Heart's Desire (2 page)

Chapter Two

DEBBIE AND DANIEL APPEAR BLEARY-EYED IN THE ARCHWAY. Daniel is bare-chested, wearing only jeans that hang low on his waist, suggesting an absence of underwear, and Debbie has a mint-green sheet wrapped around her, Statue of Liberty style. I’d rather we were all exhausted from partying, like at the beginning of the semester, but everyone is beat as a result of hitting the books hard all week.

“Hey,” they say sleepily, but in unison.

Debbie is accustomed to Bernard arriving early and unexpectedly, though usually on weekends rather than school days. And Daniel is around often enough to have met Bernard a few times as well. They also know that he’s very generous with his cooking. Bernard always claims that he’s trying out new recipes and needs tasters, as if we’re all doing him a huge favor by eating a five-course breakfast.

“Something smells terrific,” says Daniel, hungrily eyeing the platter that now contains three crepes surrounded by sliced bananas and dusted with powdered sugar.

“Come on now, I know that everyone is tired and hungry as a result of all these horrible tests!” With forced cheer Bernard digs into his shopping bags and starts taking out cartons of cream, fruit salad, and fresh orange juice.

“Your eyes are all red,” Debbie says to Bernard. “Are you okay?”

Bernard looks at me searchingly.

“He was just chopping onions,” I quickly supply a plausible explanation.

“It’s no use,” says Bernard and begins to weep again. “Gil left me and I’m just a wreck!”

Bluffing was never his great strength. At least not like blanching. Bernard crumples into the nearest chair and cradles his face in his hands.

It so happens that Debbie’s mother is a rapid-cycling bipolar and as a result she’s excellent at dealing with unexpected mood swings. Debbie calmly pours Bernard a mug of the fresh coffee and pulls a chair up right next to his. “That’s
terrible
!” She places her arm around him. “Tell us
all
about it.”

“Oh, no. You have enough to worry about with exams.” Bernard takes a deep breath and immediately begins, “Gil’s older brother died a little over a month ago. They weren’t on speaking terms because the family had disowned Gil when he came out of the closet. . . .”

Just then I notice the clock on the microwave says a quarter to eight. My exam in motion graphics starts in exactly fifteen minutes. Leaping up from the table I say to Bernard, “I’ll be back in two hours. Can you stay that long?”

“
Stay?
I can’t go
home
!” He waves the end of the dish towel with the Buckingham Palace guard wearing the big black furry hat at me. “I’ve driven mother insane the past two weeks with all my keening and wailing. She says that if I can’t let go then I need to see a psychiatrist before she’ll let me back in. And to make matters worse, she keeps reminding me that Shaw’s
Pygmalion
didn’t have a happy ending—the Americans added it when the play was made into the musical
My Fair Lady.
”

Leaving Bernard at the kitchen table I hurry off to take a quick shower. As much as I love Bernard, his timing couldn’t be worse. Not only must I do well on this test, since my grades in the class up until now haven’t been that good, but I need to stop at Career Services and figure out how to make some serious money this summer or else I’m going to have to drop out and work full-time for a year. I hated high school so much that I quit at the beginning of junior year, but college is everything that high school wasn’t, and I really want to finish and earn a degree. As it is, I’m likely to graduate a hundred grand in debt, a number considerably higher than the starting salary of the graphic designer I’m paying a fortune to become.

As I rush down the hallway, my other roommates, Suzy and Robin, emerge from their small dark cave in the back like crustaceans crawling out of their shells. With eyes half closed they stumble toward the kitchen and the aroma of a real breakfast.

By the time I return, an overly wound Bernard is recounting the Gil saga to them, starting at the beginning.

As I race out the door Bernard interrupts himself to ask me, “Uh, Hallie, that was Steve in your bed with you, wasn’t it? But I didn’t recognize the woman.”

“Actually that was Ray, my latest boyfriend of two weeks. And on the other side was Vanessa. She stayed over last night.”

He gives me a curious look. “A ménage à trois. Mother would be so proud!”

“Oh my gosh, no! Vanessa is Ray’s neighbor. She’s planning on going to school here next year. We ran out of beds.”

“Of course. I’ve forgotten how
loose
everything is at college,” says Bernard. “I suppose all that’s missing is Toulouse-Lautrec sitting over in a corner painting away and immortalizing us for posterity.”

Chapter Three

TAKING AS MANY SHORTCUTS AS POSSIBLE, I JOG OVER WET LAWNS and across streets until I reach the edge of campus. Fortunately the Cleveland Art Institute doesn’t have the same bomb shelter décor as my high school. Ivy twines down the pale cement arches in front of reddish-brown brick buildings with large windows and elegant statuary tucked into the cornices. The library looks like a domed cathedral, with stained-glass windows and a cupola that is home to a nest of storks. And there’s plenty of space between the buildings for pedestrian paths, the edges dotted with pretty bluish-gray juniper trees, grassy patches where you can relax or study outside, and strategically placed wrought-iron benches on which to sit while sipping coffee and catching up with friends. It’s really wonderful. Though I suppose it wouldn’t be a very good marketing strategy to have an ugly art school.

I slump into one of the last seats in the lecture hall just as the test books are being passed out. The tension is so palpable that if you close your eyes for a minute it’s actually possible to smell the coffee coming out of students’ pores and hear the prayers being sent heavenward to the Grade Gods.

