Stay After Class, page 16
I relented, only because he had my wallet.
“The Creative Garden,” I finally told him. “Sixth Street.”
“Do not leave,” he commanded. “I’ll be there soon.”
I leaned back on the bench in the quiet, colorful garden and looked around at the lush trees and unique nooks and crannies. There were many small areas with seats and tables, and some that looked like altars, with small stone statues and angels. I breathed in deep, and tried to calm myself.
How did we go from sliding around each other naked to this?
In ten minutes, a taxi pulled up and he jumped out, with my bag and our food in tow. He paid the driver and came through the wrought iron gate. Just watching him walk into the park made me long for a remote control that could rewind us back to last night.
He seemed to have calmed down and smiled when he saw me. Had it been only just over two weeks since he first found my list and placed his hand on my chin and lip? Just the sight of him triggered a flood of fond memories.
“Okay, that was bad,” he said, sitting on the bench next to me and opening the bag of food. He handed me the salad with a fork, and unwrapped his turkey. “But it doesn’t mean we have to miss a good meal.”
I had to fight the smile that wanted to creep onto my face so I could look appropriately displeased as I took my salad from his hands. I was starving.
“What the eff is going on, Jem?” I opened the salad.
“What was that scene about, Amanda?”
“Okay, I’ll admit I was more dramatic than called for in public. But you were ditching me, and not just at the end of the night. For good.”
“I didn’t mean that at all. I wasn’t clear.”
“Why don’t you try being clear and honest with me?” I said, taking a bite. “From the start you have been alluding to the potential wrath of hell coming down around us, but you have not given me the facts.”
“I didn’t want to scare you, or scare you off.” He looked reflective.
“You, acting like an asshat today, scared me more than any of this will,” I said. “But I reserve the right to react, and I deserve the right to be informed.”
“Okay. Pull up a bench, because this will take some time.” At least he had his sense of humor back.
“I’m listening.” Suddenly, it felt like I was the adult in this situation.
“My mentor, Alfred Alcott, taught me how to be a good artist, and how to make money as an artist,” he said. “And he commissioned a fifty-piece show that would bring me to the next level and also make him money in the process. We made a deal on a handshake and a very basic contract.
“Alfred had a weakness when it came to sex and women. He married this younger, controlling bitch, and when he passed away recently, she took over.
“At some point, she brought in a Park Avenue lawyer to amend the contract. He went to my downtown, hipster agent and pressured him to quickly initial a bunch of changes.
“I found out this morning that terms of the contract were altered to reflect that the gallery would have complete rights to display or sell everything I’ve created since the inception of the agreement two years ago. They can lay claim to everything, even shit I draw on bar napkins.” He was shaking his head. “They’ve invested in me, and my art, and turned this showing into a big deal. They kind of own me right now, anyway.”
“That’s intense, for them to have dibs on all your work.” I was sympathetic, but thinking he definitely needed a new agent.
“Perhaps what is worse is, the gallery owner is friends with the chair of my department, and she has been trying to push through my application for tenure.”
“I didn’t know you could be tenured so young.” He mentioned it to me once, and I’d heard rumors at school, but most tenured professors were older and had spent more time at a single institution.
“It’s unusual but the gallery insisted to the university that my prominence as an artist only adds to my cache as a professor. And yada, yada, yada.”
“So what’s the harm in that?” I asked. “I read an article about you in a local art magazine that quoted the gallery owner saying, ‘Great art and talent means nothing if undiscovered.’”
“Regina Alcott is self-serving bitch,” he said. “I discovered she essentially has been trying to buy my academic success. I had no idea.”
“Wait … Regina?” I stopped chewing my food, finally realizing who this Regina was. “How did she buy it?”
“She offered the college a large endowment, with the provision they fast-track my tenure. She wants to use the university to improve my street cred, so to speak, and make my work more marketable.”
“Do you want to be tenured?”
“Yes, but on my own merits. The problem is there are people in the Arts and Humanities Department who feel they are more deserving than I, and those who are completely against my appointment and will do anything to discredit me. I freaked out about that photo this morning thinking it’s a sign that someone is trying to do just that.”
“Trying to prove you are dating a student?” I noticed a blue bird at the feeder and watched it peck at the food. I almost couldn’t believe the art world and academic soap opera Jem was describing.
“I am more concerned that they would try to prove a student dated me, for improved grades.” He ran his hand through his hair.
“Ha! As if. I did my assignments. I never missed class.” Maybe, in part, because he was so cute, but I did my work.
“But I asked you to stay after class. And you were seen with me at the gallery.”
“Oh.”
“Because of this weird symbiotic relationship with the college, structured by the gallery, it means college administrators will be at my opening, including my boss, the head of the art department, and some of the professors who pretty much think I’m a young punk.”
“I get it,” I said, trying not to be upset. “So I can’t be there with you. Look, I’ve had my private showing, after all. It’s just one night.”
