Model Position

by Kitsy Clare

  “Wait a minute!” I blurt before Lydia can speak, “I have to make a confession.”

  “Yes?” She sounds incredibly put out.

  I collect the discarded bubble wrap and rise to my feet. “It was a mistake to come here and try to get a show. Dave got me this meeting because he wanted to date me, and well, I’m dating someone else. I gave him the wrong impression, and I have to make it right.”

  Lydia removes her glasses and stares. Her eyes are big and scary and remarkably blue. They vibrate with dizzying intensity. “That’s quite an accusation. That Dave would only introduce you to me in order to…date you.”

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds. I mean, he does like my work.” Or maybe he wanted to date me to impress his aunt, or he likes to have a girl on his arm as an accessory, the way he cultivates his Italian suits and cufflinks. But I don’t say any of this to Lydia Hightower. It’s not her fault. “Besides,” I continue, “the real point is that my work is wrong for your gallery.” Oh my God, there’s no turning back now. “You show expressive, wild…messy art.”

  “Messy?” she snaps.

  “Not really messy. Just, well, passionate and loose. My work is all about order.”

  “Order, hah.” She exhales as if visual order is tantamount to superficial trash. Or maybe that’s just my overactive imagination. She goes on. “I don’t show digital work.” She swings her glasses as she elaborates. “Computer art is not my thing at all. I don’t have the clients for it.”

  “Uh huh, that’s precisely what I’m saying.” I feel curiously relieved, even though I’ve just blown my chance at the big time.

  My whole body is quivering as I quickly rewrap my prints. Approaching Lydia Hightower, I brave up and hold out my hand. She has no other choice but to give it a brusque shake. “I apologize for taking up your time.”

  As I walk out of her office, I hear her say, “The nerve.”

  I slip past the chilly assistant who sneers at me on my way out of Studio Hightower. Sometimes the art world really sucks. It all seems insurmountable. At this rate, I’ll be getting some graveyard-shift bookkeeping job to augment my freelance retouching job when I get my Master of Fine Arts degree.

  That night, my dark mood is lightened by a text conversation with Erik.

  Erik: How was your day, lovely muse?

  Me: crap interview with a gallerist.

  Erik: Which one?

  Me: not worth a mention

  Erik: Keep your chin up. Art is sooo subjective. Yours is amazing!!! You’ll land that perfect gallery.

  Me: Aww, you’re sweet. Can’t wait to see your show & perfect gallery.

  Erik: Ha! Soon. Can’t wait 2 paint you

  Me: can’t wait 2 pose!!!

  I snuggle under my covers and dream of us holding each other in a studio full of Erik’s magnificent paintings. We tumble back on his double bed and wrap our arms around each other. I fill my hands with his long blond hair and he whispers in my ear how much I turn him on. He slips off my jacket and is just inching down the zipper on the side of my tight dress when the dream ends way too soon. We only get to the first long, open-mouthed kiss! I wake up panting and drooling on my pillow.

  6 CHAPTER SIX

  The next day in class, Dave saunters in without a steamy cappuccino for me. That’s a relief. But he sets up his canvas clear on the other side of the room, despite the fact that since we’re still working on the same (incredibly handsome) model. How can he paint the angles right that way? We’re supposed to set up exactly where we started our work. Clearly, Dave is pissed off. He must’ve spoken to his aunt. Either that or he’s still hopelessly in love with me and he overheard Erik asking me for a date the other day.

  I peer at him. He’s already flirting with Harper, who is setting up her easel next to him. She’s fixed her jet-black hair in cascades of curls, and she’s wearing a full parrot-green skirt and a vest with an armful of bangles like the South-American artist Frida Kahlo. Now Dave’s hand is brushing against her arm.

  Something tells me that Dave isn’t pining away for me.

  I wave. He won’t make eye contact, and neither will Harper. I try again, with a more dramatic wave. Something’s not right. But Erik is headed my way, so I can’t be bothered with a million random theories about why Dave and Harper might be giving me the cold shoulder. I made my choice, and I need to live with it. The only catch is that I’ll just have to find a gallery all on my own, which fills me with trepidation.

