by Heather Gean
“Is that your fella?” the man gruffly inquired.
“Snake Eyes, leave her alone,” the good humored voice said. I looked at Van and mouthed the name Snake Eyes with horror then remembered they couldn’t hear me unless I pressed the button.
“Van Gogh, you know what they say about those Southern women,” the older man said with a cackle. I tried to catch a peek at Van’s reaction out of the corner of my eye, but all I saw was the hint of a grin.
“What do they say about those Southern women?” I asked into the microphone. I was amused.
“They keep things cookin’ in more than just the kitchen, if you know what I mean,” the old man said. His statement was followed by a whole-hearted “mmm hmmm” from someone overzealously agreeing with his joke. I had to admit that even I got a disgusted chuckle out of that.
“Where-abouts you at, Miss Queen?” the gruff voice growled. My smile slightly faded, and the fun was suddenly gone from the CB radio.
“Hey, did you hear the joke about the whore and the Mormon missionary,” another random voice broke in.
“Boy Scouts are everywhere, drivers. Watch out,” another voice said. I suddenly felt very confused.
“The acceptable terminology is prostitute,” a hoarse woman said.
“Who told the old bitch to talk?”
Van reached over and flipped the radio off. “Once we get too close to the city it’s all a bunch of jumbled shit.” I couldn’t tell if that was the truth or if the last comment directed to me as the Mississippi Queen had bothered him. Things were quiet again. I finally replaced the microphone to its holder.
“What’s with the cop car?” I asked. My knees were still against the faded dashboard, and I had begun to further examine the old interior.
“Working on it for a friend.”
I glanced around a bit more. I reached a hand over my head and linked a few of my fingers through the metal links before dropping it back down to my lap. I wanted to ask him how he made a living only making art and doing odd jobs, but that would have been rude. Still, though, I was curious as to how he managed to keep himself afloat. Having recently been a college student, and not having the most profitable job even as a graduate, I knew just how difficult it could be at times. Van, however, seemed to have everything under control.
“Where exactly am I taking you?” he asked.
“Some shopping district. Nothing too classy. Use your better judgment.”
Van suggested that we park and take the subway into the city. It was beautiful outside so I didn’t object. I also didn’t mind his prolonged company. On foot was a better way to experience the city anyway. I fell into step alongside Van down the stairs into the subway. The sun that had warmed my shoulders disappeared and was replaced by the coolness of the underground.
For the first time all morning, something louder than the voice inside my head and my problems caught my attention. Sprayed onto the drab subway wall was a half-finished attempt to bring some color to the place. Under the fluorescent bulbs, a rainbow of exaggerated letters overlapped one another. With all the twists and turns, I could hardly make out what it said at all.
Van’s hand grazed the side of my arm. Instead of following him I pointed up to the incomplete graffiti. “Check this out.” I stood there for a few more moments, analyzing the colors and letting them sink into my retinas.
In one quick glance, Van shrugged and read the words aloud. “Resistance is fertile.”
I tilted my head to the side. “How does it say that?” After taking a few steps back, a few of the letters came into focus. “What’s that supposed to mean, anyway?”
“It’s an anarchist thing.” His tone indicated that it was the most obvious response.
“Well, excuse me for not being up on my anarchist catch-phrases.” I realized as I grumbled that Van was already ahead of me, so I jogged to catch up to him, scared of getting lost in the crowd.
The second we stepped onto the subway train, more confusion ensued. “What?” I yelled into the phone. I realized I had drawn a few glares from other passengers, and I quickly lowered my voice. “What happened, Wes?”
Wes proceeded to tell me that James Wellington was scheduled to arrive in two and a half hours and that the featured urban art sculpture had never shown up. “Why are you just now calling me about this?” I was trying to keep my cool, but the elephant sitting on my chest and the stinging behind my eyes made that difficult. “What the hell am I supposed to do about it now?” I wanted to crucify Wes with words and explain to him how he had probably ruined my career, but for the sake of being in public I did not. Last night had given my rage plenty of public exposure. My throat was so tight that I barely squeezed out my closing words to him before slamming the phone against my thigh. Van was politely ignoring my mini-tantrum.
