December 11, 1998 .13.] ohn Engman Prize page 2 Cheri Johnson: “The Painter” what he did for “a living“ — and he added these quotation marks with a slightly acidic drop in pitch. not with his fingers. as they were wrapped around a Pre- mium Light. He added. “And I have declined the ofier. the... Show moreDecember 11, 1998 .13.] ohn Engman Prize page 2 Cheri Johnson: “The Painter” what he did for “a living“ — and he added these quotation marks with a slightly acidic drop in pitch. not with his fingers. as they were wrapped around a Pre- mium Light. He added. “And I have declined the ofier. the really very kind offer. of this gentleman" —— he gestured to the bartender, who glowered — to pour this drink in a glass. and hide the distasteful thing in a recycling bin. So what do you think of that?“ At a table nearby. someone was picking lightly through a copy of Harper‘s Bazaar. “I think: how provocative!" said Amelia. who enjoyed being wicked to these young artists. She flicked her gaze to the magazine and saw a slip ofa girl. a small. grey wrist. a child‘s barrette. She would not have been surprised. had she been this girl. when the artist had told her earlier that his favorite thing to paint was flesh. The artist had looked down toward his chest and then leered sideways. his gaze almost but not quite on her face. tilting upwards past one of his raucous elbows. “Your belly." he had said. “would shiver under the velvet pricks of a horsehair brush.“ Amelia had laughed with joy and relief. for then she had known she was being made fun of. What a poor boy. trying so hard to be a dirty old man! He must have known he couldn‘t pull it off. Now she looked at him carefully. and thought again of the remark about flesh. His eyes were lucid and green. and his cheek was as soft and as taut as “A green peach." said Amelia. knowing he would catch the significance of that. if he was any sort of artist at all. “You're just like a pretty green peach perched on that stool. only you‘re ready to spring. and not roll." “We are the same age. you know." said the artist. “I heard the bouncer ask you when you came in. I know you're just old enough to drink.“ “We're not." said Amelia. laughing her plump. con~ tented housewife laugh. her rich old peasant‘s laugh. her mother-of-the-bride laugh. as fragrant as ripe squash. “As far as the world‘s concerned. I've gone and let myself go and look like a woman. and I might as well be an old woman. for that. I want you to meet my grandmother!“ she added suddenly, with another of her strange chortles. The artist looked down at one of her thighs and shiv- ered. He tried to remind himself. as he had taken to doing lately. that desire was all biology. and he forced himself to picture Amelia as a glistening. fertile. guffawing womb. The womb rocked slightly on its stool. and touched his arm in a way it could not have known was seductive. The artist closed his eyes and put his thoughts on the surplus population. “You will like my grandmother." said the womb. laughing again. this time ironically. “You two will get along better than I could ever get along with either of you." The womb hopped off the stool — the artist did not know quite how it managed to do it — and moved toward the door. Just before it pushed it open with what appeared to be the its shapely rear end. the artist breathed again and suddenly there was the whole Amelia, squinu'ng exquis- itely in the sun from the window. dressed in grey leggings that curled at her ankles and a baggy smock dress. “So what are you a painter of?“ asked the grandmother of Amelia‘s artist. The grandmother had come immedi- ately. as soon as she‘d been called. which seemed a little strange to the artist. “I‘ve already told Amelia." he said. not wishing to repeat it in front of a grandmother. even a grandmother in a jewel- colored scoop neck. He was not so young. “Is that enough. then?" asked the grandmother. but she did not pursue it. “We‘re both won'ied about her,” she said softly. motioning to Amelia at the far end of the bar. who was talking to an old man there. but not gently. as one less than her might have done; the artist heard another hearty laugh and winced. He was not worried. for he barely knew her. But he did not want to say so. And he did want her, which perhaps wasn't so different. “It's all making them think old,“ he said. sweeping his arm around the bar and toward the small windows. as if to indicate all of it, all of it; even the clothes shops and the posters in the bus terminals. Sud- denly he realized that what he had just said. his thought that had come out of his trying to simply think of some- thing to say. was right. If age could now be divided into two symbolic groups — he was always careful to keep