Writes of Spring
©2009 The Angst Guy (theangstguy@yahoo.com)
Feedback (good, bad, indifferent, just want to bother me,
whatever) is appreciated. Please write to: theangstguy@yahoo.com
Synopsis: Winter changes to spring (and more changes come to
light) in the little home of two Boston college students in this, the seventh
tale in the Pause in the Air series.
Author’s Notes: “Writes of Spring”
is the seventh of the Pause in the Air tales, taking place in an alternate
universe in which Daria Morgendorffer and
The bit
about “handscapes” was borrowed from “Handscapes,” an unfinished, unpublished
fanfic not related to this one. The word was too good not to use.
Acknowledgements: My thanks go out to everyone who sent e-mails
asking me to do another PitA story. It worked. I’ll try to do more soon.
*
The
auditorium was filled with professionals in business suits who looked up as
Jane Lane walked to the lectern and arranged her notes. She was going to tell
them about art—her art, which was on display outside in the hallway.
Strangely, the large room looked like the auditorium of her old high school in
Lawndale, but it was supposed to be in New York City at a famous art institute.
The institute’s name had slipped her mind, but it was important, she was sure
of that.
Ready to
begin, Jane looked down at the audience—and saw that it had changed. The
businessmen were gone. The men and women in the audience were now dressed as
farmers, tramps, construction workers, beatniks, and hippies. They were
artists, the most creative people on earth, and they knew bullshit when they
saw it. Jane’s throat closed up in fear. She could not pretend to know what she
was doing in front of people who knew what real art was—and weren’t afraid to
say so.
She took
a nervous breath to start her speech.
“I have
a question!” shouted a bearded man in the fourth row. He wore black nerd
glasses, overalls, and a plaid shirt. In his hands, held high over his head as
he stood up, was a scorched soft-drink can nailed to a crude plywood base. “Is
this yours?” he said in cold disdain.
Is
that really mine? Jane reeled in shock. Did I make that, trying to be
like Andy Warhol? It’s awful! What was I thinking?
Everyone
in the audience shouted at her in fury. “Another Lane!” someone cried, and
everyone took up the call. She was just another Lane, another pretender,
another flyspeck dirtying the crystal window of Art. She was not their equal
and had no right to be among them. The thousands of artists in the auditorium
mocked and cursed and laughed at her. A sudden wind blew Jane’s note cards from
the lectern to the floor. She gasped and tried to recapture them with clumsy
hands.
A man
wearing a tuxedo ran onto the stage from her right. “You’re needed at home!” he
told her. She had forgotten something! Something bad had happened! She was
running now, up the sidewalk and through the door of her parents’ home in
Lawndale, up the stairs to her old bedroom.
On her
bed was a small bundle wrapped in a soft white blanket. Jane scooped up the
bundle and held it close to her. Inside it was an infant who looked exactly
like Daria Morgendorffer, complete with tiny round-lens eyeglasses and long,
thick hair, though her hair was black and her eyes were gray. It was the
newborn daughter of Daria and Jane.
The tiny
girl gave Jane a reproachful look. “You forgot us,” she said.
And the
infant withered into a dead, brown husk and broke apart in Jane’s arms.
* * *
Gasping
for air, Jane Lane sat bolt upright in bed. She thought she had cried out when
she awoke, but she wasn’t sure. With trembling fingers she wiped cold sweat
from her face, then looked at the long, dark shape under the blankets beside
her. Her beloved was still asleep. Thankful for that, Jane turned and squinted
at the pale blue digits of the clock-phone by her bedside. It was Friday, 5:47
a.m., in the middle of a cold March in Boston. She’d had a nightmare.
Jane lay
back on her pillow, then took a deep breath and held it, trying to relax. The
nightmare came back. Grief overwhelmed her, and tears ran down into her hair
and ears. My daughter is dead! My baby! She’s dead, and it’s my fault!—but
she fought down the memory of the dreadful dream, blocking it and reigned in
her sobs. She found the tissue box on the bedside table after fumbling around,
wiped her nose and cheeks, then held her breath again for half a minute. Her
heart rate slowed. By the time she let out her fourth breath, she trusted
herself to be rational. It was time to get up and shower. The alarm was set for
6:15, she had a full day of classes, and going back to sleep again was
impossible. Who knew what she would dream next?
Jane
swung her legs off the bed, shut off the alarm, and got up, careful not to
awaken her spouse. It was cold in the apartment with the heat lowered to keep
their monthly electric bill down. Jane had taken to wearing a red cotton sweat
suit and tube socks for extra warmth in bed, but she shivered as she shuffled
across the bare wooden floor to the bathroom. Better this than that damn
dream, she thought, feeling for the light switch and closing the door
behind her.
