by Kitsy Clare
It’s all of my accumulated anger. The humiliation I’ve been holding in from his earlier treatment of me. “Yeah, you scared me big time with your trials when I first worked for you, Charles Mitton! Who gets their intern to count thousands of sugar packets for no good reason? You had nerve. That turned you on? And, hey, did you leave the key out as an experiment to see if your test subject would take the bait? I guess I failed the experiment.”
“That’s bullshit, Sienna. I hate to say it, but you’re acting like a paranoid diva.”
“Ha! Who’s acting like a paranoid diva?” I yell, feeling my neck veins bulge from the effort. “Your art is all about illusions, like your life. Those trendy pink and yellow sugar vats. Magician’s smoke and mirrors to put on a colorful, shiny spectacle so people can’t see your heart breaking underneath.” Tears mist my vision. I lower my head and my voice. “I can’t deal with that, Caz. I need us to be real.”
Maybe it’s the fact that we made hot, hot love just a few hours ago, but my passions, all of them—outrage, fury, hurt, and, as crazy as it sounds, my intense love for Caz—have boiled over—on me, on him, all over this horrid room of secrets.
“What’s real, Sienna? Have you told me much about your life?”
“More than you have.” I surreptitiously swipe away a tear while gathering the nerve to glance up at him.
Caz stands looking so hurt, so vulnerable, and his gorgeous, expressive face sinks into itself. His bow-tie perfect lips are open in stunned pain. He’s gripping those papers so hard his knuckles are white.
I should get my coat and run out of here before I hurt him anymore, or let him hurt me, but I can’t. There’s more to say, more to feel. “If you’ve hidden your identity from me and everyone, what else do you have hidden? Why do you have bags and bags of empty whiskey bottles? And what’s with the barbed wire around it? Are you an alcoholic? Were you drunk when you killed that kid? And a girl’s dress? Caz!”
I hardly know whether I want to run over and kiss him, slap him hard in the face, or run. I want to do it all, but I’m glued in place. Motionless, we glare at each other.
Finally, he mutters, “It’s not like it looks, Sienna. It’s not.”
“Then what is it?” My heart is hammering so hard against my ribs it might burst right through. “Tell me? Please. Because it looks very bad, Charles Mitton.”
Whatever rationality Caz mustered up to mumble at me he must’ve lost. He reaches out and swipes a line of paint cans off the shelf. They clatter loudly on the hardwood floor. “Get out!” he screams. “Get out of this room. Out!”
“You going to fire me? Huh? Fire your fly of an intern like you fired my best friend, Harper?”
“Harper, ha.” Caz starts nodding and chuckling like a horror-film villain. “Your best friend came on to me. After I caught her snooping in here, she thought she’d charm me by kissing me and trying to seduce me into bed.”
“Harper?” It’s my turn to laugh with unfettered hostility. “You’re completely delusional. She has a boyfriend, so why would she do a thing like that?”
He sniggers. “That didn’t stop her. You want a factoid about my real life? Here goes. I worked my tail off to rise in the art world. But it comes with a steep price. I had no idea that fame could be a fucking hazard. People demand to know all about you, thinking you’re not entitled to your privacy. They look through your goddam trash for your used paintbrushes and torn T-shirts to sell on eBay. Ask Harper, okay? Ask all of the moony interns who threw themselves at me.”
“Oh, like me?”
Caz is suddenly quiet, regretful. “No, Sienna, not you. Never you.”
But I can’t exactly listen. I’ve gone too far, too. So I barrel on. “And you do nothing to encourage it? Walking around in tank tops that show your sweaty pecs and ripped jeans with your bare butt hanging out?” My blood is boiling.
“My rear was hanging out?” Caz cringes. “Look, Sienna, you’re not part of—”
“Not part of the overeager groupie lineup outside your door? I don’t believe you, and why should I? You’re a pumped-up egotistical artist who thinks he can do whatever he wants with his flunky interns. Scare them, play dirty tricks on them, take them to fancy art auctions and make them wear wigs. What is wrong—”
“Sienna, enough!” Caz’s face has turned as crimson as mine feels.
“You don’t get to tell me when I’m done,” I shout back.
