Lake Life

by David James Poissant

Marco sets the spoonbill down. He stands and moves to the far side of the room. There are three paintings left hanging, and all three come down. “I have talent? You arrogant prick. You think I don’t know that? You think I’ve been waiting half a decade for Jacob Percival Russell to tell me that?”

  “I only—”

  “Here’s how this ends, Jake. You’re going to have a bad show. Maybe not the next show. Or the next. But somewhere down the line, some critic will decide they’ve had enough of you. Your work’s become derivative, they’ll say, a parody of itself. A second critic will echo that critic, then another, until there’s a consensus and you’re done.”

  Marco grabs the spoonbill, wraps it, and stuffs it in the box. He tapes the box shut.

  “Best-case scenario? When you’re seventy, someone floats a ‘forgotten masters’ puff piece in the Times. Your name gets dropped, but so do twenty others. One of those names ends up in lights, and, if it’s yours, people buy your work again. But let’s not kid ourselves. We both know your name won’t be the one that’s called. Because it’s not about the art. It’s about the artist. And what are you? You’re white, you’re cis, you’re upper-class, you’re male. You’re not what the art world needs right now. Fifty years from now, they’ll need you even less.”

  Marco wraps the last three paintings. He’s out of boxes, and he leans the frames against the wall. He won’t look at Jake. He’s said too much, or else he hasn’t said enough.

  “Ask Frank to show you a list of his clients sometime,” Marco says. “Ask to see the past thirty years. See how few names you recognize, and you’ll see just how ruthless this business is. Maybe then you’ll wonder what’s so wrong with picking a city you love, settling down, and making work that sells. Because, trust me, in twenty years, when you’re broke, when you don’t know where to go, when people are cracking jokes that Jake Russell sounds like a fucking dog breed, I’ll still be here, happy, painting birds.”

  Marco straightens. He stares at Jake.

  “I have talent. Fuck you.”

  Jake loved this man. He loves him still. He wants to hug him, wants to hit him.

  “Paint your birds,” Jake says. “But make real art too.”

  “Real art.”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “It’s fine. You can’t help it. It’s who you are. But here’s the truth. I’ve tried. I’ve tried, and I can’t paint that way anymore. Whatever dreamland I was in at twenty, I can’t find my way back to that place. I don’t expect you to understand.”

  Jake wants to say he understands, that he hasn’t worked a paintbrush in months, but that shame is private. If too intimate to share with Thad, it’s certainly too intimate for Marco.

  Marco stacks sealed boxes against one wall and begins unpacking boxes of new work. He unwraps a painting and hands it to Jake. A pair of robins watch Jake from a nest.

  Marco unwraps more and hangs them on the wall. The paintings are uniform, same frames, same size, which makes it easy, putting up a show. Marco gestures, and Jake hangs the robins on a hook.

  “Is it that hard to believe I’m happy?” Marco asks.

  It is. Because Jake would not be happy. He’d rather take Michael’s route. He’d rather sell men’s shoes than make bad art. At least that would be honest work. But this, this gallery, these paintings on the wall, nothing about this strikes Jake as honest.

  “I thought you’d be different,” Marco says. “When I reached out, I thought we’d have both grown up, calmed down. But you’re still the little boy in the black jacket who thinks he’s better than everybody else. It must kill you, knowing I don’t envy what you have.”

  Jake moves to touch him, and Marco pushes his hand away.

  All around them, the birds seem to flutter, come to life, warble and hum, wingbeat and song.

  “Look at you,” Marco says. “How Thad puts up with you, I’ll never know.”

  Jake rests his hands on Marco’s shoulders, and Marco lets himself be touched. Then Marco does the same, Jake’s shoulders in his hands.

  They don’t hug. They’ll never hug again. They’re wrestlers, swaying, weary from the fight. Their foreheads touch, and there’s no love in it. Still, they stand that way a long, long time.

  25.

  Tackle fills the kitchen table. Hooks and spinners, floats and lures, swivels and sinkers and weights. This morning, when Richard set out to tidy and consolidate his tackle, he hadn’t realized just how much he had. Even once he’s inserted the extra table leaf, there isn’t enough surface to spread out all of his gear.

