Monday, April 19, 2010

Part 13

"There is no greater sorrow
Than to be mindful of the happy time
In misery."

~ Dante's Inferno





Eleanor stood at the easel, smearing red paint from a tube directly onto the canvas. She picked a large flat brush and used it to smooth the paint in broad strokes across the blank field of white.
“That’s your big plan?” asked Harvest critically. “Red?”

“Go away,” she answered him, swaying under the movement of her arm.

Instead of leaving, Harvest settled back into the armchair to watch her. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know yet,” Eleanor watched the brush swing back and forth across the canvas. She added a few mounds of black to the bottom of the canvas, and began blending the two shades together. After a few moments of this, she dropped the brush into a container of water and put her bare hands on the canvas. The paint was silky cool on her palms and fingers. It was much faster spreading the paint this way and she smiled in satisfaction as the area gradually went from white to dark crimson.

“Finger painting today?” Harvest sounded amused.

She didn’t reply. She blended the black up from below, so that the color changed, starting with bright red at the top to sable at the bottom, with vertical streaks of black scarring through the red in places. When she had finished obscuring the entire canvas with color, her hands and arms, in some places up to the elbow, were covered with paint the color of blood. Eleanor stood back for a moment and regarded the canvas, tilting her head to one side.

“That’s a good color on you,” commented Harvest.

She held up her hands, the paint already drying on them. They reminded her of something. What was it?

The doorbell rang.

“Who’s that?” Harvest wondered.

She heard the children’s footsteps tumble down the stairs from the playroom. Eleanor had forgotten they were home. She grabbed a towel and went down the hall. Harvest followed. She leaned over the wall of the loft to look down to the entryway. Cailyn was unlocking the door, Jack bouncing up and down behind her.

“Cailyn,” said Eleanor. But the door was already being pulled open. Poking out from underneath the frayed cuffs of jeans that brushed the ground, she could see a pair of Converse All-Stars standing on the edge of the porch, facing the door. She couldn’t see more than this, but this was enough to send her trotting down the stairs.

“Is your mother home?” she heard a male voice ask Cailyn.

“Yes,” replied Cailyn. “She’s coming.”

Eleanor rounded the landing and came down the last flight. Cailyn still had her hand on the latch, holding the door open. She gently took the door from the girl, looking down at her children.

“Go upstairs and play,” she told them. Jack was staring unabashedly up at the man on the porch. “Go on,” Eleanor urged. Cailyn grabbed Jack’s hand. They ran up the stairs and back into the playroom.

As the children turned to leave, she looked up at the visitor on the porch. She began to say,
“Can I help you?” He was tall, slender, with extremely red hair and a prominent nose. He smiled warmly, but the smile faded quickly as he noticed Harvest standing behind her. The man seemed familiar to her, but she couldn’t place where she might have seen him before. There seemed to be a luminescence that rolled off of him, gently, as if he had been washed in moonlight and left with a glittering residue. She watched his ice-blue eyes flicker from Harvest to her and back again. Something connected in her brain as she realized he could see Harvest. Harvest stood motionless, a threatening rumble in his throat behind her. His silence prickled, as if he were breathing down the back of her neck. She heard Baz, talking conversationally to Pitchtongue as they came from the living room.

“Will you really be able to interpret people’s dreams if you eat all seventeen Shakespearean tragedies?”

“Oh yes,” replied Pitchtongue. “And if you eat the sonnets, you’ll be able to predict the weather.”

She suddenly feared for her Riverside translation of Shakespeare. She heard Harvest growl deep in his throat again. They stopped talking to crowd around her curiously.

“Who is it?” inquired Baz. She heard Pitchtongue inhale sharply. With a rustle of leaves and a snapping of twigs, the twins tumbled onto the porch from the bushes that lined the railing. They nearly fell against the man’s legs, but he stepped back quickly. Their playful fighting ceased while they crouched on all fours to glare up at him.

He took stock of them all, and then looked at her, “Are all of these yours?”

Despite the fact that she had already made the connection, she was shocked by the implication of his words. “You can see them?”

He nodded, his brows furrowed. He leaned slightly to her right to better see Harvest. “I’ve seen gamin before, many times, but never so many around one person.” She turned to look at Harvest. He was glowering at the man, his chin down.

She looked back at the man, speechless for a moment. “I’m sorry,” she finally stammered. “It’s just that, usually… people don’t…. That is, humans usually can’t….” She trailed off, not knowing what he would infer by her words, but unwilling to finish the thought out loud. Are you human?

The man smiled somewhat ruefully. “I’m sorry,” he told her. “I didn’t mean any offense.”

“None taken,” she told him.

The man stepped forward and proffered his right hand, causing the twins to scramble backward squeaking to avoid him. “I’m Weston,” he said. “Weston Baylor.”

Eleanor reached to shake his hand, suddenly remembering the paint and so held up her right hand instead, shrugging apologetically. He didn’t lower his hand, so she shrugged and grasped it briefly. A surge ran through her at his touch, like an electric shock. She pulled away and grasped her hand momentarily in the other. What just happened? Her eyes flicked sideways for an instant as she heard the deep, barely audible rumble in the back of Harvest’s throat again. Looking back, she tried to fit Weston Baylor into some category that would make sense to her. Nothing came to mind. As she squinted slightly, she saw he was outlined in light.

“Eleanor Morrow,” she told the man. His eyes lingered on her hands. “I’m an artist,” she said by way of explanation. She felt suddenly self-conscious and wanted to shut the door. “What can I do for you, Mr. Baylor?”

He looked into her eyes, flashing that wide smile that seemed to catch at her memory. “Please, call me Weston,” he said. “What kind of art?”

“Hm?” She responded. “Oh, paint on canvas. Various subjects.” She wiped futilely at her hands with the towel. “Was there something…?”

