King Perry (3 page)

Let’s see how he handles some forced intimacy.

“Hey, Perry, ready for an art gallery game?”

He says, “Does this involve the shovel painting or the onion rings?”

“Neither. The game’s called Big Secret. We both share something big and juicy, not just ‘I cheated on my ’94 income taxes,’ but a big ugly secret about ourselves that almost nobody knows. I’ll go first.”

Perry’s face registers confusion, and he says, “Wait—”

I say, “See these tiny, crisscrossing marks right here by my hairline?”

I take his hand and guide his fingers to my skull, ignoring the alarm on his face and resistance in his arm.

“They’re from rat bites.”

He jerks his fingers away and looks at me with naked disgust.

Ow.

But I can do this. I can show Perry all my love.

“When I was twelve, I used to hide in the basement of this one foster home. The guy and his lady neighbor pretended to be married so they could get foster money from the state. His name was Billy. Shitty place to live. Billy’s idea of a garbage disposal was to throw food down there for the rats to eat. I would hide from him every third Wednesday of the month, and I thought if I lay still, the rats would get tired of biting me, but honestly, it wasn’t a great strategy. Twice, child and family services hospitalized me.”

With one hand, I draw quotation marks in the air. “Scars.”

All my love.

“I know that this makes me seem creepy, because it is creepy. It’s disgusting. That’s why it’s one of my big secrets. This is me showing vulnerability, Perry, and if you look into my eyes right at this second, you will see I’m afraid of you thinking I am disgusting.”

His face changes as he sees me, really sees.

Shit. That was harder to say than I thought.

“Your turn,” I say, as if I’ve been waiting for him to speak and my nod is additional encouragement to break his silence. “Something big.”

Perry looks around us. “Vin, I never said—”

“Go,” I say, adding the slightest urgency to my suggestion. “Do it fast.”

He pauses.

“C’mon, something big,” I say in a commanding tone. “
Go.
”

“I don’t cry,” he says, the words falling out of his mouth. “I mean, I can. I broke my hand playing softball when I was twenty-eight and I—no, no, honestly, I didn’t cry then. I swore a lot. That’s mine. I don’t cry anymore. I’ve even tried watching sad movies, but nothing.”

“Could you ever?”

“I cried some at my mom’s funeral,” he says, “but that’s the last I remember, ten years ago. I miss her all the time; I just don’t cry. I don’t know if that’s normal.”

I nod and take this in. Good reveal. I say, “Your mom died when you were twenty-four?”

He says, “Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

He steps back, careful to make sure he’s not bumping into anyone, and he glances around to see who may have overheard. The crowd fills in the gaps around us, but nobody’s eavesdropping, and the constant chatter around us muffles our conversation. Nevertheless, this uncomfortable turn of events has left a crease between us.

I say, “Relax. It’s just a game to learn about each other.”

He says, “No, of course.”

His face and tone don’t match his casual words, a surprised discomfort lingering as he thinks about what he shared with a stranger. But his expression morphs quickly into something else.

“Seriously, are those…?” His fingers move tentatively toward my skull, and I turn my head to give him free access.

He slowly traces his way along my bristly hairline as his fingers tenderly express what verbally he cannot. He pushes over the blond spikes and stops to stroke the tiny canyons in my geography. I’ve run my fingers over them enough to understand that only the softest touch can fully trace the grooves.

Fifteen minutes ago, this great tenderness would have been far too intimate for a first meeting in public, for how little we know each other. But we’ve crossed another threshold together. His repulsion is gone, replaced by sad curiosity.

“Does it hurt?”

“Now? No. Just looks funky when you notice it.”

“I didn’t see it until you pointed it out.”

“Uh huh.”

He presses harder, still in the realm of gentle, as he explores further. I hate it when anyone caresses these freakish souvenirs from a fucked-up childhood, yet I have to admit his fingertips soothe me.

“Were you scared?”

“Terrified.”

“Wait, why were you hiding again?”

“I hid from Billy, the guy who owned the house. He hated the rats, even though he fed them.”

I can’t explain more than that. I think he’s had enough creepy stories for the night.

A woman sidles up to the paintings and
oohs
in appreciation.

