‘You like that word!’ says Rob, coming over to look and patting the baby, who is now tied diagonally over her breasts.
The man holds a carving knife next to the flaring nostrils of the horse.
‘You shouldn’t show him such violence at such an early age,’ says Bianca, smiling and patting him too.
When Mick and Zeb saunter over we decide it’s time for birthday tea.
So we go to Patisserie Valerie and have pyramids of strawberries and chocolate éclairs, and custard tarts and Bianca gets mesmerised by a couple who start kissing outside the glass door. They keep trying to part and kissing again, pulled together like two magnets, and get so carried away they put their hands under each other’s clothes.
Bianca claps and the shop assistants watch them through the shelves of cakes, and even the manager goes to knock on the window and then shrugs in a French way, and says to the café, ‘That’s what French cakes can do for you,’ and leaves them to it.
‘It’s my birthday,’ says Bianca.
‘Bon anniversaire!’ he says, and brings her a cake gratuit with caramel icing, and a candle burning on top, and we sing ‘Happy Birthday’, and the manager sings in French, and some of the other customers join in.
Chapter 15
The floor has been painted grey and all our spots of paint have disappeared.
The muslin curtain has been taken down, and the doors are open to the landing.
The technicians are putting up partitions and there are the sounds of hammering and sawing in the studios. They are transforming the college into an exhibition space.
The third-years are running about, calling questions to each other up and down the stairwell about, ‘Where is this?’ and ‘How much?’ and ‘Can you get mine done at the same time?’ in a frantic rush to get their work mounted, framed and hung in time for the degree show.
The first- and second-years have to pack up paintings and put them in the storeroom, and gather what we need for the summer, and transport it to the annexe.
‘When do we need to be out, then?’
‘Five o’clock, I think, but the van is going up to the annexe this morning.’
‘D’you know who is going?’ says Cecile.
‘Only us lot from our year, and some second-years,’ I say.
We are putting Rob’s materials into boxes to load into the van.
‘Is Zeb coming?’ says Cecile.
And I remember yesterday, when we were hidden behind the crowd.
‘Yes,’ I say, ‘he is.’
We’d all walked along Shaftesbury Avenue after the birthday tea to catch our buses, and waited at the bus stop among a crowd of people. I stood next to Zeb on the steps of the Casino, and heard the dringing sounds of the slot machines, the mini sirens and ding-dong of the pinball, and he’d leaned over and said, ‘Are you going to the annexe?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Are you?’
He nodded and his eyes looked at me like sunlight.
‘We’ve got the whole summer,’ he said.
‘I’d like to hear about Spain,’ I said.
‘I’d like to tell you,’ he said.
And then his eyes had turned dark and deep.
‘And you, I want to hear about what happened with you, all of that, Evie. I want to know.’
His eyes had reached into mine, and I had to hold on to his arm; tears were pricking the back of my eyes.
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry, Eve. Not now. It’s not the place.’
And I dropped my hand, and he caught it and held it, and I heard him say, ‘Evie,’ close to my neck.
Then all the people were moving at once. Cecile was shouting through the people, ‘It’s our bus, Eve!’ and grabbed my free hand through the crowd, and I’d looked back at him and he’d squeezed my hand before he let it go, and I felt the pressure all the way home.
‘What about the fire hazard?’ says Cecile.
‘What?’
‘Zeb. The fire hazard.’
‘Oh, it’s all right, he’s going to work on the roof,’ I say.
‘Trust him!’
When we’ve finished the boxes we take them downstairs and pile them up with the rest. And when I’ve swept the studio and emptied my locker, I go up to Bianca’s studio, and she is lying on the chaise longue with a hand over her forehead.
‘Oh, it’s unbearable!’ she says. ‘I can’t bear to leave! I don’t want to pack anything!’
‘But we can unpack it again today,’ I say. ‘We can start painting again tomorrow.’
‘Oh, it’s so traumatic!’ she says. ‘I can’t bear to leave my lovely space!’
Cecile comes upstairs and we sit down together and help dismantle Bianca’s studio into boxes, and take it downstairs in the lift.
