Shameless

by Nina Lemay

  “I don’t really have a dream.”

  He threads his arm through mine. The sun is setting and thick, uniform clouds have crept over the sky; a damp chill is settling over everything. I warm my icy hand in his grasp.

  “How can you not have a dream?”

  “I don’t know. Dreams never come true anyway. It’s just a waste of time.”

  “Hey, I know the art world is a tough place, but…”

  “Don’t worry,” I chuckle. “I already got the speech from everyone in my extended family. You’ll never make it as an artist, change majors before it’s too late.”

  “That’s not what I was going to say.”

  “Well, did your dream come true? Was it teaching a bunch of pretentious teen hipsters how to take photographs with outdated technology?”

  I’m afraid I went too far, but he only laughs. “Okay, that was not exactly the dream. But it’s not that bad. And right now it’s proving pretty pleasant.” He puts his arm around my shoulders and pulls me close to kiss my temple.

  “Oh? Is that why you chose that job? For the perks?” I tease.

  “For a so-called perk, you sure are a lot of effort.”

  “I do my best.”

  Glad that I managed to steer him away from the dangerous subject, I walk next to him, my arm around his waist. A drop of rain lands on my hairline as a soft pitter-patter starts on the cobblestones all around us, and we dash in the direction of the hotel.

  He takes me out to dinner again, this time to a bistro that’s refreshingly unpretentious. Not that I’m sick of decadent French food—it’s just nice to look at a menu with items I can pronounce. We take up a cozy booth in the very back. The place is half-empty even though there’s still a day left in the long weekend. Subdued retro French songs pour from the speakers.

  “So I was thinking we drive home tomorrow in the late afternoon,” he says. He’s drinking a pint of artisanal beer and I’m nursing a cider that tastes like pop but is a treacherous 8% alcohol. “Checkout is at noon, but no one is stopping us from spending part of the day in the city.” He grins. “Unless you’re already sick of me.”

  “You wish.”

  His expression grows solemn and I start to wonder if I said something wrong. “And then it’s back to standard programming, I guess?”

  “If by that you mean sneaking around and hiding away at your apartment, I don’t see what other alternatives we have.”

  “This,” he says, drawing in a breath. “This is what I wanted to talk to you about.”

  My heart jumps. I take a big gulp of cider. “Okay.”

  I want to sound like I’m actually okay. Like I’m mature and I’m ready for this conversation and whatever it might entail. Like I’m an adult who can be in a casual relationship without going bunny-boiler or suicidal. Like I’m the kind of person I always wanted to be.

  The cider weaves its tendrils of warmth through my core. My fingertips start to tingle.

  “First, how long do you have left? You’re in your second year, right?”

  “Well, I’m in Fine Arts, with a minor in Art History,” I say. “So it’s a four-year program.”

  “So two and a half,” he concludes.

  “Assuming I don’t fail anything,” I say, and kick myself. So much for sounding like a responsible adult. “But if this is what it’s about, I won’t take any more classes with you. That shouldn’t be hard. I’ll take Photography 201 with someone else, or not at all. I already have enough workshops.” I gulp. “Unless—unless you want me to, of course….”

  He gives a vigorous shake of his head. “No, no, that’s not it.”

  I’m not sure if I’m relieved to hear that. Or else what would it mean for me? That the main appeal of this little adventure to him is that he’s banging one of his students?

  Then again, so what if it is? It’s a sex thing, one way or another. He was upfront about it.

  “We can’t really go on like this, even if you’re not in one of my classes. You’re a student and I’m a teacher. And everyone knows we did have a class together.”

  “I thought you said it wasn’t that big a deal.”

  “Maybe if we’re lucky it won’t get either of us kicked out. But I know how small the art department is and do you really want people talking about us behind your back for the next three years give or take a semester?”

  I look him straight in the eye. He’s dead serious.

  “Well, what do you suggest we do?”

