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Editor’s Note: By way of an introduction, we’ve included two previously unpublished stories by Diane Williams, ‘Beauty, Love and Vanity Itself’ and ‘Velvety’ Beauty, Love and Vanity Itself As usual I’d hung myself with snappy necklaces, but otherwise had given my appearance no further thought, even though I anticipated the love of a dark person who will be my source of prosperity and emotional pleasure Mr Morton arrived about seven pm and I said, ‘I owe you an explanation’   ‘Excellent,’ he replied But when my little explanation was completed, he refused the meal I offered, saying, ‘You probably don’t like the way I drink my soda or how I eat olives with my fingers, do you?’   I only wish I could be so smooth   He exited at a good clip and nothing further developed from that affiliation   I remain prayerful – Praise be to Thee, Praise be to Thou  Nothing fancy   Understand I am not that needy, but I am greedy and it would be snobbish to refuse anything  Even a polite refusal might be viewed as ungrateful, for example: ‘I just don’t think he will make me happy’ or ‘I must decline this type of jam because it contains high fructose corn syrup’   The real thing did come along Bob – Tom spent several days in June with me He always said, ‘How do we do?’ when I met him and as so often happens in life, I also kept up with books and magazines and went along the funny path pursuing my vocation   I also went outside to enjoy the fragrant odour in an Illinois town and went along the thoroughfare that swerved near the fence where yellow roses on a tawny background faded out at the end of the season   I never thought a big cloud hanging in the air would be crooked, but it was up there – grey and deranged   The fence was making the most of its colonial post caps, patterns of diagonals and its big swaying, double-walk gate   I should go whole hog, I thought to myself, and go through the wide entryway quickly   And isn’t looking into the near distance sometimes so