by Jerry Cole
“Thank you,” the man said. He held the cigarette with his thumb and forefinger, like one would hold onto a joint. He paused once more, frowning. “You know, you look very familiar to me.”
Max tilted his head. He was ordinarily very much known, across the world, one of the top architects of the United States, recognized in those communities. On the street? He certainly wasn’t any sort of celebrity. No actor. No face.
“Do I?” Max asked, knowing he sounded coy. Was he flirting? Was this guy flirting with him, as well?
“You do.” The man pressed his lips around the cigarette once more, lifting a single eyebrow. “I wouldn’t deign to say I know your name. Although, I’m sure you’re in some way in the art community. That air about you, you know.”
Max peered at the man, wondering if he was making fun of him. He shifted, bringing his hand forward—making his fingers into scissors and fake “cutting” them. In response, the man slid his cigarette into Max’s fingers, grinning. Somehow, this had become a game. Max puffed at the cigarette, this act reminding him of his early days of architectural school—when Amanda had been at home painting, looking after the baby. He’d filled his lungs with smoke.
“Ah. I remember, now,” the man said, snapping his now-empty fingers. “Jesus, of course. My father had an old magazine clipping of you inside his studio. That architect, from America. He raved about you. Said you had an eye like no other American possibly could.”
“You flatter me,” Max said. In actuality, his cheeks filled with red. He could feel the blood.
“I speak the truth.” The man snapped again; a refined sound, which filled Max’s ears. “Dammit, I just can’t remember your name.”
“Max. Max Everett,” he said, handing the cigarette back to the Italian. “Thank you, for this. It probably set me back a few years. But thank you.”
“Naw. You look better than even that magazine clipping, if I’m being honest with you,” the man said, sniffing. “If I had any balls at all, I’d sit down with you and demand for you to answer some of my most pressing questions. Alas…”
“I’m actually meeting someone,” Max said, allowing his chin to fall to his chest. Would he eternally be too frightened for anyone to make a move on him? Probably. He shrugged, loving the feeling of having more power over this man than he actually did. He could pretend into infinity to be the kind of man people revered. Until he died alone.
“You’re married, aren’t you?” the man asked, again allowing his eyes to burn into Max’s. “I seem to remember… Although, it seems, my memory is so stunted lately. Just fizzing along…”
“Divorced, actually,” Max said. “Or, planning to be.”
The mysterious man scratched his nail across his thick eyebrow, shifting his weight. He allowed a smile to quiver across his lips—so mischievous—before dropping it, then giving Max a small bow. He seemed in total control of his body, down to the cell level. Could translate any emotion with a flick of his shoulder, a quick tweak of his tongue.
“How long will you be in Venice?” the man asked. “Just in case we have a chance to meet again.”
“I’m not quite sure,” Max heard himself say. His voice echoed in his ears, telling him a story of his own emotions he couldn’t quite understand. Sure, he was there to see his daughter, to explain. Also, didn’t he need a bit of peace for himself? To escape from the chaos of Chicago, from the rumors, from news of his wife’s new “friends”?
“Venice sucks you in. You’d best be careful of that,” the man said. He snapped his left eye into a wink, and then turned back toward the road. “Maybe I’ll see you around, Max Everett. On your road to discover yourself, maybe you’ll discover me again, too.”
Max didn’t have the words to answer back. He hung heavily against the back of his chair, watching the near-perfect Italian man as he sauntered down the road, disappearing behind the nearby church. Max blinked twice, wondering if the man had even existed; if he’d just been a strange figment of some romanticized Italian world. Then, he spun his head to the right, finding himself face-to-face with his daughter, Christine, her cheekbones high, her eyes green and flashing with anger, so much like her mother’s. She perched at the edge of the chair, the blood pulsing up to her cheeks. She seemed filled with a million things to say. A million things to declare.
“Dad,” she said.
“Christine,” Max answered back.
