February - Giants 1 страница

"What matters most is how well you walk through the fire."
Charles Bukowski

Chapter One

Gerard's fame, once thought to be a failed ambition, was now becoming a reality. It was unique the way an idea spread: like an infection, with rabidity, going into and infiltrating the minds of all who heard or possessed it. The way advertising worked felt like a magic show or a trick that we had no control over - and yet it was us in the trick. As soon as Vivian hung up one of his paintings in her art studio, she began mentioning his name like an incantation. From there, she declared that he had gone to Paris, and you know, he was rather big "over there," and she used his age as an asset. He was a practiced artist, one with maturity and depth, old enough to have learned from his youth, but still kept his spirit alive enough to remain big "over there." Never mind, Vivian said, about small embellishments about places; for the artist, the mind was another place, and she was sure that we were famous in our own heads. Gerard blushed, and then took up the same rhetorical trickery that Vivian had started. He stayed away from her studio as she hyped the show and the man himself, since absence produces mystery and mystery brings millions. I knew that we weren't going to get millions, but the most remarkable thing was that people did start to believe it. Gerard felt bad at first because some of her statements had been over-exaggerations - but that was the point of advertising. They didn't tell you the truth; they only told you part of it. That half truth was magical, Gerard and Vivian eventually agreed, because the other half the audience filled in. Gerard really did become famous "over there" because his mind counted, and because people believed that "over there" existed, they created it in their minds as well. A half truth, on both ends, actually manifested into something physical, a real, tangible proof - something that would help us pay our bills. It was funny how the power of suggestion worked so well. As soon as people thought they were buying a famous artist, they bought more and paid more attention, by virtue making him that famous artist they needed. The audience had just as much control as the artist, and as soon as Gerard began to realize that the power dynamics were equal, his guilt dissipated. He embellished himself, leaving holes and disappearing, giving as little as he could get away with, but still giving. I had never been on the other side of things before. I wasn't the artist and I wasn't the consumer. I was merely someone in between, watching it all unfold around me and marvelling at how, once and for all, it was finally working.

It seemed that even if you had gone to Paris and not become famous there, the sheer fact that you left was wonderful, more than enough for many people. Vivian had to remind me that most people who bought art were not artists themselves and never would be. They didn't ever think they would leave for Paris. For them, it may as well have been a made-up magical place, and owning objects that had been around this fantasy land, or were somewhat associated with that place, was like touching another plane of existence that they could not reach by themselves. It was their ticket to their dreams, and it would only go so far. It was wonderful that we were helping them live their dream vicariously, but my guilt manifested. Should we not be encouraging these people to go and pursue it themselves, instead of providing them with these strange objects that had an allure? Should we tell them that these places were real and they could go there if they wanted to? But again, Vivian told me to hush. Some people, no matter what, wanted to stay in the life that they had given themselves. It was neat and tidy and predictable. They needed other people to risk everything and leave to pursue their dreams, make art and write books, and then report back for them to see it all. They needed people like us, because as we had so recently experienced, this was not a stable life. We had lost our house and a lot of our money. The people who bought the art, who leaned over eagerly to hear the stories, they had too much to lose, quite simply, so they lived through us, and filled in whatever blanks we gave them with their own details.

"And there is nothing wrong with that," Vivian would constantly tell me. "Absolutely nothing. Some people have too much to lose by living life the way you two did and for some people, their life would be noting but loss."

"But wouldn't they be happy, at least trying? We were when we thought we had failed," I countered.

"Yes, you were, but that was you. You both would be miserable if you did not do art. Some people... it's merely a passing thought. They see a pretty picture and think 'what if' but they are happy in their lives. Don't make assumptions about others' happiness, only keep yours in check. And don't think that any one life is better lived than another merely based on a subtle observation, or you're no worse than those who think you're damned for loving who you do."

That remark shut me up, and instead I tried to just be some help behind the scenes and not make too many value judgements. It was sometimes hard, though. In spite of the fact that we were actually getting money again, and getting well deserved appreciation, it made me feel weird. Actually receiving money for our art, even if it wasn't that much still felt odd to me. It felt like selling out, even when those paintings were painted without economic prompt, but because they needed to exist in order for Gerard to not be in misery. What was wrong with earning a living from that? It seemed more incidental, like luck and gambling, than actually selling out and exploiting our art that way. There wasn't anything wrong with making money this way, through something we were good at, but it would take some time getting used to. Along with dealing with the people who were now interested in us.

