Truths of the Heart Page 11
“Done already?”
“Yes.”
“Let's see.”
“NO.”
“Why?”
“I'm just tired.”
“Come on.”
“Okay, look.”
She did. “That's not me!”
“I know.”
“That's….” She looked into his eyes. “Oh no, it's....”
“You better go, I need to get some sleep.”
“Me too. I like the right side of the bed.”
“Bye.”
“I want to stay.”
“Okay, but you sleep on the sofa.”
“That's no fun.”
“Then go home.”
“Poop on you.”
“See you soon and be careful.”
“Hah.”
Jude left and Seth sat at his kitchen table. Like confetti flung from a high rise building to a brisk wind, his thoughts floated to Rachelle: why this and now? I just needed some extra credit … and … damn … Jude was right, what do you think you're going to do … ask her out … she's a Prof, she'll kick you out of her class, flunk you … worse yet, laugh you off the face of the earth. Maybe I should drop the class, get out before it's too late, or worse yet, make an ass of myself … do some homework, sketch a chair, forget about her....
Beginning a sketch of his sofa and easy chair, there was a tap at his door.
He had an idea who it was. He went to the door, opened it and Laura, wrapped in a black trench coat, collar turned up, her close sent potent, brushed past him like a fashion model focused on some distant symbol. Inside, six-one in high heels, she turned and her intense green eyes looked through him.
He said, “Hello.”
Red lipstick smeared, black mascara thick, blue eye shadow deep, Laura dropped her trench coat to the floor. She wore black leotards, a white T-shirt, and silver crescent moon earrings dangled from her lobes. Thick gold bracelets wrapped her wrists. A golf-ball size crystal hung from a gold necklace. Rings on every finger, she fluffed her short red hair and handed Seth a brown paper sack. He knew what it was. Her drink of preference, a bottle of Asti Spumante.
She kicked off her high heels and said thickly, “Why didn't you show up last night?”
“I was busy.”
“Bastard.” She approached him seductively, ran her index finger across his jaw then turned and went to his easel where the picture of Jude-turned-into-Rachelle was.
She studied the painting. “Who's this?”
“Class project, nobody in particular, figment of my imagination.”
“Better be,” she went to the bedroom.
Seth popped the effervescent wine, got a single glass and went to her. Laura, nude, her right elbow on a pillow, her right hand propping her head, lay stretched out on the spread. She smoked a pink Eve cigarette.
Seth handed her the glass of wine.
She took it, sipped, then said, “What are we waiting for?”
Amid w-x-y-z sex, she bit his ear lobes, clawed his back with fingernails, poured words in flowing groans and husky whispers: “More more more … you bastard, you … I love you … yes … we're so right for each other … I love you madly....”
After some time, calmed, sipping, smoking a fresh Eve cigarette, Laura said, “Have you given any more thought to moving in with me?”
“Haven't had time.”
“I've rearranged things, you know, like I showed you, you could have the entire attic … lots of natural light up there.”
He had been to Laura's lair: a three-story Victorian house in Lansing's Historic District. The house had become a gathering place for all night parties, heavy metal music, and freaks. She had taken him up to the huge attic and promised to prepare a place for him. He couldn't do that. He needed his space, his quiet, no phones, no TV, no music no slipping in the night.
Laura, “What are you thinking?”
“Let's think about it.”
She squeezed his testicles, “What's to think?”
CHAPTER FIVE
Rachelle's first class on Tuesday—Com. 421 at 11:00 A.M.—Carl was sleeping soundly, she eased out of bed, pulled on her white robe over white pajamas, went downstairs and, T.S. watching, began her touch-toe calisthenics. As she exercised, that last journal entry she made before retiring last night—Carl, new job, Detroit, apartment—churned her mind like salmon fighting to get upstream.
Rehearsing words to deliver to Carl's sensitive ego, touch toe fifty finished, she looked to T.S. who sat waiting at his food bowl. She was sure he could read her mind. He meowed loudly.
“You be quiet.”
She opened a can of Fancy Feast tuna casserole, put it in his food bowl, retrieved the Lansing State Journal from the front stoop, then readied a special pot of regular coffee but didn't start it brewing (Carl liked his coffee still-dripping fresh).
She prepared herself a mocha cappuccino, toasted an English muffin, spread some cream cheese on it, was reading the Funky Winkerbean cartoon, when she heard Carl lumbering down the spiral staircase.
In a Lions’ blue and silver sweat suit, he sat at the kitchen table, yawned and lit a Kool. Rachelle said, “Good morning.”
“What's good about it?” He waited for her to start his coffee.
She did.
He said, “I'm sorry for being such a jerk yesterday.”
“I'm sorry for being late.”
“Good lay though, last night, huh?”
Is that what that was? The male ego in full plume, she thought, strike while the poker is bent, hot, something like that: “Carl, I've been thinking....”
“Oh Christ, here we go.”
She purred, “Caarrrlll.”
“Okay what?”
“With you starting the Monday through Friday sports show on WJJ, in three weeks … what did you say they were going to call it?”
“Playing for Keeps.”
“Yes, that's it, catchy, I wish I could hear it.”