He was silent.
“What else?”
“Regina Alcott is insisting on selling Awe, Wonder, and a Penis,” he said. “I placed it in the show just to share it, but she pointed out that the contract as it stands now makes it theirs to sell at their discretion.”
“Well, it’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. I had a huge fight with her a couple of nights ago, and again this morning when my agent could not reason with her.”
“You don’t have to worry about me and that sketch.” I honestly was not as upset as he was. “But I do think you need a new agent.”
“She found my other sketches of you, hidden in the closet, and she has threatened to exhibit them if I do not play nicely with all her demands for the show.”
It was suddenly hard to breathe. And I felt sick to my stomach, thinking of someone else seeing those sketches. Those documented moments of our lessons in love-making. Holy crap.
“All the messed up things that can happen as a result of you and me being together are getting closer to us.” He put his hand on mine. “What I said a long time ago, about seeing whether you can really handle this with me, is something we need to consider.”
“Excuse me? If I can deal with this?” I lashed out, angry and hurt. “It seems like you are the one who can’t deal with this.”
“The art world and the world of academia are riddled with politics, deals, and difficult people,” he said. “And I am smack in the middle of it now. Sometimes you can’t know how you will respond when backed into a corner. But my livelihood for years to come depends on this show and on having a job as a college professor, and this is—”
“Messing your life up? Your plans?”
He looked into my eyes, distraught. He seemed emotionally raw and wide open. Desire to ease his worries pulsed through me.
“I know what you need to do,” I said, touching his cheek. I believed sex would clear up both our situations. “Take me home with you. You need to have sex. I’m serious. The semen is backing up again.”
“After this particular day, we need to not have make up sex.” He lifted his hand to mine and pressed it harder against his cheek.
“But doesn’t that kind of sex make people closer and make things better?”
“For now, I can protect you by not making love to you.”
“But I thought you have been making love to me—with your eyes, your words, your hands, your art and your, um, kisses.”
“I’ve kept you safe on a technicality,” he said. “You’re still a virgin.”
“Because you don’t want to be accused of having sex with a student?”
“Because I don’t want you to be accused of sleeping with a professor to improve your grade. You can honestly say you have not slept with me. Despite any photos that may have surfaced, or sketches. Those are all just pieces of art. Not real life, as far as anyone else is concerned.”
I sighed so deeply that it echoed through the tiny park.
“What happened today, that’s part of what I meant about being ready,” he said. “It will take time to work things through.”
“Well, I have all the time in the world,” I joked. “You’re the one who’s getting old.”
He laughed, put down his sandwich, and dragged my hand from his face, down into his lap and squeezed it.
“I don’t want to lose you,” he said, “for any reason.”
Just then, my VirgEnd app started flashing across on my phone, on the seat next to me.
“What’s that?” he asked, looking over at it. “Three days to what?”
I did not want to add my little deadline onto his list of complications. I quickly pressed the button to turn it off.
“Three days until your show is over, yay!” I had to say something.
“About that,” he said, refocusing. “I want you to come.”
“To the show?” I scrunched my face up as if he were saying something loco. “You can’t be serious. Why don’t I just see you afterward? To celebrate.” And so that he could relieve me of my virginity.
“It’s important to me.” He rested a hand on my shoulder and massaged it gently. “Even if we can’t be obvious about our relationship, and even if I can barely talk to you, I want you there.”
It didn’t sound like a very good idea, so I said nothing.
“Besides, if you don’t show up, it will be like an admission of guilt for us both.”
“When did I become a guilty party?” I said with a mock pout. “I’m just an innocent virgin.”
“My innocent virgin.” He lifted my hand and kissed it.
“Okay, so the jury is still out about whether I will be walking into the hornets’ nest you’ve described,” I said, crumpling my napkin into a ball and tossing it into a nearby garbage can. “But I guess our fight is over.”
He nodded and took a deep breath. He breathed out hard, as if to say “close call.”
“C’mon,” he said, tossing our finished food into the trash and then texting for an Uber. “I am putting you in a cab.”
I rolled my eyes.
He lifted my pocketbook from the seat and, taking my arm, walked me out of the park.
“You are always putting me in a cab.”
“And will be doing until… ”
“Until what?”
“Until the time comes that I don’t.” He kissed my forehead, and handed me my purse.
I slid into the back seat, settled in. He looked at me through the cab window, his eyes a little sad, as if he didn’t want to part. My chest was tight watching him walk away. Then I looked in the side pocket of my bag. There was five hundred dollars.
I called him as the taxi drove off.
“Why is there five hundred dollars in here?” I was holding the cash in my hand. “Is this supposed to make me feel better, or make you feel better?”
“Don’t go there. I am just taking care of you.”
“With oodles of cab money?” I pressed my ear into the phone and took a deep breath.
“Dress money, something to wear Saturday.”
“You’re getting involved with my wardrobe again?” I shook my head in disbelief. “Maybe we should go back to the original idea: just sex.”
