The Wicked Awakening of Anne Merchant

by Joanna Wiebe

  I nod.

  “They have quite a relationship,” he says.

  “That might be stretching the meaning of the word relationship.”

  “He worships her.”

  “I don’t want to be worshipped.”

  With a dark smile, he waves out the match.

  “Listen, Anne, I was serious about mentoring you. And I was serious about you painting me. I come from a world filled with succubae and incubi. If I say something that makes you uncomfortable, simply overlook it. Sex is a non-issue for me.”

  “Just overlook it? Even though it makes me uncomfortable?”

  “It’s just for fun. Adult fun, yes, but fun nonetheless.”

  “I’m sixteen.”

  “Exactly.”

  “So not an adult.”

  “Do you want to become a better artist?”

  I cross my arms over my chest. “Please don’t give me some song and dance about sexual liberation and artistic liberation.”

  “Dante Gabriel Rossetti—limited by Victorian morality in his early and forgettable years, but—”

  “But revolutionary in his later years. Are you really going there?”

  “Why was he so revolutionary, Anne? It’s because it was only as he aged that he realized morals were and are created by immoral people so terrified of the lust they feel for their own shadows that they castigate the unwed lovers they envy and label long-haired beauties witches simply because they’d like to make love to them but are rejected. When at last Rossetti surrendered to his thirst to paint sensuous women, it was then and only then that his art came alive.”

  “Are you just pulling convenient examples out of the air?”

  “That was a good example,” he insists. “I was, in my life, Italian. And, well, Rossetti’s subject Saligia is near and dear to my heart. So Rossetti is hardly random.”

  “Well, I’m an American, so let’s not forget Rossetti’s friend and fellow artist, Whistler.”

  “What of him?”

  “His work was best when it rallied against eroticism. The model for The White Girl—”

  “Joanna Hiffernan,” he says.

  “—also posed for Whistler’s friend Courbet—”

  “Several times. And it destroyed their friendship. But, hell, what a way to go.” Dia’s eyes brighten. “On a piece like L’Origine du monde. Have you studied it?”

  Before I can answer, he darts to a distant bookshelf, which is filled with volumes on De Stijl, American realism, shock art, Ukiyo-e, and aestheticism, and, pulling down two, flips through them. Then, dashing back to me, drops one on a row of paint pots, rocking one until it tips, a mess he doesn’t seem to mind. The book is open to L’Origine du monde. I have to remind myself that it’s art, not pornography, and that no real artist blushes to see a naked subject.

  “I can’t blame Courbet for painting her, and I can’t blame Whistler for being jealous.” Holding the other book open, Dia flips back and forth between the two paintings in question, huddling in with me. “If given the choice between the dowdy, reserved Jo in The Little White Girl—what is that fan she’s holding?—and the challenging statement of that very same woman’s spread legs here,” he slaps the page with Courbet’s painting and turns his sparkling eyes on me, “you must choose Courbet. Anne, you must! If only because your uptight American Whistler thinks of a stunningly sexual creature in such a sexless, childish way. If only for the sake of feminism!”

  “Feminism?”

  “Yes!”

  “Mr. Voletto, both versions of this woman are courtesy of the male gaze.”

  “Then explore it—her, me, yourself, everything—through the female gaze, Anne, with your own brush. Right here. In this room. With me.”

  His wild and enthusiastic leer runs over my face, and I know at once that studying under Dia could elevate me to a level of artistry I’d forgotten existed and, perhaps, have never personally known. Art fired by passion. Art that begs and pants and commands unapologetically. Art that is, I hate to admit it but can’t help recognizing it as I watch his lip tremble distractingly, the opposite of what I’ve done in my life. I have painted timid, voiceless works within the confines of a hush-filled funeral home. I have painted flat, soulless works under the weight of competing for the perfection required to win the Big V. I have yet to really, truly express or explore myself on the canvas.

  “Your purple is dripping down the back of the shelf,” I stammer.

  “It’s violet, Anne, violet. And let it go. Let it all go.”