A half
hour later, her hair still damp from the shower, Jane was making a quick
breakfast in the kitchen of the two-bedroom Boston apartment she shared with
Daria. The aroma of chocolate-raspberry coffee drifted from the coffeemaker as
she prepared toast. On the counter before her was a stack of notes and study
sheets for the test she would take that afternoon over the history of Asian
art. So much to remember, so hard to keep it straight. Had her brother Trent
been right to urge her and Daria to skip college and stay in Lawndale? Her
classes seemed like so much useless torture. Her stomach knotted up. How much
longer could she keep her head above the academic waters?
On the
positive side, she’d made it, alive and well, halfway through the second
semester of her freshman year at the Boston Fine Arts College. Only two months
of classes were left before finals, and then . . . summer school and more
classes.
She
picked up the mug of coffee and held it below her nose, inhaling its aroma. I’m
not a failure, she told herself. I’ve got a shaky B+ average—better than
I thought I’d be doing, better than my C average in high school. Even if I
screw up a few classes, I’ll make it. I’m still worth something. I can do it. I
can create something great. I know I can.
But . .
. she was terrified that she would not. The projects she had so far created for
her art classes looked rigid and forced; they met the minimum requirements, but
they showed little of the promise she believed she had inside her. Worse, a
creative block had stalled all her after-school art projects for weeks. Working
on art on her free time was the last thing she wanted to do after coming home
from BFAC. Perhaps her Muse was merely tired and dozing, soon to awaken,
refreshed and ready to go.
Perhaps,
however, Jane’s Muse was gone for good. Jane had a big project that needed to be
completed for her still-photography class, but she’d been unable to think of a
thing to do for it. The final day for turning in the project description was
Monday. To her horror, nothing came to mind. She could fake genius for only so
long before—
A door
creaked down the hall. Slipper-covered feet thumped softly toward the kitchen.
Jane looked up from her notes and set her coffee aside. “Daria?”
“Maybe,”
said Daria Morgendorffer. Seven months pregnant and looking every minute of it,
Daria waddled into the tiny kitchen in her bulging, forest-green flannel
nightgown. She had gotten her long brown hair cut short and tinted the month
before, but otherwise she looked much as usual. The tint brought out a slight
reddish quality in her hair, making it a rich auburn. Jane thought Daria’s new
hairstyle was almost identical to that worn by Daria’s mother, but she wisely
did not say so.
Jane
reached over and gave her shorter spouse a long hug and a kiss on the forehead,
avoiding Daria’s big eyeglasses. “Why are you up so early?” she asked, talking
into Daria’s hair in case either of them had a bad case of morning breath. “You
don’t have to be at class today until ten.”
“Couldn’t
sleep.” Daria pulled away and walked over to the small dining table nearby. She
eased herself down into a chair, gritting her teeth as she did. “Your kid woke
me up a little while ago. Annoying as hell.”
Jane
smiled. “Like I say, it’s got your personality. Hungry?”
Daria
nodded, looking hopeful. “Are there any Pop-Tarts?”
“No, no
Pop-Tarts for you. No peanut brittle, either. You’ve overdone them both.
Cereal, an orange, glass of soymilk—”
“Jane,
please, just one—”
“—and
toast and jelly. Low-fat jelly. I didn’t buy any Pop-Tarts at the grocery, and
I found the ones you hid in the bathroom closet behind the towels. Locked ‘em
up.”
“Damn
it!”
Jane
looked at Daria with sympathetic regret. “Doctor said no, Sunshine. I’ll peel
your orange, if that helps.”
Daria
sighed, looking downcast. “Wait until you get pregnant,” she grumbled, “and
we’ll see how you like it.”
“Dream
on,” Jane said with a smirk as she gave Daria her soymilk and cereal. “I’m not
baking anything in my kiln for a while.”
Daria
looked down at her cereal bowl. “Do I eat this with my fingers?”
“Spoon
coming up. Napkin, too.”
“And a
Pop-Tart,” mumbled Daria.
“And
your mail from yesterday,” said Jane, reaching for a handful of letters on the
kitchen counter. “You didn’t open it when you came in last night. Speaking of
which, how’d the World Lit study session in the library go? You were out pretty
late.”
“It went
okay.” Daria took the letters and laid them beside her cereal bowl. “The group
liked my cheat sheet. Everyone photocopied it. I ought to charge for it, but
they’d just buy one sheet, copy it, and ruin the market.”
“It’s
not a real cheat sheet, is it?”
