Gloves, yes, long white gloves would show everyone just how serious she was about all of this. Bonnie Delia needed long white gloves. She needed lots of things but she would start with the gloves. The gloves, which she would pair with the blue evening gown that made her eyes shine and her shoulders look soft, they would make her look elegant and hide her hands.
Bonnie needed to look as refined as possible if she were to win the one thousand dollar cash prize at the “Long Beach All Washed Up Adult Beauty Pageant”.
Doing an amature adult beauty pageant was “humiliating” and “corny” according to the women in the town but on the day that Bonnie strode into the 1980’s styled convention center, she felt more glamorous than ever. She walked confidently over to a man in a green jacket behind an information desk. “Excuse me sir, but where shall I change?” she held up her gown for the man to see. “You know, for the pageant” she bobbed her head up and down and her falsely curled hair wiggled like Jell-o.

“Ma’am, this is a car show” his thick jersey accent only emphasized the sordid desperation looming in the air. Bonnie squinted at the map she had been given at the door.
“Oh, I see, I’ve made a mistake, I’m supposed to be in ballroom C!” She made a face and touched her fingertips to her head. The whole gesture made the man in the green jacket think that she shouldn’t be in any sort of beauty pageant at all. Unless it was for inner beauty of course, even then he was unsure. She sauntered off between the cars which reflected her disposition quite clearly. Her body has withered and shrunken and projected itself on the glossy finishes of Chevy and Ford and Volkswagen. She looked exactly how she was meant to in that moment.
When she finally arrived at ballroom C, big pieces of pink fabric were draped like ribbons above a small table which was dressed in an even pinker cloth. Beside the table was a poster depicting a real beauty queen fanning her pearly whites with a few hundred dollar bills. One thousand was what Bonnie kept repeating to herself. You could say it was her last hope and it was more visible now than ever as she stared at the happy millionaire in the photo and her yellow-brown curls shook around her eyes. She gave her check in card to the woman at the desk. “All right Ms. Delia, you’re all ready. Head down that hall to the left, that’s where all the ladies are gettin dressed up.”
“Perfect. Oh, and Miss, I have a guest arriving, if you’ll just send her back, I’d be grateful”
“Sure sweetheart.” Minutes later, the guest showed. She was spotted by Bonnie practically before she could get her foot through the double doors leading to the clouded dress up room.
“Maeve! Over here!” Bonnie’s hands flapped and the feathers around the sleeves of her robe did too. She looked like a big flamingo, but that’s perhaps understandable, she didn’t have on all of her makeup just yet. “Oh I’m just so happy you came!”
In a moment Maeve was up to Bonnie’s mirror. “Bonnie, this is business. Strictly business.”
“Of course Maeve, but look at how fun all of this is! Don’t you just love that smell?” Bonnie took a deep breath in. “I don’t know, it smells like glamour to me!”
“Jesus Christ, all right then.” She took a second for hesitation “Look, I’m just gonna tell ya, you’ve gotta concentrate. I’m here to collect.” Maeve spoke hardly like all the other mob guys. It earned her some respect as woman who could talk tough. “They’ve already got a hole dug for ya out in the desert if ya know what I mean” Maeve leaned in close to Bonnie’s ear. “My big brother doesn't like to have to kill guys for no money, no matter what they did to their wives”
Bonnie turned slowly back to her reflection in the mirror. She picked up the long white gloves from the suitcase beside her and faced her reflection again. She never meant for everything to erupt the way it had. She had always hoped for a happy ending but by this point, she knew that most lives didn’t get the ending she thought they deserved. She slid the white silk up her arms slowly blinking all the while hoping that she would disappear. “Maeve, you know I didn’t have any money. And what else was I supposed to do?” Her voice was so soft now.
“Bonnie, I tried, but it was a big job. Your old man didn't go down lightly to say the least.” A loud voice came on in the smoggy ballroom, calling the women to the stage in five minutes.
“S***! Alright, help me get my dress on.”
Bonnie was right, the blue dress did do something for her. She almost looked beautiful, especially standing next to the ten retired prostitutes that were her competitors. Someone might even mistake her for one of those young spring chicken gals. Ah, yes, she had been one of those once, before she met her husband. She was recalling now the moments they first spent together. Fields, and summer, and old trucks, all the glamorous stuff really. She would wear the colors of the wildflowers on her dress, hoping that he, Rick, would notice her among them. He drove the new shiny black truck that all the other guys would park around to either be near it or just so that they could glimpse it for that much longer. You could tell that Rick was a guy with money. Bonnie could tell.
Although he had money, people whispered about him. The old women in the town would sit around and drink syrupy liquids while gossiping through gray teeth and cheeks. They would say that daughters ought not to get involved with Rick, because he had left a bruise on Sally Hankinson the size of his fist. But Bonnie couldn’t help but notice his shiny truck and fine clothes and the way he spoke all nice and clean. She couldn’t look away because when she went home she wouldn’t see anything but dusty cherrywood and sunken furniture, and an old father just as poor and depressing. She couldn’t look away from Ricky, because she had nowhere else to look. He was her way out, she wouldn’t look away.
It wasn’t until after the two were married that Bonnie discovered Ricky’s stuff. The first thing she discovered was the money. She discovered just how much he had and how he got it. He was working for a guy in the casinos, shuttling cash from Atlantic City to the “big guys”, as he called them, back in New York City, mob stuff. Every two weeks, someone from “the agency” would come and pick up the cash, usually a guy named Alfonso but sometimes a girl named Maeve, would come and Bonnie would light up at the sight of a female companion, only to have her disappear after the transaction was over.
