by Arden, Alys
“Good news, I finally found someone to repair the wall. Name’s Isaac Thompson. He’s down from New York City with his pop, working with Habitat for Humanity to rebuild houses. You’ll never believe it, but we’re doing a barter. He’s going to help me fix the wall in exchange for some art lessons.”
“Wait, what?” I felt like I was on another planet. Isaac has been rebuilding houses?
“He wants art lessons. I figured since we are going to be working on your NOSA mentorship every day, it might be nice for you to have a partner in crime.” He smiled. “What’s wrong, sweetheart? Do you know this boy?”
“Apparently not,” I answered, still trying to process this Dr. Jekyll side of him. Isaac put the measuring tape down and looked up at me. My stomach surprised me with a small flutter.
Insecurity erupted.
I ran upstairs to get changed, cursing the stupid school uniform on my way, and quickly came back down in jeans and an old concert tee. My father had cleared off his workbench to simulate a classroom, and Isaac was sweeping up wall crumbles. I took a seat on one of the kitchen stools and tried to hide my disbelief that I was about to start my apprenticeship with Isaac.
When he finished, he leaned on the table next to me and looked me straight in the eyes. “Do you want me to leave?” The vulnerability in his voice hit me unexpectedly.
“Whatever. This day couldn’t possibly get any more random.”
“Famous last words,” he said and pulled the other stool next to me.
A smile twitched my lips. His usual smug attitude had been replaced with… something else. Even though I was glad my father could get the wall fixed, I wasn’t buying Isaac’s innocent act just yet.
My dad stood before us in full metalsmith safety gear: boots, rubber apron, giant gloves and helmet. I’d seen him dressed like this thousands of times, but now it seemed utterly ridiculous. I had to suppress giggles as he droned on for twenty minutes about the importance of safety when working with chemicals and fire.
“I can’t believe you are willingly subjecting yourself to this,” I whispered to Isaac, without moving my head to look at him.
“Whatever, Mac is so cool,” he whispered back.
I rolled my eyes and smiled.
“All right, let’s move on,” my father instructed. He seemed a bit nervous. “Take out your sketch pads.”
“What?” I asked. “Why? Aren’t we going to work with metal?”
“We will. Later.”
“Later? After all of that?”
His eyes pleaded with me to cut him some slack.
I dashed upstairs to get my supplies and, upon my return, found Isaac’s sketchpad lying on the table. Recent café memories flooded back, and I had to sit on my hands to keep myself from throwing it across the room.
Breathe.
I’d never met anyone who stirred such polarizing feelings in me, besides maybe my mother. Maybe his Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde thing is rubbing off on me?
My father put one of his sculptures on the table – a two-foot-tall prototype of the ballerina at NOSA.
“I’m going to give you twenty minutes to draw this figure.” He set an egg timer. “I want you to think about proportion and depth perception. Try to draw it as close to scale as you can.”
I gazed at the figure and then back down at the blank page, trying to figure out where to start. I had only drawn three lines before my father came over and changed the position of my pencil in my hand.
“It feels awkward now,” he said, “but once you get used to it, you’ll have more control over the amount of pressure you’re applying.”
He repositioned Isaac’s pencil, too, and then sat down across from us with this own sketchpad.
When the timer buzzed, my father put down his pad, but neither Isaac nor I did. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that my father had not only sketched the entire figure but had already moved on to shading it. Isaac seemed to have finished the outline of the dancer. I was stuck on the feet.
“Pencils down. Don’t worry if you aren’t finished. I probably should have given you a bowl of fruit, but, ya know, there isn’t a piece of produce within fifty miles of this place.” He stood behind me and looked over my shoulder. “Nice job for a first try, especially given the time constraint.” My father was good at turning a critique into some kind of backhanded compliment. “You need to work on proportion. See how your dancer is elongated?”
“Commentary on the emaciated state of ballerinas?” Isaac joked.
I shot him a dirty look. Just because I let him stay did not mean I was interested in his critique.
My father moved on to Isaac’s pad.
“Nice job with the form, especially the slight arch of the back. Capturing movement is one of the hardest parts of drawing.”
I tried not to get into a competitive mindset, but I was definitely annoyed that Isaac was already head of the class. As I listened to my father give him advanced tips, my attention moved to the pile of drawing tools on the table in front of me. I could swear the pile was moving.
My nose inched closer – an X-Acto knife was vibrating, causing the pile of charcoal pencils to shake. I blinked a couple of times, and the knife bounced.
I quickly slapped the tool down on the table and reached for its safety cap, causing them both to look up at me. I smiled, and they went back to the critique.
The knife continued to vibrate on the table. Even capped, the little blade made me nervous. I rested a book on top of it.
“Are you okay, sweetheart?” my father asked with a quizzical look.
“Mm hmm.”
It rolled out from under the book and onto the floor. Out of sight, out of mind.
“Okay, we’re going to repeat the exercise.” He turned the statue upside down and leaned it in between two stacks of books so she stood on her head. “But this time I want you to try to forget this is a ballerina. Forget you know she’s a woman and that she’s wearing a tutu. Forget she’s wearing a mask. I want you to look at the object like a newborn baby would, and draw what you see. A series of lines and curves. Groups of shadows and highlights. Try to draw each line exactly as you see it, and replicate each area of negative space as it relates to the boundaries which create it.”