“Stop it,” he yells, “you’re—”
“Fired? Guess what? I quit!” Bumbling over the paint cans and past him, I brush roughly against the dusty news clippings in his hand. I get a sick charge out of hearing them thwunk to the floor behind me.
In his office I grab my messenger bag from his desk, and, with a vicious swing of my arm, I knock the jack-o’-lanterns to the floor. They crack open with soggy whumps when they hit the concrete floor. Overripe pumpkin scent fills the room.
I’m really scaring myself. I’ve never lost it this badly before. Hot tears cascade down my cheeks as I charge through the crusty sugar labyrinth and out of Charles Mitton’s haunted art castle for good.
14 CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I stay in bed practically the whole next day. Why get up? It’s Sunday. My internship has apparently ended, and my heart has imploded into bloody fragments. Caz and I are both too impulsive, too moody, too messed up to work. I’m appalled by my own behavior, and terribly worried Caz is a drunken killer. He’s kept way too many secrets from me, and I guess I haven’t been too forthcoming either. My eyes are swollen shut from sobbing for hours into my damp pillow, and I’ve ruined the violet-hued dress I had on since yesterday.
I got up once to shrug off the wrinkled dress, pee, and inhale an entire king-sized chocolate bar. I’ve heard chocolate feeds the pleasure receptors in your brain that make you feel loved, but all it did was give me cramping indigestion. After which I had to chomp down three Tums and crawl miserably back to bed.
Caz hasn’t dared to call me. I really shouldn’t answer if he does. What could he say that would render his utter weirdness rational? I suppose people have the right to make themselves over. Writers have pseudonyms and performance artists create alternate art identities like the activist groups Pussy Riot and the Guerilla Girls, famous women artists who, in the seventies, wore gorilla masks to museum openings and spoke out about how the curators always chose white male artists for the landmark shows and overlooked the more talented female artists.
But those costumes and theatrics were for the civil good. They changed the rules of engagement in important ways. Caz took it way beyond any noble cause with his dubious tests. His devoted interns weren’t supposed to be lab rats!
My mind keeps coming around to the nasty Pink-Elephant Question: what did Caz do during or after that very sad accident that would make him change his identity, for years? Was he shit-faced drunk when he killed her? I’m afraid to know.
My cell pings again. In fact, Harper’s been pinging me for a few hours, but I haven’t had the energy to text her back. I’m getting weary of lounging in bed all day, though. It’s actually making me more exhausted. So at 5:00 p.m., I cut to the chase and speed-dial her.
“What’s up?” I ask.
“What’s up with you? Why didn’t you text me back?”
“Sleeping all day.” My voice sounds really pathetic. And visions of Harper tonguing Caz slither across my mind like poisonous snakes.
“That bad? You want to talk about it yet?”
“No.” I pause for drama’s sake. And because I need to catch a deep, refreshing breath or two for my oxygen-deprived brain. “Maybe I could be persuaded, in return for some strong coffee....”
“Be right over!” Harper sounds so insanely cheery I get a microscopic boost. Did she kiss him? Did she not? Either way, I need caffeine.
Dragging myself out of bed, I wriggle into jeans, my favorite old red smock, and a pair of thick red socks. I feel like I’m dressing inside out to reveal my injured heart. The skin under my eye
s is beyond repair until it gets help from a good night’s sleep, so I smear some concealer over it. Next I apply a pearly pink lipstick and comb my unruly blond hair into a passable look, parted to one side.
I think to take a cell picture of my latest work. Gazing at it lifts my spirits a little higher. The mash-up of computer art to oil paint still looks striking and fresh, and if I can do a group of these, the possibilities for a show could be closer at hand.
Harper’s right on time, barreling around the corner of Sixth Street and Avenue C in Dave’s BMW and attracting the admiration of some cute neighborhood boys. When I climb in and we squeal off, the swarthy Puerto Rican boys wave at us. Harper waves back. Incorrigible flirt.