“What is it with artists?” I asked him. “Is it impossible to submit a piece on time?” Van recognized my anger and didn’t seem to take my statement personally.
“What happened?”
“James Wellington is going to be at my exhibit for the sneak preview in a few hours and my main urban art sculpture never showed up. I mean, how hard is it to put together a bunch of trashcans or litter or whatever he was going to do?” I sighed heavily and shook my head.
“Is it really his fault?” I shot Van a glare. His eyes leveled with mine. Something about the innocence of them made me feel guilty.
“No,” I finally said. I folded my arms over my chest. “It’s my fault because I wasn’t there to follow up on everything.” My jaw began to ache from how hard I was clenching it. I hated Ashley more and more, even if only on principle.
“It isn’t your fault either. Things just happen. Control is only an illusion.”
I swayed with the unsteady movement of the subway car. I caught my troubled reflection in the window across from me, realizing I had not been a trophy wife when I got the news that I was marrying Ashley Schroeder, and after a week of New York I still wasn’t. The government may have ruled that I was only allowed to marry Ashley Schroeder, but it couldn’t keep me from running off with some random guy and living with him forever. It couldn’t force me to have a ridiculous million-dollar wedding. The idea that they could control me was only an illusion. The idea that I could control this, or any, situation was also an illusion.
“What should I do?” I asked Van. I was in the acceptance stage, though I didn’t like the look of it.
“Nothing.”
I laughed in annoyance at him to keep from crying. “I can’t do nothing.”
Van ignored me, and my annoyance with him only grew. I closed myself off and focused on the advertisements in the subway car, on the other passengers, and on the stale smell. It was his talking that pulled me out of it.
“Yeah, do you still have it?” he asked. I almost interrupted and demanded him to explain himself, but I realized he wasn’t talking to me. He was on his phone, and his tone was all business. “Yeah, that one.” The fact that it sounded like a business call struck me as odd, but I tried not to dwell on it. After a few minutes of silence following the end of his call, he nudged me with his elbow. “If you want, I’ve got an urban-esque sculpture. It isn’t trashcans and garbage, but it’s okay.”
“You’re kidding me,” I said. The glimmer of hope faded quickly. “Even if you do, there is no way you can get it to Memphis in two hours.”
Van shrugged. “That would be true, if it were here. Funny thing about that is it’s in the apartment of an old friend. It could be there in an hour.” He casually shrugged again. “But, you know, that’s just a suggestion.”
“Van,” I said with a smile, “I don’t want to think that you saved my ass because I can’t do my job.” I liked to have control, or better yet, the illusion of control.
He let out a pfffttt with a wave of his hand and a raise of one eyebrow. “Seriously? You think I’m doing this for you?” He smiled playfully at me. “I’m exploiting you as a connection to get one of my sculptures in your e
xhibit. As an artist, I need the publicity. So don’t think of it as my saving your ass, think of this as the beginning of a partnership.”
I smiled at his explanation. He linked his warm hand in mine and shook it professionally. “So, Miss Clarke,” he said, “let’s make that call?”
~*~
For the first half of lunch, I was left to sit quietly with my expensive soup and sandwich while Ashley rattled on about refrigerators to someone on his cell. Were color schemes really that important? Wasn’t the whole purpose of a fridge to keep things cold? While I listened to him diplomatically argue, I finished off most of the food on my plate, having once again missed breakfast at his house. I felt guilty to be almost done by the time he ended the call.
“Sorry about that,” he said for good measure. “Did you know in the last national survey that most people chose their refrigerator on its aesthetics alone? Not by brand or space or icemakers, but colors and stainless steel. We brought in a few new designers, but I’m not sure they’re going to make the difference.”
I nodded along, but I really didn’t have much to say. After all, I’d never bought a refrigerator.
“I thought Schroeder was the top-selling brand in the country.”
