So Much Fire and So Many Plans

by Aaron S Gallagher

  He gave her a sidelong glance. “And not because you hate to sleep alone?”

  The temperature in the car dropped a few degrees as she glared at him. “I may share my bed with an enemy,” she told him in a voice larded with disgust, “and in fact I have. But I would never share my body with someone I did not respect. Had you made such a comment beforehand, I would have shared only my bed, Brent.”

  He swallowed. “I apologize. I did not mean to offend you. I was making a small joke.”

  “I do not joke about death.”

  “I understand.”

  “I don’t believe you do,” she said, but she took a breath, let it go, and reached out to squeeze his hand as the car rolled forward. “It is all right. You’re pretty enough to forgive much.”

  His startled look made her laugh, her head flying back in a cloud of whipping hair. “Has no one called you pretty before?”

  “I’ve been called handsome,” he said. “But no. Never pretty.”

  “But of course, you are. That jaw, those blue eyes. Your adorable little smile of confusion when you don’t quite understand what’s happening. You are quite pretty. One can forgive much prettiness if the object also has function. One hopes you’re functional in addition to pretty.” She gave him the same glance he’d given her. “But of course, I am already aware of how well you function.”

  He blushed. “I do my best.”

  “You are more than adequate, dear boy,” she said. “And who taught you that thing with your tongue?”

  Brent blushed more deeply. “That… ah… that would be telling. It would be rude to break a confidence.”

  She gave him another warm smile. “Good boy.”

  They sped through the narrow streets of São Paulo, working their way east from the airport. He marveled at the compactness of the buildings as they were stacked on top of one another in the same way a child’s blocks would fall down the stairs of a house. The streets were crammed full of a sea of people with packages, burdens, or small children. They swerved around street vendors and pedestrians alike, Carolyn occasionally helping them along with prolonged blares of the Volkswagen Gol’s miniscule horn. He gripped the ohshit bar over his window several times, sure they were doomed to a crash, but Carolyn knew her streets well and she squeezed the subcompact through narrow openings he would have bet a considerable amount it wouldn’t have fit though.

  After more than an hour, they stopped front of an art gallery. He stared. The sculpture in the display window was one he’d never seen before. It was fifteen feet tall, bronze, and appeared to be a working of Hermes, except that it also seemed to be a spaceman of some description, with a futuristic helmet and the wings upon the feet were tiny jet engines. The grimace of agony upon the figure’s etched face caused Brent to wince. He leaped out of the car and ran to the window, despite the darkness, to cup his hands against the glass. A small display tag against the tortured, vein-skeined foot read ‘Agonextacy.’ The name of the artist was Stanislov Szukalski.

  Carolyn joined him at the window. “It is magnificent, is it not?”

  “I’ve never seen anything like it. Szukalski. Is he new?”

  Carolyn shook her head. “On the contrary. He’s been working for fifty years. He’s the most famous obscure artist you’ve never heard of. His sculptures have been exhibited in Chicago, New Yok, Poland, Paris, and Amsterdam. He’s been chased out of or chased himself out of nearly every major exhibition since 1930. Ossirian loved him.”

  “I can see why,” Brent said. He breathed on the glass, almost pressed his nose to it. “The motion, the action, the agony. It’s… it’s as though you can see the hands of the sculptor.”

  “Stanislov is almost eighty now. And he’s as potent as ever he was,” she said. “Would you like to see more?”

  “Absolutely. But they appear to be closed.”

  She held up a ring of keys. “It’s my gallery. My first, actually, which I bought shortly after taking over Ossirian’s career, after his first sold-out show, an exhibit that took place here.”

  Brent stood back. “That was here?”

  “Of course it was. And this is where I met him. Come inside.”

  She led him to the door, an alcove around the side of the main display. She unlocked the door and entered, turning off the alarm with a series of key punches in a glowing panel. She took a deep breath and flicked a bank of switches. Slowly the lights in the large gallery began to light.

  He watched her carefully. Carolyn stared into the depths of the gallery and her face changed. It became young. Her eyes glistened with tears and he held his breath as she began to remember.

