Truths of the Heart

by G L Rockey

  She whispered, “Maddening Z, maddening … but glorious.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Friday, a warm but gray afternoon, misty rain, overcast, Rachelle, dressed in her baseball hat and sunglasses disguise, parked a block away and stood at Seth's door. A few minutes past 2:00 P.M. She knocked lightly. Jude opened the door. Touching her sunglasses, Rachelle recognized another of Seth's friends. Rachelle, “Is Mr. Trudow in?”

  “Don't tell me, Greta Garbo lookalike?”

  Seth, dressed in Levis, white T-shirt and bare feet, stepped up. “Hi, come in,” he pointed to Jude, “she was just leaving, my soul-sister, you two met, I think, when I was ... the hospital thing, talked on the phone, Jude Wisdom, daughter of Cochise.”

  Rachelle said, “Oh, yes, how do you do.”

  “I do fine, how do you do?”

  Seth said to Jude, “See you later and if you are determined to still go to Italy with Grandpa, yes I will drive you to the airport tomorrow, get your car delivered to the dealer, you sure your father cleared it?”

  “Yes, Ron's Ford Dealership, just take it in and ask for Ron.” She turned to Rachelle, “Don't believe a word he says.”

  Jude winked and pulled the door closed behind her.

  Taking her sunglasses off, Rachelle said, “Let's get this over with.”

  Seth sensed her annoyance, “Jude really is only a soul-sister, nothing more.”

  Pretending to telegraph a total lack of interest, she said, “I have a five o'clock appointment.”

  He smiled, “She's a dear friend, really”

  She looked at him professorially, “Your life appears to be a female merry-go-round.”

  “No, it is not, I....”

  “Please.” She held up her hand. “I don't care, don't want to hear.”

  Seated at his desk, babushka in place, Rachelle said, “What was that about Jude, running away, Italy, Grandpa?”

  “She's fallen madly in love with the impresario of the Milan orchestra.”

  “That sounds exciting.”

  “At least.”

  “Tell me more about the other one, the photographer.”

  “Why?”

  “I think she followed me yesterday, or attempted to anyway.”

  Paused for a moment, “You're kidding me.”

  “No, I am not.”

  Painting again, “She's insane.”

  “Well, anyway, this is it, and you may tell her for me, get her a note or an email or something, but tell her to get off my case, or I might have to hurt her.”

  He paused, “This is a side of Rachelle not seen in academia.”

  “This is a side of me not me.”

  “Perhaps it's a mistake.”

  “What?”

  “Her following you.”

  “I don't think so.”

  “Let's get back to work.”

  “Lets.”

  Absorbed, he worked with sure strokes—those amber topaz eyes, that slightly large but perfect nose, tear drop nostrils, elegant neck, slightly sloping shoulders. The canvas was becoming an illusion of depth and substance, distance, three dimensional, alive. He had captured her essence too—calm on the surface and yet, beneath, uneasy, longing, a searching.

  Some final touch-up needed, stepping to the window, he invited her to take a look.

  She stood slowly and went to the canvas. She looked. She folded her arms and studied. After several minutes, “You flatter me.”

  Looking out the window, his palms moist, Seth put his hands in his pockets, then turned and looked at her. She still studied the painting. The short distance between them was only a few feet.

  She looked to him and smiled, “It's wonderful, maybe I am a peasant after all.”

  “This is not a vice.”

  He looked into her eyes. She looked into his. She didn't look away. They looked into each other for what seemed a day.

  Creation, instinct, energy, something primordial. Seth's thoughts soared, she must know how he felt. He stepped to her and took her hands and went to kiss her.

  She backed away. “Seth, please.”

  He released her hands and stepped back.

  Her eyes avoiding his, she said, “I must go.” She took her baseball hat, sun glassed, and quickly left.

  Down the steps, at her car, she got in and sat. She couldn't get the key in the ignition. Couldn't or didn't want to? She felt his pull. She couldn't let it go at this. She went back and tapped at the door.

  He opened it, turned and walked to his desk.