“When was that ever the original idea?”
“It was my idea, until very recently, when you started suggesting that our relationship was not just about sex.”
“I am sure there are plenty of college boys that would be happy to bed you and relieve you of your virginity,” he said. “But I think, despite your anxiousness to get it over with, you want more.”
“I do,” I said softly. “I want you,” I added, under my breath.
Chapter Twenty-one
Friday, June 3
VirgEnd Countdown: 2 Days
Sunnyside
I didn’t have experience with heartbreak, but Jem’s behavior was giving me a taste.
I woke up thinking about how weird things had gotten. I was out of breath just remembering how I ran from him, how he chased me. And my mind was reviewing all the things he’d revealed while we were sitting in the garden yesterday and it sounded like I was at the center of an art world and academic drama. How could it be that Wednesday I was in his arms and Thursday he was pushing me away? One minute he was telling me he’d made a mistake and the next he’s insisting I come to his show?
Is this how adult men act when they get stressed? Maybe I was too young for this!
In the morning light, it seemed he was being selfish. I understood he was mired in the complications and conflict around his show but why press me to be there? It may be painful to pretend we were not an item and strange to fake my way through his opening.
I had a selfish thought too: now that he was freaking out about his show I wondered if I would ever meet my goal of virginity loss by my twenty-second birthday, which was two days away. Since I was born at 12:32 a.m. on June 5th, I literally had to at least start having sex by midnight the day of his opening.
I wanted it to be Jem but maybe this fantasy was just not meant to be, especially since he was giving me such mixed messages right now. He wanted me to come to the show, but didn’t want to talk to me there, and he told me to rethink whether I could handle this whole thing. What the eff?
But then, just as I was thinking of him the phone rang. It was him. Synchronicities like that always confirmed the strength of our connection.
“These past twenty-four hours have been insane,” he said. “But God, I’ve missed you, so fucking much. I want to make sure you’re coming Saturday.”
Oh God, I hope I’ll be coming Saturday, but at this point I may have to settle for any penis inside me just to do the deed. My virginity had to go. “After all your concerns about being outed? Of me being recognized? Still not sure that’s a good idea.”
“I can’t introduce you as my girlfriend,” he said. “But there is no rule that says you can’t come to a cocktail party. I have to schmooze and continue to sell my soul, but you can get a peek into my world”
“Back up,” I said. “Am I your girlfriend?”
“Amanda, I want you there,” he said, evading the question. “Let’s not label things, or label us. Not right now.”
“My head is going to explode from your mixed messages.” I ran my fingers through my hair and sighed.
“This is not a mixed message. I want you there.” He said it in his stern professor voice. “And you are my girlfriend. Well, I want you to be.”
My heart fluttered.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll be there.” I agreed, thinking I would blend into the background and try not to fall into a puddle of tears when he ignored me for his patrons and assorted bosses and “masters.”
“You may want to trade in the short shorts for a cocktail dress,” he said. “Use the money I gave you to buy something nice, and then taxi in. I don’t want you on the train looking irresistible.”
“Can you even afford a five-hundred-dollar dress with the twisted predicament you’re in?”
“I didn’t say I was broke, I just said there was a lot riding on this show in terms of future earnings.” He sounded confident and sure of himself again. “My paintings sell for a lot of money. That is why there is so much intrigue and drama around all this. I am a commodity. But you know what, if things don’t work out, I can always paint wall murals for rich people with mansions. They always ask me to.”
“That actually sounds like a cool gig.”
“So I’ll see you Saturday?”
“Okey-doke. See you then.”
Chapter Twenty-two
Saturday, June 4
Morning
VirgEnd Countdown:
Less than 1 Day
Sunnyside
Since I was under twenty-four hours from my target goal, my VirgEnd App woke me up with a beep from my phone. It was now counting down hours, minutes, and seconds.
Your Deadline is Approaching was written across the screen. Then this: 14 Hours 31 Minutes 40 seconds.
Tension fluttered in my stomach. And my chest felt all excited and tight.
I texted Tara.
Me: S.O.S.
I sent a smiley face that looked like it was drowning.
Tara: Holy crap, did you do it?
Me: Negative. And all sorts of bad stuff is happening related to school and his opening. Oh man, it’s a hot mess. And I’m gonna miss my deadline.
Tara: You’re a gorgeous young virgin. We’ll find someone to do you. Come to the Jersey Shore.
Me: I still want him. Besides, I promised I’d go to his show.
Tara: Then you’ll have to be the showstopper.
Me: ?
Tara: Be so irresistible, he has to have you. Call me on Facetime. I’ll help you dress.
I was happy to see Tara’s face on my phone. She was sitting on her porch, which overlooked the ocean, sipping coffee.
“Girlfriend, I thought you would have ditched your hymen by now.”
“I’ve tried, believe me, and we’ve done like everything else.”