“Why are we doing this, Dad?” I asked, genuinely interested in the process.
“Our minds are trained to call on experiences we already know. Since you know you are drawing a ballerina, your memory informs you what a ballerina should look like. Turning the statue upside down will help you to draw what youseeinstead of what youknow. Fight your intuition; draw what feels instinctual.”
After staring for a couple of minutes, my mind eventually let go of the image of the upside-down ballerina, and I began to draw lines and shadows as if it was natural. When the timer went off, we both put down our pencils and eagerly flipped our pads around. I expected to see a crazy tangle of graphite, but, to my surprise, a ballerina was staring back at me – feet and all.
“Whoa.”
“This is crazy,” said Isaac.
I looked over at his two sketches. The second was nearly perfect. “Nice job.”
“You both did a nice job,” my father said. “Sometimes, being an artist is about forgetting the constructs society has been instilling in you since birth.”
“Oh my God, Dad, you sound like…”
“What?”
“You sound like an actual teacher.”
He laughed. “Is that so shocking?”
“Well, yeah, kind of… it’s just that teachers are old and bald, and you are… I don’t know, not that.”
“What are you saying? You think I’m cool?”
“Well, no, you are still my dad.”
“On that note, I’m going to quit while I’m ahead. That’s it for the day.”
“Thanks, Mac. That was awesome.”
Does he mean that, or is he just sucking up? My day around the student body of Sacred Heart had me questioning everyone’s motives.
/> My dad turned the miniature statue upright and asked, “So, Isaac, how long have you been in town?”
“We arrived from New York about forty-eight hours after the Storm hit, since my father was consulting for the Feds on the initial damage assessment—”
“How exactly did you get in from New York that soon after the Storm hit?” I asked.
“We flew to Jackson, Mississippi, and then drove down to Stennis Space Center. The National Guard took us to the city limits in a giant Hummer, transferred us to a boat, and sent us downriver to the French Quarter. It was pretty surreal. We thought we’d be here for a couple of weeks, but you know how the story goes.”
Isaac came down on a rescue mission? Seriously?
“So, how do you like New Orleans, despite everything?” my father asked.
“Well, to be honest, sir, I haven’t really seen much of the city. I have to get up at four-thirty a.m. to be on site by five. Plus, the curfew.”
“That’s very admirable, son.”
“Thanks. I would really like to see the city, though. It seems like a pretty special place.”
I struggled not to snap my pencil in half. I could see where this was going.
“Well, I’m sure Adele wouldn’t mind showing you around. Right, sweetheart?”
“Dad!”
“What? You know so much about the city from all of those books you read, and you can explain how everything is supposed to look. How it will be again, once everything is rebuilt—”
“I would love that,” Isaac said, trying to look innocent.
Trickster,I thought, fuming.
“You want to see the town?” I asked sweetly. “Meet me in front of the Cathedral at seven.”
“It’s a date,” he replied, with a look of concern at my sudden change in mood.
“It’s not a date,” my father corrected. “Don’t make me change my mind.”
“I mean, not a date date—”
“If she’s not back by curfew, I can assure you, there will never be another nondate. Is that clear?”
“You’ve got room to talk,” I muttered.
“What was that, sweetheart—?”
“Yes, sir,” Isaac said. “You don’t have to worry.”
“I’m serious, Isaac. I get that you’re from New York City, but crime’s different here. If I hear that she leaves your sight, it will be the last time you hang out.”
“Dad!”
“No problem, sir. I completely understand, Mr. Le Moyne— I mean, Mac.”
“I’ll make sure I’m back by curfew, not Isaac,” I snapped. “Don’t talk about me as if I am not here!” I began to yawn uncontrollably. I tried my best to fight it, but the sleepless night was catching up with me. “I need to take a nap if I am going to make it through our date tonight.”
“It’s not a date, Adele!” my father insisted as I left the table.
“Uh huh.” I hoped it made him sweat. That was the least he deserved for inadvertently playing matchmaker.
“I’ll see you at seven in front of the Cathedral,” Isaac said. I turned back from the door – he tried not to smile while he packed up his things.
“Don’t be late or the deal’s off.”
Chapter 18 Downtown Boys, pt 2
I could have easily slept through the night.
Yawning, I cranked the Victrola and forced myself into sheer turquoise tights and a black sweater-dress from Paris. If I was late meeting Isaac, my grand plan wouldn’t work out.
I quickly reapplied the day’s makeup, stealing a few seconds to add a little smoky eyeliner – there was a decent chance we would run into my father down at the bar, and I hoped my appearance would make him think twice before putting me into this position again. Spritz of perfume. His behavior had surprised me. Normally, he did anything he could to keep boys away. Especially boys with long hair and attitudes. Accessorized, I reknotted the loose bun on top of my head and skipped out the door just as “Ziggy Stardust” wound down.
