Designing Morgan

by Lucey Phillips

  There was no good time for the confrontation I’d planned, but this would be a terrible time. I hopped up and ran into our apartment, leaving my laptop closed on an end table. I turned on the TV, lay down on the couch under a blanket, and pretended to be asleep.

  Soon I heard him walk past me and then begin snoring in the bedroom. That night I stayed on the couch. I seemed to only be able to sleep in 45-minute intervals punctuated with an hour of lying awake, watching headlights streak across the room and trying to figure out where I would live, where I would work, and what I would do without Clint.

  When he finally woke up at noon the next day, it took all of the courage I had to place the laptop on the table in front of him while he ate cold pizza for breakfast.

  “You and Janae text a lot,” I’d said. “Like, a lot—way more than you text me. Or anyone.”

  For a very quick moment he looked remorseful. He started to make an excuse for the texts—they were work-related. But then his expression became hard. His voice was angry.

  “What’s wrong with you, Morgan? Why are you snooping through my phone records?” He had a disgusted look on his face that I’d never seen before—his eyes narrowed and his lips formed a snarl.

  “That account is under my name,” Clint had said.

  “You gave me the password so I could pay the bill.”

  “What else have you spied on?” Clint asked. He walked toward the bedroom desk and pulled out envelopes from the bank. “Did you go through my bank statements too?”

  Then he shoved his phone into my hand. “Why don’t you just read the texts? You’ve spied on me anyway. God, I thought you loved me. I thought we trusted each other.”

  He wasn’t making any sense, but he stormed around our apartment and ranted for a good 40 minutes. I couldn’t get a word in. And somehow, by the time he was done, I was in tears and asking him to forgive me. I had reached a new dimension of self-loathing that day.

  Even now, standing in this mansion belonging to Clint and his bride, I couldn’t quite figure out how I got from discovering evidence of his illicit relationship to crying and asking for his forgiveness.

  We stayed together a few more months before things finally fell apart and I moved out. I started working on the jewelry line that would become Candy Blue. I spent a lot of time at Sophie’s house.

  But it never felt like Clint was entirely out of my life. Even now, with his wedding a couple months away, he occupied space in my life. And he required much more of my energy than he deserved.

  I turned toward Clint.

  “I need you to stop texting me,” I said. I tried to keep my voice stern, businesslike.

  “I’m sorry, Morgan,” Clint said. His eyes were warm and his expression was sincere. “I mean, I’m sorry for the whole thing. For all the fighting and stuff when we were together. I’ve grown up since then.”

  “I have too,” I said. “And I’m finally mature enough to know that you shouldn’t be friends with your ex.”

  “I don’t want to stop texting. I don’t want you out of my life,” Clint said. “We have a connection and you know it. I’ll never find someone else like you.” Clint took a tiny step toward me. Now we were so close we were almost touching.

  “A part of me will always love you,” he said. “Don’t you feel the same?” His eyes were even more tender now, almost misty.

  I didn’t answer him. This was the same sap that kept me clinging to him for years, unable to move on. Finally I shook my head.

  “Maybe I don’t know what love is,” I said. “But I’m pretty sure this isn’t it. This is just… just entanglement.

  “Hannah’s a cute girl. I want you to be happy with her,” I said. I couldn’t make myself look at him.

  He whispered my name while he reached toward my face. I kept my eyes down. Then Clint touched my hair and swept it back, tucking it behind my ear. I turned away, but just slightly. Clint lowered his hand down to brush along my arm, allowing his fingertips graze my skin.

  A motor started groaning above us.

  “She’s here,” Clint said. His expression was grim. He pointed at the ceiling. “That’s the garage door.”

  We went upstairs and met Hannah in the kitchen. She said hello to me, but she acted as if Clint were invisible. I had never seen her this subdued.

  When I showed her the jewelry she seemed to truly like it. The necklaces had three strands of tiny clear crystals and small red pearls all spaced about an inch apart on a thin silver cable. The bridesmaid’s dresses were scarlet to go with her Christmas wedding motif. For a different occasion, the jewelry would be too sparkly and colorful. But for a Christmas wedding, it was perfect.

