Josh isn’t sure about this type. He likes it; he knows that. He’s shown it to Jenna, and she likes it, too. It doesn’t look like anything he’s seen before, which excites him, when he lets himself think about it. He’s relieved to have left his Art Nouveau phase behind, though it was important to go through that. He’s trying not to worry about it. For now he’s paying the bills, and the type is his secret. He has told his parents he is writing a book of criticism about contemporary epic poetry. “Contemporary epic poetry is hot,” he tells his mother over the phone. “Unlimited potential for growth.”
They rent a studio apartment to save money for their supplies. Josh works in an outbuilding—an old garage—that was supposed to have been torn down decades ago. The place smells of mold, motor oil, and dust, odors that appeal to him because he associates them with his work. When Jenna finishes with her composition for the evening, she fires up the hibachi, sets up two lawn chairs outside the garage door, and grills hot dogs or brownish beef or catfish—whatever is on sale at Winn-Dixie. She rations their beer. She hands him a sweating bottle. “Your mother’s talking about a visit.” He looks up from his work. “Let her.” He knows she won’t come. She doesn’t understand that he hasn’t given anything up.
At night, they nurse their beers and walk barefoot through the neighborhood. The frogs make a racket in the pond, and small rats wriggle and swirl on its banks. In the darkness, Josh sees letters floating, swooping in and out of his field of vision. He could shake his head to clear the images, but he doesn’t. For a moment he wonders how much longer he and Jenna can go on. Will she tire of this life? Will he? How will it ever change? Jenna has been humming more or less the same tune. She retraces an auditory path, making little detours and variations. Her lips move, and her eyes are unfocused yet alert. He hears her work it out. She pulls her hand away from his and takes her music from her back pocket. She darts across the boulevard, wincing over small rocks and broken glass, to the illuminated steps of the community center. This is the best life they have known.
In the morning, they ride the bus to work with the community college students and mothers with babies on their way to day care, then jobs. They get coffee in the café before the store opens. Jenna puts on her nametag and heads off to Classics, where she hides from customers. Because her work is portable, she plays the How-Can-I-Make-This-Measure-Better game while she hides. She is the point person in Music for modern American composers, but no one ever asks about modern American composers. Josh loves that about her—that she has a passion for something hardly anyone cares about. He loves the way she walks around with her compositions folded lengthwise in the back pocket of her jeans. He loves the demented, possessed look that crosses her face when she is desperate to reach her hideout, before the sound escapes her. When he sees her this way, possessed by her work, he feels a roar inside him; he wants to circle around her, to guard the entrance to her cave in Classics. She looks like anyone, except for the dappled quality of alert dreaminess. No one knows who she is, but he has caught a glimpse of her. He can’t wait to see what she will do.
Acknowledgments
I’m grateful and indebted to many, including the following:
To the editors of the journals in which these stories have appeared, my thanks for their encouragement: Big Fiction: “Three Portraits of Elaine Shapiro”; The Cincinnati Review: “Girls Come Calling,” “Fine Arts,” and “Word Problem”; Consequence Magazine: “History of Art” and “Repatriation”; Fiction Southeast: “Chinese Opera”; Granta: “The War Artist”; The Lightship Anthology #3: “The Confused Husband”; Memorious: “The War Artist Makes God Visible”; The Rusty Toque: “Exile”; The Southern Review: “A Note on the Type” (forthcoming); Wraparound South: “Magnolia Grandiflora.”
To everyone at LSU Press, and especially to Michael Griffith and Susan Murray for their generous and careful attention to this manuscript.
To Miami University, the Ohio Arts Council, and the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center.
To Terra Chalberg, for her guidance.
To writers who graciously read various parts and versions of this manuscript over the years: David Ebenbach, Chris Bachelder, Hugh Hunter, David O’Gorman, Martha Otis, Jody Bates, Joe Squance, Zack Hill, Bethany Pierce, Dana Leonard, Deanne Devine, John Morogiello, David Schloss, Larisa Breton, Erin McGraw, and all the members of the FAWC summer workshops; and to the friends and family who helped with research: Jennifer Behrendt Dudas, Josh Russell, Ryan “Puddy” Hough, Gary Nicholson, Jim Rascati, Debora Greger; Brandy Kershner and Christina Carlton, for introducing me to Utrecht, my first glimpse of Europe. The errors and inadequacies are mine, not theirs.
To Billy, for his unflagging support.
Notes
Angela Gould’s painting 1933 to 2002 in Blue Green inspired the clock series described in “Magnolia Grandiflora.”
These sources provided inspiration, information, and insight:
Carter, Sebastian. Twentieth Century Type Designers. New York: Norton, 1995.
Caxotte, Pierre, Jacques Perret, Rover Nimier, and Robert Descharnes. Versailles que j’aime. Paris: Éditions Sun, 1958.
Gough, Paul. Stanley Spencer: Journey to Burghclere. Bristol, UK: Sansom, 2006.
McCarthy, Fiona. Stanley Spencer: An English Vision. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997.
Zim, Herbert S., and Ira N. Gabrielson. A Guide to the Most Familiar American Birds. Golden Nature Guide. New York: Golden Press, 1949.
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