“People suck,” Perry says slowly. “They really,
really
do.”

Our new neighbor says, “Excuse me, who did this?”

“Richard Mangin,” I say, louder than necessary.

Perry looks disappointed but nods. His arm falls away, and he takes a step back.

“Is that a Dalí reference?” the woman asks, a petite blonde with dangly gold bracelets way too big for her slender arms.

Perry looks annoyed.

I don’t mind; I didn’t want to get all chatty about me. Besides, it’s showtime.

I nod and in a louder voice say, “Yeah, the shiny gold flank. For a while in the ’60s and ’70s, a small number of surrealists would sometimes paint a rounded, metallic sheen into their canvas, not exactly a melting clock but still a homage. It’s called the Golden Curve, also referencing a physics theory regarding the underlying architecture of the cosmos. As a convention, the Golden Curve never caught on with more than a handful of painters, a whimsical tribute from Dalí devotees.”

“Oh,” Dangly Bracelet Woman says. “Nice.”

I shoot Perry a look that says “I got this,” but I don’t think that’s a problem; his eyes are wide.

I’ve been waiting for an opportunity like this. I could have created one myself, but the art gallery is crowded now, and since we’re all invading each other’s space by circumstance, another interruption seemed inevitable.

I step away from Perry and our new friend, maneuver to the second painting, and use a commanding tone to say, “The Golden Curve is also in Richard Mangin’s medium-sized canvas. That one.”

My sudden pointing grabs the attention of three or four people nearby.

Speak louder. Draw them in.

“Notice in the petals of the third sunflower you can see the Golden Curve again. The shadows from two tree branches almost form hands on a clock. And if you look below the Golden Curve in the flower stems, you can see this artist was definitely integrating Impressionism.”

Perry remains stunned. I don’t know if he knows this or not, but he’s sure surprised I know it. I lied when I told him I didn’t know much about art. He’s going to be pissed about that, I bet.

I say, “He started imitating Monet and then changed his mind, painting over the blurred edges, creating something interesting and new. It doesn’t quite work, but Mangin’s style as a painter was evolving.”

Nine people in our crowd now. Ten.

Quit counting. Pay attention.

I face Perry.

“Unfortunately the painter died young. I’m not sure, but I’m guessing mid- to late-forties. His style had not yet matured, not fully. Who knows where he might have gone. He himself might have become the next Salvador Dalí.”

Perry’s lips part. He looks as if he might drop his own cup of wine.

“Look at this one, his final big canvas called
Siren Song
.” I wave to the painting behind me, but I never stop staring at him.

He flinches, and I know my intuition was on track.

Others draw near.

“The adult man behind the instrument is strong yet formless at the same time, more shapes and colors than a human outline. Naked potential. The painter had not met this man; he is the future. But note the face, such joy and youthful energy. I bet the only time Richard Mangin could get his son to sit still was during cello practice. If you ran into this kid as an adult and made him laugh over a joke about onion rings, I bet you could catch a glimpse of that same smile, even if he grew up to become an uptight investment banker.”

Perry’s blue eyes lock on to mine in surprised threat.

Throw open the kingdom gates; it’s on.

Perry gets nudged closer as more pack in, and my hunch is he can’t tell what to make of me, of this show. Maybe I shouldn’t have called him uptight. Gently, Vin. Let his face be your compass.

“This painter knew he was dying.
Siren Song
is an instruction manual to a man he would never meet. Richard Mangin says ‘Son, it’s pretty fucked out there. The sky is slashed and bleeding, but don’t be alarmed. The purple is everything. Trust the violets, the lavender whirls, the eggplant streaks. Don’t let anyone tell you what kind of man you should be. You are more than flesh; you are swirling light and formless energy.’”

“Yes,” someone says. “I see it.”

“The Golden Curve. Right there.”

Murmuring ensues. Murmur murmur murm—

You’re fucking talking, you moron!

I jerk my arms to mimic the contours.

“Threatening, jagged rocks crawl across the desert, yet this parched land is painted watery celery green, as if from between dead cracks emerges life itself. The painter says, ‘From your desolation, my son, create yourself anew.’”

