Desire and a Piece of Wood
Little mementos from friends and lovers, pieces of artwork found in local art shows or created on my living room floor, such are the trappings of a single life. Such are the trappings of my room, my bathroom, my kitchen, my home. Everything I’ve owned was either given as a gift or purchased by my own hand, my very own and nobody else’s. Moving into this apartment with the man I loved, I rearranged the whole thing to reflect my own tastes and feel more like “home.” Looking around, you can tell by a glance which items belong to me and which belong to him. His couch looks across at his big screened television as it’s shaded by my window curtains. My lamps illuminate a living room from vantage points perched atop his shelves. An eclectic mix of “His and Hers” litters the place, blending tastes and memories. When I wish for a particular piece of furniture or decorative frame, I buy it. When he has a new electronic toy in mind, he makes the purchase and adds to the collection.
Last week, a bookcase was the mission. My little stream of books was quickly growing into a raging river that I was running out of room for on my little bookshelves and tables. In response to this emergency, I was on a hunt. It had to be tall. It had to look good in the study. Above all, it had to promise protection from this type of overflow for a decent amount of time. Lacking in funds, he made a suggestion that I explore the local secondhand store. Escorting me to said store, he helped me to browse and price the goods offered. Running my hands over them appraisingly, estimating the amount of volumes that could fit on each shelf, I would finally look at the price of each and learn the disturbing news: that was one overpriced secondhand store.
I asked him where he found such a joke for a shop and he laughed and swore he had bought that couch of his there for a more than decent price. Well, I couldn’t really blame him for suggesting the place after hearing that. I do love his couch. Not as much as he does, of course but, then, I’m pretty sure nobody could love that couch as much as he does. Shrugging off the failure of my mission, I headed out to his truck. Holding the door open for me, he lingered there while I walked on. When I turned to see what was keeping him, I saw he was reading the flyer on the door. “Hey, babe,” he called out in my direction, “wanna go to an auction?”
An auction? What was he talking about? I made my way back to the door and the advertisement that held his attention. According to the flyer, there would be an auction in three days not too far from town. The directions, of course, made no sense to me. I’m not from here. But, fortunately for me, living with a man who knows the area has its perks. I went home in much more hopeful spirits. I was going to an auction!
Three days later, we were off on our adventure. I agreed to let him drive because he has a truck, and I had an idea that could come in pretty handy if this auction was any good. As for knowing where
he was going, I had my doubts. The further we got out of town, the emptier the road seemed. What kind of auction could this be that was held in the middle of nowhere? Surely, he must be mistaken. I peppered him with questions about the directions. I think he started to get annoyed. His patient tone started sounding just a little too patient. You would think this would induce me to shut up. It didn’t. Up until we finally saw the little brick building, I questioned his every move. Surrounded by nothing but a dozen or so cars and a white sign with arranged black letters slipped in to spell, “Auction Tonite,” it was a suspiciously forlorn looking little place. Now my new worry was not whether we would find it but whether it was even worth finding. When we finally pulled up to an empty area (there really were no actual parking spaces in the dirt lot), one thick eyebrow shot up as he asked, “I guess I knew where I was going after all, huh?”
I didn’t look at him as I hopped down from my seat and replied innocently, “Who said you didn’t?” With this, I jauntily made my way toward the fluorescent light streaming into the night from a small wooden doorway. He caught up to me and grabbed my hand in his as we walked in.
“Are you ready for this?” was his query as we stepped into the unflattering light. I gave his hand a playful squeeze and raised my chin a little higher. Of course, I was ready. I would leave with a bookcase. An affordable one. This was my mission.
Shuffling through the crowd of surprisingly older patrons, we finally made our way to a window with a rather large woman squeezed into a seat behind it. She surveyed us with bored eyes over her glasses and asked how she could help us. Feeling a little silly, we asked the obvious question: what to do. Giving a slight smile, the woman’s face reflected he realization that we were auction virgins. Suddenly much more interested in us and generous with her words, she explained the process. Give your info. Take a number. Use the number. Pay out. Concluding with questions of her own, she got our names, phone numbers, addresses, and such. She handed us what felt to be a thick piece of posterboard with a number written on it in in black Sharpie and wished us luck.