“No,
just a study sheet with everything condensed on it from the books and class
notes, sort of like those study sheets I made in high school.” Daria took a sip
of her soymilk, making a face. Regular milk was inclined to screw up her
digestion since she’d become pregnant. She then poured milk from her glass over
her cereal and looked around. “Where’s the sugar?”
Jane got
a small box out of a cabinet and put it on the table along with Daria’s peeled
orange. “Use this. It’s a sweetener I got that won’t—” make you fat
“—it’s a lot healthier for you than real sugar. Try it.”
With a
dark look, Daria opened the box and took out two sweetener packets, emptying
them over her cereal. She spooned the result into her mouth, crunched it up,
paused to evaluate the taste, and—to Jane’s relief—kept chewing. “Doesn’t suck
too badly,” Daria said. She flinched, then put down her spoon and pressed a
hand against her nightgown-covered abdomen. “He kicked me again. This kid never
sleeps. I thought they were supposed to sleep a lot when they were in the
womb.”
“It’s
just the special way it has of saying it loves you,” said Jane with a grin.
“It’s
just his way of saying he loves kicking all my major internal organs, you
mean,” said Daria.
His
way of saying . . . ? Jane turned away from buttering Daria’s toast.
“What?” she said.
“It’s
not that he loves me, he just likes kicking me.” Daria noticed Jane was staring
at her. “What?”
“You
said ‘he.’”
“Oh.”
Daria hesitated, then sighed. “Yeah, it’s a boy.”
“A boy?”
said Jane, eyes wide. “Wha—how—I mean, wha—I mean, how did you—how do you—?”
“I just
know,” said Daria, matter-of-factly. “Mom was telling me the other day about
how Quinn and I felt inside her, and while she was talking I could tell it
wasn’t like that. It’s a boy.”
Myriad
thoughts fought to be the first one out of Jane’s mouth. “Wha—d-d-did you,
like, go to the doctor and, um, you know, get—”
“No. I
can just tell.”
Jane
made an attempt to continue fixing breakfast in a nonchalant way, but she kept
dropping the toast when she tried to spread margarine on it. “So, you don’t
really know if it’s a girl or a boy, you sort of—”
“Boy,
definitely,” said Daria, and she returned to eating her cereal.
Jane put
down the toast and walked over to the table, where she sat down next to Daria.
She put a hand on her spouse’s back. “How long have—did you—how long—”
“Just
since Tuesday night,” said Daria, still eating. “I sort of thought it was a boy
before then, but when I was talking with Mom, I knew it.”
“Does
she know?”
“No.
Just you and me.”
Jane
felt relief at that, but the shock was still deep. “It’s—it’s all so, so, so
weird, because we weren’t—” She took a deep breath and pulled her hand back “—I
know I’m not being very coherent, but I thought we were going to let ourselves
be surprised when it was born, you know? It was a surprise, you know, to hear
you say you know what—”
“I’m
positive,” said Daria softly. After a reflective look, she looked down at her
belly. “Active little guy, too.”
Jane
reached for Daria’s midsection and gently pressed her hand against the green
flannel. A moment later, she felt movement. It mesmerized her. A son. We’re
going to have a son. Assuming Daria knows what she’s talking about. I never
knew she had an intuitive side; she was always a thinker, not a guesser. Is it
normal for a pregnant woman to know things like this? Guess I won’t know until
I decide to get pregnant—yeah, right, assuming we ever decide I should do it
and I could ever find a guy I’d want to—oh! It moved again! He moved! Our son.
My son? Can I call him my son, even though it’s really Trent and Daria’s son?
She wouldn’t have done it if it weren’t for me, and I’m raising him with Daria,
so it’s really my son, right? Like adopting? But not like adopting, because
whatever genes Trent and I share are in him, too. He’s kicking me. My son is
kicking me. We did this. We made him. We created a baby.
“Apollo,
this is Houston,” said Daria in a deadpan. “Come in, over.”
“What?
Oh, sorry.” Jane shook her head to clear it, and then stood up. She walked
slowly back to the kitchen counter where she had been preparing toast and
wondered what she was supposed to do with the bread and margarine. She wiped
her eyes and picked up the butter knife. In the background, she heard Daria
spoon cereal into her mouth, chew it noisily, and open an envelope.
“Another
credit-card application,” Daria said. “This makes about a dozen so far this
year.” Another envelope was opened. “Thirteen now.” Another envelope. “We still
have just over seven thousand left in our bank account. Good old free-loving
Aunt Rita. Oh, by the way, Mom said she and Dad were sending over another
check, just in case we needed it. Maybe I should have told them about Rita’s
little bribe, but—”
“No,”
said Jane, finally done fixing two slices of toast. “Don’t tell her.”
