Art Lessons

by Katherine Koller

  So be it, as Mr. Kaplan says. He’s always talking in Shakespearean lingo. It’s actually catching. I find myself quoting Mercutio from Romeo and Juliet to myself. Zounds. That dreamers often lie.

  Every other day my last class is English, and today Mr. Kaplan lets us read for the whole period. So my hand is home free. Turning pages with my left is a breeze. I get a kick out of what a suck Romeo is and wonder why Juliet even goes for him. I decide that she’s really repressed, and it wouldn’t matter who the dude was, she’d hang off her balcony for him, as long as he’s young and stupid like her.

  Dad took me to see the movie. It was an actual date, my first one with a guy. How sad to have it with your own dad, but it was weirdly fun. I think Mom was even a little bit jealous. Dad thought it might help me appreciate R & J. He set it up between all his travelling and even bought a jumbo popcorn and a Ginger Ale for me, and black licorice in a giant package to last us the whole way through. If Auntie Magda was there, she’d be crying from the very first scene. Leonardo DiCaprio tried really hard, but I didn’t cry. I actually laughed a bit into my straw. The kissing scenes are definitely awkward when you’re sitting with your Dad.

  Academic purposes, he whispers.

  Okay, Dad.

  It was a bit of a thrill, though, to be out on a weeknight with him. It felt grown up.

  The warts are still there on Friday in English, when the guy to my right hands me a note, and I’m forced to take it with my afflicted hand. It’s from Ricco two rows over. He’s Italian, studly and dark-eyed.

  Wanna go to DQ after?

  I glance over casually at him and nod.

  Is this, like, a real date? My hand dangles like it’s been hit by lightening, and I replace it in my pocket with the note, which gets squished and rubbed with sweat. My eyes are on the page but there’s a Grand Canyon in front of me for all I know. I decide what kind of Blizzard I’m going to get – but will he want to share one? No worries. The left hand will be fine with it. Straw in, hold the icy cup with the left. The mashed note in my right pocket feels like it’s on fire!

  The bell rings and I don’t rush because I’m not sure where I’m going to meet Ricco. Then I see him waiting at the end of the hall and I hurry it up at my locker, but on the walk over to Dairy Queen, the guy has nothing to say. He’s either totally shy or totally dumb. But he’s not a jock like my brothers. I’ve seen him behind the meat counter at the Italian Centre, calmly slicing meat while I redden and run to the nut aisle. But inside DQ in the line-up he smiles at me, and I’m Juliet.

  While we wait for our order, he flips open his cell phone to take a call and while we’re sitting it keeps on ringing. And he keeps on answering, and talking in that monosyllabic shorthand that makes guys sound like their entire vocabulary consists of fifteen words. He doesn’t erupt into Italian, which would be interesting, but he’s listening to a high-pitched stream of it. Like he’s late for work or something?

  When I realize that I actually had more fun with the Old Gent at eight on Monday morning, I get up, my Blizzard half-full. Strawberry Cheesecake comes off my personal menu forever. He’s on the phone again. I realize that he and I haven’t exchanged enough words out loud to make a conversation. I need another way to communicate here. I take out his macerated note from my pocket and before I can stop it, my right hand draws a straight-line non-smiley face on the back of it, drops it on the table, picks up the Blizzard, chucks it in the garbage and opens the door to the afternoon.

  On the way home, I take the walk instead of the bus. I shove the hoodie into my backpack and my right hand balances the straps over one shoulder in the mellow September sun. I let my cloistered hand breathe. My backpack feels featherweight with my right hand back in action.

  There’s a box of Band-Aids, the clear kind, on the kitchen counter. Mom makes spareribs, a mountain of them, and asks if I had a meeting after school, on a Friday. I only smile. Yeah, with the lamest Italian stallion since Romeo.

  Are you going up to draw for a bit?

  I nod.

  You can take those to your room if you want.

  She points to the Band-Aids and some mail with her knife.

  I wave thanks with my right hand. I can feel the strength pouring back into it. It’s ready for drawing, gloves off.

  I pick up the card, from Freddy. He’s weeks late, but he didn’t forget my fifteenth birthday.