Now able to gather our wits about us, we first claimed our seats. Not too close to the front with all the eager-beaver elderly couples, but also not too far in the back with the large Mexican family that kept having to corral their numerous little ones with threats and hisses. Leaving our marker and a jacket with our seats, we took a little time to peruse the wares. There was a lovely dresser that I had one eye on, and I was keeping the other out for my bookcase. Yet,
I couldn’t seem to find one. My browsing slowly took on the form of searching as I wandered through every nook and cranny of that back area. Finally, nestled in between a well-worn recliner and a few kitchen chairs, I found one. It was tall, wooden. It had about five or six shelves. If only I could get it for less than fifty dollars. I would just have to try.
After a little more wandering and a bathroom break for each, we settled down in our seats. I could see the auctioneer getting warmed up, and it seemed all the grey heads in front of us were starting to perk up. It was show time.
The first few minutes were exciting enough. Introductions were made and a few big-ticket items were auctioned off. The auctioneer was old school and spoke in tongues. I listened closely and came
to learn that if I concentrated very hard and didn’t let myself get distracted, I could actually sort of understand what was being said. Proud of this discovery, I found myself showing off, translating for my partner under my breath from time to time. Understandably,
he didn’t seem very interested in my new talent, and I lost my motivation fairly quickly. It really wasn’t too far into the auction that it really started getting interesting. My gorgeous dresser came up, and I was ready with my posterboard. The bidding started at five dollars. Ten dollars. Twenty.Twenty-five.Thirty.Thirty-Five. With the bidding only rising five dollars at a time, I was confident that I would end up with a big, tall, handsome dresser for under fifty dollars. But the bidding was going awfully quickly and the price rose with it. Fifty. Fifty-Five. Sixty. Sixty-five. Once it reached seventy-five dollars, I rested my numbered posterboard in defeat. It ended up selling to a middle-aged couple for around ninety dollars. In fact, a lot of furniture pieces were going to that middle aged couple. I watched them with growing interest. Reclining confidently in his chair, the husband looked mildly bored until his wife would point to an old piece of furniture and whisper in his ear. He would keep raising that posterboard in his hand until he won. And he almost always won. Miffed at their audacity, I mused that the wife probably refurbished the pieces as a hobby. She didn’t look like she needed secondhand furniture. In fact, she didn’t look like she needed much of anything. It must be nice to have that much time on your hands and money to blow on little hobbies. Yes, I was bitter. I had really liked that bookcase.
When I wasn’t observing Mr and Mrs. Moneybags, I looked at the large paintings, mirrors, and ironworks hanging on the barnwood walls. My eye kept getting drawn to one painting in particular. It wasn’t on canvas. It was on a large piece of wood and hung from a chain on wall. In it, a large ship sailed toward a castle that loomed ahead on an island against a fiery gold and orange hued backdrop.
It was original. It was fascinating. The more I looked at it, the more I came to realize that I loved it. I wanted it. Of course, I imagined I would have to consult my other half first. A painting this large wasn’t exactly a decorating choice to be made lightly. I mused over ways to broach the subject to him.
As I thought of clever and convincing things to say for my cause, I felt a nudge. “Hey, Hun, see that painting?” he whispered in my ear. My gaze travelled past his pointing finger and, with no small amount of shock, I realized he was pointing to my painting. “What do you think of that?” he asked. At that moment, I was pretty sure I had never loved him more.
I cautiously admitted, “I actually think it’s kind of awesome. What do you think?”
His answer was simple and sweet: “We should get it.”
The rest of that auction was spent planning how we would accomplish this feat. Well, I did purchase a couple of items I wanted in the meantime: an ottoman for him, so he would stop resting his feet on my end table, a much needed coffee maker, and a couple other small things. For the most part, however, our focus was singular.