I suddenly felt like I was back at school and in constant on-guard mode. I was surrounded by people who seemed to experience art through their eyes only, and each time they blinked they ate another painting, another card, another poem, another form of life. They blinked and bought, and that was all they did. I was surrounded by people who made their living from judging other work and by critiquing it. Yes, the dreaded critique came back, and I couldn't believe Vivian was letting the other professors in the school come in and look at the work and then borrow it for classes where they would rip it to shreds at worse, or at best, dissect it like a vivisection.

"It's good, Frank. Just calm down. The more people see it, the more people will pay attention. More people that come to the show means more money you both will eventually make," she told me, as I helped her traipse the canvases back and forth across campus. We fell several different times on huge patches of ice, and each time we did, both our arms went up in the arm and we held the canvas above our bodies as we went down. We protected the piece at all cost from damage, but we put it willingly into the fire of criticism. I did not get it, but I shrugged it off. I had to trust Vivian at this point. She had taken on the role of curator, advertiser, and publicist at this point, and was making it into a magic show for all to see.

And she was right a lot of the time. Although these critics would often call Gerard's work a cheap imitation of prior work, a recycler of the times, reproduction done worse than Warhol, they also praised his use of colour, his vast knowledge of art to make reference too, and admired his new innovations in old pieces. One professor even bought a piece right then and there because he was using it so much in his class. And professors had money to spend, so when Vivian raised the price over what we had been asking, he made no question and handed it over. There was no bargaining or huffed bantering (which I had often witnessed Gerard in the throes of in Paris during the market selling of postcards); there was only the exchange of funds and a delighted professor. It seemed really futile to me, spending this amount of money on other people's work so that the kids could look at instead and learn, rather than buying them paint and paper so they could just keep creating their own and learn through experience, but I kept my mouth shut. Vivian, over the course of the weeks that I had spent with her getting the show prepared, had drilled me on the importance of art history.

"We need to understand where we come from before we can know where we're going," she would tell me. "As much as we want to create from the depths of our dear little souls, we have to acknowledge that our souls, our minds, or whatever, have been shaped by what came before. Even if we don't fully realize it."

"But why does it have to go Artist's Work, and then our work? History and then creation? Why can't we create and then see from what we create how the history has affected us?"

She smiled and I knew that this was a stumbling block she must have come over when she first began her studies. She did go to art school, after all, I kept reminding myself. She knew what she was talking about. She reached her hand out and touched my shoulder suddenly, showing her approval, but it was a while before she said anything. "Oh, Frank," she began as we picked up more supplies and began another trek. "I've thought those things before and questioned them mercifully. But do you know who was my source for those wonderings? Who made up that part of my soul?"

She winked at me, and I smiled back at her. Of course. She had gone to art school with Gerard, after all. She smiled again. "Yes, a great artist asked that question a long time ago. Neither of us reached a conclusion that was satisfactory. I think, even he has learned the history, to know where he is going now."

"But he did that through experience," I meekly argued.

"And who says learning isn't one of the most wonderful forms of experience?" She winked at me again, and I bit my lip. Gerard, he did know history, and I knew some of it now, too. Only I had never sat in a classroom for much longer than I had to because it didn't offer me what I needed. But that didn't mean I was unable to be that learner. Gerard merely offered me a fusion of what it meant to experience, and to listen. To do and to watch.

"The thing is," Vivian went on. "No act of creation is an act of the self necessarily, because you need other people to form that self. Art history, I think, makes that explicit. We could not be where we are now, Gerard could not have painted Star Crossed, without having something before it." She held up the painting we talked about, before placing it above her desk. She was about to start a class, and after I had helped her set up, I was free for the rest of the afternoon. She told me to take some time to myself, and realize that these paintings, these sales, were also going to give us both time. Although it seemed strange and unreal, Gerard and I both began to look at our new limited wealth as something good, something we needed. We fell under the fever of the infection and we used it to buy more things to fuel us: supplies.

Gerard spent most of his time painting now. He tried to make other reproductions of what he had painted previously so he could replace what had been bought, but he gave up. Reproducing his own work was hard for him, it never became quite right. Usually he would do a variation on it. When Star Crossed was sold before the show, he did it again, but this time made the lovers into two men and they were holding the sheet over their body and their faces were uncovered. I smiled when I saw this new interpretation, knowing that these two dark haired men before me were the youthful editions of us, and the blanket we held against our bodies was the same colour as the one on the bed we shared. He painted more and more, and the canvases themselves kept getting larger and larger. Vivian and I had started to make them in the large art class room where the first year students usually hung out. We also corralled Dean and Callie into helping us stretch the canvas, nail the frames, and deal with gesso since I hated the way it smelled. We spent hours there preparing the raw materials for Gerard and then Vivian and I would bring them home and hand them over, and he would give us what he finished that day and the whole process would start all over again.