  Auguste Rodin, The Kiss. Wish we could, love Freddy. How romantic. I think a long-distance Romeo is best, because you don’t have to see him up close. Or talk to him, even. Or be a victim of his confused hormones, never mind your own. Last year Freddy sent Auguste Renoir, Bouquet of Chrysanthemums. Freddy and waiting.

  I toast Freddy with some nail polish. Tomorrow is Saturday morning art class, at the art gallery. I’m wearing my tight tangerine shirt and black jeans. Even though they make you wear paint aprons over your clothes, I want my nails to match so I decide on Mandarin Mist. It’s a bit brighter than my shirt, so its name doesn’t really correspond with the colour but, as Babci would say, it mix good.

  I love colour names on cosmetics and used to fantasize about being a colour label-writer.

  Cranberry Spice is Mom’s lipstick.

  Roman Red is Babci’s.

  Auntie Magda likes Nectarine Toffee or Pagan Pink. She never wears red with her tan and blonde highlights.

  I only buy the ones that make sense to me, that truly say the value of the colour, so I mainly use lip gloss because I don’t actually believe most of the colours. I appreciate authentica, as the Old Gent says. But nail polish is different. It’s for fun, and I like feeling the smoothness of my nails. It makes me feel put together.

  I paint the left hand first, out of habit. Then I activate my newfound ambidexterity. I’ve never found painting the right hand difficult, but I always go slower. I challenge myself and go the same speed. And there it is, done in the same amount of time. No blobs. What a skill.

  Then I look closer. The six warts are gone, like blossoms that have dropped from the branch overnight. Even with my magnifying glass, there’s hardly a trace. The big one, the wicked instigator, still protrudes, but it’s less ominous without its minions. I consider angel power. I’ve been concentrating all week on finishing a tree series on roots upturned into the air, a school project I handed in today. The side-reaching roots form a canopy of their own, unearthed and exposed. I got the idea from Mom, who hangs her geraniums upside down on a string along the garage ceiling for the winter. Then she reroots them in water in early spring. I love that those dried out roots can grow again.

  I don’t want to jinx it so I don’t give the warts another thought and wiggle my fingers in front of the window to dry the nail polish faster, sending the fumes outside, like incense, to heaven.

  Trees Entwined

  Auntie Magda is getting married.

  Everyone is surprised and we can hardly wait to meet Lowell, her fiancé. She’s kept him a secret, never brought him over for Sunday dinner or anything, but says they’ve been seeing each other for a while.

  Babci is beyond delighted. She is in ecstasies. She even made chruściki, delicate sugar-dusted deep-fried loveknots. Auntie Magda will finally wear the dress lovingly created for her many years ago and, of course, it still fits. Babci will bead it now. And then, she says, she may quit sewing. Her eyes are tired, even though they still twinkle. Her eyes want a wedding.

  Babci’s two hands flutter over her pacemaker.

  Kasia, little birdie, don’t wait so long like Ciocia Magda. She presses my heart.

  I don’t know why Auntie Magda is getting married at all, because she likes being on her own. But then I’m introduced to Lowell.

  He met Auntie Magda at his orthodontics office. She wanted a little tooth straightening and found herself a fiancé. Babci has always wanted a Polish doctor for her Magda, but with Lowell, the doctor part cancels out th
e need for the Polish part in her equation. For my Dad, who is neither Polish nor a doctor, Babci invented a new formula that perfectly describes him: Handsome, Handy, with Height and Holy.

  Of Babci’s essential four Hs for husbands, Lowell’s got the Handsome part covered, but he’s not Handy at all. He says he’s not outdoorsy. He lives in a condo and buys everything new. Auntie Magda laughs that he replaces anything that doesn’t work the same day.

  She and I dropped in on him once, because they’re going to live at her condo and rent out his, and she’s doing the deal.

  When she tells him the offer, he throws his cell phone against the wall. I pick it up for him. It’s still working. When I give it back, his nails look manicured, polished. They’re in better shape than mine.

  Thanks, kiddo, he says.

  Not anymore, I say.

  She’s a gorgeous young woman, Auntie Magda says. And she spins me around. Look at her gentle curves. You are going to look so elegant at the wedding! People will be watching you, not me.

  Lowell, though, checks his phone all over for superficial damage.

  He doesn’t take the offer she found, and rents out his condo to his friend instead.