  CHAPTER THREE

  It was a Friday night and she had been at the University late. She had wanted to get to the gallery opening early so she could meet the artists. There were three: a Greek painter named Constantine Andreou, a woman named Lygia Clark, both of whom were well-known in Brazil, and an unknown painter named Christoph Ossirian. Nothing about the third painter was known to her except that he sounded French. An avid fan of the French neoclassical style, she was eager to meet him, along with her heroes Andreou and Clark. By the time she managed to get to La Galaria, the rooms were packed with the critics and painters and artists minor. She wedged herself into the crowded room and managed to secure a glass of champagne, but although she saw Clark and Andreou, she could not place the French painter. She milled through the gallery. Andreou and Clark had exhibited work in La Galaria before, and were holding court in front of a pair of their paintings. Clark was arguing that the style was more than substance, and Andreou, as usual, was refuting her with piffs and huffs of exasperated frustration and dismissal, although his actual words were far and few. She shook her head in dismissal of them both. She had heard them lecture at La Studio on several occasions.

  She worked her way around to Ossirian’s work, listening with half an ear to the comments around her. By far, the critics were favorable of this upstart’s work, although he had no reputation, and no one seemed to know from whence he had come, only his name.

  In fact, Ossirian had been sleeping with the owner of the gallery for two weeks, having begged a supper and a place to store his canvases out of the constant rain. The gallery owner, a man named Ruffiero, had allowed Ossirian to join the exhibition primarily because neither Andreou nor Clark had provided enough artwork to fill the gallery walls. Ossirian, however, produced more paintings every day in a fevered Rubens-like production schedule. But Rubens had needed a studio of apprentices to produce so much work, and Ossirian worked alone.

  Carolyn found herself before a massive canvas nearly three meters tall and half again that as wide, but it appeared blank. As she peered closer, it occurred to her that the entire painting was done in a single, smooth sheet of ink-black. No variations of color could be seen. As she examined it, she realized that the swirls and ridges of paint gave an impression of objects and rooms beyond them. She became enraptured as, like a mirage, the ghostly image of the art revealed itself to her.

  “It is shit,” a voice behind her said in a strange amalgam of accents. His stilted Portuguese was hard to follow at first.

  She looked at the man who had spoken. She corrected herself: boy. He looked to be perhaps seventeen, if that. He had an unruly shock of curly black hair atop a head whose sides were shaved to the skin. His piercing green eyes were blazing with fury and hatred. He wore an old tee shirt and faded jeans spattered liberally with a multitude of hues of paint. He sipped at a bottle of local beer.

  “Pardon?” she asked.

  “This painting. It is shit,” he repeated. He shrugged. “I do not mean to offend. You think so, too. I can see it on your heart.”

  She drew back. The odd phrase had put her off-balance. “I-I hadn’t made up my mind. I’ve got to read it a while.”

  “No, no,” he said with finality. “It’s garbage. Pretense hiding beneath obfuscation.”

  He took her arm and drew her closer to him. The heat seemed to be boiling from him in w
aves, so angry was he. “There is no motion, no life. It is without soul! You think so too. I feel it in your eyes!”

  She stared at him. She glanced at the painting again. On reflection, he had spoken the first instinct of her soul. It was technically brilliant, perhaps, but it lacked something. It lacked heart.

  Without waiting, he tugged her along, elbowing people from his path. “Move, you dogs,” he bellowed, gesturing with the beer bottle. “I’m making a point! Move, I say!”

  He shoved himself and her before a second canvas. This one showed a swirl of red and yellow, as flames seemed to lick the edges of the wood around the painting. “And this!” he demanded. “You think it is shit as well!”

  She stared, open-mouthed. “I-I rather like this one,” she said. “It has some heat in the-”

  “Liar!” he snapped. He dashed the bottle to the floor. She flinched from the explosion. Several nearby patrons muttered angrily. He rounded on them, eyes blazing. “Be silent! I’m asking an informed opinion! Your uneducated simpering means less than the grunt of pigs in the street to me!”