  Hannah pulled up a picture of her bridesmaids dresses on her phone and laid it on the countertop. She then placed the necklace in a circle around the phone. She put the earrings on either side of the phone, taking the time to adjust them so they hung on imaginary ears just right. Then she laid the bracelet off to the side.

  This wasn’t the first time she had struck me as childlike—frivolous and innocent. I felt a pang of pity for her, but I wasn’t sure why.

  Then she smiled up at me. “I love it,” she said. “Let’s do it.”

  11.

  “Your art is making me kind of uncomfortable,” Sophie said as she peered at my painting over the top of her computer screen.

  “Good,” I said, smiling. “It’s supposed to. It’s an indictment of the American woman’s willingness to be subjugated by her own consumerist lifestyle.”

  The painting showed a toddler in a dress hugging a doll that had bright diamonds for eyes and had its mouth, hands, and feet bound by strands of pearls and gemstones. I gave the toddler the same creepy diamond eyes.

  “I get it,” Sophie said with a wrinkled nose. “Of course, the whole consumerist lifestyle thing paid for the canvas and paints and the roof over our heads.”

  I shrugged. “Artistic irony, I guess.”

  I had finally accepted that I my portfolio needed some new artworks before I submitted my MFA application. I had cleaned the enclosed side porch of my house, which served as my home art studio, and stocked it with some new supplies.

  Ever since Sophie and I made up from our disagreement and spent the afternoon working together on her front porch, we’d been spending several hours working together every day. Hannah’s enthusiasm for the new jewelry I’d designed for her wedding was a win that Sophie and I needed. On top of that, Hannah mentioned us on her blog, which caused Candy Blue’s sales to blow up.

  Sophie had been coming over with coffee for us every morning. I would either focus on new designs for Candy Blue or new art for my portfolio. Sophie would write blog posts and do whatever it is she does via email that keeps Candy Blue rolling along.

  She didn’t need the accountability of having a work partner, but I did.

  It had always been that way with us. Sophie knows how to work. I know how to play.

  I wouldn’t have graduated from high school without her. When spring of our senior year rolled around, the guidance counselor, Mr. Pond, called me into his office to tell me that I had an abundance of art credits, but I was missing a science credit—chemistry.

  “No, I took chemistry,” I’d said, passionate adolescent tears already forming in my eyes. “Last year.”

  “You failed,” he said.

  “But I took it.”

  “You don’t get credit for an F,” he said. “I can’t believe I have to explain this to you. You have to pass a course to get credit for it.”

  “Oh.” That’s when the tears really started to stream down my face. Mr. Pond explained that I couldn’t graduate until I passed chemistry with a C. He said the chemistry teacher, Mrs. Shaw, had agreed to allow me to do a one-on-one course with her. If I passed, I could graduate on time and go to college in the fall, just like I’d planned.

  It was a complete disaster.

  Shy people do not do well in one-on-one learning scenarios. It’s too much attention, too
much pressure. During each lesson I would nod along as Mrs. Shaw explained things to me. I would leave more confused than when the lesson started.

  Then I’d go straight to Sophie’s house, and she would fix everything.

  “God, why am I so dumb with this stuff?” I had said one afternoon. “I hate it.”

  “You know you’re not dumb,” Sophie said. There was no pity in her voice. “You’re used to everything coming easily to you. You want to draw a beautiful flower—poof—you do it without even trying. Same with writing, and even with sports.

  “Now finally here’s something you actually have to put a little work into. You don’t even know what it feels like to work at learning so you assume you can’t do it.”

  My mom had called me lazy-brained many times. I never understood what she meant, until now.

  Sophie didn’t like chemistry any more than I did but, unlike me, when Sophie read the textbook and followed the instructions, she could put the pieces together and everything made sense to her.

  Then she figured out how to get that information to make sense to me: She used Skittles and M&Ms and Gobstoppers to represent the molecules. We moved them around to balance the equations. She had me draw and label my formula. And she even found YouTube videos that animated the reactions.