The only painting that he held back for the show was I Remember Everything. He said he didn't want to have too many eyes eating it just yet, and he wanted to save that for the show itself. But everything else, practically everything but that one painting was gone by the time the show actually began, and he had had to paint everything all over again. He didn't seem to mind. Although all of this experience happened within a week's time period and seemed to make my life feel like it was on fast forward, Gerard worked with ease. He was ready for this. This wasn't fast for him, it was almost slow, and so much of his body language was screaming finally at the top of his lungs. He had been waiting for this his entire life. He could handle anything right about now. While I struggled with shoulder strains and Vivian and I had bruises on both our thighs as big as small islands from falling on the ice, he was calm and quiet, and hummed to himself as he painted.

The show itself was going to be a small affair, followed by a semi-permanent installation. At one of the community art centres, there was a new artist room that could be rented out for specific displays. We had it for the rest of February, starting just after the second week. The opening itself would be on Valentine's Day. There would be a small party and some local media attention to announce its existence to the small local art world and we would need to be there, but after that night, the paintings that were still around would be hung in a small room with their name, Gerard's name, and the price on a small card near it. Vivian's number would also be listed and she would be contacted if anyone was interested in a sale. This place would be open for free during the day and anyone could come. We had made advertisements for the afternoon public shows the week leading up to it and had been placing them all over the university campus, in other art spaces, and even through Jasmine's magazine. Vivian figured our big crowd would be university folks, but we tried to go to public libraries and all over. We needed to get the word out to as many people as possible, because after the opening night, it was pretty much out of our hands. We rented the public space with the money from the first two paintings that had sold independently through Vivian's effort shuffling them around campus, and the rest of the money had gone to supplies. So, although we were gaining momentum and exposure and yes, indeed, getting money, it was all disappearing as quickly as it was coming. It took a lot to have an art show, to buy and make canvases and paint and gradually, as I got more and more used to the business side of things, I stopped feeling bad about advertising and selling our work. It was vital to actually survive.

"At some point," Vivian informed me. "You just have to trust your customer. You have it to trust people. They know what they want and so they go for it. Manipulation and deception can happen from advertisement, but at the same time, where does personal responsibly start and our responsibility end? People seek what makes them happy. We are making them happy. I trust that."

I nodded. The last thing I wanted to do was to step in between a person and art, even if I thought that they were buying it just to fulfill some larger hole within themselves that they could fill. Maybe they could and maybe they couldn't, or maybe this was the stepping stone to something better for themselves. Maybe if they bought a painting from a local artist, thinking that they would never get to where he had gotten, they would sit and stare at it and think about it, and then realize that it was possible for them too. Maybe these people needed to be in that odd in between area for awhile before they got to make up their minds.

Or, as Vivian had told me, maybe they just wanted to put it in a dentist's office and have that be it. Either way, we were providing a service, and we needed to do it. It was a great service, and at least we could take some credit in that.

All of this was so thrilling to me. In spite of my years in art school, I had never been this involved with the actual production of art itself. I was either consuming with my eyes, or struggling under the weight of critique. This was completely different, and it occupied another in between space in the art world. We were like little elves that set up the materials for the larger person who took over and stood in its wake, but even that didn't give us enough credit. I didn't feel small in Gerard's shadow, I felt his equal - for the first time in my life. I felt like I was on the same page with Gerard, and I was beginning to understand why Vivian loved her job the way she did, and how she and Gerard related to one another in the art world. She had taken the art history route, and he had taken the experiential route, and although those paths crossed and converged, it wasn't quite the same. Since she didn't paint herself or have any means of creating her own product, I had always wondered on what grounds they formed their friendship (other than nude modelling). But I saw it now: the art of production. It was an art in itself; we got the paintings set up, we got the venue ready, we got fliers out which we designed ourselves, and we stretched canvases until late into the night. Most of the work I did was late at night, actually, or afternoon because that was when Vivian had time away from her teaching duties, or couldn't do anything at all and I had to take over. At one point, I was even in charge of overseeing what Dean and Callie did and I had no idea when the tables had turned so much. I was given so much power, and yet, I had no education. I was working at a drug store on the night shift in between time getting all of this ready, and my two lives seemed to smack up against one another and become so startling. I became a mix of opposites, an infection of art and disease of perfection, and I had never felt so healthy and alive.