  He turned to her. She realized he was skinny as a tenement rat, his damp shirt tight enough to show his ribs. He was all tendon and bone, there seemed to be no flesh to him, yet he was lithe and tall, nearly six feet.

  “You’d say you like it to garner favor with the creator!” he accused. He pressed his palm against the paint. “See! There is no heat here!”

  “I-it’s a painting,” she stammered, pulling away from his iron grip. His fingers left marks on her arm. “It isn’t going to burn you, of course, you madman.”

  “Of course not!” he agreed, crowing. “Because it is shit!”

  He plowed into a knot of critics and patrons, driving them from his path. Behind her, Carolyn heard the gallery owner, Ruffiero, raise a cry. The madman shoved people from his path until he had cleared a space before a third painting. The small placard to the right indicated that the title was simply ‘The Muse.’ This painting showed the delicate curve of a woman’s back as she gestured toward the sun, though her face was turned slightly away from the morning rays. She was naked, bathed in the brilliant yellows and reds of the early morning sunrise. Carolyn caught her breath. Her skin prickled. She recognized the courtyard in which the woman bathed. It was a public bath near her dormitory. In fact, this could be-

  She froze as she looked upon the edge of the face of the bare yet oddly chaste figure. Only one eye and the curve of a cheek were visible, and only the jawline from below the ear to the edge of the cheek, but she had seen those features before. In pictures. In her mirror.

  She glanced around, saw Ruffiero charging toward her, and grabbed his hand.

  “Senhor,” she called heatedly, “I demand you show me the artist who has painted this piece! He has been spying upon me!”

  Ruffiero stopped short, his huffing anger momentarily quelled. “Repeat that?”

  She pointed. “This painting! I am its subject! I demand you bring me the artist that I might have words.”

  Ruffiero glanced at the angry young man with whom Carolyn appeared to be acquainted. “But,” the gallery owner said, mystified, “he is here.”

  He pointed at the madman at her side. She turned and stared at the youth. “He? He cannot be the artist.”

  “I’m no artist,” the boy growled. “I’m no artist, how dare you consider me that! This? This is a sketch! It is incomplete! It too is shit!”

  She rounded on him. A crowd had gathered. She thrust her nose to his. “How dare you spy upon me!”

  The boy blinked. “I did not spy upon you.” His voice was mild, a stark contrast to his previous ranting.

  “This is me! This is the fountain near the university! You’ve been painting me!”

  “I have of course been painting from nature,” the boy confessed. “Are you not of nature?”

  Carolyn blinked at him. “I-”

  “You are a natural feature of this land, are you not? I sought to evoke the ethereal beauty of São Paulo by painting its water nymphs. From the several I observed, I chose the most beautiful one. I chose most carefully,” the boy explained. He looked her up and down. “I saw you come in. I was delighted to recognize you, and wanted to introduce myself. I have seen you from afar. As I am now closer to you, I can say for certain that you are the most beautiful in this land. Your beauty inspired me to paint this.”

  He bowed deeply.

  “I apologize for offending you so, my Muse,” he intoned. He stood. “To have rendered you so poorly is an unforgivable crime. I shall destroy this poor daub that insults you so!”

  He reached for the painting, fingers clawed. “Come, deceitful paint! You have offended she who must be cherished and you must pay!”

  He glanced at Ruffiero. “I told you, sir, that these weren’t complete! These works are merely amusements! Flickering thoughts, to be dallied with for a day, perhaps two! Not meant for an educated public!”

  He clawed at the canvas. Ruffiero grabbed his hands and held him at bay.

  “You must cease!” the man cried. “You cannot harm this canvas! It is sold already!”

  The boy froze, horrified. “You cannot do this!”

  “It is my gallery!” Ruffiero declared. “I can sell anything I wish! You have sold this piece, boy! This and eleven others!”

  The boy staggered backward, horror etched on his thin face. He plunged his fingers into his mass of dark, curly hair. “You cannot! It is a crime!”

  “Boy, you have made over three hundred thousand real today!” Ruffiero growled. “And I am owed fifteen percent of that!”

  The boy turned to the crowd. “Who has bought this shit?” he demanded. “Who are you, who have so much money and so little taste, eh?”