We wanted that painting. The more we looked at it, the stronger the need grew. We saw other people look at it or point to it and whisper, and we counted them as foes. These were our enemy. They were
to be defeated in an epic bidding war. With our combined forces, we decided we could spend no more than one hundred and thirty dollars. But we were willing to bend the rules just a bit if the situation demanded it.
Caught up in our battle plans, it didn’t even really bother me when the middle aged couple took my bookcase. I did, however, take notice when they started looking over in the direction of a certain large piece of wood with ships on it. I nudged my fellow auction warrior. Nodding my head overtly in the direction of the whispering couple, I watched his reaction out of the corner of my eye. Looking in the direction of my nod, he breathed, “Oh, hell no.” We knew now. When the time came, this would be the couple to beat. It would be our final battle. We raised our price limit to one hundred and fifty dollars.
We had plenty of time to engage in such planning and chatter. If there’s one thing there’s plenty of at an auction, it’s time. If it wasn’t for that painting, in fact, we would have split after two hours of listening to the babbling of the auctioneer. My posterboard hadn’t been used for quite a while and was lying all alone in the chair next to me. Women bought big bags of old paste jewelry and homemade aprons with chickens and cats on them. Old men held long, drawn out bidding wars over military pins and coins. Oh, there were so very many coins! Yawning and stretching, we found ourselves engaged in other conversation, all the time keeping one eye on our prize. If we could just wait it out; if we could just outbid that damned couple, it would ours. Every so often we would study the nuances of it and discuss its awesomeness at length. Every so often we would study our arch nemeses: the middle aged couple. We would breathe words of encouragement and sighs over how much time was passing.
Eventually, it became clear to us that the items on the wall would be the last to be auctioned off. Therefore, time was on our side. People were already starting to tire out and leave. One by one, our competition was picked off, driven out by the need for sleep. We laughed. Weaklings! Our youth, for the first time that night, was working to our advantage. We might not have much money, but we sure as hell had the energy to wait all night if we had to. The minutes ticked off and another hour dragged by. And, then, a miracle happened.
I looked over at the middle aged couple and saw the husband slowly stacking up their winnings, whispering to his wife and nodding toward the back of the room. They took their time about it, but as far as I could tell, they were definitely packing up. I felt my arm gripped as someone else realized the same thing. We chattered in excitement as they paid the window lady and slowly made their way out of the building, loaded down with bulky furniture pieces. We looked at each other in amazement. Our main competition was gone. Our chances of winning had just risen tenfold, and we almost couldn’t contain our excitement. Thank God for youth and energy! We just might win!
Slowly but surely, the time came for the wall art to be auctioned off. Nobody showed much interest in the mirrors, but the ironworks brought in some hefty prices. We looked around us and realized those that remained had been waiting for this moment as well. They had been waiting for wall pieces. Some had perhaps even been waiting to get the very same painting. We were ready, though. As they finally described our painting and decided to start the bidding at two dollars, he suddenly tapped me on the arm. “Babe, give me the number.”
Confusedly, I handed him the posterboard. His jaw was set and his brow furrowed. As the auctioneer rattled off, I got lost in the noise, discombobulated and unsure where the price was going. It was all moving so fast. But he calmly raised the posterboard every so often. Quickly, assuredly, his wrist flicked it up and back down.
A thrill moved through me as I marveled at him. He was going to win. We were going to win this thing. When it ended, I looked up at him searchingly, flushed with a mixture of pride and confusion. Who won?
He turned to me and smiled. “Baby, we got it!” he exclaimed. He squeezed my leg and took a deep, satisfied breath. I let a squeal escape my lips, causing a few older women to turn a scrutinizing eye upon me. I didn’t care, we had won! It was actually ours. And it was thirty-six whole dollars.
As we carried it into the apartment later that night, we gushed and gloried over the magnificent victory we had wrought. The way he had played it! The way I had planned it! The way we had won it! Now, hanging by its chain in a prominent position above his couch, next to my lamp, hangs our painting. And as for my bookcase.... well, that’s another story.