all of his classifications safely in the symbolic — of children and adults. or girls and old women. with an obvious prefer- ence given to one and only half-hearted joy taken in the other. then Amelia was unsurprisineg lost. This was an unusual revelation for a young man to come to. and for this reason he was proud of it: it was also. for a young man who made most of his money painting flesh. very valuable. He was seized almost immediawa by a wild desire to paint Amelia: Amelia and only Amelia. only she would do. a TTHEBARTHEPAINTERTOLDAMELIA Certainly there were other Amelias out there. But none of them had brought him to this artistic crux. Earlier he had wanted her only momentarily; now he wanted her forever. or rather now he wanted her in both ways. He did not care which one came first. “Innocence and old age you can laugh at." said Amelia's grandmother. She had dropped her face at an angle. and in its slice of shadow it was almost alluring, thought the young artist. with a little discomfort. “But if you really look at yourself at that age. Amelia‘s age. you can‘t do it. There‘s too much to take seriously." The artist nodded slowly. thinking of some of the early photographs of Truman Capote. stretched out disarmineg across one of his back covers. his hands folded as if con- cealing bombs. his shapely and serious lips. He thought of Amelia again. without looking at her at the end of the bar. a glistening womb bending easily on her stool. “You have to make her see it." said the artist, with a sudden rush of urgency. grasping one of the grandmother‘s hands. “Otherwise she'll never let me see it." he added, with an emphasis on the second “see” that he wished a moment later he would have left off. This was still her grandmother. after all. But the grandmother smirked. “I’ve already told her Amelia had laughed with joy and relief, for then she had known she was being made fun of. What a poor boy, trying so hard to be a dirty old man! He must have known he couldn’t pull it ofif. how I used to dance at her age." she said. “and how people knew what it was to have something to shake.“ The artist thought. “Let‘s show her some pictures." he said. In the end. they brought her to an art store. (“But don‘t show her any Matisse." the grandmother whispered to the artist before going in. “he just makes it all look ridiculous." and the artist, although he was not sure he agreed, said, yes. they would start and end with some Renaissance pieces. for now.) They took Amelia's hand fu'mly and led her to prints; they both considered Botticelli and Veronese standard. Amelia‘s grandmother also found a book with Velazquez‘s Mars in it. which the artist thought was insult- ing. and he whispered fiercely that he didn‘t know what something like that had to do with their project. In retallia- tion. he showed Amelia Angelica and the Hermit. Amelia was mild and obliging. still laughing. and at times protest- ing that really. she had seen all of these before at one time or another and liked them all well enough. but what did they think they were doing? She was sorry she had intro- duced them. But still they grabbed her hands. and then. at times. each other's. and together the three of them made an odd set of halted Graces. not really Graces at all. of course. but somehow making the grandmother think of that when she caught a glimpse of their joined reflection in the front window of the store. They bought Amelia a book of plates. and the artist pre- sented it to her on the sidewalk. When they left each other — Amelia and her grandmother walking together. the artist in the opposite direction. with his back as curved as a young artist‘s should be — the day was ending. and already the city was filling with the sun‘s forgotten curves of grief. The artist met Amelia‘s grandmother for drinks. At one point. she looked at him slyly over the tipped rim of her glass. put it down. and pressed one thumbnail to her lip. The artist looked at her warily. “You know. you don‘t think she's beautiful.” she said frankly. with no preten- tious emphasis on the "don't." “You can‘t possibly. Her ass is like a plum." “God.” He ran his palms down his thighs. “Her ass is like a plum.“ repeated the grandmother. “How many asses like plums have you seen made beautiful lately? You don‘t decide what beauty is." “I am an artist!