  I stagger out of our session weakened by Dia’s fervor but—I can’t deny it—hungry for more. It’s with a ravenous appetite I can’t explain that I meet Ben, and, on seeing him, clutch his sweater at the chest, pull him to me, and kiss him, refusing to let him go even when he starts to pull away. It’s not until a snowball hits me in the back that I release him.

  I turn to find Molly smiling at me as she shapes another snowball.

  I turn back to Ben, and he’s scooping up snow, too. He stands, tells me to duck, and whips one at her. But she’s too fast for him.

  “Nice try, California boy!” she shouts. She runs our way and throws a snowball at Ben, catching him just above the belt.

  I join in, too. But my next mentoring session is on my mind; it can’t arrive soon enough. When it’s finally Saturday morning again, I show up ten minutes early and endure Dia vilifying every stroke I paint. But even when he scorches my canvas in the fireplace and tells me to come back when I have a better sense of who I am, I eat it up. I want more. I want to be the person—the artist—Dia sees in me.

  Weeks pass.

  Saturdays come and go. Ben says little about my rekindled obsession with painting, and I say little about how desperately fast his remaining days on Earth are flying by. It’s like we’ve both agreed that if the other person won’t like what we’re thinking, we’ll keep it to ourselves.

  The Scrutiny hangs over our heads as November turns to December and Christmas nears.

  The Scrutiny is held every New Year’s Day. The entire student body competes in it. It’s one of the few events in the year that gives us the chance to set ourselves apart from the others. Dia’s been talking about it in our sessions almost every week, though he won’t reveal what he has planned. Each year it changes, but it’s usually little more than brainteasers and word puzzles you have to solve.

  Of course, Pilot is desperate for me to win it. I need to excel at everything if I’m going to stand a chance at the Big V because, although Dia seems pleased that I humiliated Mephisto, the other Guardians against whom Pilot will be debating are sure to spin my escape-plan-gone-wrong as a failure and, by extension, me as unworthy of a second chance.

  “So focus,” Pilot insists when he sees me sketching Dia’s eyes behind my palm. We’re in our daily coaching session in the cafeteria. “How are you ever going to win the Scrutiny like this?”

  “You don’t even know what this year’s Scrutiny challenge is,” I remind him as he balls up my paper and throws it over his shoulder. Whatever. He’ll be the one cleaning it up later, anyway. “We’ve been going over word puzzles and past challenges so much, I can barely see straight. Everything looks like a puzzle to me. The opening and closing of a door is starting to become a puzzle.”

  “It should! That means the practice is paying off,” he says.

  “I can’t help but think I’d be better off with Teddy coaching me.”

  “That twisted shithead would ruin your life, Anne. Avoid him. I’m serious.”

  I roll my eyes.

  “Listen, no one knows what the Scrutiny challenge will be,” Pilot says. “But if you win it—hell, if you even rank in the top— you’ll get tons of gold stars, Anne. You’ll be at the top of the short list, and that is where you want to be even if you’re not up for the Big V until next year.”

  “Yeah, yeah. The short list.” The list that Ben’s nowhere near topping.

  “Yeah, yeah. It’s just my life on the line.”


  “It’s actually my life on the line,” I remind him. “Yours is already gone.”

  “You’d think you’d feel remorse for having killed me, Anne. This is your chance to give me back the life you stole. I can’t make it up to Anastasia. You should count yourself lucky that you’ve got this chance to clear your conscience.”

  “Is Anastasia the girl you murdered?”

  Dropping his eyes, he nods. “I wish I had the chance to take that night back. I think about it all the time.”

  A tear drops onto the sheet of paper, ballooning the word liar rather poetically. I watch him until he lifts his gaze. There’s no mistaking that he’s looking up to see if I’m buying his sob story. Which I’m not. Same old Pilot, I think as I leave him in the cafeteria and head back to my dorm room.