  Wastebasket beside him, Richard tosses what he can into the trash. A pink jig with half a hook. A cracked rattletrap. A spinnerbait minus skirt and blades.

  Amazing, the merchandise a person can amass in thirty years. Richard’s father would be disgusted. Growing up with little, Richard was raised to look down on the type of person he’s become: elitist, academic, upper middle class—someone who has more than he needs, who, most days, fails to appreciate all he has. There are more lures here than he’ll use in this lifetime, more Florida potboilers in the garage than he can read before he’s dead.

  His sons are the same.

  Every Christmas Michael shows up with the latest, most expensive phone. Meanwhile he can’t pay his bills and asks Richard to write another check.

  Thad, at least, is frugal, his accumulation contained to the books and comics he can afford. There’s a passion attached to these purchases, and Richard hopes that lasts, hopes books make Thad happy the rest of his life. As a boy, Thad had trouble sticking to one thing. First he liked to draw. Then it was sports, football and baseball. By high school it was theater, then music. He had a band—what was the name of it? Thad played the keyboard, the most dispensable of high school garage band instruments, and sure enough, within a year the band had dispensed with him.

  Richard throws out more rusty lures, a hook without a barb.

  Diane joins him from the kitchen, and Richard clears a place for her to set her plate, the sandwich she’s made herself for lunch.

  “They’re beautiful,” Diane says, running a finger over the exaggerated eyes of a Hula Popper. In all the years she’s joined them on the lake, she’s never accompanied Richard fishing.

  “Where’d everyone run off to?” Richard asks. Sleeping late, he was surprised to wake to a half-empty house.

  “Michael went to Highlands. Lisa’s at church. Jake left early, not sure where, but Thad wouldn’t let him take their car, so he got a rental. Not sure what that’s about. I didn’t even know we had Enterprise out here. If you’re heading into town, there’s Thad’s car. I can’t tell if he’s not sharing or just not sharing with Jake.”

  “That’s all right,” Richard says. “A day at the lake will be nice.”

  Beyond the window, the boats are gone, sun up, the water like glass. This is the bay he remembers. This is the lake he loves.

  Then Thad is with them. The coffeepot’s gone cold, but he pours what’s left into a mug and microwaves the mug. He asks where everybody’s gone, Diane gives him the same spiel she gave Richard, and he joins them at the table. He sips his coffee and pokes at a silver spoon lure, its surface scored like the handles of a walnut cracker.

  “Careful, Son,” Richard says, then feels bad. All this time, he’s let Diane browse the tackle, undisturbed. He tries not to do this, to treat his sons’ partners with more respect than he treats his sons, but it’s hard not to, the way his sons behave at times, the questionable choices they make. He loves them, fully, unconditionally. But respect comes harder than love.

  “I think Mom threw my comics out,” Thad says.

  “I’m sure they’ll turn up,” Richard says. “Hand me that float.”

  Thad slides a red bobber across the table. “The boxes were white cardboard. Long ones, a few hundred comics in each. Some were pretty valuable.”

  “Hey,” Richard says, “how about a joke?”

  His son’s not stupid. It won’t be lost on him that his
old man’s changing the subject. Still, Richard draws from his dusty arsenal of well-worn jokes.

  “What’s the difference between a hippo and a Zippo?”

  “I don’t know,” Diane says. “What’s the difference?”

  “One’s heavy, and one’s a little lighter.”

  Diane laughs appreciatively. Thad’s heard the joke before. He’s heard all of Richard’s jokes before.

  “That band you were in,” Richard says, “what was it called?”

  “You were in a band?” Diane asks.

  “Dad’s using the word band pretty liberally,” Thad says. “More like five high school guys and a garage. We did some Weezer, some Blink-182, a lot of Green Day. This was 2004, so we knew American Idiot inside and out.”

  “But the band name,” Richard says.

  “Inadequate Grass,” Thad says.

  “That’s it. That’s the name.”

  “You remember the computer game?” Thad asks Diane. “Oregon Trail?”