My drug store job wasn't too strenuous; it was mostly training and I had maybe two half shifts for that work, and one full eight hour night shift before the show opened. It was an easy job and since it was at night no one really came in, at least when I was there. I took the night shift because I got paid a little more, and because it ended up working time-wise. Just after I did my first night shift, I walked home under the coming dawn, fell asleep until dinner time, and the night of the opening of the show.

"Hey, sleepyhead," Vivian called as I walked up the stairs. The dinner cooking was the first thing I had smelled as soon as I awoke, and Vivian had gone all out for this affair: Kraft Dinner. She shrugged her shoulders when everyone questioned her culinary attributes.

"There will be other food at the place tonight, so why would I dazzle you here when I just know I'll be upstaged? Eat now to keep your strength, but dine well later," she said as she sat down. She placed two small pots in the middle of the table on placemats, and then we began.

Cassandra was sitting in her usual spot: next to me and across from her mom and I across from Gerard. Everyone was already very well dressed, Gerard especially, although I supposed I was somewhat biased there. He had on dark pants with a subtle crease down the legs, a nice belt with a silver buckle, and a white collared shirt that he actually tucked in. His hair was combed back and neatly placed. He was clean-shaven, and I could smell a touch of aftershave from across the table. The only thing about him that was unkempt and typical artist about his attire was his jacket: it was the same dove one that he had had years ago. He refused to wear anything but it, although it was super-loose when he buttoned it up and it was faded from years of wear.

"It's how I envision myself," Gerard told Vivian as she teased over dinner. "I must stay true to my artistic vision."

Attention was turned on me next, and I was questioned about my own attire for that night. Considering I had just woken up and was still in my pj pants and a t-shirt, I had no idea what to wear.

"You're my date, tonight," Gerard told me, slipping his hand across the table. "You need to look good."

I smiled so strongly, my cheeks burned. We were a couple, now, a couple of artists and a couple of people in love. I had been worried, at first, that since Vivian was mostly calling the shots tonight that she would keep Gerard close to her. And since she was very well dressed (in a low cut red v-neck top, dark enough to not clash with her hair and bring out the hazel in her eyes), very articulate and poised, that people would just assume that the two of them were together. But no, Gerard insisted that we were the couple of the night, and we needed to match to prove it.

"You're not going to dress in the same outfit, are you?" Cassandra groaned. "It's not cute when twins do it, and it's even less cute when two adults choose to do it."

Gerard shook his head. "No, no, Frank can wear whatever he wants, but people will know. I won't let him out of my sight."

Gerard winked at me from across the table, which was a new behaviour for him. It seemed too playful and coy sexually, when we were usually so straight forward and serious about that kind of stuff. It made my skin quiver with anticipation and my heart thud in my chest. He was excited about his show, and I could tell. He barely ate anything ("Nerves, Viv, not a reflection on your culinary expertise, I promise you"), and he kept his gaze on me. He smiled a lot, and when I inhaled my food and then ran down the stairs to start getting ready to go, he followed calmly.

I decided on a blue collared shirt that Vivian had given me and dark pants. I tried to tuck in the shirt, but became discouraged. I felt like a tool anytime I did that, and I was convinced it made me look shorter than I already was. I was young, right? I could get away with an un-tucked shirt? I had a feeling no one but Vivian would care, so I decided to tuck it in until we got there and then worry about it later. I shaved quickly with an electric razor so things went faster, and then tried to fix my hair and get rid of the bed head I had. I didn't look as amazing as I was convinced everyone else looked, but I was okay. I may be taken for a student and not an artist, but I was okay with that.

When I walked out of the bathroom, Gerard was there waiting. He stood by the bed, leaning against the bottom part of the frame, with his hands cupped in front of him. He stood up straighter when I came out, and his attention focused right on me.

"You look amazing," he told me. He slinked over to me and put one hand on my waist and the other on my shoulder, toying with my neck and jaw line.

I took in a quivering breath. "Not as good as you."

Our faces grew closer together, until it seemed like we were breathing in one another's mouth. He kissed me first, biting my bottom lip as he drew himself away. He kissed my cheek and made his way up to my ear, playing with the lobe before he said, "I have something for you."