“It’s good to see you.” Her words were stale, clearly lies. She’d never been happy to see him. Even when she’d been a girl, a young toddler, she’d wept for her mother until she’d arrived at the crib.
They ordered two glasses of wine. Christine reported that she didn’t have another class until much later that night, that she’d cleared the afternoon to spend with her father. The wines were brought to their table, filled nearly to the brim.
“So. Italy, huh?” Max heard himself say to his daughter, uninspired words that held no meaning. Once, when a magazine journalist had interviewed him several years before, Max had held his chin atop his fists and dove into a discussion about his relationship with his demonic car-crazed father, his riches, the way it colored his own history and life. He imagined Christine doing something similar about him—declaring that her stunted, anti-emotional father was the source of her passionate anger.
“Mmhmm,” Christine responded back. Her forehead wrinkled, then flattened. “It’s good you came all the way here, I guess. You said you had a building going up here?”
“Yes. I haven’t stopped at the site yet,” Max said. He bit his lip, his head still swimming with the memory of that strange Italian man who had passed him by. Surely, that had been attraction? Surely, he hadn’t imagined it?
“Well, I personally think it’s stupid to build here,” Christine said, using that haughty teenage voice she should have abandoned long before. “I mean, have you seen it here? It’s crumbling. It’s falling into the water. It doesn’t have time for your artistic eye, or whatever, Dad.”
“Aren’t you the one who’s supposed to be crafting some sort of artistic eye?” Max heard himself spew, like a drunk vomiting.
They sat in silence for a long moment. Max knew that Christine felt disrespected. In some respects, he had wanted that. To put her in her place. All the years of art camps, of paying for the top-dollar, art high school and sending her on various trips around the world to “get cultured,” as she put it. Jesus. Or perhaps, he was just resentful—since she seemed arms-open to whatever happened next. Once, he’d walked in on her while she’d been making out with a female friend in the garage—her fingers wrapped tight around the shoulders, like she felt afraid the friend might float away in the wind. How had she known to dive toward emotion, so readily? How had she known what her body craved?
Of course, he’d bucked back as quick as he could, not wanting that conversation to explode back in his face. Amanda had just chuckled when he’d told her, saying, “Oh, sure. She’s in that experimental phase, isn’t she?”
Max realized that neither he nor his daughter had spoken in quite some time. Their wine glasses were empty, with just a small dredge of wine at the bottom. Max’s head spun slightly, like a very slow carousel. He watched as his daughter drew her fingers into a small pocket in her dress, taking out an almond. She crunched at it, clearly unable to think of a single thing to say. Perhaps this was the moment to drop the bomb. To say—divorce. Divorce. A boat crept toward them, a water taxi that vomited fifty people up onto the sidewalk.
“I’ve been working one-on-one with my instructor,” she said. She allowed an almond to fall from her fingers, into the water just beyond. It floated, coating turning a darker color. Then, it continued its course, a strange seed looking for a dock.
“Oh?” Max feigned interest, hoping they could avoid the real reason he’d come as long as possible.
“Yes. Mario. He’s remarkable, Dad. He’s been showing me a brand-new perspective on painting. You know, I’m not mom. I know that. I don’t have her precise talen
t. I certainly don’t have… your…” She trailed off. She’d always been unable to acknowledge her father’s fame, in the same way as her mother’s. There was more poetry to her mother’s fame, and Max knew that. It wasn’t something he was jealous of. Rather, his work was too brash for it. Demanding of attention.
“Anyway, he’s a volatile guy,” Christine continued. Light glinted in her eyes, showing something a bit more than respect, Max thought. Somewhere in the back of his mind, a worm tingled. He wondered if Christine was falling for her art teacher. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time something like that happened. In fact, it was more or less expected, at some point in your career.
Max, himself, had slept with several of the men who’d yanked him up through the ranks over the years—the powerful architects of Rome and London, the mega-businessmen of New York, the Los Angeles big-smiling creeps who’d stated they wanted to make him into a kind of celebrity. A kind of architecture star.
