Simon Says (14 page)

The buildings on the canvas surround the shimmering stars and reflect their light back, and I suddenly straighten up and stare inside the painting at the glaring reflections. A different sort of mirror takes shape in my mind as the pieces of the puzzle that have been spinning in confusion settle into a pattern at last. Is this pattern what I was warning myself about the night of the storm? Is this really Graeme Brandt? Not the image I'd hoped to find, but the truth inside?

I have to draw Graeme. I have to see if I'm right about him. I'm not sure I like the image, but I can't get it out of my mind. Ill know as soon as I see him and put the lines on paper whether it's a true drawing or not And I have to know—I have to understand him. I want to startle him, also. I want to define the bond between us. Or maybe I want to break it.

The drama department has a collection of one-acts scheduled next weekend, with a cast party after. If I'm right, that's the sort of party Graeme won't miss.

"You going to the cast party?" I ask Adrian.

"Probably," he says, a secretive smile on his face. I wonder who he's going with, glad that he's got a date.

"Can you get me in?"

"You don't really need an invite," he tells me, his voice curious. "But you can tag along with me if you like."

"Thanks." Graeme has to be there.

"What's so important about this party, anyway?"

I shrug. "I'm just a party animal, I guess."

Adrian laughs, a brittle sound like breaking glass. "Oh, that's you, all right!" The sketch I made of him hangs above his desk. I'm touched, and a little sorry I drew it for him, because I suspect he puts more stock in the gift than he should. But it's a true drawing, even if it's only one side of him.

I make it through the week, painting and keeping my mouth shut in Mr. Wallace's class. The shreds of the lemon are gone the next class session, and he never says anything else about it Stalemate, I guess. We have a new arrangement—a tumble of children's building blocks. I like the angles and the shadows and use charcoal to rough in the blocks on a fresh canvas without any little extras.

I wonder what Mr. Wallace would say if I painted the whole thing in black and white, or maybe sepia tones, like an old photograph? But I don't because I suddenly see that my perspective on these hard-edged cubes isn't quite perfect I rub out the charcoal and adjust an angle slightly, looking at the blocks in a different way—looking at the idea of fundamental techniques in a different way. If I'd seen the lines like this in my painting of the roof, the image would have been sharper, more focused. Why couldn't Mr. Wallace show us that instead of getting so hung up on the purity of photo-painting his dead-life arrangements? Or is that what he's been trying to teach us, and I haven't been paying attention? I paint the blocks with care.

I start phoning the people Rachel wants me to sketch, asking if I can come by and watch them work sometime, explaining that I don't want them to "sit" for
me, just be themselves, and I'll take care of the rest It sounds so simple.... They fell for it of course, and I start sketching the truth they never realize they've revealed. I'm on overdrive, filling every minute so I don't have to think.

I even nerve myself to talk to Alona again in computer class. I ask her some questions about the kaleidoscope idea I had for the
Lord Jim
false image game, and she flips back her long braid and lights up with excitement She goes on about if-then cause-and-effect logic strings. I picture shimmering strands of gray brain matter logically stretching from situation to image, but don't think this will help me write the program, until Alona suggests we work together on it Apparently Ms. Cooper said we could team up for the term project. I must not have been listening. Alona says she couldn't think of anything interesting enough, but she likes this because she's a writer. I don't let her see my inner wince at the word
writer. Are all writers like Graeme? Do they fit the pattern Vve seen for him?
I don't know Alona well enough to know what she's like, and I don't think I want to. I like the way she smiles, though, and I don't want to see her eyes slide away from me (
from my paintings
) uncomfortably. I don't want to let myself hope they might not slide away but will light up with pleasure. It hurts more when I let myself hope.

Finally time drags past and gets me to the night of the one-acts, and I sit through them numbly, waiting. Bits of plays, moments of theater, fragments flickering onstage, and all I can think of is the images of Graeme Brandt in my mind's kaleidoscope.