  “So how’s your archeologist boyfriend?” Sophie asked me, peering over her laptop screen again.

  “Pretty sure he’s not my boyfriend,” I said. “And I don’t think he’s an archeologist, either. Well. Maybe.”

  “Sounds passionate,” Sophie said flatly. “He’s not your boyfriend and you don’t really know what he does for a living?”

  “He’s a student. He’ll probably be a professor and an author some day,” I said. “Anyway, I’m pretty sure he’s not an archeologist. I don’t think he does the actual digging in the dirt. I’m pretty sure he just, like researches what the archeologists find.”

  “Have you seen him lately?”

  “We’ve been texting a little,” I said.

  “Every day?” she asked me. “Does he text you good morning and good night?”

  “No.”

  She shrugged. “You’re right, he’s not your boyfriend.”

  I shrugged too. “He should be. He seems like a good guy.”

  “So what’s the holdup?” Sophie asked. “Oh my god. It’s Clint isn’t it? You’re still not over him.”

  She annunciated “still” as if it were an STD. Of course, Clint did have the staying power of some unpleasant viral afflictions.

  “It’s not like I long for him. He’s just so persistent. Sometimes he wears me down,” I said. “We had a moment of weirdness when I was at his house.”

  “What happened?”

  I explained to Sophie how I was alone with Clint for a few minutes and had told him not to text me any more.

  “Let me guess. He wants to be friends. They always want to be friends,” She said, rolling her eyes.

  “That’s been his go-to line for years,” I said.

  “Maybe you just need to get involved with someone else?” Sophie said. “I don’t know, maybe that’s the only way to really purge him from your life.”

  I gave a noncommittal “yeah.” But that didn’t seem quite right. Humans aren’t interchangeable Monopoly pieces, are they?

  Lee and I had planned to cook dinner together at my house tonight. Sophie had a few brash suggestions about possible entertainment options for Lee and me, but I ignored her. I was too absorbed in my painting to give that much thought.

  When Sophie said goodbye, she had a mischievous twinkle in her eye.

  “Stop it,” I’d said. “I don’t even know if I’m that into him—or if he’s that into me.”

  “That’s why God made alcohol,” Sophie said before jogging down my porch steps and getting into her car.

  I fed the pets and spent a few minutes straightening up my kitchen before I got back to my painting.

  Then there was a knock on my door. I might not have even noticed it if it weren’t for Franklin’s one lazy warning bark. “Oh crap,” I whispered to myself. I put down my brush and wiped my hands on my paint-smeared jeans and sweatshirt. The entire afternoon had passed by in what felt like minutes. That happened to me sometimes when I was working on jewelry—I’d get absorbed in the process and time just slipped away from me. It rarely happened when I was painting, though. Standing there in front of the canvas, making so many decisions, somehow wore me out.

  Lee was here with dinner.

  I tried to redo my ponytail while I ran to the door. Reggie darted across the living room, nearly tripping me as he fled the scary door-knocking-dude. Suddenly I felt hungry and shaky.

  “I didn’t forget you were coming,” I said quickly as I opened the door. Now my cheeks were burning. “I was just working on my painting and, I don’t know, I fell into a time warp or something.”

  Lee smiled, looking pleased.

  “I’m sorry. I’m a mess,” I said.

  “First of all: Hello. You look lovely,” he said as he leaned down to kiss me on the cheek. “Anyway, I don’t really go for women who spend their entire afternoon looking in the mirror.”

  “Hello,” I said, still flustered.

  Lee asked to see my painting. For some reason it hadn’t even occurred to me that he would be interested in seeing my art.

  My friends and family were supportive, but they never seemed particularly excited about it. And Clint had never asked to see what I was working on. When I showed him my finished artworks, he managed to feign interest for a few seconds and grunt a “nice” or “cool.” He never went out of his way to look at my artworks unless I asked him.