When the van arrives, everyone packs in their paintings and Karl flicks his eyes up to the sky when Bianca comes through the door of the college carrying the chaise longue upwards, with her hands round the middle as though she’s dancing with it.
‘Bianca, do you have to?’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘Yes, of course. I can’t do without it!’
So when the big canvases have been tied to the roof rack and we are sitting in two rows next to a stack of materials and smaller paintings piled up behind Karl’s seat, he and Bianca lift the chaise longue into the van and lie it along our knees.
I am wondering where Zeb has got to when a second-year comes out of the door with a big box and stands at the door of the van.
‘Another box?’ says Karl, scratching his head.
‘Zeb’s not coming,’ he says, resting the box on the step, filled with an assortment of copper tubing, rolls of wire and plugs and metal shapes. ‘But could you take this for him? He says he’ll bring the rest later.’
‘OK,’ says Karl, pushing the box into the van so we have to lift up our feet. He closes the door and we are jammed together in the back. He starts the engine and we judder forward.
I am disappointed that Zeb isn’t coming. But when I look back at the college my heart sinks and my breath quickens as I see him in the corridor, having an intense conversation with Suzanne.
We arrive at a tall red-brick building and the studios are on the top floor. We walk up flights of stairs, and the green tiles on the walls make our voices echo. We can hear the sounds of the bouncing muffled feet of little ballet dancers, and the plink-plink of the piano keys behind the closed doors, as we carry our boxes and stretchers up the stairs.
The studios have tall windows that look over the trees and houses all the way to Putney and Wandsworth.
We sweep the floor and choose our spaces and Bianca finds a good position for the chaise longue.
‘Let’s go back and pack up the pictures now,’ says Bianca. ‘I feel homesick!’
‘I’m going to stay here a bit,’ I say.
So everyone troops out of the double doors, and I hear their footsteps echo on the tiles of the stairwell.
I unpack my pictures in the silence and arrange them on the floor around the walls. I take out the photograph Magda gave me and put it on the windowsill next to the palette.
I look at the faces of my mum and dad, looking so young and unsure, and decide that somewhere I will put them in the paintings, maybe surrounded by blue.
I unpack my paints and put them on a table and unwrap my brushes so everything is ready. I look at the pictures again and imagine the colours. I am ready to go back.
Before I reach the door, I turn around and look at the big studio, with the boxes of materials stacked in the corner; tubes of paint, rolls of paper and canvas, tins of media, primer and glue, and in the quiet I can feel something is waiting; an invisible reality more vast than this one. That’s why Bianca wants the glinting colours, and why Zeb wants the exploding light, and Rob the presence of her ancestors caked in mud; because part of us is from there, and longs for there, and we want to touch that place, and let it through somehow.
I close the door and walk down the stairs, and try not to think too
much about Suzanne.
When I get back to college the ground floor is already a gallery with pristine white walls and work on display. Upstairs, our studio space has been divided by white partitions.
I walk up to the top-floor storeroom and find Bianca wrapping her work in bubble wrap.
‘I’m scared it will get nicked, actually,’ she says, ‘but it needs protecting anyway. Here’s a good space for yours, Evie. Let’s put them together, safety in numbers!’
She looks up. ‘Did you start painting?’
‘No, I was just unpacking.’
‘Oh, Zeb was looking for you,’ she says, moving her eyebrows up and down quickly.
‘Was he?’ I say.
‘Yes, he said to tell you he’ll see you at the degree show.’
I look at her for a minute.
‘Why didn’t he come?’
‘Oh, the third-years finally decided it wouldn’t steal the show but enhance it to have his fireworks, as long as he didn’t attach them to his sculptures, so he had to sort them out. Suzanne was making a song and dance about it, though.’
‘I saw them talking in the corridor,’ I say.
She looks at me for a moment. ‘Did you think he was getting back with her?’ She smiles. ‘You idiot, Evie!’
And I look into the dark corner at the back of the storeroom and shake my head at myself.