  His skin is definitely moisturized. And tanned, but Auntie Magda tells me he fake bakes, at a tanning salon.

  Do you? I ask.

  Oh, no. It’s not good for me. He says it makes his teeth look whiter, for clients.

  He’s tall enough, but not enough Height to change a light bulb. Not his thing, anyway.

  And he’s not Holy. He swore at that one. But Babci doesn’t seem to care. She is swept away, as are we all, by his looks: dark curly hair, straightest of bleached smiles and a stubble beard that Auntie Magda often strokes with her fingers before he catches her hand and kisses it. I think I’m in love, too.

  The wedding is going to be at the Holy Rosary Polish church, but there will be no mass. This, Babci is willing to accept. At this point, with her pearl Magda permanently thirty-nine years old, Babci keeps her mouth zipped.

  But to me, she says, I whisper the mass, in Polish, and no one in the church knows, but it counts. My angels help me.

  I am going to be the bridesmaid! Actually, junior bridesmaid because I’m only sixteen, but really because there is no groomsman. Lowell has a cousin but he can’t make the trip, from Australia. Stella is twelve, too old to be a flower girl, but she is anyway, so it will be only us sisters walking up the aisle for our Auntie Magda.

  No one wants Babci to make dresses for Stella and me, because she tires easily now and has trouble seeing, but she says these are her last dresses, for her Kasia and Sasha, which is what she still calls us, and she will do it. But I will help. We pick the simplest of designs, an empire waist for both, and she has been saving the most exquisite satin, off-white, like the bridal gown, but with no beading or veil. Thank goodness.

  I have to undress to my underwear for the fitting. Babci slides the strong yet smooth palms of her hands around my bare middle. The tops of her hands are gnarly and papery.

  Such a nice waist, she says. You keep it. Keep your waist.

  She takes such care over my dress. I could wear it for my own wedding if, like Auntie Magda, I keep my waist. Babci adds lace to the bodice, and it makes me feel like a bride-to-be, which I am, as maid of honour. We cry a little when it is done. I tell her that I’ll wear the dress at my own wedding, no matter what. She’s already thought of that. She’s made the side seams extra large in case I need to take it out a little, later, much later, for when I marry. If I ever do.

  Make sure you marry. No be alone all your life. You make food anyway. So? Make enough for two. Why not with a man to make you feel like a queen?

  I wonder how cooking for Lowell will make Auntie Magda feel like a queen, or if he’d ever throw the dish against the wall.

  But Babci is thinking of Dziadziu. And feels like a queen, even after all these years he’s been gone. Her jewel eyes of spruce blue sparkle when she remembers him and her head lifts as if she wears a crown. I haven’t noticed that shining yet in Auntie Magda’s eyes, or Lowell’s. In fact, I haven’t seen them look into each other’s eyes yet. Lowell often inspects his hands.

  Auntie Magda takes Babci and me to the cemetery to tell Dziadziu about her wedding. I wonder why Babci doesn’t just talk to her Dziadziu candle but this is pretty big news, even though Lowell cancelled at the last minute to rebook patients for today so he can take the week off for the honeymoon later. Babci isn’t too upset that Lowell and Dziadziu won’t “meet.” Mom thinks it’s because Auntie Magda has been close to marrying several times, but always backed out, so again Babci says nothing. Babci wears a gold silk kerchief tied up tight even though it’s a warm sunny fall day and Auntie Magda keeps the top of her convertible up. Because Mom and Stella can’t come either, I am the only one from our branch of the family to go to the cemetery.

  It’s going to be a small, family wedding. We only have three weeks to prepare, so I am over at Babci’s for a few weekends working on my dress and Stella’s. Babci lets me tack down the facings and do the pressing. Auntie Magda wants the wedding before the winter, so Babci doesn’t have to go out in the cold. Since her pacemaker, Babci moves slower. She constantly rests her hand on her heart, as if the pacemaker is a pet, or another hand.

  The doctor said Babci should eventually forget that it’s there.

  Nie, nie, I don’t, she says.

  She talks to it. She scolds. Too fast, like a toy clown, you wind me up!