  “This is what I’m asking you.” He runs his hands over his hair. “Look, I’ll be straightforward. I’m willing to quit after this semester.”

  I choke on my cider.

  “I’m serious. If I hand in my notice now, they’ll find someone else, and there won’t be any hassle. Another job isn’t an issue. I have my old trust fund money to fall back on, and I should have something else in no time.”

  I still can’t figure out what to say. What can you say?

  “For me?” I rasp.

  He puts his hands on the table between us. The stark letters on his knuckles stand out against his slightly tanned skin. I cover them with my palm.

  “I think it’ll come as no surprise, Hannah. You’re smart and I’m not very subtle about it. I’ve gotten quite attached to you.”

  My heart thrums. “We’ve been seeing each other for a month.”

  “A month and a half.”

  “But didn’t you say… what about the casual relationship? Not lying to get in my pants?”

  “I’m not lying.”

  “So you want me to be your…” I can’t bring myself to say the word girlfriend. Something about it is so juvenile, so high-school, that it can’t possibly apply to this man sitting across from me. I can’t call him “boyfriend.” A boyfriend is someone who takes you to a movie and McDonalds and then tries to stick his hands down your pants in the back of his dad’s car.

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “Of course it’s not. When is it ever?” the bitterness in my voice surprises me.

  “I’m willing to quit the university so we can legitimately date each other.”

  “That’s—that’s too big. You don’t—you shouldn’t—”

  “Doesn’t matter. I’m willing to do it. But, this is the hard part. I need you to do something too.”

  “I don’t think dropping out is such a good idea,” I say carefully. “I’m on a student visa and I might get sent back to the States.”

  He sighs. He rubs his eyes, leans on his elbows and rests his forehead on his hands.

  And that’s when the suspicion starts to creep into my mind.

  “That’s not what I meant, Hannah.”

  “Then what is it about?”

  I already know what it’s about. Shame squeezes my windpipe, shame and self-loathing and all those other things I’ve managed to push back, put out of my mind if only for this weekend. I should have known there’s no running from them, not really.

  “It’s about your job.”

  “I can’t afford to quit. Tuition costs twice what it does to locals for me. I won’t be able to pay rent. I’ll have to get into debt.” The words roll off my tongue like from a conveyer belt, soulless and mechanic and cold. Auto-response.

  “None of the other girls in your classes strip. And they get by somehow.”

  “Like who? Like Audrey?”

  His head snaps up. “What does Audrey have to do with it?”

  “Her parents pick up the tab for everything. Even her apartment. One of the other girls told me.”

  “Well, there are plenty of others who get by with part-time jobs. And loans.”

  “So you’d rather I owe six figures before I even get my BFA?” I press the heels of my hands into the table, lifting myself up a little to be level with him.

  “Other people do it,” he says obstinately.

  “Have you ever had to do it?”

  The waitress hovers hesitantly a few feet away, her arms overloaded with our plates. We
both glower at her and wait silently as she sets them down. Emmanuel gives her a curt merci.

  Our bison burgers and French fries steam on the table between us, but neither of us even thinks of touching them.

  “I’ve worked since I was sixteen,” he says tersely.

  “You have a freaking trust fund,” I snap. “You just said so. You can afford to just up and quit your job for some girl’s pretty smile. Well, I can’t. And if you’ve worked since you were sixteen, well guess what, so have I.”

  “That’s not a job,” he says. His lip curls with a look of disgust that sinks daggers into my heart. “That’s—”

  “Go on, say it. I know you’re thinking it so just get it out.”

  “It’s degrading. You’re making yourself into an object for men to paw at.”

  “First of all, there’s no pawing…”

  “I’ve talked to you, ‘Annah,” he snaps. In the surge of emotion he forgets the H on my name again, but somehow I no longer find it cute. “You sound like a smart girl. And you sound like you have good values, like you aspire to be more than a pretty object. How does that so-called job fit with that?”