“Yeah, well, we can’t stay on top if we don’t keep up with these things. I have to meet with some guys tonight. We’re really trying to expand the global distribution of our products. And it’s… I’m sorry. I’m boring you.”
“No, it’s fine.” I smiled cordially as I took a drink of my tea.
“You look stressed,” he noted. “Is everything all right?”
“I’m fine. Why would you think that?”
“Well, you’re my fiancée, I think I should be able to sense if you’re stressed or not.”
“Well, when you put it that way…” I took another long drink and forced a chuckle. I tried to be gentle with my observations. “Do you feel like you’ve known me for more than just a few days?”
“I feel like I’ve known you forever.” He embellished with one of his trademark winks. And I agreed with his statement, but not in a good way. Somehow we had managed to skip the formalities and jump straight into a vat of serious relationship shit in a matter of days. It was more complicated than a week-old relationship should’ve been.
I dodged having to respond by sending the conversation on a tangent. “What do people give as wedding gifts when the groom runs an appliances company? Obviously you won’t have any trouble coming by a toaster or blender or coffee maker.”
“I’m sure we’ll be surprised. The kinds of guests my mother will invite always try to outdo each other. It’ll be a competition of sorts, and we come out the winners.” He finally took a bite of his sandwich, determining that it hadn’t been made to his specifications. While he searched out the waiter, I sent Wes a text trying to see if Van’s piece had arrived yet.
“Are you texting for work or play?” Ashley asked me curiously.
“Work,” I replied as I finished it up and pressed the send button. “We had an issue with some of the artists submitting on time. It’s a big mess that is hopefully being sorted out now.”
“Well, you’re headed back tomorrow so you can check up on it in person,” he said with a big smile. “Where the hell is our waiter?”
“Yeah, it’ll be good to get back. Got any big plans for my last night in?”
“Sorry, I have to meet with the Swedish associates. I would invite you along but it’ll be nothing but boring business talk. I’ll make sure you have access to a car. Why don’t you just go out on the town? Have some fun?” Before I could say anything the waiter finally appeared. Ashley switched personalities instantly. “I ordered this without mayo, extra tomatoes. And I’m sort of in a hurry, so if you could get this fixed quickly I would appreciate it.” He flashed his straight, white smile at the waiter as he stammered and apologized.
“Is there anything else I could get for you, on the house?”
“A whiskey sour would be great. And a gin martini for my lady.”
“Yes, sir, coming right up.”
Ashley turned his charming, classically good-looking smile on me. “You know what they say. All work and no play makes for a dull boy. Or in our case, a dull couple. And we wouldn’t want that, would we?”
Chapter 11
It felt better to get back to my regular life than I’d expected, even though I went straight back to work. I sat cross-legged on the tile floor in the middle of the last room of my exhibit, which was somehow more comfortable than the plane I had just gotten off of. The large thermos propped between both of my hands and resting on one of my legs was full of coffee that had barely been sipped at. Wes paced around me in short, frantic steps. “You’re making me dizzy,” I said to him. He came to an abrupt stop, pushed his glasses further up his nose, and threw his hands helplessly up in the air.
“You can’t just sit there, Rainy. Say something! Either tell me I’m your savior or tell me that I need to find a new job if I hope to pay my rent next month. Tell me something!” Wes required immediate feedback; he was incredibly needy like that. I locked into his pleading stare and wondered how long until he self-destructed.