He pushed himself away from my body slightly, and then began to touch my chest. He found my pocket right on my left side and dropped something inside. "Just in case we get separated tonight in the crowd, I want you to know that I'm there. I have one too and we'll find each other eventually," he began to talk less seductively and more seriously. "I'm worried that there will be a lot of people there and I'll get distracted, or you will. There will be a lot of questions to answer and please don't feel like you have to speak for me. Just be yourself, have fun, and look around. And remember, we'll find each other at the end. We have to now."

He kissed me once again quickly on the lips, and then began to head for the stairs. My heart lurched and I wanted to reach out after him, but I was still paralyzed from his touch. It was almost time to go. I reached into my pocket to see what he had given me, and pulled out a small box. It was similar to one that you would place a ring inside and I started to feel my heart beat wildly in my chest. There was no way this was what I thought it was. That was not Gerard. I panicked - I almost dreaded it being a ring because that would mean that I didn't know Gerard as well as I thought. And yet, it would make me so happy. I was so overwhelmed by the amount of emotion that overcame me, and I almost couldn't open the box. I heard Vivian call from upstairs that it was time to go, and my hands shook as I began to peel back the lid. Gerard had already gone upstairs and everyone but myself and Vivian were in the car; it was clear he did not need a response. I shouted to Vivian that I was almost there, and she left me alone. After hearing her footsteps echo to the doorway, I took a deep breath and began to open the box slowly.

A tiny bird stared up at me. A small, white bird, obviously a dove, carved out of wood and then painted. I laughed, feeling a huge wave of relief wash over me. I would have obviously said yes if he had proposed, but I was relieved that he had not. It would be too big of a change in our relationship, and I liked things the way they were right then. Even if the change was positive, it was a risk. I wanted to be in love with him how I was in love with him then for as long as that could last. And this small trinket seemed to express the same sentiment. With delight, I took the bird out and began to examine it in my hand. I realized that in its claw feet there was a tiny piece of paper, a tiny scroll. Like the carrier pigeons, I thought, and I began to take it out. I unravelled it, and my heart began to beat rapidly again, wondering if it was going to be the same question that I both dreaded and wanted from before, but with a different medium.

On the scroll it read: I Will Never Forget You.

I held it close to my chest and breathed out a sigh of relief. I could not have loved that man anymore, but then again, I knew at this point he was full of surprises. This was the perfect gift. Placing the dove back into its box, I put it in my shirt pocket, and feeling protected against the uncertainty of the night, I went upstairs.

Gerard and I were in the backseat of Vivian's car, she and Cassandra in the front. At first Vivian wanted the "man of the hour" up in the front, but when Gerard insisted upon being with me in the back, Vivian let it be so. She would constantly check up on us using her rear-view mirror as she drove, and told us in a half-joking, half-serious manner to not mess up the back seat of her car. We laughed and slyly responded that we were fine, and then couldn't keep our hands off one another anyway.

"I really liked your present," I whispered in his ear in the car. "Where did you get something like that?"

He leaned into my ear, but instead of answering, he bit the lobe playfully and then started to kiss my neck. His hand had been on my knee and it slipped down to my mid-thigh area and remained there even as Vivian teased us.

"I'm allowed to have my secrets," he eventually replied coyly. We kissed a bit more in the backseat and I almost wished we didn't have a gallery to go to. It had been such a long time since he had been this amorous. I supposed that now his energy for creating art had already been channelled, he needed to fill that passion with something. Or maybe he was excited because he was finally being recognized. Either way, he was completely enamoured with me right then, and the feeling was so mutual.

"Jeez guys, we're right here," Cassandra joked. "This is going a bit beyond a public display of affection. We're getting close to a movie set back there."

We both laughed and kept going. We kept our clothing on, but our hands went everywhere and our mouths were locked.

"If I get a ticket for you guys not wearing seatbelts, I'm taking all of your commission," Vivian teased.

"Go ahead," Gerard approved, and then cupped my forming erection. It was dark enough outside and in the back seat that no one would see what made me gasp, but the two women in front of us were not idiots. Gerard squeezed and gingerly ran his hands all over, but I bit back my moans and told him, "Not now, it's too close to the show."

Gerard nodded, biting my lip with me, and agreed. We pulled into the driveway and composed ourselves. He took my hand, but we were chaste with our affections now. Vivian and Cassandra got out, and we all took awhile to collect ourselves before going inside.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14