“It you moved to Detroit you could.”
“I know, I know.”
“You know.”
She removed the coffee pot and filled his mug with fresh brew. “Carl … with you announcing the weekend Lions games, this new daily sport's show, driving back and forth … aren't you going to be, as they say in the boys' locker room, busting your balls?” She chuckled as she set the mug in front of him. “So to speak.”
He sipped
“Just joking. Anyway, I've been thinking, maybe it would be a good idea, you know, for now, if you thought about leasing an apartment in Detroit, the one you used to have at that Center was beautiful.”
Paused in mid sip, “Trying to get rid of me, huh.”
Stroking his back, “Honey … driving back and forth, it's 90 miles one way … I'd worry all the time.”
“I was hoping you would reconsider, move to Detroit.”
“Carl, you know I can't do that, not now, I have a contract with the
University, we've been over that....”
“Screw that University, they don't own you.”
That's interesting. “It just seems to make eminent sense. I could drive to Detroit on home-game weekends … absence makes the heart grow fonder.”
After a half hour of playing touchdown ego, Rachelle persuaded Carl they were adults and, with what surely would be Herculean demands at WJJ—his on-air shift, sales calls, promotions, not to mention the regular season Lions games—common sense dictated he get a temporary address in Detroit.
Seeing him weaken, she said, “When this current academic year is over, next spring, we can explore some Detroit real estate.”
He extended his right hand, “Shake on it.”
She hesitated, crossed her left-hand fingers behind her back, and shook. Carl beamed like he had completed a short football pass, “If you still want to teach, we can get you a job at Wayne State. Dent has some contacts there, I know the coach.”
She looked at T.S. and silently said, They just don't understand.
T.S. yawned and looked away as if to say, You're incorrigible.
Rachelle said, “We'll see.”
Carl, sipping coffee, said, “I'll call Dent, I could stay with him for a few days. He's bunking on his yacht, I can look around for an apartment.”
“Yes, yes, excellent idea. Is Mr. Dent's divorce going through, okay?”
“I guess, Penny wants the house, alimony, a ton.”
“Be careful of that Candy lady friend of Mr. Dent.”
“I think that's history.”
“Oh, I thought they were getting married?”
“I think Dent caught her screwing around.”
“That's a switch.”
CHAPTER SIX
Tuesday was a maze of classes, Seth's shift at da Vinci's went like a fast-food lunch. The apparition named Rachelle he had witnessed Monday afternoon killed his thoughts, Laura's “I've-prepared-a-place-for-you” a nagging whisper in his ear, Wednesday morning's wee hours progressed like Billy Graham says hell will pass for gluttons, liars, and fornicators. Seth, glad to be up and dressed, looked forward to Com. 501. He would analyze this Zannes apparition–was she real or some other worldly phenomena, alien encounter at the corner of Sagittarius and the Milky Way, or just another random meeting at First Street and Elm.
Arriving a few minutes early at the Com. 501 classroom, Seth sat in the same seat he had set in first day of class, back row by the window. After five minutes, fellow students seated, Zannes entered.
Her face pale, silver barrettes secured her hair which was combed straight back from her forehead. She was dressed in a black denim pant suit and white blouse with just enough cleavage revealed to inspire a sketch.
Damn! This creature is true. I would die for her, right now, tonight, tomorrow, whenever.
Sketching her, he noted a sad distance in her eyes and she began, with effort, it seemed to him, to be upbeat: “So, one person dropped the class. Not bad, I usually get three or four on the first go around.” She smiled. “I see our senior is still with us.”
All eyes on Seth, he nodded.
Rachelle looked over the class, “So here we are, now thirteen. Hope that number doesn't portend anything ominous.”
She walked to the window nearest Seth, looked out for a moment, then turned, leaned back against the sill and smiled down at him.
He mouthed a whisper, “Why so blue?”
“What?”
He shrugged nothing.
She glanced at his sketch pad then looked over the class, “Before we start on Wolfe, any questions?”
Her spring-rain fragrance killing him, Seth looked and saw it—Yep, a rock the size of Gibraltar on her left ring-finger, Jude Jude Jude.
A student’s hand went up. “Do you have to be a little crazy to be a writer?”
“Men do, women cope.”
Laughter.
Student: “So, the answer is yes.”
“Probably.”
Laughter.
Student: “I was wondering what communication theory you believe, follow.”
“Deconstructionist, modified.”
“And what is that?”
“Controlled insanity.”
Laughter.
As she talked, walked back and forth Seth noticed that she gestured with her hands as if words were clay and she was molding ideas. In caught glances, he said to her silently, you can't be real, I'm dreaming this.
Studying her, reciting mental notes, he moved to sketch her face: high cheekbones, shadow of a dimple, round chin about the size of a plum, skin the color of a ripe Bartlett pear; upper lip resembling the extended wings of a bird in flight; lower lip full and moist; tear drop nostrils, nose slightly enlarged in the middle but nice. Natural brows to accent her regal forehead. Eyes as by a master craftsman flawlessly spaced in the oval of her head, topaz irises, natural eye lashes, a touch of peach fuzz at her ear lobes.