She doesn’t bother to nudge me for the lowdown until we are safely ensconced in a dark booth at Pushcart Coffee and I have a steaming mug in hand. The java kicks its way through me while I register Harper’s outfit: earthy cashmere sweater and scarf with golden paisleys that blend with her sweater like creamy butter. She looks good. Maybe not good enough for Caz to jump her bones, my treacherous mind chortles silently.
Her dark eyes glitter with curiosity as she leans over her cappuccino. “Okay,” she says, “I came through on my part of the trade. Please, Sienna, what’s going on?” I realize that so very much has gone on since that time I sat on Lydia Hightower’s bed with Harper after that difficult Skype call.
“First of all, I broke it off with Erik.”
“No! Why?”
“He’s going to be away for at least a year.”
“That’s a long time, but if you love him....”
No matter what Harper did or didn’t do, she cares about me, and that counts for a lot. I sigh and blink back my sudden tears. “I do, but, um, I was pretty sure I was falling in love with someone else.”
A panicked expression spreads over Harper’s pretty face. I guess it’s dawning on her who I’m referring to. “Sienna, no. Really?”
I nod, slowly and forlornly. And then I hold up my hand like a traffic guard, warding her off. “Don’t even bother laying into me. I broke it off with Caz, too.”
“What the heck happened?”
It all explodes out, like a bad case of the runs. I tell her about his games and tricks, about the amazing dishes he cooked for me, the shootout of the sugar windows, our mutual art critique, the Christie’s auction and his strange wig disguise, the carving of the pumpkins, and about the amazing sex. Oh yes, the hot, randy, intense sex. I almost crack a grin at how huge Harper’s eyes get while I’m describing that part.
“So, why did you break it off with him, then?” she asks. I notice that she hasn’t taken one sip of her coffee yet. Uh huh. If I were on the receiving end of this tale, my mouth would be gaping too wide to safely drink scalding coffee.
“Because I broke into his private room.” I stare at her to see if the mention of the room brings out any trace of guilty memory on her face.
She blinks twice and flips her hair behind her ears. Hmm, evidence in the blinks. “Oh? What did you find?”
“I saw the mannequin with the ripped dress, just like you said. I saw bags and bags of empty Jack Daniels bottles with freaking barbed wire around them. And here’s a new thing. I found a whole bunch of articles about a guy named Charles Mitton.”
“Huh? Who’s he?”
“He’s Caz. Caz is Charles Mitton.” I stare at her long and hard.
“What?”
“Apparently Caz ran over some little girl way back when in Amarillo, Texas, and she died.”
Harper gasps. “No, that’s terrible!”
“Yeah.” I nod solemnly. “According to multiple eyewitnesses, it wasn’t his fault. But still....”
Harper starts to bite the skin off a finger. “Lord, if I hit a kid, I’d be traumatized for life.”
She’s got a point. I’ve been so upset with Caz, I hadn’t quite seen it in those terms. And I’m surprised that Harper, given how negative she’s been about him, would quickly jump to his defense. “True. It’s not what he did that made me break it off, more like him pretending to be someone else and not telling me, I mean testing everyone—it was way too much.”
Harper rolls her eyes. “I hear you. But um....” She shrugs. “I’m sure it was overwhelming for him to talk about. He thought he’d break down or be a pariah.”
I have to hand it to her; she’s making more sense than I did yesterday. Emotions got way out of hand. “But, Harper, what if he was stinking drunk when he killed her? Would he get a pass for that?”
“Hmm, I’d have to think about that. Can’t you just ask him?”
“I don’t know if he’d tell me the truth. I don’t know much of anything at the moment, Harper. If only he’d opened up, been honest with me. Starting with his car phobia.” I take a sip of coffee and wade into more dangerous waters.
“He told me something else, something about you.” I frown at her. “Harper, I really need everyone in my life to stop lying and to tell me the truth, okay?” She nods silently. “Did you come on to him? He said that you tried to seduce him after he caught you in that locked room.”
A loaded silence weighs heavily between us. I swear it’s full of her unspoken guilt. She speaks so softly it’s hard to hear her. “Yeah…I did.”
I try to keep calm though I’m brewing with an explosive mix of emotions. “Why? Why would you do that?”
“I…I don’t even know.”
“Not good enough, Harper,” I snap. “Don’t be a jerk like Caz. I deserve better from you.”