He watched her. “Oh… yes. You moved here recently, didn’t you?”

She nodded. “Eight months ago.”

“So long?” He shook his head. “I meant to come by much earlier, to welcome you to the neighborhood. But, well, tempus fugit you know.”

She nodded. Time flies. How true this was.

“I’m sorry I haven’t gotten around to it until now.” He paused for some reply, but she waited for him to continue. “We were very glad to know a new family would be joining us here. Do you like the neighborhood? Have you met anyone?”

“It’s a lovely neighborhood,” she told him. “The children have made many friends. It’s nice to have so many peers their age so close.” I haven’t made friends, she thought. But I don’t really want to. “So, are you here in some official capacity? A welcoming committee for the Homeowner’s Association or something?”

He laughed. “I suppose you could say that.”

Harvest, Baz and Pitchtongue hadn’t said a word. The twins sat limply, watching the exchange.

“How old are your children?”

“Cailyn is seven. Jack is five.”

He seemed to be waiting for something else.

“And your husband, what does he do for a living?”

She sighed inwardly. “I’m not married.”

He seemed confused. “Odd. We were told that a family of six would be moving into this house….” He looked at her.

“I’m not married,” she said again. “I’m widowed. My husband was killed in a car accident in the month after we moved here, along with my two youngest children.” There – she had said it. Out loud, she had said it. It had never been that effortless before.

His mouth formed a small and silent O. People never knew what to say.

“You don’t have to say anything,” she told him. “I know it’s a social quandary that’s impossible to resolve, so don’t worry about it.”

He looked concerned, unrelieved by her reassurances. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I can only imagine what that must be like for you.”

No you can’t, she thought.

“My younger brother was killed in an accident several years ago,” he continued. “It was… difficult.”

She gauged him. Looking into his eyes, she could see that he was sincere, that there had been a pain long ago; a pain that had passed through him, searing understanding and compassion into him. She nodded.

They locked eyes for a long moment. She waited. Looking at him felt like rising up out of the dark.

“Well, um…” he said finally. “This is the part where I welcome you to the neighborhood and ask you if you need anything.”

She was shaking her head before he had finished. “No,” she said. “We don’t need anything, but thank you.”

He stepped backward off the porch, and then looked once more at Harvest. “Well, if you think of something, anything at all, let me know. I’m on Willow Court, number twenty-two nineteen.” He stuck his hand in his back pocket, pulling out his wallet. “On second thought,” he said, pulling out a small white card. “Here’s my number.” He stepped back and held out the card. She took it in one red hand.

“Thank you,” Eleanor told him.

Weston Baylor, the card said. Art director, VirtualFILM. It listed his number and an address in Dallas.

He turned to go, pausing in the driveway to call, “Don’t forget, anything at all.”

Eleanor nodded and waved. She stood to watch him go, seeing the evening mold itself around him. She watched his back intensely. The air shimmered behind him in massive invisible curves up over his shoulders, more felt to her than seen.

“Wait,” she called. He stopped and turned. She stepped off the porch, pulling the front door shut behind her, and for once, Harvest and the smaller ones didn’t follow. Eleanor stepped toward him, holding up her hand. “You…” she said, as the light coming off of him and the electric energy in his touch and the sensation of shimmering substance around him all resolved themselves in her mind. “You…” She couldn’t say the words.

“Yes?” he asked.

Her hand was still raised. She lowered it slowly. “What are you doing here?”

He smiled again. “I’m welcoming you to the neighborhood.”

She shook her head dismissively. “Yes, but, why are you here?”

He held up both hands in an innocent surrender. “I live here….”

“Yes,” she said impatiently, “but –“

“Ms. Morrow,” he said gently, holding out one of his hands to shake again. In a daze, she put her own hand into his and he held it briefly. The same electrical current pulsed through her at his touch. Then he seemed to realize they were standing very close together in the middle of her driveway. He stepped back and released her hand.

“Have a good night,” he said, “it was very nice to meet you.”

She nodded silently.

He said, “We’ll talk again soon.” And turned back down the driveway.

Eleanor walked backwards to her front door and opened it behind her back. She stepped back from the door as the twins scooted past her feet into the entryway. Harvest stalked into the kitchen. She looked back down the driveway to see the lithe figure known to her as Weston Baylor turn left and go along the curve of the sidewalk out of sight. Closing the door, she followed Harvest and put the business card on the counter with the mail. Baz and Pitchtongue padded behind her in silence. Fox swooped down from somewhere above and glided past her shoulder, landing on the refrigerator.

Harvest was standing on the other side of the island, his back to her. The twins waited on either side of the doorway. Eleanor walked between them. She went to the sink and turned on the faucet, putting her hands under warm water. The water ran red into the basin. Still Harvest didn’t speak. The silence was unnerving.

“What’s your problem?” she asked him.

He growled again.

“Would you stop that?” She dried her hands on a kitchen towel.

“Is he gone?” squeaked Fox.

“Who was that?” Baz whispered to Pitchtongue. They stood with the twins.

For once, Pitchtongue didn’t answer. She turned to look at him in amazement, saw he was staring at Harvest. They all were. She looked back and forth between them. “What…?” she began.

Harvest turned suddenly, addressing Pitchtongue. “Don’t question me!” he said fiercely. Baz cowered, whimpering. Pitchtongue eyed Harvest. The twins clutched each other. “I’ll take care of it,” Harvest told them. “Go!” They all scampered from the room. Eleanor raised one eyebrow.

“My dear,” Harvest said to her. “You’ll excuse us for our absence this evening. There is business to which we must attend.”

Her mouth dropped open. “Um, yeah…” she stammered. “Sure, whatever.” But Harvest was already gone.

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