“Don’t
worry. I’d have to tell Mom why Rita was bribing us, and I don’t think I could
stomach the consequences any more than you could.”
Jane
walked to the table with the toast in hand, then realized she didn’t have a
plate to put it on. She put down the toast slices, walked over to the
refrigerator, took out the orange juice and put it on the table, then went to
the cupboard and got a glass, which she put in the refrigerator. Walking back to
the table, she stared down at the toast and carton of orange juice, without the
slightest idea of what to do next.
“Are you
okay?” asked Daria, watching Jane with interest.
“Sure.”
Jane took the orange juice carton and put it in the refrigerator again, then
took out her glass and put it on the table, empty, and sat down. She stared at
the toast.
Daria
braced herself against the table’s edge and got up. She walked around to the
refrigerator, got out the orange juice, poured Jane a glass of it, then got two
small plates, one for each toast slice, and put the toast on it. She gave one
to Jane and one to herself.
“Thanks,”
Jane mumbled. “Guess I’m not really with it.”
“Do
tell,” said Daria, looking in one of the cabinets for jelly.
I
remember the dream now, Jane thought, staring at her toast. I remember
our daughter died because I forgot about her and Daria. I was so involved in my
work, I went away and didn’t come back, just like my own father and mother did,
and I was just as bad as they were. Am I going to be like that? What can I do?
Maybe it won’t matter because I’m not getting anywhere lately anyway with my
art. It’s all garbage and looks forced and isn’t saying anything, and I feel
like it’s coming out of me like tin cans on a conveyor belt, processed for
class and grades and not anything like what I want it to say or do or be. I
really am another Lane, another hometown pottery-maker, color dabbler, a
seller of wind chimes at county crafts fairs. Another screwed-up Lane with a
spouse and a baby, and one day it will be just me alone, because I wasn’t there
when my family needed me.
Jane
felt a hand grip her shoulder from behind. She reached for it automatically but
did not look around.
“Big
test today?” asked Daria, giving Jane a kiss on the top of her head before
walking back to her chair.
“Yeah,”
said Jane dully. “Big one. Hope I’m ready for it.”
“You’re
doing pretty well so far.” Daria picked up the last envelope, frowned, and
turned it facedown on the table. She went back to eating her cereal.
Jane
looked over with a flicker of interest. She reached for the envelope and picked
it up before Daria could stop her. “This is from Inner Galaxy Magazine,” she
said after looking at the return address. “Why don’t you open it?”
“It’s
just a rejection,” said Daria glumly. “I’ve sent them six stories and they sent
almost all of them back. Just leave it.”
Jane
weighed the envelope in her hand. “This has more than one sheet of paper in
it,” she said, shaking off her depression with an effort. “Either you open it
now or I will.”
With an
unhappy look, Daria reached for the envelope and opened it. Jane watched as
Daria pulled out several sheaves of papers stapled together at the top. A cover
letter came with them.
“What’s
that?” asked Jane, but she already thought she knew what it was. It looked like
multiple copies of a free-lance contract.
Daria
stared at the cover letter with wide eyes. She flipped the cover letter back to
read some of the stapled papers, then looked back at the letter. “Well,” she
said, and then she didn’t say anything more.
Jane
waited until Daria appeared to finish the letter, then put out a hand. After a
moment, Daria gave the letter to her and began to read the stapled papers. Jane
glanced at the beautiful letterhead on the stationery, showing a galaxy behind
a female alien’s head, then went to the body of the letter itself.
Dear Ms. Morgendorffer:
Please accept our apologies for not getting back to
you sooner. We’ve had a bit of an editorial bottleneck here at Inner Galaxy,
but we hope to resolve it soon. At any rate, we have read your recent
submission, “The Daughters of Memory,” and we enjoyed it very much.
“Was
this the story you were working on last October after you did that story about
the girl who got kidnapped by aliens and came back to earth as a brain-stealer?
The girl who ate her dopey parents?”
“Mmm.”
“I
remember this one, too. This one was good. I liked the main character, the one
who . . . oh.” Jane focused on the letter again.
I rarely see such intriguing characters as Mem, though I confess I know nothing about memory palaces
and some of the other mnemonic techniques you describe. My editorial assistants
assure me you have your facts down correctly, but they want to know your
sources, particularly whether you are using a book by Francis Yates for your
information. You can take up the specifics with them at a later date. The
background you posit for the future earth seemed a bit loose, scientifically
speaking, but it was internally consistent and engaging, and Mem and her daughters dominate the story, so we’re not
inclined to be picky.
“What’s
he talking about? Your story made perfect sense! Everyone on Earth is made
stupid by an alien stupid bomb, except Mem and her family, and what does he
know about science, anyway? He’s just an editor! Who does he think he is, Carl
Sagan?”