  Night after night, Molly watches me sketch furiously at my desk and marvels at the number of trees that have to die just so I can crumple pages up and start all over again, all in an effort to impress Dia the following Saturday. Morning after morning, Garnet growls in our workshop, nonplussed by Dia’s interest in mentoring me, to say nothing of her frustration at Ben’s insistence that he doesn’t want to be with her—insistence that even I can’t help challenging. To no success. All I want is for Ben to have a chance at the Big V, but he refuses to give in to Garnet—he refuses to leave me for her, as if the short-term loss of our relationship isn’t worth the longterm gain.

  Ben.

  It’s only when I’m with Ben that I don’t long for Saturday and don’t hope the seconds will tick away faster. It’s only with Ben that the arrival and passing of another Saturday means something bad: we’re getting that much closer to his graduation. I’ve taken to coaching Ben the way Pilot coaches me, but, for someone as bright as Ben, it seems that nothing sticks like it should. He takes my energy, smiles appreciatively, and then reminds me that he’s doomed. As if I should give up the way he has.

  And, to be clear, he has given up.

  “Maybe you should be flattered,” Molly offers as I get ready for bed. “Ben wants to be with you for as long as he can.”

  Molly has become the girl everyone goes to for illegal gadgets, which her gramps keeps her stocked with. Instead of taking payment, she’s been stockpiling favors. She is reading through envelopes of them as I groan about the new year being Ben’s last year on Earth.

  “No, he wants to be with me for six more months. And then die. And in the meantime? I’m totally getting crazier about him.”

  “Aww.”

  “Molly, seriously.”

  “It’s sweet! You have a boyfriend you adore who seems to adore you right back.”

  I do adore him. I adore him more than I want to admit. I’ve never really believed in meant to be, but the way I feel just thinking about him, I can’t help but hope that it’s our destiny that we be together. But for how long? Am I supposed to fall in love with him… just to kill that love and live the rest of my life yearning for it? Letting him die would be like condemning myself to a living hell.

  I just wish he would put my feelings a tiny bit above his.

  My frustration with Ben’s stubbornness finds its way into my last session with Dia before Christmas and the Scrutiny. While the fire crackles, he reclines on the chaise and rolls up his sleeves to trace one of his many colorful tattoos with his finger. It’s my job to study him as my subject, which leaves me helpless to studying his body and gives me good reason to marvel, even in my frustration, as the blue, pink, and red of his many tattoos glow when his fingertip strokes them. I’m surprised to see him entirely transform a red rose tattoo into a Betty Boop with just the touch of his hand.

  “Could you please stop redrawing your tattoos?” I snap. “It’s impossible to paint a changing subject.”

  “Why don’t you throw that painting into the fire right now?”

  “You haven’t even looked at it.”

  “Yes, well, I can tell it’s garbage from here.”

  Thanks, mentor.

  “Do you wanna know why I’m so sure that piece of junk isn’t worth my time, kid?”

  The worst thing is playing along with questions like that. Of course I don’t want to know. Especially not when he calls me kid.

  “It’s because,” he swings his bare feet down and waits until I return his stare, “you’re in a bad mood. You’re obviously in a bad mood about something—probably Ben—or it could be Christmas without your dad—and here you are grinding your teeth.”

  “Mad about Ben?”

  He smirks.

  “Is something funny?” I ask.

  “You don’t think that maybe you and Ben are a little poorly matched?”

  I swallow. “Why would you say that?”

  “Forget it.”

  “Tell me.”

  I wait for him to tell me Ben’s flawless. And privileged. And meticulous to the point of OCD. While I, in comparison, am too tall, too thick-waisted and thick-legged, too wild-haired, too poor with teeth that are too crooked. But he doesn’t say any of that. He says something much worse.

  “You’re not meant for him.”

  ten

  THE MUSE

  I KNOW NOW THAT I’M GETTING TOO CLOSE TO THIS DEVIL called Dia Voletto. I know that because, like a good little devil, he’s found my Achilles heel, the gap in my armor, and he’s driven his sword into it.

  “Come on, Anne,” Dia says to me. “You must know you’re meant for someone much better than that simple Zin character.”

  “If you could please. Stop. Moving.”

  “You’re angry.”

  “I just think you need a better sense of boundaries.”

  “Then take it out on the canvas.”