  “This so-called job,” I say levelly, even though deep down I’m crackling with anger, “allows me to live on my own and pay my tuition without getting into debt. It allowed me to get away from fucking Minnesota and live in a place I actually like, pay my own bills, and take care of myself.”

  I pause for a breath, watching his expression that never wavers. His look is steely.

  “Unless,” he says, his voice cold and indifferent, “unless it was all just talk. Just something you said to impress me and to get me to think you were actually not a shallow, materialistic twit like the kind of girls who work in those places.”

  The few people in the restaurant are starting to glance at us. I notice the waiters huddled next to the bar, casting significant looks at our table as they whisper to one another.

  “Oh. Is that what you think I am? You think I go out of my way to say exactly what you want to hear so I can prey on your sensitive fucking soul?”

  “Maybe you don’t even realize it. That’s the worst part. You’re in it and you can’t see the forest from the trees. Next you’ll be getting fake tits and acrylic talons, all because it makes you more desirable to some ‘roided-out douchebag from Laval. The question is, is that what you want to be? And if the answer’s yes, I don’t want to be with a person like that.”

  I push the table away and get up. I’m trembling and my pulse races in my ears. He’s looking up at me, his expression icy, nothing but the line between his eyebrows to give away any emotions.

  If he has any at all.

  “I never lied to you,” I say. “I never pretended to be anything I’m not. You knew how I was and what I did when you first pursued me. And then you started feeding me your I’m-falling-for-you bullshit. Just don’t expect me to change everything you don’t like about me at your beck and call.”

  “I’m not asking you to change anything!” he explodes. He slams his hands into the table, making the dishes and glasses jump.

  My heart lurches, but I stand straight, without flinching, and hold his gaze.

  “I’m trying to keep you from spiraling down in this hole you’ve gotten yourself into! This—job—it’s not good for you. It’s not good for anyone.”

  “Oh, no, of course not. I’m independent, I take care of myself, my rent is paid on time. And I do that by making men pay to do what they do ninety percent of the time anyway—ogle my body like I’m an object. How awful.”

  For a few moments he glares back at me, and the bitterness and anger in his eyes is enough to make me stagger back. Then he drops his head onto his hands.

  For the longest time, I just stand there, towering over him, and wait.

  “Merde,” he finally mutters. He still won’t look up. “You’re right, Hannah. Right as always.”

  I gulp hard, but don’t move an inch. A lump rises in my throat, choking off my voice.

  “I did know who you were and I got into it anyway.” He shakes his head in disbelief. “And now I’ve started to fall for a girl I can’t have anything with, even though I knew better. How typical of me.”

  Every word is a rusted nail he drives between my ribs, a razor blade under my fingernails.

  “I have no right to ask you to change for me.”

  I want to say damn right, but I still can’t speak. I feel what’s coming, and my heart jumps like a canary in a cage.

  “It’s all my own fault. I’m sorry I got you involved in this. I should have left you alone from the very beginning, but I just couldn’t resist.” He tears his hands through his hair. “That’s just me. I’m always drawn to the broken ones.”

  Fury rushes through me like an electric charge. “I’m not broken,” I say slowly. “And I don’t need fixing, or saving, or whatever the hell you think you’re trying to do right now.”

  “I’m only trying to make you understand,” he says. His voice is exhausted, bitter and hoarse. “It’s not up to me to fix you.”

  “And if that’s what attracts you to a person, whatever you think is broken about them—maybe you’re the one who should reevaluate your life.”

  The anguish that fills his gaze is like a punch under the ribs. If this were a movie, I’d angrily snatch my purse from the seat and storm out, heels clacking, eyes ablaze, with everyone staring in my wake. But I can’t bring myself to move, not for a long moment. I wait for him to say something, to stop me. But he doesn’t.

  In a brittle voice, I ask him for keys to the hotel room. He moves slowly, but reaches into his pocket and slides the key card halfway across the table, then leaves it there, waiting for me to take it.

  Only when I put it in my pocket he speaks up.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going home.”

