THE DEFILER

Full story originally appeared in Long Con.

The public washrooms adjacent to the Altarpiece Gallery in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs are rarely occupied in the mornings midweek, particularly in the offseason. These facilities are designed to offer stillness and tranquility, complementing the museum’s overall solemn and unfussy atmosphere. They’re well-maintained and always in good order, housing toilets of durable construction and reliable, brisk plumbing. The tiles are fresh, the mirrors clean.

And so, entering with one’s mind swirling from the dignified exhibitions and collections, the arabesques and parquetry and tapestries, the reproductions of eighteenth-century drawing rooms, one rightfully expects only silence, a quick reprieve, then a return to the day’s explorations. It’s jarring, then, as one’s eyes wander a stall’s interior, to discover an aberration, a vicious slash of red marring the wall’s pristine white.

In thick daubs of Estée Lauder lipstick, what was immaculate was now befouled: SADDAM HUSSEIN SWINGER LIFESTYLE.

Read the rest here.