“Jane.”
“Well—!”
The story is much longer than our usual fare, and in
fact it qualifies as a novella, not a “short story” per your cover letter, but
after some discussion we decided to take it and run with it—under one
condition. Can you allow the story to be split into two parts, one for the
November and the other for the December issues for this year? If you are
agreeable, it will be the main story for both months and will get the cover art
for November, too. If you have any suggestions on where to divide the tale (I
have my own idea but wish to hear from you first), please send them to me
soonest, as I need to get the artist going now. We might use the same artist
for both cover and interiors (to be resolved here, don’t worry about it).
“Holy
shit!” Jane gasped. “They took your story—and for two issues, yet! Two issues!
And you get the cover art! Holy shit!”
“Mmm,”
said Daria, still reading the contract.
“How can
you be so calm? You’re going to be published! Twice, with one story!”
“Mmm.”
Enclosed are three copies of our standard contract
for first North American serial rights. Please sign all three, but keep one for
your own files. Are you agented? If so, write back at once so we may contact
your agent instead. Better yet, call—use the toll-free number below my
signature, not the number on the letterhead. Proofs will be supplied to you
this summer, probably in July or August. Details to follow.
Jane got
up and leaned over to see the paperwork Daria was reading. A brief scan gave
Jane all the information she needed.
“Seven
hundred and ninety-six dollars?” she yelled, and she jumped up with fists
clenched in the air and screamed, “YES!”
“Jane!”
After
dancing and jumping around the living room and knocking a pile of books off the
coffee table, Jane stopped to read the rest of the letter.
By the way, I don’t recall seeing your name in print
before. Didn’t see you at the Boskone SF convention last
month, either. You live in Boston, Taxachusetts, right? Anyway, can you
send along a short bio, about 100-150 words? We include a few notes about the
author at the end of each story.
Thank you again for a superbly told tale. Got
anything else lying around you’d care to send in? If so, address it to my
attention and put “DARIA” in the lower left corner so we can sort it out early
from the rest of the slush pile.
All
the best,
Mike
“Nemo” Nowall
Editor,
Inner Galaxy
“And
you’re getting special treatment! Oh, God, this is great! I can’t believe
it!”
“Mmm.
They didn’t like my other stories. Why does he want to see them again?”
“Who
cares? Daria, what is it with you? I mean, right, you can’t go dancing around
like you are—oh, hell, sure you can!” Jane rushed to Daria’s side and tried to
drag her to her feet. “Get up! Let’s dance!”
“I can’t
dance! I hate dancing!”
“So do
I! Who cares? Let’s dance! Come on!” Jane hugged her spouse and kissed her,
getting poked in the cheek by the rim of Daria’s glasses. “Be happy!”
“I am
happy,” Daria said in a flat voice. “But you smudged my lenses.”
“I’ll
lick your nose if you don’t dance!”
Daria
groaned in resignation and pressed her face into Jane’s shoulder as they
hugged, shifting her weight from one foot to the other in the most pathetic
attempt at dancing ever made by a human. “Okay, I have to stop,” she said after
four seconds of torment. “Your kid kicked my bladder, and I have to go to the
bathroom.”
Jane let
Daria go after several more kisses and another hug. As her spouse waddled off
down the hallway, Jane sat down at the table again to read over the contract
Daria left behind. It was hard to believe that poking at a computer a few hours
a night could net this much money. The contract looked like some of the art
contracts passed around among BFAC students who had gained free-lance work.
Could
I do this, too?
Jane
made a skeptical face, but she continued to look over the contract and think
about it. Writing was out of the question, but she thought she could snare some
free-lance work illustrating various publications. If she earned enough, it
would help them both in the long run. She’d painted a number of masterpiece
knock-offs for an art gallery in Lawndale when she was a high-school senior,
and the works had sold quickly—but it wasn’t her art, and all the money
went to repair a collapsed gazebo in her parents’ backyard, smashed during the
making of a music video by her brother Trent’s band. At any rate, the
experience proved that free-lance work had value—possibly a lot of value.
But was
it what she wanted to do with her talent in the long run? She hadn’t thought so
then. What about now?
On
one hand, Jane thought, free-lance work would let me stay home with
Daria all the time, except for class work. I wouldn’t have to travel anywhere
except on personal vacations. If I could snag some work, like Daria’s getting
for her writing, it would sure help with our joint checking and savings
accounts.