“It’s fine.” His entire body hunched over as he breathed a sigh of relief. Words suddenly began spilling from his mouth at an alarming rate, but I remained in an unusual state of calm. I was calm in the middle of my mental chaos like someone who was suffering from hypothermia may experience the sensation of being warm. My lack of freaking out was freaking Wes out. “Wes, it’s fine!” My voice echoed in the circular room.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Don’t apologize.” He plopped down beside me on the floor and followed my gaze. I was focused in on the centerpiece in the room again. I couldn’t quite wrap my mind around it. It began with a taxidermied sheep. The sheep had a false mustache glued under its nose and was wearing a perfectly tailored suit jacket with a matching tie. The tie, however, was twisted around backwards and led up to a child-sized, department store mannequin’s hand. The mannequin was graffitied in colorful patterns and, unlike the sheep, wore no clothing. Atop his head was a row of light bulbs, fully lit, that were positioned in the form of a mohawk. Van Sherman’s name was on the wall behind it, bolded, and just above the italicized title, Baaa. It stood beautifully on the center wall in that last room as the focal point, the final thing anyone would be likely to remember from the exhibit. I had a few ideas on how to interpret it, but no good ones.
“What the hell is it?” Wes asked. I shrugged and took a swig of coffee which was lukewarm by then. I titled my head to the opposite side, but the new position offered no new perspective.
“I have no idea.” We sat there for a few minutes longer.
James Wellington’s review hadn’t come out yet. Honestly, I knew there was nothing I could do about it. The exhibit seemed in perfect order by this point. Van’s sculpture had arrived fifteen minutes before Mr. Wellington’s arrival, in just enough time to get it up with a handwritten nametag taped to the wall behind it. It wasn’t as if James Wellington was God; it wasn’t as if his single review would decide my fate, especially since Piper would be likely to publish a positive review. Besides, how could he hate it? How could he judge that which couldn’t be understood?
“How did you get this piece on such short notice?” Wes asked. “Kudos to you on that one. I could practically see my resignation standing in front of me when it walked in.”
“I met an artist in New York. Friend of the fiancé.” Wes nodded and turned his attention back to the piece that saved the day. I returned my gaze casually to it. “Who brought it in?”
“Some chick. She signed it in at the front but didn’t leave a telephone number or address. She acted like it wasn’t important if she ever saw it again.” I’m not sure why I’d asked. I’m not sure why I cared. But I found this extra puzzle piece in the mystery that was Van intriguing.
A few minutes later I was sorting through files that had accumulated on
my desk during my absence. Wes’ organizational skills were not the greatest. I flipped through some memos, all of which were about meetings that I’d missed during my absence, and tossed them into the wastebasket. I had just located the exhibit’s artist authorization files when a head topped with blonde tresses swung into my cubicle. “You’re back!” Liz shrieked. I dropped the file to my desk as Liz bound me to my chair with a hug. “You said you would call me the second you got back! You’re such a liar. Ah, but you’re home! Anyway, guess what?” Her sentence was a giant whirlwind of words. It took me a second to gather my wits.
“What?”
“I Googled you!” Liz said with a maniacal laugh.
“I didn’t think you were into girls,” I said. She rolled her eyes and pushed me and my chair out from in front of the computer. She quickly began an internet search on my computer. “What are you doing?”
“You’re famous. I can’t believe you managed it before me, but there it is.” Liz motioned to the search results for Rainy Clarke. A whole page of results popped up, and they were all about me Rainy Clarke, not some random other Rainy Clarke. It felt like my privacy had been invaded, and I drew closer to the screen to inspect the damage.
“What the hell?”
Liz clicked the first one on the list and read, “Ashley Schroeder and his bride-to-be Rainy Clarke were spotted in the city on Wednesday evening, looking the picture of perfection, and fighting it out in public. Rumors that Rainy’s father Tennessee Congressman Charles Clarke pulled strings to match the two together have not been confirmed, but the legitimacy of the union is still questionable considering their less than orderly conduct. Insiders reveal that the wedding is scheduled for December and--”
“Don’t read anymore. It makes me want to gag.” I shut the laptop screen of the computer.
Liz leaned against my desk and looked down at my pale face. “You fought in public?”
I shrugged bitterly. “It’s complicated.”
“He’s fucking gorgeous. How complicated can it be?” She realized I was serious and left it alone. “So you’re getting married in December?” I nodded. I felt nauseous, maybe from my ears finally adjusting to ground-level pressure, maybe from lack of anything to eat that day. “Am I in it? Is it going to be million-dollar fabulous?”