This party isn't at the theater. The director's one of the dorm masters, and he's throwing the cast party in his dorm apartment I wander in behind Adrian and a light designer from the one-acts, as if I belong, and nobody stops me. A few feces smile at me—they look dimly familiar from the party after Adrian's quartet last week. If the same students are here, then I'm right that this is the group he feels comfortable with—I'm right that he'll come, too.
Graeme.
I hunt through the ice chest, hoping for a ginger ale, find one, and wait for him.

As soon as he walks through the door, I can't help my mind flying to his. But he's not alone tonight. He comes in talking to one of the actors, a few steps behind an older man who looks familiar. I saw him at the Orientation Week party. He has a strong, wary fece, and Graeme keeps glancing at him, including him in the conversation. I watch them together, testing the image that haunts me.

Graeme glances across the room and our eyes meet He flashes the same clear smile I remember too well from the other night When I don't respond right away he raises his eyebrows slightly, and I realize I have responded. I'm smiling back at him without meaning to.

He says something to the others and crosses the room toward me. The actor shrugs and heads off to the kitchen, but the man trails Graeme possessively, his sharp black eyes examining me narrowly. I wouldn't like to tangle with him.

"Charles. How're you doing?"

The tone is warm but makes no demands, with none
of the closeness I backed away from before. I feel relieved—almost safe being friendly with him.

"Fine. Good show, wasn't it?"
Was it? I have no idea.

"We'll have to wait to see what Tyler writes about it before we know about that," he returns, his voice now rippling in amusement The right tone for the party. "This is Mr. Adler, my mentor." And then his tone changes again. "Sir, this is Charles Weston, the new sketch artist for
Ventures.
He just transferred here."

"Welcome to Whitman," Mr. Adler tells me. He glances around. "Don't make too late a night of it Gray. You should be working."

Graeme smiles at him gently. "Yes sir. As soon as the new book's right in my mind, I'll get to work like a good boy. You'll be begging me to take some time off and go to a party before I burn out."

Mr. Adler sighs. "At least you've got something in the works. It's been a long time since that first book, Gray."

"I know."

Mr. Adler shakes his head, then glances around for the director. "I'm going to see if Bill needs a hand."

Graeme watches him go. "He's right of course."

I nod. "I've been asking about your next book since I met you. At least you
have
to answer to him. I'm glad something's coming into focus."

He smiles faintly. "It isn't But it doesn't hurt him to think it is."

I can't answer that The silence lengthens between us until it becomes dangerous, but all I can think is,
I'm right—I know how to draw him.

"Hello, Charles. Graeme." Rachel's cool voice breaks
the silence, and I can't quite hide the relief as I turn to her. Shared silence means understanding, and Graeme and I don't really understand each other. It means acceptance (
even belonging
)—things I can't be part of, no matter how much I want to. I thought he could show me how to belong without playing games, but he can't.

"Hi," I tell her.

"Any luck setting up appointments with the students I suggested?" she asks, her thumbs hooked in the pockets of a paisley vest that looks like swirls of oils on a watery surface. Graeme glances at me quizzically.

"I'm doing some sketches to go with an article," I tell him. "Yeah, I've met with three of them already and seen their work. I've already done roughs."

"Good—I'd like the lot by next week."

"I think I can manage that."

Graeme says, "IH let you guys talk shop." He gives me another smile and heads across the room.

Rachel watches his graceful walk, then turns back to me. "What about him?"

I tell her, "I was planning to do a rough sketch tonight, but I think I know just what to draw."

Her smile matches my own, and without warning time slides to a halt
I know all about Graeme Brandt,
I want to tell her.
I know about all of them—the insiders, the successes that everyone else looks up to because they feel safe with them. I see what they think they are, and I understand why people like them. And I can tell you because you're not like them, are you? You're like me.

Then I see answering delight flare in her eyes, and I blink back into myself, remembering that she's not like
me, not in the end.
Why not? Why shouldn't she be like me? Why shouldn't
someone
be like me?
But that's only wishful thinking. It's just that I
want
her (
someone
) to be like me. The real Rachel wants to see inside of me and rearrange the pieces, and that's different from what I do—I arrange the pieces in my sketches so other people can see the pattern. Rearranging pieces is more like forcing your pattern on someone else.