  A man and. Woman stepped forward. The man was clad in a tuxedo, the woman in a cream evening gown of raw silk. “That is mine,” the man declared. “I have pledged it. You are the artist?”

  “Arteest, arteest,” the boy sneered in his peculiar Portuguese. “I’m no arteest! I am a painter, sir! An arteest is a dead painter! Do I look dead to you?”

  He turned to Carolyn, sudden worry upon his flushed brow. “Am I dead? My Muse, please tell me truly!”

  “You are not dead,” she assured him, dislocation stirring unusual dread along her spine. “I can assure you, you live yet.”

  “Yet, yet,” the boy raved. “La, it is early yet.”

  He turned to the man, his erstwhile benefactor. “I implore you, sir! Do not purchase this scribble! It is unfinished! It is a sketch only! See!”

  He thrust a finger at Carolyn.

  “She is the nymph of the waters, bathing in the scent of the jungle and the first light of the new dawn! See her! Her eyes! Her nose! See the shape of her breast, the curve of her hip! She is a beauty! This picture is nothing compared to her!”

  He turned to the suddenly-blushing young girl. “Strip!” he demanded. “Show them your purity! Show them your beauty, my goddess of the morning!”

  She drew herself back from him. “I think I won’t,” she said. “I rather think I will not, and how dare you suggest so?”

  Stricken, the boy plunged to his knees before her, his stick-arms wrapping around her legs. “I apologize, my goddess! I am sorry! Forgive me, please!”

  The boy sobbed against her legs.

  Helpless, Carolyn stared at the silent, stunned crowd. An idea occurred. She had more than once confronted the madmen burning with holy fire in her village square in Ecuador. Harmless in and of themselves, they nevertheless lived on another plane of reality, and could be dealt with only as such. They burned with holy fire and raved like madmen. Roasting in the fire of purity and ecstasy, they were starved of body and enflamed of soul, irrational and uncontrollable, but they could be negotiated with. You could come to an accord, if you knew how. Inspiration struck her, and she smiled down at him. She put a hand into his hair, knelt, and whispered to him, “I forgive you, my poor boy. Of course I do. How could a muse ever be cro
ss with the madness her inspiration raises in her-” she stuttered, nearly saying ‘artist’, but chose instead to call him, “-maker?”

  The boy stared up at her, his head raising. His eyes were clear and pure. “You forgive me, my goddess?”

  “Of course, my maker,” she soothed.

  She helped him to his feet. He stared around at the crowd, as though he’d not noticed them. She saw confusion and panic on his face. “I-”

  “Shhh,” she soothed. “Come with me. We shall retreat to a quiet corner and you may tell me more about the vision I have visited upon you.”

  “Can you not see it?” he asked, cocking his head. “Do you now know what you have given me?”

  She felt the question was dangerous, that the wrong answer would set him off. She thought furiously, and said, “But of course it is a muse’s curse to deliver inspiration but have none for herself. That is why we need you.”

  “Yes, yes,” he agreed. “I’m sorry, my Muse. Yes. Forgive me.”

  At once he was tugging her by the wrist after him. She pulled him up short and glared up at Ruffiero. It had been only moments, but she realized Ruffiero had been conning the young painter. “I’ll be by in the morning for a full account of his sales, and for his share of the profits,” she warned, planting a finger in his chest.

  Ruffiero shifted his gaze to the crowd and back. “And who are you to be demanding this?”

  “You heard him,” she said, imperious, although she was terrified. She raised her voice so that all would hear. Witnesses could force a man to be honest when morals would not. “I am his muse. I am his inspiration. And as far as you’re concerned, I’m his manager as well. Eight in the morning, sir, and I’ll expect copies of all the pertinent paperwork.”

  Only then did she let the boy tug her along the rows of silent observers, out the door of the gallery, and into the street.

  In the middle of the street, with the lights of the gallery shining on him, the boy turned. “I am sorry, my goddess,” he stammered. His face was flushed with excitement and, she thought, much drink. She worried that he might fall again to his knees before her. “I have forgotten myself. I am-”