The Jewelry Store
- Oct 15, 2019
- 2 min read
by C. Cimmone
Yesterday I went into a jewelry store with a friend. She was looking for fancy bracelets and rings. Harmless it seemed. Mundane, almost.
The front door was grand and silver. Glass cases filled the room — horizontal and studied with downward gazes of shoppers. The salesmen’s pressed suits, black and tight, were a great contrast to the cream carpet beneath their feet.
We meandered between cases and smiled politely at intense patrons of the diamond event. I stared at a diamond to appear involved in the present and salesman #4 offered assistance, sizing and suggestions.
“It smells like a funeral home in here,” I mumbled to my friend. The lighting, dim almost, was present only to catch the reflections of gold and stones. The lighting, in my mind, appeared to scream and bounce light from atop shiny caskets and handles to carry the dead. The salesman’s careful approach was missing, unlike an undertaker, yet his search for selling us counterfeit happiness was similar.
The lyricless piano songs swayed with the brush of the black suits and my feet pressed the carpet with nervousness and resistance. I did not want to try on diamonds and gold — my need for such was lacking. I didn’t even know my ring size. I had never required such a measurement.
My friend was displeased with the selection of bracelets and matching earrings and we rounded the last horizontal case.
“I’ve got to get out of here,” I whispered. Sweat dropped down my temple and my hands shook gently. I raised my head and saw a choir singing “It Is Well with My Soul” without sound or smile. I turned to hear salesman #2 ask if I had chosen a casket — if I had brought photos. The woman wiping a glass counter raised an eyebrow and asked, “Did you know death comes in threes?” She smiled at the glass case.
I looked at my hands, trembling once more, flipped over to my palm and imagined the blue of my veins smeared all over. I thought about him. I thought about the blue veins, stopping like tar in the middle of the night.
I thought about his hair, once curly and soft, now sticky from whatever they do to save your heart from dying. I thought about the mole on his right arm. “Would you like us to save this piece for you, ma’am?” salesman #1 smiled and bowed, pointing to a tiny mole on a blue-smeared corpse and raising a razor blade in his left hand. He ran the razor down the side of the glass case and smiled.
The choir sang on, mouths moving with solemn soundless breath, and I wondered when it would be over. I wondered if he was the third death or if I was.
C. Cimmone is a North American author and comic. Her narrative, creative nonfiction poetry and prose possess dark tones, often emphasizing women’s sexuality, mental health, substance abuse, and coming-of-age. Cimmone serves as editor-at-large for Trampset, contributing author for Arouse Magazine, and volunteer reader for Marias at Sampaguitas. Her work has been featured in a menagerie of publications.
