VICE

The storage unit where she stored gasoline and tools had become a place of worship since her husband's death. Every morning, she would go there just to say "good morning" to all these components of the storage unit landscape. She would caress the brass gasoline canisters, the rough screw cabinets, the containers of rotating tongs. She passionately inhaled the workshop's aroma. Her nostrils were filled with the scents of gasoline, car grease, and the rust eroding the metal structures. She passionately inhaled her husband's scent. He had been gone for a year and a half, and that was exactly how long it took her to go mad. Poor old woman, who for forty years had proudly sported the blood-purple around her eyes, who would spit her teeth whenever she desired change, innovation, happiness.

At the center of the storage unit stood a sturdy wooden table. Its legs were clad in rusting metal that had once been green, but now the autumnal dullness carved extravagant patterns on it. The table provided a fitting support for the most important mechanical device in her life, the most emotional device in the world. The beautiful silver vise gleamed like never before. All because she'd bought that sensational polishing fluid and mohair cleaning cloth in town that "catches the smallest specks of dust and makes your vise shine like never before." She polished them three times a day. In the morning, immediately after waking, after grooming herself and emptying her full bladder, she would run (if that was even possible at her advanced age) to the storage room. Her legs, swollen with age, would then acquire a magical force. They carried her toward the shed. She floated. She flew. A more or less worn-out cleaning cloth fluttered in the air, and in her hand dangled antistatic fluid—always in a spray can, always of the highest quality. Her face... all the delights of the world were painted on it. She was old—she looked beautiful. Not like when her husband had provided her with free eyeshadow, when he'd croaked, "Because you were naughty, you were a naughty wife..." and had taken to her as only a "real" man could. He'd indulged her for forty years. For a year and a half, all she had left was the storage room and that vice. A silver object of desire. His head crackled within him like firewood in a solid fire. Her brain rose and fell—up and down—sparks flew, and he added more stakes and cradled her to his tender chest.

The storage room door opened of its own accord. Silently. She just brushed the wooden boards with her fingertips, and the gates of her wonderful kingdom opened. There it stood—right in the center. Proud. Eternal, shining with divine radiance. A silver glow caressed the old woman's eyes, and she already knew she loved them like nothing else in the world. This was her vice. The gateway to freedom, a delightful grip,who freed her from the tyranny of testosterone.

A cloth gently polished the perfect surface of the vise. It was very large. The cleaning fluid initially left unpleasant smudges, only to penetrate the metal's interior a moment later, melding into the world's most beautiful device. The old woman was crying. Her wrinkled cheeks quivered with emotion. The wild years of her youth were reflected in the almost transparent sheet of metal. He—handsome, cheerful, carrying a Coke and fries, and she sat in the front seat of his super-restored car, whose brand had already lost its importance after their first kiss. She gazed at the panorama of the old building right next to the fast-food restaurant. She hadn't finished eating by then. There were still a few fries left in the paper spiral, the drink still simmering in the branded cup, and he was already slipping his hand under her skirt, brooking no argument, assuring her that it was his. They drove away toward town, and she rubbed her wet eyes with the sweater her mother had sewn. "You'll be so beautiful in it," she said, buttoning up her daughter's final buttons. Perfectly happy, wild, popular, beaten, humiliated, never finished eating fries, never—always.

There was still some time left until the next time she polished her vise. She sat on the porch, forgetting about her children, her mother, her overworked father. She forgot about the hated history professor who experimented with explosives and one night blew up his wife, himself, and a little boy who didn't deserve to be his son. She forgot about the world. She forgot about the past. Even after she'd gone mad a few months ago, she'd still been eating. A can of red beans, a piece of fried bacon, and an onion repeatedly burned were her staple diet. Sometimes, when she felt differently—exceptionally—she'd drive her worn-out station wagon into town for a rare cut of beef. She prepared it like it was '56—with herbs from the backyard garden, with tears from memories. The postman was always late with his pension, but that didn't bother her. For as long as she could remember, her husband had been collecting her pension, and now she didn't need much. Just beef once a month and a fresh cloth, cleaning fluid. No animals—no people in her life. She stared ahead at the brown-flecked fields, the landscape of her youth. The smell of autumn saddened her. Killed her. Over a year ago, at this same time, she had dragged his drunken bulk to the storage room. His superhuman strength carried ninety kilograms of manure. He reeked of rum, and the hairs in his swollen nostrils waved lasciviously in all directions. They writhed repulsively, inviting him to another hygienic session. She would no longer remove them with silver, introverted tweezers that would never open wide enough. She dragged him, and he panted, twisted, fidgeted. Doors had always opened on their own. And so it was this time. The smell of stale engine oil and rusty sockets hit her. She was pushing him into the very center of the action. Right into the center of the stage. So that all viewers could be assured of a 100% comfortable viewing experience. Thunderous applause erupted. His plump head shone with showmanship, professionally held in a powerful vice.

The woman rose and walked to the front door. She entered the house. Mold greeted her warmly, and the old woman put wood in the old-fashioned, discredited stove. The knife slowly pierced the metal lid of a can of beans. Physically, this task posed no problem for her. She had always been strong, even when he had beaten her with a metal pipe for loving him. Bacon sizzled in a dirty pan. The bean juice winked at her. The whole room smelled of "homegrown food"—"Daddy, what happened to you while I was suffering..." She ate slowly. She chewed thoroughly, chewed, and swallowed. Dignified, as if it weren't beans. She ate and was already looking forward to her afternoon polishing. She would wash the dishes later. A mohair cloth and fantastic antistatic liquid were waiting in the cupboard for a sign from their owner. They leaped into her worn hands and, of their own accord, pulled the woman toward the vise. ...the orchestra played beautifully as she tightened her grip on the clamp. The audience murmured with delight. Mothers shielded their children's eyes while they watched with bated breath at this extraordinary spectacle. She heard it begin to crack, to crack, to pour. Her hand trembled, and she looked him straight in the eyes—large, astonished, filled with fear, half-dead. She pressed the lever until it stopped. It wasn't easy to shake off forty years of suffering. Now she pressed the pin as tenderly as she did everything she did for him—and the action flowed with love and understanding, hatred, and paralyzing fear. She did it very well. She had a craft in her hands. They would later write: "So real, so natural. Tears and cries of delight tore through the rapt audience. Really, old lady, you're amazing, a..."

The applause slowly faded, the spectators left the storeroom, and she kissed him again—the first, the last. She burned it in the backyard. Then she just polished it. She devoted herself wholeheartedly to caring for the most beautiful vise in the world. She caressed it like her own child, talked to it, though she was never particularly talkative. She confided in it, looked at it as if in a mirror, reminisced. She had to buy a new cloth. This one was already starting to smudge. She would do it soon. It was a long way to town, and she had to get there before dark. She had to be in time to tenderly polish it again..