On
the other hand, I’d never paint what I wanted to paint. That book-cover artist who
visited BFAC last week said he was booked solid and hardly dared turn down
work, so he could build his reputation. He didn’t even go on vacations. I’d
always have to do what the contracts called for, painting scenes for someone
else’s stories and never my own views of life and the universe and good and
evil and all that. And I’d have to be the dead-solid best, the absolute top of
the line to a steady stream of big-paying work. I’m just not there yet. But is
money more important now, or saying what I want to say? I’m not getting
anywhere as it is, so why not go the free-lance route? I could try, yeah, and I
wouldn’t have to do it full-time, but—
“That must be one hell of a
test coming today,” said Daria, sitting down again across from Jane. “Care for
some diet strawberry jelly?”
“Uh,
sure.” They finished their breakfast in silence as Daria picked up the letter
and contracts to read them over once more. Jane finished first and carried her
plates to the dishwasher, feeling depressed. What am I going to do with my
life?
“Jane?”
“What?”
“Can you
get me a pen, please?”
“Sure.”
Jane fished one out of the utility drawer and handed it over, feeling a stab of
jealousy as she watched Daria sign the contracts. Shame followed. It took a few
moments to locate a stamp and an envelope large enough to return two of the
contracts.
“I
should scribble out a note for Nemo, too,” Daria said, looking around again.
She gripped the table’s edge to brace herself and get up again.
“Wait,
let me get you some paper.” Jane left and walked to the bedroom they both used
as their creative space, picking up a notepad from her overly cluttered desk. A
second stab of jealousy hit her as she glanced at Daria’s neatly organized
computer desk. Daria had finally found her voice, perhaps—the one thing she had
wanted to do since high school, when she had begun to write seriously. When
will I find my voice? When? Tomorrow? Ten years from now? Never?
It was
then that Jane saw the most recent issue of Inner Galaxy magazine on Daria’s
desk. She glanced at the door, then walked over and picked up the issue,
flipping to the front where the table of contents was. It was there that Jane
also found the names of the magazine’s staff, subscription information, and
free-lance guidelines for writers and artists. Snatching a pencil, she wrote
down the name and address of the art director, tore the sheet from the pad,
folded it up, and stuffed it in her pants pocket.
Back in
the kitchen, she handed the pad to Daria. “Thanks,” said her spouse, and began
to handwrite a note to the editor. She stopped after a few words and looked at
Jane. “Should I type this? It’d look more professional.”
“He
might like the personal touch,” Jane said. “Your handwriting is fine.” She
frowned. “Of course, you might want to keep a copy of your correspondence, so—”
Daria
put down the pencil and forced herself up on her feet. “I’ll type it and save a
copy to the hard drive,” she said, waddling off to the creative room. “Damn it,
kid, stop kicking me! You’re coming out in two months, so get over it!”
“I’d
better go if I want to catch the bus to campus,” Jane called.
“You
want the car today?” Daria called back before turning on her computer.
“No.
It’s yours.” Jane visited the bathroom a last time, applied lipstick and a
minimal amount of makeup, got her book bag, put on her boots and coat, and
headed into the creative room to give Daria a goodbye kiss. She found Daria
pecking away at her desktop computer with a bland expression.
“I love
you,” said Jane, hovering over Daria’s head, waiting for her to turn her face
up to get the kiss.
“Mmm,”
said Daria, typing intently.
“I’m
waiting.”
“Just a
sec.”
Jane
waited a moment more. She looked down at the huge bulge in Daria’s abdomen.
Our
baby. Our son. What will we call you? Will I always be there for you when you
need me?
Despite her heavy backpack,
Jane knelt down on the floor beside Daria’s chair. “Turn around,” she said in a
low voice.
Daria
stopped typing and looked down at her blankly. “What?”
“Turn
around and face me.”
Daria looked
at the computer monitor, then looked at Jane and was on the verge of offering
an excuse for why she couldn’t turn around just yet, but she read urgency in
Jane’s face. She sighed and scooted her chair around to face Jane, who pulled
up the bottom of Daria’s flannel nightgown to expose her bare legs and abdomen.
“Hey,
it’s cold in here!” Daria protested—but she got up from the chair for a moment
to let Jane raise the nightgown farther, and she held the hem up to her
breasts. Jane closed her eyes and leaned down, putting the left side of her
face against Daria’s pregnant bulge. Her arms encircled Daria’s waist. Someone
in Daria’s belly moved against Jane’s cheek as if trying his best to touch her.
“A boy?”
Jane whispered.
“It’s a
boy,” Daria whispered back. She raised a hand and ran her fingers through
Jane’s silky black bangs. After a moment, she noticed that Jane’s shoulders
were quivering. “Are you okay?” she asked.
Jane’s
head nodded but did not rise. Her arms tightened around Daria as she drew in a
shaky breath and continued to cry without sound.