  She entered and closed the door. “Seth, about the manuscript, did you make the revisions?”

  “I've decided it's not something I want to do.”

  She removed her sunglasses, “Seth, this must not happen.”

  “It has happened.”

  “No.”

  “Oh, okay.” He walked to the window and stared out at the gray day.

  She said, “Seth, I'm sorry if I misled you.”

  “You didn't mislead me. I saw it in your eyes. Since forever, we were meant to collide. We have no control over this.”

  “I'm leaving.” She stepped toward the door.

  “Again?” He stared out the window.

  She stopped.

  He said, “You know professor, there is a mistake beginning painters tend to make.”

  She waited.

  “Beginning painters tend to complicate subject matter. Instead of dealing with a simple arrangement of light, dark, hues, values, their painting is a confusing pattern scattered all over the canvas.”

  She listened.

  “There's another art exercise, getting to know your colors. Red mixed with green produces gray. Get to know your colors, Dr. Zannes.”

  She turned and said to him, “I know my colors, just fine.”

  Still looking out the window, “No you don't. Avoiding, you choose not to believe what you know, changing truth to fit the circumstance, lying to the universe.”

  “I am not lying to anyone. Maybe that is your problem. You are trying to change reality to suit yourself.”

  “Shall I call you Dr. Zannes again? Shall I write you a note, lie to truth and let you read my lie?”

  She put her hand on the door knob. “I have to go.”

  “You are a false spring.”

  She stopped.

  He looked out at sunlight breaking through the clouds. “The sun is coming out.”

  In her life she had never felt this genuine, pure, alive.

  He quoted: “'Between the idea and the reality, between the motion and the act falls the shadow, For Thine is the Kingdom.'”

  She knew the poem, The Hollow Men by T.S.Eliot. She walked to him, touched his shoulder.

  He turned to her and took her fingers and kissed them softly and held them to his face. He looked into her moist eyes.

  She withdrew her hands and looked away. “Seth, you have such a promising future.”

  “I have a theory Doctor, about the future: there is none, it's all a myth, we are living in an unseen myth, someone's imagination, like a story, a novel, and the writer has no boundaries and things simply go all over the place, planes crash, people die, doltheads win. Whatever the writer decides, we do. On the other hand, in a lesser book, call it 'The Good Book of Life', minor writers have to be somewhat logical or their readers will be suspicious of plot manipulation.”

  “But Seth, you know what I mean, find a young person to live your life with. Not someone who can only cause you pain.”

  “Listen to you, that is not you talking. That is some phony person inside you.”

  “Seth....”

  “If you don't want me that's one thing, but don't lie to me with egg roll slogans.”

  “Seth, I….”

  “'Truths of the heart', remember the lectures, Doctor Zannes?”

  She knew. She didn't know what to say. She had never thought of her growing fondness for Seth as a life relationship.

  Or had she. Yes she had. But … come on Doc, who
are you kidding.

  He said, “You know Dr. Zannes, there is in the artist's world an object called a reducing glass. It shrinks subject so that the rough edges appear less evident than when viewed normally.”

  He paused, “Some people do that with truth.”

  “Thank you Dr. Trudow.”

  He started toward the door, “I'm sorry, Dr. Zannes. It was foolish of me. I'll not bother you anymore. You can go off and create new knowledge and find truth. Please feel free to stay as long as you like.”

  “Where are you going?”

  He opened the door. “Please show yourself out when you're back in disguise.”

  “Seth, wait. Let's talk.”

  “I have some things that I must do.”

  “Wait.” She went to him. “Seth, Please, don't be difficult. Let's reason this out.”

  “Reason it out, null the hypothesis, science a proof.”

  Frustrated, “Yes, yes, who is the teacher here?”

  “Some third person.”

  “Seth, please....”

  “Why are you here? You could have brushed me off long ago. Why didn't you?”

  “But Seth, can you imagine. In ten years I'll be fifty....”

  “Oh my, old granny.”

  “I'm also married.”

  “To what?”