“ said the artist, trembling. “You don't decide what beauty is." repeated the grand- mother. She took another drink and again peered at him over the rim of her glass. In the dim light of the bar -—- this was a different bar than the one in which they had met. but similarly lit —— she saw him slowly stop trembling and slit his eyes. “Fuck you!" said the artist. saying it almost like a ques- tion. “I am an artist. Fuck you." he repeated. smiling. “Maybe.” said the grandmother. Amelia came. saying she had taken a liking to Trtian‘s Gypsy Madonna The artist dreamt of Amelia. When he looked attire Gypsy Madonna before going to bed. she was the glisten- ing womb. no longer laughing. however. but hovering deli- cately before his bed: if he did not look at the Madonna, she was the full-bodied Amelia. stretched out across the foot of his bed. her powerful legs arched. or coming toward him from the window. Always. unless she was only a womb. Amelia's eyes were crackling. and her mouth was tragic and firm. She was making progress. reported Amelia’s grand- mother to the aru'st. in one of their hushed telephone con- versations. hushed for secrecy if Amelia was in the next room at her grandmother‘s, hushed for amusement if she was not. Yesterday, the grandmother had caught her in a beautiful pose at the window, a finger to her pretty lip as if she was wonied about something. That's encouraging. said the artist. Yes. sighed the grandmother. only the next minute she was turning and chuckling -— and without toss— ing her head -— and suggesting a game of cards. The grandmother laughed for a long time over that one. while the artist listened in pain. He was losing his patience, and every night he was trying to paint Amelia from his dreams and his imagination. and finding he could not do it. What kind of painter was he. with an inadequate imagination? He confessed this to the grandmother, who listened qui— etly while he ranted. until finally she could not stop herself from breaking their code of quiet. dark tension. and cried out “Oh!” very loudly. It shocked them both. The grand- mother pushed her palm down her face from her forehead to her mouth. and then hung up. She was alone in the apartment. She went to the gilded mirror in the hallway and stared at herself. and for the first time in her life she did not believe the reflection was her own. She tried to believe it, scrunching up her eyebrows and watching them creep over her eyes like bristles. touching her wrinkles and seeing her fingers caress them with love. But something strange had happened to her; she could not believe it. She turned from the mirror and began to dig through the box of pictures she had left on the sofa. where she had been show— ing them to Amelia. They were pictures of her in her early twenties. when she had entered dance competitions all the way down the coast. It was evening; in the dark apartment she squinted at the photographs with growing excitement. How her mouther had raged when she had bought red and purple dresses meant especially to flare and then cling to the legs, so that the thin fabric outlined a woman's plump thighs; how dark and beautiful the young men beside her looked. their hands poised not quite decorously low on her waist. How she had waited. with delicious terror, for this age, with a quivering apprehension only a late-developing six- teen-year-old could know. at night touching her arms lightly, in her childhood bed. The grandmother looked through the photographs steadily. one after the other. slowly at first. then more quickly. ravenously; she looked and shuddered. In one picture a blond-haired boy was looking earnestly at the camera with his head cocked in a way that he could not have known would not look mysterious and dark to her, years later. but only tender and comical. But still she held the picture and looked and looked and looked. and while she smiled once she did not. could not. bring herself to laugh. When Amelia comes in the young artist does not even hear her. for she has learned, from he and the grandmother. how to be furtive and sly. When he finally sees that she has come in. he first wonders how she could have possibly known where he lives, because he has just moved. Then he realizes that she must have looked him up. sought him out. tracked him hungrily from contact to contact until finally she found him. sitting tenser at the window and worrying about the fading light. Suddenly he realizes what this might mean. and he looks up at her. believing that if he is not right he will certainly die right there before her. crumple right at the heavy rubber pleats of her thick-soled shoes. He looks. She is smiling very faintly. She reaches out one finger, as she has gotten very close to him by now. and very lightly. very deliberately. touches his neck. “Paint me." she says. “Paint me." Now she has lost her smile altogether. and the artist thinks her eyes must be as beauti- ful as Narcissus‘ were. reflected in that treacherous brook. He thinks that it would be nice to have the grandmother here for this. but he cannot think of a way of suggesting it that would not sound absurd. Show less