Nobody's like me, in the end. I just have to find a way to get used to it I slide my sketch pad out of my pack and turn away, looking for a place to sit I don't care how rude she thinks I am—the ruder, the better.

A mahogany telephone table stands in a corner, and I dose in on it pulling out the straight-backed chair and moving the notepad, the mug of pens and pencils, and the little vase of silk flowers to make room to draw. I deliberately don't look back toward Rachel. I pull out my sketch pad and make myself think of Graeme, instead. There's the deferential student I saw with his mentor tonight, the celebrity I saw at the writers' party that first week, the charmer I saw in action after the concert the aloof romantic who watched the storm with me, the writer I saw in his studio, the intimate friend I pushed away. The images revolve around and around inside my head as the kaleidoscope races out of control—all of them Graeme, and none of them the
real
Graeme.

My pen moves across the sketch pad, but my unruly left hand seems to have a mind of its own. Instead of the shifting lines of Graeme's (
beautiful
) responsive face, my hand produces a strong face framed by a neat cap of shining hair, dear eyes, with highlights in them
that break apart into shifting kaleidoscope shards of colored glass. Before the lines of Rachel's face can come into focus, I turn over the page and force my hand to follow my eyes across the room to Graeme Brandt.

He stands talking to his mentor, the perfect posture of respect His expression is attentive, and even though I can't hear his voice I'm sure it's just the right tone for a student accepting his teacher's advice. It's a terrific performance, better than anything onstage tonight.
Adrian says ... show time.

Now I start sketching in earnest—swift uncompromising lines, unyielding black. All the thought I've put into seeing inside of Graeme, all my struggles to understand him, everything I hoped and the truth I have to face—it all goes into the drawing. A slender figure emerges, pen poised in his graceful right hand. Around the figure, a series of mirrors reflect wished-for images toward the waiting author. I take pains to show each expectation. But within the circle of mirrors, and above the lean body, just where the head should be, I draw yet another mirror—huge, empty, all-encompassing, reflecting all of the images back on themselves. Without hesitation, ignoring the ache in my fingers that tells me I've grasped my pen too tightly for too long, I sign the sketch and rip it out of the pad. I know it's a true drawing.

I hear a gasp and a distant murmur of voices. I mean to look for Rachel, to give her the sketch, but when I look up I see Graeme coming toward me, his expression puzzled but friendly.
I know,
I want to tell him.
You see? I understand now. I've seen how you play the game. But
I don't understand why—and I don't think I can forgive you for not being who I thought you were.

On a deeper level, I'm begging,
Please let me be wrong.

He readies the table and bends down to look at the drawing, then freezes, staring at it I wait for him to say something, but he looks up from it his blue eyes gone nearly black, turned into bottomless pools. Someone says something to him, and he snatches up the paper, folding it roughly in half to hide the stark lines.

"Graeme—" I can't shorten his name, like the others do, the ones who don't know him. But he doesn't stop to listen. He backs away from me, then turns. He's across the room and gone before I have the chance to say more.

"Well, well."

The other kids, strangers with hungry eyes who enjoyed the show, have turned away, whispering to each other. But Adrian leans against the wall beside the small table.

"Your sketch seems to have made quite a stir."

His tone sounds almost relieved at Graeme's abrupt departure, and he studies the door instead of meeting my eyes. I realize he's been standing there for a while now—long enough to have seen the sketch before Graeme hid it—long enough to compare it with the sketch I did of him—no doubt long enough to tell himself that he's made a conquest after all, that he won me over to the point where I've spurned Graeme Brandt for Adrian Lawson. Something inside of me snaps at his assumption that I could care enough about him to be in
tentionally kind to him and deliberately cruel to Graeme. I want to rip the sketch I made of him into shreds. Why did I ever think that
roommate
might mean
friend!
That his music that night might mean we had something in common? You let somebody get a little close to you, and they think they own the right to twist your actions any way they like. Adrian turns to me and his eyes widen, nonplussed by the fury he sees in mine.