents.”

“That’s true.”

And it was Ginger’s turn to raise her eyebrows. “Wait, what happened to yours?” she asked. “Your accent – it’s gone.”

“Why do you think your husband’s here?” she asked. “Why do you think I’m here? Why do you think everybody in that room is here right now?”

Ginger shrugged. “They like antiques?”

“Hardly,” Zhee laughed and handed Ginger her flask. “We’re all looking for something else. Something different. Something with worth.”

“Uh-huh.” Ginger took a drag on the flask. The whisky burned her lips and throat, and she coughed.

“So how about it then?” and Zhee snapped the scissors again.

“Maybe an inch or so.”

Zhee shook her head. “I’ll just leave you with the scissors,” she said, turning to the door. “And the flask.” She patted Ginger on the shoulder.

“But don’t you have to go to the bathroom?” Ginger asked.

“I just needed to make sure my face was in tact,” Zhee said, falling back into her British accent. “Besides, I don’t want to miss the Chinese fans,” and she mimed covering her face with a fan.

A waft of the auctioneer’s voice floated inside the bathroom as the door opened and shut behind her.

“Two-thousand, five-hundred. Fair warning. Fair warning.”

And Ginger was in fact left with the scissors and the flask. She took a long sip and untied her hair. Red curls bundled down her back and fell to her shoulders.

She snapped the scissors in the air as she’d seen Zhee do, laid them on the sink and sipped the whisky. She snipped off a few hairs from the very end, and they fell into the sink.

She studied her reflection in the mirror and thought of her husband in the auction room, raising his paddle. She grabbed a few locks and cut just below her finger. Red ringlets fell in quick succession.

Ginger imagined walking back into the auction room. Her husband wouldn’t even recognize her. He would be shocked, maybe even angered. She hoped he would be just a little angry.

She would walk right up to him in the middle of the auction and introduce herself. She would need a new name. She would extend her hand and give her new name and then look him right in the eye and wait for the recognition to register. The thought gave her a thrill.

She raised her eyes to the mirror and looked at herself steadily. Then she lifted the flask and took a long draught. She could no longer feel the burn of the whisky. She cut in a diagonal.