“I never know what he’s going to do next, or say,” Christine continued. “Sometimes, he tells me I’m complete drivel. Then, I cry for days. Other times, he tells me I’ve made real headway. That if I wanted to, I could go show my work in Berlin right now. It’s that fucking progressive.”
Something so violent about hearing your own child use a curse word, Max thought.
“Berlin, huh? Ugly city, architecturally,” he said. When he spoke, he sensed, already, that he’d said the wrong thing.
“Jesus, Dad. You’re so old-fashioned. Maybe art doesn’t always have to be pretty. Did you ever think of that?” she demanded.
Silence hung between them. Max brought his fingers around the wine stem, stirring the glass back and forth. He marveled at how far away he currently was from telling her the thing he’d come all this way to say. He could hardly see it, like it was on a distant shore of his own mind.
“Do you want to come see my studio space?” Christine finally asked. She crunched on the back-half of another almond, making it last.
“Sure thing,” Max heard himself say, his voice coming from far back in his head. Anything to push reality back a bit further.
Max paid for the wines and they began a slow trek across the cobblestones, ducking behind churches and easing by cozy shadowed bars where aperol spritz drinks gleamed orange. Christine walked with the confidence of a much older woman, her chin high. It was almost a strut, like a bird, her knees a bit too high.
Just tell her, Max’s brain echoed. An old Italian woman cut in front of him, holding a large basket of oranges. He stepped back fast, anxious that he would hit her, and watched as several of the oranges tumbled to the ground. Christine kept her high-stepping in front of him, rolling her eyes back at his apparent clumsiness. His hands drew into fists. This near-perfect world she’d cultivated for herself. He was about to stab it through. Let out the air.
“Christine. Wait,” he said, stumbling forward. His voice had taken on the grit he’d used with that stranger, that Italian man. He no longer sounded like the passive father, attempting to dance his way through a better relationship with his daughter.
Christine noted this, spun back. She hovered at the edge of the canal, her hair whipping along with a sudden Italian wind—perhaps in from the mountains. It had a crispness to it. Something that evoked memories of all falls past, when Christine had been a young thing—picking her Halloween costume, carving a pumpkin in the garage with her mother.
Max lifted his hands to Christine’s shoulders, gripping them. Immediately, she grew tense, her eyes animal-bright. “Dad…” she began. “What the hell.”
“Christine, I came here because I need to tell you something,” he said. He felt his eyes blinking a bit too fast. “I don’t want to alarm you. If I don’t get it out right now…”
“You’re freaking me out,” Christine said. Her words were no longer snarky.
Behind them, another water taxi snaked past. The Italian driver’s eyes bored into Max’s, so dominant, fully black. Almost like a reptile’s.
“Your mother and I are getting a divorce,” Max finally sputtered. He was unable to look at Christine when he said it. Felt that it was akin to looking into the flame of the fire, or directly into the sun. Surely, the truth couldn’t hurt her so badly if it kind of deflected off of him, instead of coming into her direct—like a sword.
She crumpled. It happened almost immediately. She shrunk away from his grip, becoming almost water-like, and bucked a few steps toward the shimmering turquoise canal. Her bottom lip quivered. Instantly, her face became one from several years before; charged with teenage adrenaline, yet still bulbous, like a child’s.
“Why are you doing this to Mom?” she demanded.
The question felt like a smack, for, of course, it was completely warranted. Without giving her another bit of information, Christine had picked up on the truth, that this was all his plan, his “fancy.” That Amanda would have stuck by him and loved him till his dying day. Max’s hands hung at his side, his fingers empty. He held no other words for her. His thoughts were inarticulate, passing like water.
Christine spun on her heels, darting away from him. On instinct, Max followed her—forcing his knees higher, tracing a line from the taxi dock, toward a large wide-open garage window. Christine gripped the edge of the garage door, sputtering, allowing her body to curve into a question mark. Max stumbled up behind her, keeping his distance. In front of them both, a large studio space opened up: several easels, stretched with the beginnings of oil paintings. One, on the far wall, seemed to be on display. Several students formed a half-moon shape around it, with someone at the center stretching his hand over it. From where he stood, Max couldn’t make out the explanation.