Bonnie also found out that the way that Ricky was making so much money was because of some illegal handlings. She once saw him directly taking about four stacks of hundreds and placing them in the freezer panels. She found out he was stealing. She also found out that she hadn’t really escaped the whole cycle of things. She thought she had gotten rid of poor and ugly forever but it turns out she was re-inserted into a different life with different ugliness. Ugliness that was hard to escape. When she could see a flame light behind Ricky’s eyes, she knew to shield her head and just make sure he didn’t crack any bones, that was all she could do. When she was crouched against a wall in this position waiting for the blows to stop, she found it hard to consider that her situation was better. But, she found out about all this nasty stuff just at the right time.
One of the days when the girl came to pick up the briefcase, she told Bonnie she wanted to come in. She walked right over to the freezer and started pulling the bundles of cash right out from the panels. A flash of creamy wild yellow passed the window. It was the man of the house “Oh god, please help me you have to put it back” Bonnie was turning into puddles before Maeve’s feet, her green silk robe pooling around her as she sunk to the ground to plead into Maeve’s knees.
“Get up, will ya” Maeve whispered
“Please, please, he’ll hurt me. I know he will. Please I need your help.” The garage opened as Bonnie panted.
“For’ f**k's sake”
“Please kill him, he’ll kill me if you don’t kill him” Maeve began putting the money back into its place. She stared determinedly at the dark skin mottling the delicate arms extending out of the emerald sleeves. Maeve clamped her hand down over the bruise and the two women stared at each others eyes.
“You sure” Mave already knew the answer.
Footsteps.
The door swung open. Rick strode in, “Ey there Maeve, my wife gettin hysterical on ya?”
“No, she’s alright Ricky”
“Good, good. Got your money?”
“Yup, on my way out” Maeve could hear wails coming from inside as she walked away from the door, but she didn’t turn around.
Three days later Maeve called Bonnie when she was sure Rick wasn’t home. “Hey there Bonnie. I talked to my brother about all that stuff that happened. We’re able to help ya out, seeing as it is a common interest and all.”
Bonnie sighed “Yes.”
“But, because you’re not Italian, you know, we do charge. And because my brother isn’t too keen on having to whack one of the guys he grew up with, it’s gonna be a little extra”
“Well...how much?”
“Thousand bucks”
“Alright I have the money”
“You sure?”
“Yes”
“It’ll be taken care of by tomorrow. I’ll come by on wednesday to pick up the payment”
“Alright” with that the two hung up and he deed was done. At least until Maeve came for the money. When she did, everything started all over again.
See, Bonnie didn’t really have the money, she was just so desperate to get rid of the deadbeat husband, she lied to the goddamn mob. They gave her an extension because of everything she’d been through and on account of the fact that organized crime bosses can sometimes be very accommodating.
She entered the pageant as the last chance at life and when she put on those gloves to cover up her bruises, she hoped that people would also forget to notice her dulled eyes. She wasn’t ugly she was just tired and worn down. But upon taking the stage at the pageant, she was a vision in blue, like the mother of christ. She looked like she could be in a meadow again, with all yellow light washing over her and only money to notice.
She looked so nice and the women she was with looked good too. I’ll bet if the whole stage were covered in grass and mist and stars and stuff, you’d think you were in a grand old dream. Their dresses and their faces all so pale, young, light. They exhibited such grace that you barely even noticed them when the Master of Ceremonies, really a generous title, placed the sash over Bonnie’s shoulder.

“And now” he began to announce to the small crowd, “we shall present Miss Bonnie Delia with a one thousand dollar bond!” Bonnie’s face shattered from a smile and Maeve dropped her head back in disappointment. Bonnie’s shaking hands rustled the paper as she made her way off the stage. Maeve rushed to meet her and grab her by the arm.
“A f**king bond? Did you know about this?”
“No. I swear I didn’t. On the website...it said cash. I just thought-” She was calm and sorry.
“Do ya see what ya did? You destroyed yourself.” As Bonnie took off her costume, she thought that maybe that couldn’t be true. “I’ll go get the car. Then we’ll go meet my brother to see what we’re gonna do wit ya.” Maeve stormed off. She was angry at Bonnie for not trying hard enough and she was angry at the way things had gone and the fact that the poor girl had ended up in this mess in the first place.
Bonnie could have been mad or sad or frightened, but she just felt normal. She maybe even felt happy. It began to rain outside and the other women’s faces were melting off in the storm. Bonnie stayed inside and began to fold the gloves and place them neatly in her luggage. She stared outside and could feel the rain coming into her lungs and she was drowning trying to anticipate what was sure to be her death. Maeve’s brother just wanted the money, Bonnie didn’t have that. She would either die or maybe Maeve would take her somewhere where her brother couldn’t find her, so that Bonnie could start a new life. All kinds of water was rushing down now and Bonnie couldn’t help but think that this was her end. Whatever Maeve decided to do, it was the end of this life for her. She was feeling lighter and like she could sport those gloves with dignity, so she pulled them from their spot in the bag and put them on again. She was feeling better because she knew that this was the end of it all. She could get out of this cycle she was bound to, she wouldn’t be hurt or embarrassed or poor. She thought that this was maybe her happy ending and she smiled as she got into the car and drove for miles.