  She said nothing.

  “Tell me to buzz off, get lost Trudow. But please don't play this silly game with me.”

  She looked into his eyes and that said it all. He took her face in his hands and kissed her lips.

  “Oh Seth....”

  “Let it happen.”

  She stepped back, “Seth, no … this will only hurt you and I so much don't want to do that.”

  “I have to go.”

  “No, not yet.” She held his hand.

  He released her grip, paused, “Rachelle, you're right, we should take some time to reason this out.”

  “You sound like the professor.”

  He said, “You know that favorite spot of yours along the Red Cedar, what was it, your Rodin spot. I'll meet you there, let's see, time to think it over, today is Friday, say Monday night, that'll give you time. We'll meet, say the bewitching hour, midnight. If you can change the law of gravity, dear Professor, you won't be there, and I will see you no more. Good day.”

  He left.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  After leaving Seth, Rachelle drove around. She drove around just driving. She drove around. She drove to Grand Ledge, past her childhood home. Her father vivid in her memory, she drove around. After two hours of driving around, finally home in Lake Lansing, T.S. greeted her with a long “Meeeooow,” and an even longer once-over.

  “I know, I know.” She threw her baseball hat on the counter along with her sunglasses.

  The kitchen phone blinking, two messages, ID, Carl. She played them:

  “Rachelle, you there? Pick up. Did you reconsider coming over for the weekend. More lawyer meetings on Saturday, or I'd come over there. Call me.” BEEP.

  “Rachelle, you there, pick up. Your cell phone is on messaging forward too. Call me.” BEEP.

  Her mind in shadow, doubt, excitement, with both hands she squeezed her hair back over her head. Should she call Carl or not? She was getting better at it but still a terrible liar. No. She erased the messages, left answering on, and poured a glass of white merlot.

  Evening coming on, the sun setting, the hours, the minutes, the earth seemed to move more slowly on its axis.

  Even the rays from the sun mosey. Mosey? And who can say not. Who cares? The tides care. He has never done more than kiss me, and I am even now exploding. God help me, I love him. This is insane.

  She ate nothing, drank another glass of white merlot. T.S. avoided her. In bed, she tried to read, fell asleep just after three A.M.

  Dream grabbing images of Seth at her face, the phone rang. She had turned the kitchen answering machine on. After the second ring she heard Carl's voice booming up the steps like a tidal wave: “JESUS CHRIST RACHELLE. YOU THERE? PICK UP. RACHELLE, PICK UP. HELLO. WE'RE LEAVING FOR D.C. SUNDAY MORNING, HEARINGS START ON MONDAY, SHOULD END COUPLE DAYS, THEN, CORKY AND I ARE GOING ON TO BARCELONA, GAME ON SATURDAY. CALL ME.”

  She looked at the bedside clock. 3:20. She thought about calling just so he’d stop but instead rested her head back in the soft pillow. T.S. snuggled up by her side, she closed her eyes and, who knows how long after, dreamed:

  The phone rang. The message machine on, she yawned at the prospect of talking to Carl. She picked up. It was Seth. She said, Hi there, why don't you come over. Sure. We can go for a boat ride. She turned to a rustling and Seth stood by the side of her bed. She threw back the covers, pulled off her night shirt, reached for his hands, began kissing his fingers....

  She awoke to a real ringing, the bedside phone. She picked up. The answering machine audio playing, “No one is available….”

  She said sleepily, “Hello.”

  Carl: “Where the fuck you been!”

  She hung up. The phone began ringing again. After two rings, she heard the downstairs machine's audio playing then a click. No message.

  ****

  Up at six, Rachelle did her calisthenics, went downstairs and made some

  hazelnut cappuccino. T.S. stressed, he wouldn't eat.

  She said, “I'm sorry, we'll just have to work this through.”

  She decided to go shopping, went to the mall and walked around. Then she walked around. Then she got in her car and drove around. Then she went home, took T.S. and sailed around Lake Lansing in Percy Bysshe Shelley. Came back, took a swim. Cajoled T.S.