I soften my face and breathe. I speak into Perry with quiet authority. “A dying king painted this, a love letter to his young son. It’s a father’s final blessing. And its message is….”

The crowd remains still in anticipatory silence.

Perry’s face remains locked in alarm.

“Its message is,” I say, drawing out the words, “remember who you were always meant to be.
Remember the king.
”

Perry flinches and backs up, pushes his way out of the crowd in a manner that’s somewhere between polite and hasty.

Crap.

Still talking, Vin.

“Notice those wings and prison bars. On one level, it’s obvious, but look again.”

Dammit, Perry, don’t leave.
I have more to say.

“You can see in the position of those prison bars that the Golden Curve is not the only physics reference. Those bars curve to represent cosine….”

Perry scissors his legs toward the giant glass doors. Seconds later, Perry Mangin disappears into the night without glancing backward. Cute Twink nods with relief.

Well, fuck.

Scrap the old plan; I’ve got a new one.
Siren Song
gets purchased tonight. Maybe I can help all three of these paintings get sold. I have to get Perry’s attention, get him back to the gallery. While I can’t force anything, I bet king energy can influence this. I can influence this. Three or four people seem awfully interested. I try to make extra eye contact with them as I wrap it up. That dude over there is hooked.

Dude?

Oh, right. Perry said that.

“… and a tribute to his son,” I say and clasp my hands together. “If giving this painting as a gift, a mom or dad might retell this sad story and say, ‘Like this painter, I would find a way to cross time and death just to tell you how much I loved you.’”

I pause and then dip my head. “Thank you.”

A smattering of polite applause follows.

Jeez, I drove Perry out of the gallery.

A man in the crowd blurts out, “I’ll take it.”

Someone else—perhaps a rakish real estate agent—disagrees. Quite politely, I might add.

The first man says, “Two hundred above asking.”

“Three hundred above asking.”

Act surprised by what’s happening, Vin. Look
surprised
.

“
Four
hundred.”

“
Five
hundred.”

On the plus side, Perry’s bolting counts as proof enough my arrow found its mark. He doesn’t need to know any more about a King Weekend; I wouldn’t have explained much anyway. And I was totally right, he does have a great ass. Those corporate guys hang out at the gym.

I should get a gym membership.

“
Eight
hundred.”

The bids climb higher and higher, everyone eager to see who first quits this expensive game of leapfrog. My new banker friend would undoubtedly frown on spontaneous art investments, but he’s not here to stop the outcome. Folks across the room notice and cross over. Who’s that lady with the scarf?

I see a few individuals, possibly savvier, considering Mangin’s two remaining paintings in a new light, wondering if this is one of those ground-floor things you hear about in the art world: someone who is nobody suddenly becomes somebody.

Cute Twink looks flustered. Arms crossed and keeping his distance, he’s still cool. But I’m sure he didn’t think anyone would actually purchase tonight with such dramatics. An older man, casually but meticulously dressed, accepts Cute Twink’s nods to let this unfold. That must be him, the gallery owner. Shame on me for not noticing Scarf Woman. She knows what she’s looking at when it comes to art; she’s into this.

The first bidder looks at me desperately and says, “Two thousand dollars over.”

“I will pay double the asking price.”

Art gallery patrons gasp because, hey, big drama. It’s fun watching stuff like this: spilled wine, dramatic bidding war. All that’s missing is a super-hard face slap and a big exit. Well, Perry made the big exit; check that off the list. I wonder if I could manage to get my face slapped? Probably.

At last, the bidding war is over. We have a winner!

I’m tempted to shake hands with the man who lost and compliment him on his good taste, but he shoots me a dark look. Maybe he already planned to buy this painting prior to my little show. Sorry, dude.

Crap. I’m going to have that word stuck in my head all week.

A few folks chatter and move to the other Mangin paintings, saying, “Yes. Right there. The Golden Curve.”

Scarf Woman nods at the Mangin painting to the right and says, “I’ll take this one.”

Well, good. I knew she had taste.

I shake some hands as people compliment me and ask me what gallery I work for, and I have to explain that I’m no art dealer, I’m a Realtor from the Mission who is showing a two-bedroom condo with a ton of early afternoon light.