  “Sure,” Diane says. “ ‘Little Timmy has died of typhoid.’ ”

  “Exactly. You’d be on the trail, there’d be a drought, and your oxen would die from ‘Inadequate Grass.’ ”

  Richard isn’t following any of this. He’s trying to remember if he’s ever even played a video game.

  “We had T-shirts, too,” Thad says. “Name on the front, a pot leaf on the back. We thought we were so edgy. We couldn’t wear them, since you aren’t supposed to wear the shirt of the band you’re in, so we tried to sell them. We did a few gigs, battles of the bands. We dragged that box of shirts to every show and never sold a single one.” He turns to Richard. “Maybe that box of shirts is around here too. In the garage. With my comic books.”

  The table cleared of damaged gear, Richard files bobbers and lures into the trays of his tackle box.

  “I believe I’ll go fishing this afternoon,” he announces.

  “I’m off to Nico’s,” Thad says.

  Diane says nothing, and Richard hates picturing her left alone with her sandwich. He wishes he knew why she and Michael are at odds. He wishes he knew how to help.

  “If you’d like to come with me…?” he says.

  The invitation isn’t insincere, but Diane waves it away, and he wonders if she thinks it was. Or perhaps she’d rather have some time to herself. He’s not the best conversationalist.

  Diane eats her sandwich. Thad goes to his room. Richard stands.

  The wastebasket beside him is filled with broken things, gouged Styrofoam floats, bent hooks, lures too rusty to attract fish. The tackle box, when he picks it up, is lighter, packed only with what might still be of use.

  26.

  Highlands doesn’t have a good bar, let alone a good dive bar, and nothing like the loud, dark-cornered bars back home. Days off, or after work, Michael’s butt has warmed the stools of every Dallas–Fort Worth bar there is. He pays cash so Diane can’t track his movements on the credit cards, though she has been known to ask him why so many ATM withdrawals.

  There was one place in Highlands last year. Decent. Cheap. Henry’s, maybe? Harry’s? Something with an H. Or else a W. Willy’s? He’s not sure. He had moonshine this morning, before he left the house, and he’s having trouble combing through his thoughts.

  He passes Nico’s and pulls onto Main Street, a three-block strip of boutique shops and cafés. He turns onto a side street and parallel parks his Hyundai between a new model Mercedes and a stately Lincoln Town Car. The people who live here have money. He checks his wallet—he has enough cash for three drinks, maybe four—then he’s out of the car and looking for Henry’s. Or Willy’s. Any bar will do.

  Church bells sing out eleven o’clock. Fuck him, it’s Sunday. State blue laws mean he has an hour to kill, assuming he can even find a place that serves on Sundays. Blood floods his hands, his face, adrenaline at the thought he might not get his liquor. Which is pathetic. It’s not like he doesn’t know how pathetic that is.

  He’ll stop drinking soon.

  He can’t stop. Half a day, and his hands shake. Next come the headaches, cold sweats, stomachaches and cramps.

  He hurries down the sidewalk, checking every awning, every window for signs of alcohol. The day is overcast, like the sky wants to rain again but can’t. The street isn’t yet bustling, most people are at church or waiting for places to open up. Ahead, an older woman guides her Chihuahua into a purveyor of gluten-free dog treats.

  Michael stops in at two brunch places, thinking of mimosas, but both give him the same answer—no alcohol before noon—and he walks on.

  He passes the bakery, the coffeehouse that has a different name each year, the old theater that’s been a storefront for at least five businesses since Michael was a kid. Still, the frontage is the same, the Galaxy logo where the single-screen movie theater used to be, the missing G, letters rusted red. Spines erupt from each letter’s peak—pigeon repellant—and Michael can’t help wondering whether a bird’s ever been skewered, and whose job it was to clean up the mess.

  He passes the Highlands Fine Art Gallery, then doubles back. The window is wide. It drips, recently squeegeed. Inside, brightly colored canvases interrupt the walls. He can’t tell if they’re any good. He doesn’t understand abstract art. He likes Jake’s stuff all right. Jake doesn’t just splash a canvas and call it art. His paintings may not make sense, but at least the objects in them look like objects from real life. At least there’s skill involved.