Worry
filled Daria’s face. She waited until Jane kissed her belly several times just
below the navel, and got up to wipe her red eyes on her coat sleeves. “Are you
okay?” Daria repeated.
“Yeah.
See you tonight.” Jane kissed her mouth, then turned away for the door.
“Jane?”
“I’m
okay.” Jane looked back and waved. Tears ran down her face. She sniffed and
wiped her face with the palms of her hands. “A boy!” she said. “I’m already
thinking up names. I guess having another Trent around would be a little too
much, huh?”
“That’s
okay with you, right?”
“What?
Calling the baby Trent?”
“No,
that it’s a boy.”
“Oh!”
Jane looked started and shook her head. “No, that’s fine. It—you know, it was
just finding out. It caught me by surprise. I’ve just been so used to calling
the baby an it, and now it’s a he, and I guess it sort of got to
me. I dunno. It made it real, I guess.”
Daria
raised an eyebrow. “Made it real?”
Jane
winced and smacked herself on the forehead. “D’oh! Sorry, that didn’t come out
right. Just forget it.”
“I think
I understand. It’s a person now, not an it.”
Swallowing,
Jane nodded. She did not meet Daria’s gaze. “I’d better go.” She hesitated
before adding, “I love you both.”
Daria
looked at Jane for a long moment. “We love you, too,” she said softly. “Good
luck on your test.”
Jane
nodded and left the apartment. Freezing air stabbed deep into her lungs and
hurt her throat. The fog of her breath curled around her aching face. The bus
came on time, and she climbed its steps and was gone.
Daria
waited until she heard the bus pull away before she picked up her computer
keyboard and retrieved the plastic-wrapped Pop-Tart below it. She ate it in one
minute flat, then continued with her letter to the editor. The peanut brittle
taped to the bottom of her top desk drawer was still secure and would serve as
the weekend’s sneak snack.
* * *
Ten
hours later, at 5:30 that overcast afternoon, the bus came back. Empty-faced,
Jane climbed down the steps. She rubbed a gloved hand over her weary face and
trudged along the sidewalk toward the apartment, hoping her nose wouldn’t run
until she got home. Almost all the snow was gone, leaving dead leaves and
debris visible everywhere. The world was a wash of cold and colorless grays and
browns.
It
looks like my future, Jane thought—but it was hard to be too depressed. The
weekend had begun. The test on the history of Asian art had not gone well, but
there were more important things to be thankful for. It helped to forcefully
remind herself of them.
She
unlocked the apartment door and pushed it open. Warm yellow light and the smell
of baking pizza spilled over her and filled her senses. She closed the door
behind her, hesitating before she put down her backpack. Should I tell her
that I’m planning to start piling up free-lance work? It doesn’t matter, I
guess, but maybe . . . no. Not yet.
The
toilet flushed in the bathroom. After a pause, the door opened and soft
footsteps came down the hallway. “Oh,” said Daria, walking over. “I didn’t hear
you come in. How’d the test go? Or does the way you look pretty much say it
all?”
Jane
hugged her and they kissed. “It’s been a long day,” she said into Daria’s hair.
“It’s good to see my Sunshine again.”
They
talked about their day as they ate their traditional Friday-night low-fat,
healthy vegetable pizza—sprinkled with a good bit of high-fat cheese and
hamburger to celebrate the week’s end. They both decided to wear green
underwear but regular, non-green clothing on St. Patrick’s Day, just to be
different, and agreed to get a large, live houseplant to celebrate the first
day of spring, arriving the following week. When the weather improved, they
would visit Boston Common and take pictures.
After
dinner they watched Sick, Sad World
and a rented comedy video that turned out much funnier than either had
expected. Jane forgot her dark mood as she and Daria cuddled together under an
afghan on the overstuffed couch, leaning back on the pillows with their feet
propped up on the ottoman, laughing at a movie together for the first time in
weeks.
Near the
movie’s end, Jane leaned over and whispered an indecent proposal.
No reply
came. Jane turned her head and squinted in the dim light. Daria was sound
asleep, her glasses still on as she faced the TV.
You
must have been more tired today than I was, Jane thought with a rueful
smile. She looked down at Daria’s hands, curled up below her chin clutching the
edge of the blanket, then sighed and snuggled closer to her lover.
What
am I going to do? Jane asked Daria in silence. This is a bad time to
start wondering if I’m heading down the wrong path with my career. I want to
create whatever I want to create, just as you do with your stories, but school
is overwhelming and I have no idea where my Muse has gone. I’m a dry fountain,
an empty waterfall, a cup with dust in the bottom. All I have is you and our
child. Who do I turn to, to find the right path to walk? Where can I go to find
my own voice, just as you are finding yours? Thanks to your aunt, we have
enough money for the time being, a little breathing space, but it won’t last
forever. I want my art to make money, yes, but if I set out to do that on
purpose, if making money is my only goal, all I’ve ever dreamed of doing will
be sacrificed.