  And everywhere there was Seth.

  His touch floored me. And when he kissed me … try to be adult. If you were adult, you would not be in this pickle. How juvenile and unscientific. Scientific! You! Call 911! Call Elisabeth! Somebody. It's a sexual attraction that would be over after the first union. For him or you?

  She found herself angry for thinking of their relationship at such a visceral lever. She wanted it to be on a higher level. She wanted it to be beautiful.

  Do you hear yourself Zannes, this is mad.

  Remembering his tenderness, she was weak, sweaty, she had never been sweaty before over a male. It's obscene. Oh, really. Wait until Carl....

  Sunday was more of the same. Wandering around shopping malls, sailing, swimming. Unable to think of food, she drank a half-liter of white merlot. Dozen calls from Carl, she didn't answer. T.S. was in hiding.

  Sunday night warm, she put on white silk pajamas and, thunder and lightning nearby, sat in the upstairs study nursing a glass of white merlot. A window open, the curtains billowed from a heady breeze. Out of nowhere T.S. jumped beside her and made big-time eye contact.

  She said, “I know.”

  She took up her journal and wrote:

  Seth, Seth, Seth … this is stupid, idiotic, maddening. Grade school nonsense … is it? I want to devour him, give him, mother him, love him, everything. It is not a wanting from him. I want to overpower him with giving, draw him into me and surround him, protect him. I can't do this.

  She paused, said to herself, “Why can't you, Doc? Do an experiment. Hypothesis: Young men and older women have more fun. Or the null, young men and older women have less fun.”

  T.S. purred.

  “Thank you very much, I need you purring just now.”

  He yawned.

  She wrote:

  It has happened. It is born. A living thing. Growing by leaps and bounds. You're so very fortunate. Many people never know. Never realize what you have found. Take it. Live it. The world will be better for it. The human race will be more human. And don't be gumming, when you are seventy, “What might have been.”

  She thought a minute then wrote:

  Molecules have rearranged themselves in a unique one and only one pattern so that nothing in the future will ever be the same. Possibly never again. I feel like I'm reaching a time when all the hours, the time of the past is speeding
together like sand in an hour glass, rushing to pass through the tiny passage through which all the grains must pass. Rushing, longing, grasping, and then calm. If not the calm then what? Love or a battering of regret? Whatever happens, let it not be the tragedy of a moment gone. The wink not winked. The hello not said. Seize it, relish it, live it … be his summer sun, winter warmth. I want him in me all over me, and we will grow a forest of love.

  As if he had read her thoughts, T.S. jumped off her lap.

  “That bad huh.”

  Just then the bedside phone rang. Thinking it must be Carl, she went to the phone. Caller ID indicated anonymous.

  Seth? Her heart skipped a beat. She picked up. The recorded message ended. She said “Hello.”

  No response but she sensed that someone was there.

  “Hello.”

  Nothing.

  She hung up. The phone began ringing again. She picked up, “Hello.”

  Recorded message ended, a moment of silence, then a long shrill hyena- like laugh.

  She hung up. Her immediate thought, “Kids, pranks, wrong number.”

  Later than night, in bed with T.S. by her side, lightning and thunder, steady rain, she thought she heard someone on the deck. She looked, nothing.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  For Seth, the time since he left Rachelle in his apartment passed like a long flight over endless seas. Saturday morning he drove Jude to the airport. An emotional send off, they would write, keep in touch; he would keep her posted on his apparition. He then delivered her car to Ron's Ford dealership and took a bus home.

  Beneath the sickness at the loss of Jude, every thought, everything he touched, every place he looked—Rachelle. Her smell, her freshness, her face, her touch, her voice, her teeth, everywhere. Rachelle, Rachelle, Rachelle.

  Damn!

  Sick is easy, he thought. I have never been this whatever-it-is before. Who are you kidding? You know what it is. Say it. What started it all. Love.

  He couldn't work. He tried to paint but the thought of living with her, sleeping with her, eating with her, breathing her breath destroyed his concentration.