* * *
The sun was setting; a breeze pricked my legs through the tights – the temperature had dropped since I’d last been out. I debated going back for a jacket, but didn’t want to risk being late.
Jackson Square felt creepy without the fortunetellers, artists, and street performers that usually littered the pedestrian streets late into the night. I was surprised but happy to see a few other people standing around the old town square. Isaac was sitting on the steps of the gated park in front of the Cathedral. When the click of my ankle booties against the slate came within earshot, he looked up.
“Hey.” The relief in his voice didn’t escape me.
“Did you think I wasn’t going to show?”
“No, but I guess I kind of deserve to be stood up.”
“Yeah, don’t ever pull anything like that again.”
“Just say yes the next time I ask you out and I won’t have to.” I immediately wanted to smack off his curt smile, but before I could fire back, he quickly added, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I don’t want to fight on our first date.”
“It’s not a date, remember?”
“Call it whatever you want. I’m just glad I managed to get you here.”
“It’s not like I really had any say in the matter.”
He ignored the comment. “So what are we doing here, anyway?”
“Ma bébé!” That was exactly the booming voice I wanted to hear. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”
I turned around, straight into a crushing hug. “Ren… ribs… can’t breathe.”
His eyes were fixed on Isaac before he even set me down. “Hmm, curious…”
“Ren, Isaac wants to learn about the great city of La Nouvelle-Orléans, so I thought, what better way to get to know the city than on your walking tour?”
“I see. Oui, oui. Bienvenue.” He looked Isaac up and down, as if assessing his heckler-likelihood.
Isaac leaned close to me and lowered his voice: “Nice one.”
I tried my best to contain my extra-wide grin.
“Laissez les bon temps rouler!” Ren yelled, accepting the challenge.
Isaac looked to me. “Are you going to give me a clue?”
I laughed. “In Louisiana at least, it means, ‘Let the good times roll.’”
“Gather around, everyone,” Ren called out to the few people lingering in the square. “So glad you all decided to brave the nightfall. I’m sad to say this tour is going to be cut a little short thanks to the Parish-wide curfew, but don’t worry, you’ll still get all the tales because we won’t be making any drinking pit stops. Unfortunately, everything is closed. Everything legal that is, er—” He cut himself off when he saw the inquisitive look on my face. “But please feel free to partake in your own libations if you brought them.” He lifted his coat to reveal his flask. “It is perfectly legal to drink here on the streets of La Nouvelle-Orléans.”
The tour hadn’t even begun and already people were enthralled by Ren. “I wonder if he dresses like that all the time?” one of them whispered. I chuckled. Ren was in full gear tonight, somewhere in between the gentleman pirate Jean Laffite and the vampire Lestat.
A quick round of introductions told us that five out of the eight other people on the tour were recovery workers from various organizations and one couple was visiting to help relatives clean out their house. The last person, a blonde woman, offered no real information about herself. Her hair, which flowed down her back in beautiful, wild waves, was so bright it glowed white, and despite the temperature she wore a skintight tank top and a gauzy pink skirt that blew when the breeze picked up. How is she not freezing?
I looked at Isaac, who was just in a white T-shirt. “Aren’t you cold?”
“No, I’m a New Yorker, remember?”
“Right, how could I have forgotten?”
The woman looked at me, her lips puckering daringly. Chills swept up my spine. I looked away and crossed my arms.
“Oh, are you cold?” he asked.
“
No, I’m fine.” I dropped my arms to appear more convincing.
Ren went around collecting money. When he got to us, Isaac pulled out two twenty-dollar bills.
“I can get my own ticket.”
“No, I got it. You wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for me,” he insisted, but I shook my head. I didn’t want to owe Isaac anything.
“Like I’d ever take your money, ma chérie,” Ren said to me. “But I’ll gladly take yours.” He plucked one of the bills from between Isaac’s fingers.
“I promise, I’ll be on my best behavior,” he reassured Ren.
“Oh, honey, I love trouble. Don’t change your ways on account of me.”
“I’m not changing them on account of you,” Isaac said and then glanced at me.
“Interesting…,” Ren mumbled, looking back and forth between us, “very interesting.”
My eyes dropped to the floor.
“Time to start, folks!” he yelled to the group and then beckoned us to follow him down Pirate's Alley just as the sun set.
The flames in the gas lamps became visible, creating the perfect ambiance for a ghost tour, and the bells in the steeple clanged as if they were a planned part of his act. He stopped halfway down the alley and, after an attention-commanding pause, proceeded to tell us the story of how the infamous alley got its name. As he spoke, he focused briefly on something behind us, and then the echoing sounds of heels on stone became louder. I turned to see the silhouette of a girl running down the alley towards us.
Is that Désirée Borges?
Isaac’s back stiffened. “Do you know that girl?”
“Sort of.”
“Sorry, I’m late,” she grumbled, pulling cash from her wallet, but Ren shook his hand, motioning for her not to interrupt. She merged into the group next to me. I couldn’t tell if she was annoyed or relieved to see someone she knew. Especially since that someone was me.
“What are you doing here?” I whispered.
“My dad forced me.” She sounded annoyed. “You know, help boost tourism, support local businesses, blah, blah, blah.”