Christine took a tentative step toward the group, her head tilting. Max recognized that her body was tense, her fingers extended and almost sword-like. He followed behind her, wondering if she’d forgotten his presence.
As they approached the group, Max felt a surge of apprehension, suddenly realizing what they were looking at.
The students peered at a tall, Italian man—curly hair, dark, flashing eyes, a witty smile. The very man Max had met out on the street, only an hour before. The man held a lighter aloft, and swirled the flame over several of the lines on the painting before him. It was as if he were taking an old yard stick, instructing his students on mathematics. Instead, the chalk board was a large, stretched canvas, and the numbers were wishy-washy lines, ill-fated color choices… Even from where Max stood, he recognized that the painting was well on its way to becoming… drivel.
Of course, there was something familiar about that drivel.
“Our dear, dear Christine, she travels all the way across the world to create this?” the man spoke, his words haughty. “I simply cannot abide by it. If we’re going to call ourselves an art studio. If we’re going to find anything real in all this madness. Then I simply mustn’t look at this another moment more…”
“Mario!” Christine screeched.
In that moment, the man called Mario sparked the lighter, igniting the edge of the painting. Christine rushed forward, forcing the students to part like the Red Sea. She charged past them, gripping the edge of what was, or had been, her painting. It had begun to crumple into itself, blacken. Beside her, Mario looked on—his face a half-smirk. Max’s stomach twisted with feelings of resentment—how dare this man burn his daughter’s painting—along with feelings of, well, attraction, sincere appreciation. In his early days of architecture school, Max had had many teachers, with overzealous opinions and angry ways of showing them. It had forced him toward a better path.
Perhaps Christine was too hot-headed for all that.
Christine flashed back toward the canal, her eyes burning with tears. The students watched her, looking like a pale-faced pack of animals. A herd of sheep, maybe. Blinking around at their works, still on their easels, Max realized that Christine truly was one of the better artists of the group. Perhaps that was the reason for this burning: she wasn’t meeting
her potential. Perhaps Max had been too hard on her. Only discredited her, since she was one of his own. How could she be anything special?
“FUCK THIS!” Christine cried, smashing the painting into the top of the canal. It splashed in the water, then began to float along the edge, bobbing against the cement as it turned toward the center of the city. Christine’s hands remained in fists, near her chest, as if she were about to smash her fists against herself, rattling herself raw like a soldier.
Max remained frozen, in full view of both his daughter’s overzealous, arrogant—entirely handsome painting teacher, and the class that peppered toward him and Christine. Christine still refused to look at him. Time seemed to drip along without any sense of reason. He marveled at his sense of timing: flirting with the very man who was trying to yank Christine up into the art world, to ignite a fire within her. It seemed that no matter where he turned, Max’s decisions were destructive for both himself and for Christine.
She’d been the reason he’d married Amanda. The reason his world had shifted, so early—keeping him back in Chicago, for several years, until he’d pulled himself into the higher-ranks of the architecture world. And now, he watched her: a creature, so similar and also so unlike himself, huffing, tears sweeping down her cheeks, as she watched her painting float away. Her world was crumbling. And, as her creator, it was all Max’s fault.
Chapter Four
Mario
Haughty. High-spirited. Electric. He’d charged into the studio, finding several of his students hunkered over their paintings and drawings, their movements sloppy. Mario had been fresh off of meeting that handsome stranger, Max Everett—the architect from Chicago, and, according to his father, one of the only artists from America with a proper architectural eye. “The Italians, they built the great buildings of the world,” his father had said. “If there was ever a place for another reign to form, it’s in Chicago—where this man had married the old with the new, crafted lines that ease seamlessly into the older-century beauty. it’s how we must all approach our art, Mario. With this remembrance of the past.”