  Erik is like an early birthday present, wrapped in that loose silk bathrobe. When he leans over me to check out the progress of my painting, my senses infuse with his clean-scented warmth. He must’ve taken a shower just before he came to work, because the tips of his hair are still damp. It brings an instant fantasy to mind of us in his shower, lathering each other in sensitive areas. “Madame Muse, you are more mysterious than the Mona Lisa,” he whispers in my ear. His breath sends chills through me.

  I lightly touch his hand, resting on his knee. “Monsieur Muse, you are sexier than the Greek god statuary in the Met,” I parry back. It’s all I can do not to kiss him. The taste of his mouth would fill me with an aching desire, make me want to go back for seconds and thirds. I sense he feels the same thing, because the sexual tension between us is thick, yummy, edible. But it wouldn’t be proper here in the studio. After all, this is Erik’s “office”.

  As he bounds onto the stage, I see Dave glance my way and then quickly turn to his easel. Taffy and a few of the other girls are gazing longingly at Erik. The gleam of lust in their eyes is crystal clear, because it mirrors my own! I’ll need to keep a hawk-eye on the situation.

  Erik adjusts himself on the leopard rug and stretches out his legs, inspiring his pecs to ripple in all the right places. I can’t help it; my gaze lands on the loincloth and the satisfying bulge. It’s a heavenly indulgence to stare at Erik in order to catch all of the light and shadows. I apply a mixture of brown ochre and midnight blue to the darkest areas. For his tight abs under his pecs I blend flesh, rose madder, brown ochre, and a dash of linseed and paint these parts in. After about twenty minutes of this, I’m getting turned on for real from stroking on the creamy paint and layering the second denser areas of muscle. It’s as if every stroke of paint on canvas is really a stroke on his warm flesh. I’m so wet that my panties are slick and sliding. It’s easy to imagine that it’s my hand caressing Erik’s shoulders, thighs, and butt instead of the brush. And that it’s his firm, steady fingers rubbing me to velvety arousal. I almost feel the big O come on as I lean forward then back in the chair in order to render each detail just right.

  Does Erik sense this? He’s grinning at me with those sly Tomcat eyes, and I feel a deep blush come on. If I can get this turned on by just painting him, God only knows what it will be like when we finally get to hold each other and explore! I laugh under my breath, and Erik smiles bigger too. Uh, oh, he must be psychic. He knows how randy my mind is. Oh my God, I practically climax right here in the seat, just from these thoughts. This is so intense!

  My nicely ordered world is ripping apart at the seams. I clamp my legs together as my insides throb.

  I was supposed to date Dave.

  I was supposed to show at a great uptown gallery.

  When I hit my twenties, I was supposed to have a tidy love life with predictable hugs and predictable orgasms achieved only in a neatly made bed of thousand-count Egyptian cotton. Not a “near-climax” in a paint-spattered chair in a studio full of earnest, disorderly artists, and not just by thinking about my guy.

  This reminds me of when I was in high school when I first discovered the O and could come incredibly easily from pressing a pillow between my thighs and rubbing on it, teen-heartthrob magazine open to a sexy pop idol in the other hand. At this rate, in a week or two, I’ll be able to simply look at Erik and come.

  I’m caught off guard when the instructor calls a break and Erik disappears behind the curtain. My neck is about as hot as it gets, and my private parts are to
o. I need to get up and take refuge in the ladies’ room, dry myself and slap some cold water on my face. As I walk down the hall, Harper calls after me. Ack! I can’t talk to her in this state. She’ll see that my ears are crimson and I’m practically panting. Now it’s my turn to ignore my friend.

  Harper catches up with me by the bank of sinks as I’m dousing my face with icy water. “Didn’t you hear me calling you?” she scolds as she reapplies her makeup.

  “Didn’t you see me waving to you when you first came in?” I retort.

  “Touché.” She flips her dark waterfall of hair over her shoulders.

  “So, what’s on your mind?”

  “We were a little tipsy the other night,” she starts.

  “You think?”

  She studies me in the wide mirror. “Okay, very tipsy.” We both laugh, which eases us into a lighter mood. “I just need to hear it from you, now that you’re sober.”

  “Hear what?” Pretty sure I know, but I’ll let her say it.