“Okay, okay.” She fumbles with her spoon before dropping it with a clatter on the table. “It’s just that, well, number one, he’s incredibly attractive.” No denying that. “Number two? He looked so damn lost when he poked his head in.”
He did look lost. A tiny bubble of love for Caz rises in me. “Like a little boy?”
“Yeah, I felt bad for him. And then, when he got furious, I got scared and thought, maybe I could calm him down with a kiss.”
“Harper, you’re making no sense!”
“I know,” she wails softly. “Look, he’s legendary, he’s hot, and I sensed it’d be my last chance to kiss the notorious bad-boy artist before I got the boot.” She makes a tortured face. “Plus, I’m telling you, he looked completely forlorn.”
“Oh, Harper.” I begin to laugh, and I don’t stop until tears are rolling down my cheeks, half from hilarity, but also from the intense sadness of losing Caz when I’ve just found him. He’s so smart, so creative, and so sexy. But so freaking nuts.
She rushes over to my side of the booth. Wraps her arms around me. “I’m really, really sorry. I was lying to you like Caz was. Oh, Sienna, I had no idea. You love the guy for real, don’t you? I was so mortified by what I’d done that I pretended to hate him. Plus, I was terrified you’d tell Dave. He would one-hundred percent freak!”
“He would. But I’d never tell Dave, no matter what.” I wipe my eyes on a napkin and give her a reluctant hug. “What you did is between you and me. Everyone has slips. Everyone.”
“Sheesh. You have no idea how relieved I am to hear that.” She hugs me back.
“You really did that? I admire your balls, lady. You kissed Caz when he was in a rage?” She nods sheepishly while I snort. “I would’ve loved to have seen that.”
“It was funny.” She cringes. “But only when I thought about it later.”
We cackle together over the image and it feels so good to laugh that soon I realize my belly’s not churning anymore from upset but from hunger. “I’m famished, Harper.”
“Oh, good. That means you’re feeling better.” She pulls out a ten-dollar bill and pays the waiter when he passes. “Let’s roll on over to Spring Street Natural and stuff ourselves with health food.”
“Sounds like a plan!”
***
As we wait for our order, I get out my cell to show Harper my newest piece. My heart immediately starts to hammer. Caz has texted me! I don’t want to look. Not when I’m finally sta
rting to recover. I steady my breath and make sure to just click into my photos.
In the dim light of the restaurant, Harper apparently hasn’t noticed the shocked change in my expression. Instead, she stares at the image. “Wow, I love it, Sienna! It’s deeper, somehow. The paint on top of the digital stuff is so original,” she gushes. “You always like to be so clean and precise with your prints. What made you think of mixing it up?”
“Caz.”
“Oh, really.” Her tone drips with both sarcasm and unbridled interest.
“Yeah, during that mutual critique session, he was saying I should do something way out of my comfort zone, something to bring my prints to a new level.”
“I hate to say it, he’s totally right about that.”
“Hmm. Okay, but it’s his turn to pay attention to my suggestions about his work.”
As I relay what I told Caz to Harper, she quirks up her brows in a sardonic grimace. “Stop doing his clever installations and take a serious look into his heart? Cold day in hell.” When she sees my morose expression, she tries to backpedal, but she can’t exactly un-say it. “Sorry, Sienna. I keep putting my foot in my mouth. Who knows? Caz may have a revelation.”
“I won’t hold my breath.”
The food arrives, so we’re both saved from any more angsty drama. Even Harper’s last comment can’t take the edge off my appetite, since all I’ve eaten for twenty-four hours is a chocolate bar and three Tums. I pile in stir-fried chicken and dumplings and salad—the works.
Afterwards, Harper drops me off in front of my apartment. Our hunky Puerto Rican cheering squad is no longer hanging out on the corner, and evening darkness has whisked in all my creepy-crawly loneliness. But when Harper asks if I’m okay and if I want to spend the night at Dave and her apartment, I draw the line.
“Thanks, Harper. You’ve helped a lot, even with your admission of guilt.” We chuckle awkwardly over that. “It’s just that I can’t wake up to Dave trolling around in his boxers.”