The exam isn’t too bad, though mostly because I met someone in a mechanical drawing class who took the course last semester and told me exactly what to study. However, a stop in Career Services afterward doesn’t turn out to be as big a success. All the salaried internships were snatched up a month ago and the only jobs left are either in warehouses or as data clerks and receptionists, paying $6.50 an hour.

When I reach the apartment the windows are wide open and it smells as fresh as spring. Bernard has straightened up the kitchen and somehow organized the heaps of junk all over the living room into neat stacks. He appears pale but composed.

“How was the test?” he asks.

“Not nearly as good as your breakfast,” I say.

“Now Hallie, I’ve been afraid to inquire, but what’s happening with your summer internship at that art gallery in Buffalo?”

“Oh, I got it, all right. The only problem is that at the last minute I found out they don’t
pay anything.
The woman claims that it’s a ‘résumé builder.’ Sounds more like ‘slave labor’ to me. And I need to make some serious money this summer. Otherwise I’m going to be living in a tent next year and I’ll be paying off student loans from my nursing home.”

“So I assume that you’re declining the position.” Bernard appears more relieved than disappointed.

I scowl in the affirmative.

“Thank heavens. Because you
must
come home ASAP. Brandt’s busy working on some laboratory project with a professor over at the community college. Apparently the high school ran out of experiments for him to do.”

When I left for college, sixteen-year-old Brandt had taken my place as the local adolescent in distress and live-in gardener.

“Quite the budding scientist, that boy,” Bernard continues, “but absolutely useless in the garden and the kitchen. Anyway, you simply must resume your role as yard person this summer. The grounds will not survive another season of Brandt!”

Only I get the feeling Bernard has something other than just yard work in mind for me. But at least he seems to have regained a bit of his old enthusiasm.

“And . . . ,” I prompt him.

“It will be just like old times,” Bernard claims a shade too cheerfully.

“And . . . ,” I say again as I watch him grow suddenly grim.

“I need your help getting Gil back.” He sounds desperate. “Mother is no use at all with her
live and let live
nonsense. Whereas you’re clever about things like this. I
need
you!” he implores.

And now I begin to understand why he’s shown up in the middle of the week.

“Of course, you’ll receive a raise,” says Bernard. “How’s fifteen dollars an hour?”

When you’re talking about tuition, rent, books, and art supplies, even fifteen dollars an hour doesn’t go very far. However, it’s not as if I have another job lined up. And there
is
a one-year scholarship being offered to the winner of the annual design competition sponsored by an advertising agency here in Cleveland. Only the entries are due at the end of June and I haven’t even begun to think about it.

“All right. But on weekends I have to work on winning this stupid contest. And I’m not doing anything
illegal.
I want to get a fresh start back home.” After dropping out of high school, getting kicked out of the local casino for underage gambling, and then the bum rap over some stolen money, I’ve had enough of being the town miscreant.

“Of course; you’ll become a model citizen, earn a plaque, and run for town council—I’ll throw wonderful tea parties with cucumber sandwiches like the Kennedy women used to do—and then you’ll go on to prosecute all of your old cronies and become the first woman President. Now, when can we leave?”

“This horrible cat food campaign is due at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. And I haven’t even started it yet.” How did I get so behind? A string of ill-fated romances is how. This is another good thing about college: It teaches you to answer your own questions.

“Perhaps I can help,” offers Bernard. “I could think up a jingle, or rather, a little
kitty ditty.
”

“Thanks. But it’s computer stuff. And it’s going to take all night.” This deadline crunch is my own fault. There’d been plenty of time to do the damn thing. My mind has just been elsewhere. On how to lose my virginity in two semesters or less, to be specific.

“Very well, then I’ll prepare a fortifying repast for everyone,” says Bernard. “You’ve all been working much too hard. For dinner we need comfort food—meatloaf, garlic mashed potatoes, an enormous spinach salad with hot dressing, macaroni and cheese, creamed corn, and Bernard’s Very Berry Crumble for dessert.”

“Anything but pizza sounds good to me.”

“How many gourmands do you think we can expect?”

“If kids find out that you’re cooking, probably around twelve.”

Bernard heads out to the grocery store and I hit the books—or rather, the keyboard.

Debbie invites her drawing professor to dinner, who she suspects has a crush on Bernard. A few months ago he drove all the way to Bernard’s antiques shop supposedly to see some Victorian pencil sketches. And then he stayed for over three hours.

By the time we all reconvene, everyone appears to be in good spirits. The two men indeed seem to get on well at dinner. The wine flows, the food is delicious, and we stuff ourselves into carbohydrate comas.

Bernard says not to worry about the messy kitchen and waves us students off to finish our projects while he and Professor Harris clean up and then sit around the kitchen talking. The first time I go for coffee I’m actually encouraged. Not only have the men created a tasteful study-break buffet of highly caffeinated beverages, Power-Bars, and Bernard’s chocolate chunk cookies, but they’re enjoying glasses of sherry and animatedly discussing Victorian wallpaper. From what I can gather, they’re both fond of “tripartite treatment with geometric patterns” and believe that “imitation High Style plasterwork is a sacrilege.”

However, when I go for a refill, Bernard is tearfully telling the professor about Gil’s recent departure. I end up ushering out a flummoxed Professor Harris while making excuses for Bernard. Then I pack him off to the back bedroom, since Suzy left for home after finishing her last exam this afternoon and Robin is having a final fling over at her boyfriend’s dormitory.

One thing is certain: Bernard is as theatrical in his sorrow as he previously was in his exuberance. As I settle down to work I can hear him singing “It Ain’t Necessarily So” from
Porgy and Bess,
complete with dialect and low rolling bass notes.