  “That you’re okay with me trying to get friendlier with Dave.”

  That’s what I thought she’d say. It’s not Dave I want. It’s an exhibition. And now I have to start over from scratch. I sigh. “I’m okay with it. Really.” I give Harper a hug, and she gives me a longer one back.

  “I really like him,” she gushes. “He seems to like me, and he loves my art.”

  “That’s great, Harper.” I know how much Dave likes her, but the next thing he’ll offer her is a show at Hightower, and that’s causing more unwelcome flickers of resentment. I hate being jealous of a friend. It’s the worst.

  As we walk back to the painting studio, Erik’s wise, healing words run through my head: Keep your chin up. Art is so subjective. Yours is amazing. You’ll land that perfect gallery.

  I turn to Harper. “Hey, if you do go out with Dave, maybe we could do a double date: you with Dave, me with Erik.”

  She gives me a real bear hug. “Ooh, Sienna, that would be fun! I hope it works out.”

  I do too. But the sight we walk back to has me doubting Erik all over again. He’s in his loose bathrobe leaning against the studio stage, surrounded by four girls, including Taffy. Harper gives me a pointed look before she goes back to her easel as if to say watch out for that flirty guy. All of the girls are giggling at something Erik’s just said, and he’s not exactly running in the other direction. My heart is heavy. It’s hard to believe that Erik would only want me with all of the oversexed minxes cavorting around him. He sees me and waves me over, but the instructor calls out, “Back to the pose. Now!”

  The girls scatter, Erik climbs back onstage, and I head reluctantly to my easel.

  My mood is dark and distracted when I return to the painting. I can’t get back into it, due to my worrying about having to fight off a horde of horny art students every time I see Erik. Even the thought is exhausting. I head out of class early, feeling dispirited. Besides, I need to put in a few freelance hours at the Chanel headquarters uptown to photoshop some ads. Hopefully that will help me clear my head. But an edgy incoming text from Dave makes me feel even worse.

  We need 2 talk asap. Got a bone 2 pick.

  As I hop the subway to work, I text Dave back.

  Has to wait. Have work now. Meet @ Dean & Deluca tomorrow?

  Dave’s incoming text is fast:

  Tomorrow 10 am. D&D

  Dean and Deluca is the gourmet coffee and grub place near campus. Neutral ground. Maybe I can work on figuring out what to say to Dave while I wait for Museum School to empty out. Erik and I have planned to reconvene and sneak up to the studio for the pose, but not until tonight.

  The pose! The gaze. At this, my heart pings. Despite my misgivings about Erik’s ability to be faithful, I can’t lie; the thought of him studying every inch of my naked body is incredibly exciting.

  For the sake of art, I tell myself.

  ***

  I punch in my password, and the door slides open. Freelancing here at Chanel is convenient because I can work at odd hours and thus avoid the nine-to-five subway crush with folks heading out to the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn.

  The editorial department’s walls are lined with glitzy Chanel ads: newer ones like a goateed Brad Pitt gazing longingly at Chanel, and Keira Knightley literally sucking on an elegantly-shaped bottle, and then the older classics with stars and starlets embracing the stuff as if it’s the answer to all of their wet dreams. As if it’s giving them an ecstatic climax. Wondering if I’ll get my own O with Erik tonight gives me a shiver of pleasure as I head back to the photo-retouching studio. “Behave yourself,” I chide under my breath. “No crazy fantasizing at work because you only have one set of dry panties.”

  I startle to see a co-worker in his retouching cubicle near mine. Hopefully, he hasn’t just heard what I was muttering to myself. “Oh! Hey, Eyelash.” I wave. He’s packing up his equipment. He specializes in smoothing out faces and women’s makeup, and he’s a pro at eyeliner and lash extension, thus the nickname.

  “What’s up, Sienna? You working late?”

  “For a few hours. I have a sitting tonight; someone’s painting my portrait.”

  “That’s great! A real painter, like with paint-paint?” he asks as if everyone these days paints with a Wacom pad and a digital pen.

  “Yeah, believe it. Oils.”

  He winks at me as he hoists his backpack over his shoulders. “Give good pose, or whatever the expression is.”