Her lips
pressed together in a flat line. Is that a bad thing, though? Everyone in my
family sacrificed the relationships they had with each other to have their own,
uninterrupted artistic life. Mom and Dad ran off separately, my sibs ran
off—except for Trent, but he slept all day and wasn’t really there when he was
there. Did you know I might do that, too, when you married me, Sunshine? Did
you trust me not to do it?
Is it
a bad thing, then, to sacrifice my art for us, for my family? But I want to create!
I have something to say, something to show! And I don’t know what it is!
Jane’s eyes closed. I have to be brave
when there is no reason left for hope. I have to hold on when there is nothing
left inside me to cling to. I have to believe it will work out somehow, that
what we’ve created is worth it all, all I can give to it.
You are
my life, Daria. You and our child, you are all there is for me.
Jane
could not get close enough to kiss her spouse without bumping her shoulder and
waking her. She leaned back, her eyes sad, and let her gaze roam the quiet
room. Tiring of that, she looked again at her pregnant love and noted how small
and vulnerable she was. One day we’ll both be gone, Jane thought. Who
will remember us then?
She
found herself looking at Daria’s enlarged abdomen, and she knew the answer.
A table
light across the room illuminated Daria’s hands. At a range of only a few
inches, her fingers looked like hilly ridges between great valleys. The
knuckles were like smooth mountains, the backs of her hands the Great Plains.
They’re
like landscapes, Jane thought, still more than a little sorry her indecent
proposal would have to wait. She would have liked for her hands to have crossed
those warm, lovely landscapes below the afghan, under Daria’s clothing. She
looked at Daria’s hands and imagined herself to be so small, she could climb
the back of one hand toward the summit on the nearest knuckle.
Landscapes.
Handscapes.
Jane blinked. She stopped
thinking of sex and peered closely at Daria’s hands. She stared at them for a
long time, thinking and imagining.
Handscapes.
It was
possible to get off the couch without awakening Daria, who was a hard sleeper
of late. Jane tucked her in, then padded off in sock feet to the creative room
and turned on the light. She looked through her sketchbooks at some old
drawings she’d done in high school of her own hands, then hunted around for a
picture book on Rodin’s sculptures. She found this unsatisfying and stood
frowning in thought.
An idea
came, and she went to the bathroom and took out a small plastic bottle of hand
lotion. She smeared some on her hands, rubbed it in, then held her hands up to
the bathroom lights and looked at her semi-gloss skin. Her fingers twisted and
turned as she posed her hands in many positions next to her eyes, trying to
envision her hands as landscapes, new environments that offered contact,
communication, the chance to touch and be touched. Every person was a new
continent, a world waiting to be explored. . . .
It
worked. It would work better with someone’s hands other than her own, rougher
and more interesting hands, but it worked. More shadows might help, too.
She
wiped off her hands on a towel, found her camera and set it up on its tripod,
then set up a couple of lights in the creative room and got the hand lotion
again. She took a whole roll of experimental close-up shots of her own hands
against a black background, then dropped the roll in a pouch and wrote out the
label to have it developed at BFAC’s photo lab. She could get it in tomorrow
while running errands around town with Daria.
That
done, Jane sat down at her worktable and pulled out the project description
sheet for her still photography class.
HANDSCAPES,
she put in all-capitals handwriting, in the space for the project name. She
filled out the rest of the form, making it up as she went along. One hundred
photographs minimum, in black and white, arranged on black upright display
panels. One hundred close-up photographs of hands as landscapes, Ansel Adams
style.
She never
once thought about her test over the history of Asian art.
At
half-past two, she glanced at the clock and grimaced. She’d pay for this in the
morning, but it was worth it. After closing up shop in the creative room, she
turned the heat up, went back to the living room, and turned off the lights and
TV. As she started to climb on the couch next to Daria, too tired to change
into her sweat suit, she felt something crinkle in her pocket. She got up again
and fished out the piece of paper with the name and address of Inner Galaxy’s
art director. After a moment, she crumpled the paper and threw it away in the
wastebasket under the kitchen sink.
She got
back on the couch under the thick afghan, snuggling up to her lover. In the
semi-darkness she listened to Daria’s breathing, slow waves coming in to the
shore, and when it was time, she went down into the sea unafraid.
Original: 05/17/04; modified 11/21/04, 07/23/06, 10/06/06, 11/15/09
FINIS