  “You don’t have a car.”

  “I’ll take the bus.”

  He doesn’t argue.

  As I walk out, I can’t bring myself to look over my shoulder. The rain pours down in a monotone wall and I turn my face up, letting the icy strands wash away my tears.

  I’m on the last bus out of the terminal. I won’t be in Montreal until two in the morning.

  I didn’t bring a book or a sketchbook with me to pass the time. I even left the camera, except I took out the film first. My first thought was to expose it to the light, destroy it, but for some reason I packed it safely away in its plastic container, and right now it’s at the bottom of my duffel bag.

  Only an hour after the bus peels out of the terminal I realize I forgot to leave the bracelet on the counter like I intended, just like I did with the other gifts. I remember it when it slips out from under the cuff of my hoodie and falls over my hand with a soft clink of charms.

  Dumbfounded, I hold up my hand and look at it. Something to remember this place by, indeed. I debate throwing it right out the bus window. I even unclasp it and take it off. It’s so delicate, real white gold, with deeply gleaming enamel on the purple-blue iris flowers. I can’t bring myself to do it.

  Maybe Emmanuel was right about me. I’m nothing but a materialistic whore.

  I have the entire three-hour bus ride to think about what happened. To alternately kick myself and boil with rage at Emmanuel, at the world, at the whole situation. The Cinderella tale is over, the prince is a rat, the carriage is a Greyhound that smells like burnt rubber.

  How could I ever have thought it might be different? It was only a matter of time before the other shoe dropped. And I didn’t even see it coming.

  I lean my forehead on the oily glass and try to see outside, but it’s too dark and the windows are tinted. I think it might still be raining, but I can’t tell for sure.

  I get back to my place in the dead of night, at the same time I would normally be coming home from work. I make my way up to my loft, unlock the door. The apartment greets me with cold, stale air and humidity that washes over me the second I step
through the doorway; it smells like something in the fridge went bad, or I forgot to take out the trash. It’s too cold to open the windows but I do anyway, breaking two nails on the windowpane that’s rusted and refuses to budge. Then I light three cones of incense. Its smoke curls under the ceiling in thin grey threads like spider webs and the heavy, blunt smell of burning patchouli masks the stink.

  When I go to run myself a hot bath, I find the source of it: a dead mouse at the bottom of the bathtub. I look at it, curled up there on its side, its beady little eye fogged over like a marble, its grey fur matted. My shower curtain flaps a little in the breeze from the window and the sound of the night city floods in along with the dirty night air.

  I think of going to get the camera and almost regret leaving it at the hotel room. I want to capture this moment, this apartment, dark and silent and filled with smoke. I even have the perfect title: La Desolation.

  But I only have my phone to take pictures with and that doesn’t have the same feel. I clean up the mouse, like any normal person would do, but now I’m put off of having the bath. I just shower, as quickly as I can, long enough to get rid of the scent of citrusy hotel shower gel and Emmanuel’s lavender cologne and his skin on mine, the lingering smell of sex. I scrub myself raw between my thighs, pick him out from under my fingernails, until every last fleck of him is gone, gone, gone, swirling down the drain along with dregs of my cheap Dove soap.

  I collapse into my bed only to find that my sheets are damp too, and cold as hell. At least it’s pretty hard to cry and clatter your teeth at the same time, so I just curl up in fetal position and shiver and shiver until I fall asleep.

  The next day I wake up at noon. The windows are still open and I’m pretty sure the apartment is below freezing point. I jump out of bed and my skin hardens like a carapace, puckers up in gooseflesh. I wrap the blanket around myself and run to close all the windows, then crank up the heat.

  It’s so late and so early. The whole day ahead of me and I have no idea what to do with myself. My unfinished paintings, the school ones and my own, stare at me from the walls in mute reproach.

  When I brush the dust off my laptop cover and open it, I have two emails waiting for me: one is an automated message from the drugstore on the corner informing me that my photos have come back developed.