  Even though I was a little nervous about showing Lee what I’d been working on, I decided to just take the plunge and show him. Confidence is sexy, I reminded myself. Playing coy is not. So I led Lee through my living room and out into my side-porch studio.

  Even though I’d told Sophie the theme of my painting, I said nothing to Lee. Sophie was the only person I trusted with the background information on my paintings. I made a point of never explaining my art—I want the viewer to appreciate it from their own perspective. Plus, I was taught to never put myself in the position of explaining, or worse, defending my creative expression.

  “I like it,” he said enthusiastically. “Kind of dark, but I think it’s awesome.”

  He looked at it a long time. While I was cleaning my paints and brushes, I snuck glances at Lee. He was really taking in my painting. He wasn’t pretending. I felt a warmth toward him that I hadn’t even felt that night at the ballpark when he was worried about me, and comforting too.

  He had brought steaks and red wine. I made a salad and baked rolls from refrigerated dough while Lee worked at the grill. We sat down to eat at the picnic table. I lit a citronella candle to keep the bugs away, even though there weren’t many this time of year.

  “What?” Lee said while I spread butter on my roll.

  “What?”

  “You’re smiling,” he said. “You’ve been walking around with a little grin on your lips this whole time.”

  “Oh,” I shrugged. I tried to stop, but that just made my smile bigger—almost bursting into a little giggle. “I guess I’m happy?”

  He laughed. “Ok. I’m happy you’re happy. But if you were, like, brooding, that would be ok too.”

  “Am I usually brooding?” I asked.

  “No.” Lee squinted, looking up toward the small cherry trees that lined my back fence. “Sometimes you’re thoughtful, though. I’ve never seen you just smile, like, an ongoing smile.”

  “Now you’re smiling!”

  “Cheers,” he said. We clinked wine glasses and didn’t talk for a few minutes. It was pleasant. We’d finally gotten to that stage of dating where you don’t feel compelled to fill every moment with chitchat.

  After dinner, we walked Franklin for so long that he kept stopping and tugging the leash toward home. And when that didn’t work, he’d bump
his nose hard into my hand.

  “We better go back,” Lee said finally. “Maybe his paws are getting sore.”

  It had been dark before we even started on our walk. At some point, Lee and I had started holding hands. We were talking then. I think I was telling him about Sophie and some story from when we were growing up together, and I noticed my hand in his. I wasn’t even sure how it happened—who had taken whose hand first. Maybe they just found each other.

  “I guess so,” I said. There was obvious regret in my voice. It was probably time for the date to end, but I didn’t want it to be over. I wanted Lee to stay. But maybe I didn’t know him well enough for that. Well, not yet.

  He gave my hand a squeeze. Maybe he didn’t want our night to end, either.

  I packed Lee some salad and rolls, placing the containers into an empty grocery bag. He said he’d eat them for lunch tomorrow.

  “Are you sure you want to send me with that glass container?” Lee asked me. “That means you’re committing to see me at least one more time, so I can return it.”

  “Meh, if things go south I can buy another one,” I said, teasing him.

  As I added a napkin to the bag, he walked up behind me and gave me a hug around my waist. It made my legs feel weak. I didn’t know what to do, so I just rested my hands on his arms and closed my eyes, leaning back into him a little bit.

  He placed his hands gently on my hips, and I could feel his cheek by my ear. I could hear him breathe and feel his breath in his chest too. Finally I turned around, opening my eyes only for a second.

  Our lips found each other so easily, so gently.

  If there had been more wine and less walking, that kiss probably would have been the beginning of the rest of our night. Instead, it was a lovely, lingering, goodnight kiss.

  12.

  The Western Pennsylvania Hilltop Artisans Celebration attracts the most egregious plastic-faced, label flaunting, European SUV driving yuppies in all of yuppiedom. But today, I wasn’t going to complain.

  I promised Sophie, and myself, that today I would act like a woman who was grateful for the good fortune my career has had—because I was. And because I was still a little disgusted with myself regarding the past couple years of whining I’d done while Sophie was slaving over email eighteen hours a day.