Chapter 16
‘Come and get ready in Brixton with us,’ Bianca said. ‘Silvia is coming too, it’ll be fun!’
So I went back with her on the 137, clutching my dress for the degree show in a plastic bag, and watched the sun slip over the water from the top deck while Bianca took the dress out the bag and told me not to wear ‘that old thing’.
After we’d climbed the stairs through the glass-stained sunlight, Bianca made fennel tea and we went and sat in the scented bathroom where Silvia was in the bath, washing her hair. I tried on the dresses from the rail, and Bianca gave her opinion from the armchair, and every now and then Silvia turned round to look. By the time Silvia had rinsed her hair, and was stepping out of the bath with the towel wrapped round her, I’d decided on the dress with roses on, that I’m wearing now.
We took it in turns to sit in the armchair and after another pot of fennel tea, everyone had decided what to wear.
We caught the bus and teetered down the road to college, Silvia in a deep red dress with a blue-black boa around her naked shoulders, and Bianca with feathers in her hair, in a Chinese dress of gold silk.
We turned the corner, and people were spilling out of the glass doors and standing around the Henry Moore sculpture with wine glasses in their hands. ‘Fine Art Degree Show’ was written in red letters on the glass wall, and the quadrangle was bedecked in bunting made of white-fringed flags, printed with red and black drawings.
The tutors looked strange in their smart clothes. Paul was gleaming in a silver suit with a yellow tie and long shiny shoes, which looked like crocodile skin.
Bianca said, ‘Oh my God,’ and made a face behind her hand.
We walked through the doors and into the noise of people talking and I noticed Miss Pym resplendent in turquoise, and Terry wearing a tie.
Bianca wanted to go upstairs to her space, but Silvia said, ‘I’m going this way,’ pointing to the sign that said ‘Sculpture Department’.
‘I’m looking for a strong sculptor!’ she said, flicking the feather boa around her neck, ‘not a wimpy painter!’ and she kissed the air with her eyes closed.
I didn’t think about it then, when I watched her cross the hall. I don’t know why. It’s only now as I look over the banisters, through the crowds of people, that I think of Zeb.
We watched Terry catching sight of her and following her with a wine bottle and an empty glass. I even said, ‘Will she be all right with the terrible Terry on her trail?’ and Bianca flicked the air with her hand. ‘Silvia? She’s from Sicily!’
It was when they both disappeared down the corridor to sculpture that I began to think about how everyone loves Silvia.
‘Come on,’ says Bianca. ‘Let’s go upstairs to the abstract floor.’
‘D’you think Silvia’s got anyone in mind?’
‘No, she just likes flirting!’
We pass Geoff, wearing a Hawaiian shirt, and Bianca whispers, ‘I am a born-again Christian looking funky!’
I smile at her, and decide to put the whole thing out my mind.
I look through the crowds of people at the paintings we have watched emerge, and the spaces without their grime suddenly make the paintings stand out, cut clean of their beginnings.
Maria Ines and Anna are on the landing and they greet Bianca in a shower of Italian.
‘Come through!’ she says. ‘I will show you where I have been working. Ah, my beautiful space!’
Bianca’s old space is filled with people and hung with blue paintings that belong to Mona, the third-year student. Bianca takes no notice of the paintings or the people and points out the window, showing Anna and Maria Ines the view of London. Mona is hovering round her space with a wine bottle, introducing her friends to each other, and looks a little ill at ease.
I walk upstairs and find the colour harmonies I once saw in a sketchbook, turned into paintings as long as the wall.
They fill the room with clear colour sounds and I stand and look, and listen to them sing.
I wander through the unfamiliar spaces, partitioned into corridors and alcoves, looking at the paintings in between the crowds. The third-year students, with wine bottles in their hands, talk very fast, smile a lot and hand out their cards.
I look over the banisters and see the top of Cecile’s head and walk downstairs to the next floor with relief.
‘Oh I’m glad to see you!’ I say. ‘All these people!’
Cecile looks elegant in a green dress.
She puts her arm through mine. ‘Me too. Let’s wander about! Where’s Bianca?’