Absorbed, he sketched detail of her hair, tapering back around her ears. He imagined her hair free, flowing around her face, with streaks of light brown, full, texture of spun gold.
Her essence penetrating into him like whiskey fermenting in charred oak barrels, he worked while he listened to her lecturing:
“...throwing a bucket of paint at a wall creates something—a paint splattered wall. But it is not art. Anybody can do it. C.K. Chesterton expressed it best, 'Art, not seen in the animal world, is the signature of the human being'.”
She paced at the front of the room, “I think it has something to do with creating something from nothing. Music, literature, colors on a canvas, a sculpture … and, if what you create is beautiful, not something that a simian could do, it is rare.”
Student: “Simian?”
She stopped pacing, “Ape.”
Laughter.
Student: “Isn't beauty in the eye of the beholder?”
“Depends what you mean by the beholder.”
“I don't understand.”
“Well, a goat can be a beholder, now can't it?”
Laughter.
Blah blah blah, I know beauty when I see it and you are the most beautiful creature I have ever laid eyes on.
Seth sketched her lips as she was saying, “So one of our challenges here is to seek the truth through the written word … characters in situations where they might stumble, soar, love. Not a forced truth by you the author, but something found by a character you have created.”
Seth thought: What created you?
He sketched her hands—open, pointing, never a fist. He imagined the joints and muscle and the suppleness of her fingers and how she used her index to punctuate thoughts: “A few of my colleagues in the Communication Department talk about the communication process in terms of processing human symbols, finding structure in the chaos.”
Seth worked on her delicate upper eye lids.
Rachelle: “In their view human beings are machines that process bits of information.”
Seth filled in the smooth flow of her neck into her blouse, highlighted the slight pointed lift of her breasts. He imagined them and paused to study her in full, taking her in like a cool glass of water
Rachelle looked at him then glanced away, “In sum, communication science relies on rules that people agree upon to accomplish whatever it is they are trying to get done to, for, or with one another.”
She tilted her head just so and folded her arms and continued: “Science is unique and valued because of its ‘prove it' perspective. If others cannot verify a finding, it's more or less hearsay.”
You're not hearsay. Seth sketched the tip of her slightly pointed nose.
Rachelle: “On the other hand, we are here to study the art of communication … seeking truths through the written word.”
Seth caught her eye. It was the damndest thing he ever felt. Weak, and yet strong enough to lift the room. She smiled at him.
He skipped a beat in time.
She held up a piece of chalk. “Collectively we call this c-h-a-l-k. When we see it, talk about it, write about it, we know what we are talking about.”
I know what I'm talking about.
Rachelle: “On the other hand, we can agree on how to spell love but when we try to express the notion in words it becomes more difficult. For example, what do you think Keats meant in his “Ode on a Grecian Urn: ‘beauty, truth, is all you need to know’?”
You!
“Seth alluded to it in our opening session when he talked about a voice.”
She looked at him. “Tell us again Seth, when you hear that voice.”
Snicker. Chuckle. Snort.
Seth: “You mean that sunset thing?”
“Yes.”
“When I see a sunset, the voice says, 'Try this one … and I paint the sunset … but when finished, I have only a painting. Even less so when you try to describe a sunset with words. No matter the final form, we have only a representation of the real thing.”
Rachelle said, “I think that says it. It's about creativity, imagination,
something out of nothing. Now, let's get to Wolfe's The Far and the Near. Anybody have any thoughts?”
The discussion began and Seth detected again, beneath the alive, alert, openness, a sadness in Rachelle.
Student: “Wolfe is saying how things, viewed from a distance, sometime look rosy but when experienced up close they may be ugly. Kind of like the grass seems greener over the fence.”
As they talked, discussed, Seth sketching Rachelle, she said to him, “And what does our senior think?”
He froze.
She smiled, waiting.
“I didn't read it.”
Rachelle looked at her watch. “Well, we never did get to John Gardner, and we don't have time to start today.” She looked at Seth. “We'll start next session with an overview of Gardner by Mr. Trudow.”
He smiled.
“Any questions?”
Back row Rose, “On the writing assignment, I wanted to do a collection of poetry.”
“Put it in a proposal, let's look at it. Anything else?” She paused. Nothing.
“Okay, before we leave, let's go ahead and make first appointments to discuss your projects. First come first served.”
Seth sat back and watched the rush to her desk.
Appointment made, everyone gone, Rachelle looked to him, said, “And?”
He went to her.
She said, “Hi there.”
“Sorry about Wolfe....”
“Don't worry about it.”
“I was wondering if … what's left, you know, appointment time, for the project thing?”
“What's good for you?”
You. “Anytime.”
“Let's see, how would tomorrow be, say....”
“I work at da Vinci's, Tuesday, Thursday, 3:00 to 7:00.”
“You do?”
“Yes.”
“I love that place, what do you do there?”
“Whatever they want.”
She smiled, “My father was an artist.”
A sparkle in his eye, “I'd like to see his work.”
“I have some in my office, when you come by, how about tomorrow morning, 10:00 A.M.”
“Works for me.”
“Ten it is.”
“We just talk, or....”
She tilted her head, “Do you have something in mind?”