“Laur-oh!”
“It’s my man.”
The class has perked up immensely at this man’s presence and he makes his rounds, bussing cheeks, giving daps, and finally, one enormous hug to the model, who doesn’t seem to mind embracing a sopping wet raincoat.
“So, Roz.” Daniel checks his watch and then looks down at my feet, neatly lined up in the hallway, while my head peeks around the doorway. “In or out. Class is about to start and we keep the door closed during session out of respect for our model.”
“I’m not signed up…” I say again, uselessly, as if it will stop time and prevent any sort of decision from needing to be made. I could just drip on this doorstep into infinity, enjoying the vibes and risking nothing.
“First one’s free.” He winks but then jolts as Esther pops up from nowhere.
“No, it’s not,” she says. “But if you decide to sign up you can pay later.”
“I don’t have any supplies…”
“We have plenty extra lying around,” Daniel insists.
“I’m soaking wet…”
“Live with it?” he suggests, and I laugh.
It looks so warm and bright in there. The people, each very different from the next, seem to know one another well. The air is rich with charcoal and wax and paper. This is how some people spend an early Friday evening in June.
Esther fans every imaginable shade of colored pencils in front of me. “Pick a color,” she says sternly.
Sometimes, someone tells you to do something and you just do it. Which is how I find myself with a forest-green colored pencil in my hand and a pad of paper on my lap. Daniel’s gone to find an easel for me, so I’m sitting on a free stool and trying not to draw attention to myself. Even though I’m soaking wet and wearing knee socks and the only person not chatting freely with someone else.
Glancing up at the model in the robe (peeling a banana and still doing some pre-class chitchat), I figure I better quickly check and see if there is some sort of prodigious hidden talent I’m about to unearth. Perhaps the universe has plunked me on this wobbly stool for a reason.
But, yeah, just as I thought. No. No, I’m not secretly amazing at drawing. The model, wiry and vivacious in real life, is reduced to a lumpy, squat little alienoid on my paper.
What am I even doing here?
“Oh. That’s wonderful.” I startle and turn to see Daniel, easel in hand, peering at my paper. “So, I see you already have an established drawing practice!” he says.
“Absolutely not,” I say.
He laughs and then studies my drawing again. “Well, then you’re just naturally talented.”
Either he’s seeing something I’m not or he’s a hell of a salesman. I narrow my eyes. “Are we looking at the same blob?”
He laughs. “No, seriously. Most newbies drawing the figure…they just try to copy exactly what they’re seeing andput it down on the page. But look, what you’re doing with Alan…you’re building him part by part. Constructing him. As anidea,not a likeness. Not easy to do with a stubby colored pencil. Very cool.” He gives me a double thumbs-up. Someone calls his name and he leaves me there with the empty easel and a possibly terrible drawing on my lap.
My toe hits one wet corner of the packaged frame resting on the floor and the paper wrinkles accusingly. I wince and gather it up, clutching it against my chest.
What would it be like to have the chutzpah to just start a new life? To be someone who goes to drawing class on Friday nights with a roomful of strangers? What would it be like to be brave enough to evenwonderabout life without Vin?
I don’t find the answer.
Because I want my old life back, not a new hobby. Because I’ve failed at marriage and I don’t know if I can handle being bad at one more thing.
I’m on my feet and meeting Daniel at the door to the classroom, where he’s about to close it up and start class.
“I really have to go,” I whisper.
“Sure,” Daniel says easily. “In that case…” He gestures for me to step out into the hallway. At the last second, he pokes his head back out into the hall and catches my eye. “I’m closing this, but door’s always open. I mean, again, not literally, because like I said we keep it closed during class. But if you want to come back. Come back. Okay. Get home safe.”
And then the door is closed in my face and the light dims accordingly.