‘Upstairs in her space.’
‘Her space!’ Cecile laughs. ‘Poor Mona.’
I shrug. ‘You know what she says about the paintings?’
‘I know,’ says Cecile. ‘Dishcloths. Isn’t she awful!’
We walk downstairs to the figurative floor and the sounds of people talking echo up the stairwell. On the landing are paintings of a man with a cow, and chickens in a farmyard. The paintings are colourful and splashy.
I see Sergei wearing his same old jacket, walking round the pictures, eyeing them up close, with his hands behind his back and the strange quivering sneer on his lips.
But as I pass by I notice his hair is all fluffy on the back of his head, like he’s been sleeping on it, and hasn’t brushed it out. It reminds me of a little bird.
‘Cecile, I feel sorry for Sergei!’
‘Quick, let’s get away, that sounds dangerous,’ she says.
We walk around the figurative floor, past the model painted from many angles lying on a blue curtain, through landscapes and cityscapes and portraits, discussing the pictures we like, and every now and then I take a look out the window to see if I can catch a glimpse of Zeb in the sculpture yard.
‘You like him, don’t you,’ says Cecile.
‘Yes,’ I say, smiling at the floor.
‘Let’s go down,’ I say, looking up.
‘Come on then,’ she says. ‘I want to see the sculptures, and they’re doing a piece of performance art in a minute.’
We meet Rob on the stairs with Mick and the little bundle, who is now called George. She smiles a tired smile.
‘It’s mayhem here!’ she says, and Mick puts his arm round her shoulders. ‘I’m beginning to feel claustrophobic!’
‘Come outside with us,’ I say.
So we all walk downstairs, and I meet Safi coming up, dressed in a brown and silver sari.
‘Eve, how glad I am to see you!’ she says, folding her hands over mine.
Around her the air feels less crowded and more peaceful.
‘You look very bea
utiful today, my dear,’ she says. I love the melody in her words.
‘Thank you, Safi,’ I say, and I walk down the stairs to join the others, feeling very beautiful today.
A crowd of dishevelled students pass us as we cross the hall, talking about ‘Our sculpture department is better equipped! And aren’t the studios dark’, and Rob and Cecile look at each other and say, ‘Royal College’.
We meet Bianca in the doorway. She is talking to Giacomo and Cesar, and everyone is getting a bit drunk.
‘There’s going to be music outside!’ says Bianca, looking excited and flushed. ‘I want to dance with you!’ she says, putting her arms round Giacomo, who lifts her off her feet.
We walk through the studios; past sculptures made of glass and mirrors, carved wood and plaster figures, and metal geometry in three dimensions, through Suzanne’s space, past the wobbly sculpture on a plinth, and Suzanne in a rubber dress talking to two men in sunglasses, and out into the sculpture yard.
In the back of the shed I see Zeb in a red shirt, busy with some boxes. Cecile looks at me, smiling, and I wish that she wouldn’t.
We watch a piece of performance art involving a large rusty metal wheel, and two people make gestures that are sometimes in synchrony and sometimes not, but none of us can work out what it signifies. Everyone claps, except Rob, who says, ‘Performance Fart!’ in a loud voice.
Then someone tinkles a glass and Paul gives a speech about the third-years and Zeb punctuates it with fireworks with pink tails and unexpected colourful explosions in the dark shed, which make everyone laugh with surprise.
Afterwards I watch him as he moves around the shed with a bucket, kneeling down to collect the spent fireworks. He must feel my eyes on him, because he looks up and smiles.
People begin to disperse or linger and someone turns on the twinkling lights that are threaded round the yard, and music starts playing through the speakers that are hidden in the piles of wood and bags of plaster.
Cecile says, ‘There’s my husband!’ and goes to join a man with grey hair who greets her with kind blue eyes.
People begin to dance where they are standing, and I don’t know if it’s the dimming light, but the air feels charged and vibrant, as though something secret is happening under the music; and the sculpture yard slowly changes its atmosphere and becomes intimate.
Invisible River Page 21