  Once, Michael asked Jake what the painting he made for the lake house meant, but Jake only laughed at him. “What does it mean?” he asked. “What do your shoes mean? What’s the meaning of the sun?” Michael wanted to argue that such meanings were self-evident. Shoes protect your feet. The sun’s essential to life on earth. But Michael had already learned his lesson. No matter how nice Jake seems, no matter the gifts or cash he throws around, no matter his upbringing or how much he’s overcome, Thad’s boyfriend is still a dick.

  Plus, Jake’s never given Diane his time or professional counsel as an artist, never asked to see her work, and Diane, all this time, has been too shy to ask. Jake knows she sculpts, she paints, and he couldn’t act less interested.

  Fuck Jake. Michael will do something nice for Diane. A present. Something that says, Please don’t divorce me. I’m sorry. I’m scared.

  The gallery is open, and he goes in. He may not know what’s good, but he knows what his wife likes. Given a dozen paintings, he could pick the one that best matches the work hanging on their walls, none of which is Diane’s, a fact Michael finds bewildering. Artists don’t display their own work, they sell it, his wife says. Never mind that no one’s buying, that their spare bedroom’s packed with Diane’s paintings, vases, pots.

  The gallery is wide, Pac-Manned with low, freestanding walls like office cubicles, a labyrinth of art. Michael hears voices and follows them to the middle of the maze where a man and woman stand, talking. The man is older, gray hair, gray suit. The woman’s middle-aged, enormous glasses balanced on her nose. Her hair is bobbed, her forehead bangs. What is it about turning forty that makes every woman cut her hair so short?

  The man holds a framed painting, and the woman examines it. The painting depicts the northern lights over a mountain range, and it’s beautiful. Michael’s shocked, actually, to find such beauty in this place. The woman moves toward the painting until her face is inches from the canvas, then backs away. She pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

  “Original,” she asks, “or—” then she says something that sounds to Michael like g-clay.

  “It’s a g-clay,” the man says.

  Michael half expects the guy to call her madam. He must be the owner or curator, or whatever you call the person who runs a gallery. He wears glasses of his own, lenses nickel-rimmed and round. He gives Michael’s presence no acknowledgment. Neither of them do.

  The woman stares at the painting awhile longer. Everything about the man’s posture, the expression on his face, says he’s
not a man who’s used to holding paintings, but that for this customer he makes an exception.

  “I was hoping for an original, not a g-clay,” she says.

  Michael really needs these people to stop saying g-clay.

  “It’s a fine print,” the man says.

  So g-clay means print? Why not say print? Is there something special about a g-clay, or does it just make buyers feel special saying it?

  “I assure you,” the man says. “This g-clay is number four of fifty. Very limited.”

  Say the word again, and Michael will g-clay the nearest canvas with his fist.

  “The only original in this series,” the man says, “is the Reykjavík.”

  Michael’s turned to leave, but Reykjavík turns him around. Reykjavík is a word he knows. It is the capital of Iceland. He knows this because Diane has always said she’d like to go.

  Michael turns back, and the man holds up a painting of Iceland’s capital at night. The image is mostly grays and greens, a little dull, a little rushed-looking compared to the print.

  The woman brings a hand to her cheek. Her thumb worries her ear. “I prefer the g-clay. But I’d love to have an original. I’d take both, except we’re running out of room. I never should have had that kitchen wall knocked down.”

  Michael doesn’t mean to laugh. They turn.

  “I’ll be with you shortly,” the man says.

  The woman looks away. “I’ll have to think about this. Can you hold them for me?”

  “Absolutely,” the man says. “Just remember, twenty-four hours.”

  “Of course. I won’t make that mistake again.”

  It’s only once the man has returned the painting to the wall and escorted the woman slowly, talkatively, out, that Michael sees the painting he wants. It’s neither of the paintings the woman’s put on reserve. It’s a landscape. Nothing grand, which is good. Diane doesn’t do grand. She prefers understated, would have, for example, preferred a smaller house. She’d love the landscape on the wall. A black road runs between green hills, blue sky above, not one cloud creeping in.