  “Ha! What’re you up to this weekend?”

  “Buzzing up to the Catskills with Paula.” He takes motorcycle jaunts with his girlfriend. Sounds cool, but my butt would probably be vibrating from it for a week.

  “Say hi to Paula and have a fun ride.”

  “Will do.”

  I peer around the cluttered cubicles. Photos and art snippets are pinned up at all angles, and the coffee machine is surrounded by cups with funny slogans: Beware, Wild Artist at Work, and Digital Makeover Man. Eyelash even has his own mug someone gave him for his birthday. It’s a model’s face with horribly retouched brows and lips that make her look like a cross between a monkey and an evil clown. The sight of it always makes me laugh. “Am I the last one here?” I ask him.

  “’Fraid so. Everyone got the afternoon off early.” With that, Eyelash adjusts his motorcycle helmet and heads out.

  I don’t mind working alone. And right now, it’s a welcome distraction from wondering exactly what Dave’s beef with me is. Digital retouching puts me in a trance. Here, I’m a sorceress who makes earthly perfume bottles sparkle with otherworldly splendor and render them so 3-D you’d swear you could pick one up, spray it on, and even sniff the fragrance.

  Retouching is where I learned my techniques for my own computer art—the layering of semi-transparent tone over tone, the uncanny Rorschach mirroring, the way I can use the clone tool to stamp a particular design over and over and over into a mathematically precise kaleidoscope masterpiece.

  The ad that I’m retouching this afternoon has the Chanel No. 5 classic amber-rich tones. I match my retouching color exactly with my digital eyedropper and enhance the bottle with light gold gleams. In the photo, the bottle sits on a woman’s vanity dresser, and its essence is reflected on a wooden door in the background. I use my virtual airbrush to smooth that reflection to a sugary cotton-candy blur. Commercial ads are journeys into the core of need and desire, not so different from fine art.

  We all want that vision of a perfect perfume, a perfect, flawless love, and a passionate kiss under a cloudless sky.

  My mind strays to Erik. In my painting, I’ve already made love to him by stroking on paint the way I would stroke a lover’s skin. I’ve caressed every part of his body, even the parts under his loincloth. I glance at the ad I’m working on and giggle. I’ve loved this perfume bottle too, stroking on rays of celestial sunshine. This chain of thoughts is absurd, and I start to laugh out loud. I laugh until tears flow. I’m glad that I’m alone because I sound like a friggin’ maniac.

/>   Am I nervous about my undressing date with Erik? A little, plus I can’t help but wonder how many other girls have posed for him.

  ***

  It’s dark by the time Erik and I convene on the steps of Museum School. He’s ruggedly handsome under the glow of the moon, which accentuates his chiseled shin, strong nose, and slanted eyes. And he’s wearing a version of my favorite outfit of his: worn jeans, a nubbly sweater that hugs his lean body, and his scuffed boots. His hair is stylishly tousled, and the moon lends it lemony highlights.

  Since when did I start to prefer the windblown, carefree look? It seems only weeks ago I was admiring Dave’s corporate power-lunch look. I’ve preferred it ever since Erik appeared, since my mad, unexpected crush, since my world turned romantically, breathlessly changeable. I’m amazed. Until recently, such pandemonium would’ve put me into full-tilt panic mode. I would’ve had to clean my apartment and line up my shoes all over again to regain any sense of order. But now? Let my shoes stay wherever I kick them off—at disordered angles. Let them all land where they’re going to land. Well, except for my new snakeskin stilettos.

  I run up to Erik, and he plants a kiss on my cheek. “How’s my muse?” he asks, slipping an arm around me and pulling me in for a hug.

  I snuggle into his neck and breathe in his unique blend of cologne and buttery oil paint. “I’m great now,” I say. “Can I help carry stuff?” He’s juggling a canvas in one hand and his heavy paint bag over his shoulder.

  “I’m good. Just please get the door.”

  I hold it open, and we pad down the hall, past the sculpture studio with its oversized plaster heads and the printmaking shop with its etching beds and silkscreen frames. There’s still someone in the film and TV studio, using the editing bay. Hurrying past, we head to the stairs.