  Sometimes, abruptly, she has to sit down. We’ve brought a folding chair, so she won’t kneel for her prayers by the graveside, but she does anyway, using the chair only to get down and up. My job is to take the old flowers and put them in a plastic bag. Babci likes to crumble and sprinkle the dried up Dziadziu flowers over her vegetable garden to keep away slugs. Next I have to wipe out the metal vase with some paper towel. Then I pour water from a 7-Up bottle into it while Babci adds her blessings to the already holy water.

  I also get to unwrap and arrange the new flowers, brought by Auntie Magda from the florist: brilliant irises, the rich blue of the autumn sky; yellow chrysanthemums, Babci’s favourite; and red gerbera daisies with straws around their stems to support their heavy heads. I add the greens last, cedar boughs. I smell them first, so fresh and woodsy. I know the green will far outlast the blue, yellow and red. The flowers look even more intense against the black gravestone, black like the coal my Dziadziu mined in the river valley. Far below the roots of any trees. Where he made rooms in the rock from the very coal he shoveled and, car by car, sent outside to the sun. When the boys and I found his miner’s headlamp in the jumbled garage, an island in her garden, Babci let me keep it to remind me of him. I wish it still worked, for night sketching. Charlie and Tom found pieces of coal to keep, and even played street hockey at Babci’s with a flat puck piece.

  In the cemetery stands a corner of tall Norway spruce. Their branches try to reach up but droop down like curtains. Some seem entwined, holding each other’s crossing branches. They must have been planted a hundred years ago to protect their ground people from wind and noise. When I walk near enough to touch them, I feel the heat of the afternoon sun radiating from their boughs. Charlie and Tom and Stella and I used to play in them, shooed off to expend our energy away from where Babci knelt, on Easter visits to Dziadziu.

  Today Babci is not sad. She has that glow, like a queen. She and Auntie Magda are speaking Polish, a prayer. I think it’s the “Our Father” because I hear the word for bread, chleba, as in “Give us this day, our daily bread.” I wonder if bread really means bread here, or time, “our day.” I’m squirming and Auntie Magda puts her hand on my shoulder to make me still. I realize that my time, my day, is not the same as Babci’s and I try to be patient for these prayers to end. So we can have tree cake, sękacz, a sponge cake with a cross-section of dark and light layers, like the growth rings
on my old tree cookie. But it’s boughten, out of a little Bon Ton Bakery box tied with string. Babci hardly has any and declines to leave some for Dziadziu as she usually does when it’s her own. It’s definitely not the same, much sweeter, but I happily eat the leftovers. Auntie Magda indulges in her usual one bite only and hands the rest to me.

  You’re just like Charlie and Tom!

  No, they’d be fighting over it.

  You’re still growing.

  So we hem your dress last thing, says Babci.

  Auntie Magda lights a thick white candle with a deep well for the wick, which protects the flame from the fall breeze when we leave. She resists lighting a cigarette during the entire outing, because of Babci, who has trouble breathing. Babci blames Dziadziu’s death on his heavy smoking, although I wonder about coal dust.

  So Auntie Magda chews Nicorette gum when she’s with Babci, snapping it. It’s usually Mom who brings Babci for her Dziadziu visit because Auntie Magda is always working. She has never liked cemeteries. You can tell by the colours she wears: today she is in the hottest of pinks. But she prays to her dead father, here with her mother, that her marriage will be loving and long. At least I think that’s what she’s saying. I don’t understand the language, but I am a witness to the words. Me, and the trees.

  At the wedding, in my two-inch cream heels, I walk tall like Auntie Magda made me practice. Dad agreed to escort her up the aisle, but not give her away because, as he says, Auntie Magda is her own person, not a dame to get or give. Mom is in the front row, and supports Babci’s arm when she stands up. Babci is beaming, and Mom smiles at me, too, but she still seems less thrilled than the rest of us.

  But Auntie Magda is bringing us Uncle Lowell, I want to shout to Mom. Maybe it’s the rush we’ve been in to get ready. She’s had a lot to do, like getting the boys in suits. When did they get so good looking? Charlie and Tom both have Dziadziu’s dark hair and day-old beard. They also each have a dolled-up blonde girlfriend on their arm. But I feel like a princess, like Babci says I am, and she gives a little clap when I pass her, holding the flowers, creamy roses. If Auntie Magda is the queen today, Babci is a queen mother! She’s always admired the Queen Mother.