50.

Lollapalooza brought Audrey fame, fortune, and feet. It didn’t make her a house hold name—not yet—but she gained a rabid core of followers who bought tickets solely to see her per for-mances. The majority of her fans were the so-called slackers and Gen-Xers of the early-to-mid-90s—the un-generation, the un-colas, those cool-in-their-uncoolness readers of beat literature, computer manuals, and eastern philosophy who pumped gas for $4.05 an hour. Those questioners of everything whose questions asked nothing. Those anti-corporateers with hoop rings through their noses, onion rings in the backs of their vans, dirt rings in their bathtubs. These were the vast majority of Audrey’s fan base, and yet she had nothing in common with them, not even the adoration of herself and her gift. To the bitter end, she was disgustingly humble.

However, there was one exception to Audrey’s slacker followers—Herr Essenalles, the notorious German “eatist.”

Their first meeting took place on July 2, 1996. The stately, salt-and-pepper-haired Essenalles, sporting a pinstriped silk suit and a thick mustache, attended a Jim Rose Circus Sideshow in Portland, Oregon. He was so impressed that he sent Audrey a bouquet of Casablanca lilies and a $5,000 bottle of Gewürztraminer, with a note reading, After we drink together, we shall eat together—From an Admirer. Audrey, along with the rest of the United States, had never heard of Herr Essenalles, but after he bribed his way backstage that evening, she accepted his invitation to dine at the illustrious Chateau de Spree, where they spent two hours in intimate conversation, the exact content of which has never been known, but which shall nonetheless be re created here:

“You eat your soup so daintily,” he purred, his accent dripping onto the table. The candlelight flickered in his narrow eyes. “Not at all like your vaudeville routine.”

“What the fuck is vaudeville? I’m from Grand Rapids.”

“Ja, of course.” A pleasant, guttural chuckle that shakes the table. “What I mean is that you are like an animal on that stage. You have—what should I say?—impulsion in your gaze. No joy.”

Audrey belched into her hand. Under the table, she lifted her leg to massage her right stump. Her knee bumped his. They exchanged bashful grins—his toothy, hers teethy.

“You are not such an angry person,” Herr Essenalles said, wiping his mouth with the burgundy napkin. “It is acting, exactly as I had hoped. A persona for the stage. Such a kaleidoscopic beauty could not have the monster’s heart that they say.”

“I killed a doctor,” she said. She raised a butter knife to her lips, bit it in half and swallowed. “How do you know anything about my heart?”

He stared in wonder as she gulped the rest of the knife. This simple act alone would have taken him twenty minutes. The nerves in his chest and groin came alive.

Beneath the table, her hand grasped his knee.

“I’ve had a shitty life,” she said. Her teeth flashed again, this time not a smile. “Only one person really cared about me, and now she’s in Hell.”

Essenalles’s lip itched. He wanted to wipe the perspiration, but he was unable to move, unable to breathe. Sitting here in her grip was intoxicating agony. “History,” he managed to rasp, tears welling, “puts a saint in every dream.” Audrey, with the approval of Jim Rose, allowed Herr Essenalles unrestricted backstage access for the next five shows, after which the 52-year-old German gave an effusive interview to the Los Angeles Times. He praised Audrey Mapes as a “biological miracle,” “living evidence of evolution,” and a “window to the future of mankind.” The gist of his argument was that our century-long dependence on industry, chemicals, and artificial environs had created a new breed of human, one who could subsist entirely on man-made materials.

The article caused a minor stir in the United States, but a major stir on Moriarty Street. It inspired Toby to break a lamp with a karate kick. Murray got drunk on Maker’s Mark and sobbed through three “sick days” in front of the television. Grandma Pencil prayed her entire 1932 sterling silver rosary, a gift from the St. Monica nuns.

It was clear from the article that the unctuous kraut was smitten. Audrey’s family knew, simply from the words he used, that Audrey had slept with him. This didn’t sit well, but there was nothing they could do about it.

McKenna ate a banana for fourteen hours, but it had nothing to do with Audrey’s skeeziness. What was everyone so upset about? Audrey had never been a Pollyanna, never been pure. In ninth grade, she’d gone down on Bobby Merrick at the Comstock Park fireworks. In tenth grade, she’d lost her virginity to Markie Gearing. But oh yes, nobody knew about these transgressions. Nobody but McKenna, who actually cared enough to read her sister’s journal and find out what kind of girl was living under their roof.