  “Don’t act like you’re getting under my skin just to motivate me to paint better.”

  “Take your feelings out on the canvas.”

  “But I’m painting you,” I snap. “I’m not painting my feelings.”

  With a laugh, he claps his hands together and grins behind the temple they form. If he expects better than a glare from me, he’s beyond out of touch.

  “Now I know exactly what you’ve been missing,” he says.

  “I’m sure you think you do.”

  “Narcissism,” he says, his eyes twinkling.

  “Says the demon version of Narcissus.”

  “Anne, listen to me carefully.” His eyes, already dark, seem to blacken. “Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the painted canvas, reveals himself.”

  “That was eloquently put.”

  “It should be. It’s straight from The Picture of Dorian Gray. The beauty of the portrait of Dorian Gray was not his at all, but the desire of Basil, the artist.”

  “I haven’t read that book.”

  “You ought to. It will help you.” He adds, with a smile, “And it’s very sexy.”

  “You talk about sex too much.”

  “Says the virgin.”

  He strides over to observe the rendering of his lean, tattooed body on my canvas. As he hunches next to me and pensively taps his finger on his lips, his loose button-up grazes my arm. I shift away.

  “You don’t know anything about me and Ben,” I say.

  “About Ben, no. But about you, yes.”

  “About relationships.”

  He lowers himself elegantly to the floor and crosses his brightly colored arms around his knees, looking up at me as he does.

  “You think I haven’t had relationships? Look at me, Anne. Do you think I’m unfamiliar with girls falling in love with me?”

  “Nice ego.”

  “A girl like you ought to have my confidence. Or does Ben hold you on too high a pedestal to touch you the way beautiful women deserve to be touched? No, this must be it: you both scrub down with bleach, head to toe, before you can, what’s the word? Snuggle.”

  Exactly the words
to make me drop my brush in the birdbath and pull off my smock. He sees me get up to leave, and he laughs a little more. But he doesn’t try to stop me. Not physically, at least.

  “I had a serious relationship once,” he says. “She was lovely. Well, to be honest, she was a tease who tormented me.”

  I grab my book bag. “I thought we agreed to be…not like that.”

  “Like what? Personal?”

  “Inappropriate.”

  “I’m not trying to seduce you. I’m trying to talk to you. I forget sometimes that you’re so young. Please,” he says, tugging my bag from my grip and gesturing to the chair I’ve just abandoned. “Sit.”

  Reluctantly, I teeter on the edge of my seat.

  “Her name was Gia,” he begins. I glance at his Dia + Gia tattoo, which is the only one he never changes. “She was the most powerful underworld goddess. The Seven Sinning Sisters served her. Every incubus and succubus in existence served her. As did witches, familiars, all of them. She was particularly good at claiming the souls of men.”

  “She was a succubus?” I ask.

  “She started as one, but she became a goddess. She was at least as powerful as Mephistopheles, and twice as powerful as I.”

  “Did you leave her behind in the underworld to come here?”

  “She left me. Just like Ben will leave you.”

  “Seriously, I don’t want to talk to you about Ben.”

  “Why not? Because you only want to do what’s safe? Even if you did talk to me about him, you’d do it in the safest possible way, wouldn’t you?”

  “I guess we’ll never know.”

  He shoves his hands through his hair and messes it wildly. He’s beaming when he looks at me again.

  “The unsafe reality is the one you need to explore, Anne!” he proclaims. “The one where humans are darker than Lucifer himself. The one where a demon is a human. The one where nothing is black or white and we are more than the places we come from yet inevitably and tragically tied to them.”

  The unsafe reality. It’s a terrifying reality, one I’ve been avoiding since the day my mother was diagnosed with rapid-cycling bipolar disorder. It’s becoming clear to me that I’ve exchanged my artistry—who I am—for the safety and comfort of a normal life. Is there such a thing? If all life comes in shades of gray and we can be just as evil as demons—I mean, I killed Pilot, and I truly haven’t felt a twinge of regret since—then perhaps normalcy is simply an unattainable illusion, a mirage.