Chapter 6 #2
‘Don’t “obviously” me. There’s nothing obvious about you. Which is my own fault. I couldn’t imagine that a bartending rugby-coaching smartarse fanboy would happen to be a masterful artist.’
‘Wait, say that again, I’m gonna change my Instagram bio!’
Grinning, Loris opens the built-in closet on the right side of his TV stand. Charles throws his coat, scarf and suit jacket onto the backrest of the sofa and sits sideways against the mismatched pillows to gaze at the drawing.
‘Did you go to art school?’
‘I took evening classes back in France.’
‘When did you start?’
‘About seven years ago.’
‘So you were in… what you call lycée? High school?’
‘Yeah. I mean, I had just joined a regular high school. Before that, I was in a sports study programme, but I had to quit when my knees went like, “A career in rugby? Sorry, dude, not in this life.”’
Charles looks back at Loris, who’s pushing the coffee table aside with the body parts that betrayed him.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It sucked, but my mum is a wise woman. She knew I had a natural gift for art, so she enrolled me to take my hands off my punching ball. It did wonders for my spirits.’
‘I bet. Did you get a degree?’
‘No, it was just a community centre. But who needs diplomas? The real key to success is to know how to make yourself indispensable. Oh, come on!’
Loris is wrestling with something stuck in the closet. Charles moves to offer his help, but Loris finally pulls out a folded easel. He then grabs a wooden case, a plank and a roll of masking paper, and brings everything to the space he freed up.
‘What are you doing?’
‘I told you I was gonna multitask.’
Loris removes a sheet of wax paper from inside a large portfolio and turns it towards Charles, who bounces back up.
‘Stop it!’
It can’t be colour pencils. It has to be photos.
A crafty photomontage of a cracked mirror floating like a cork in a raging ocean.
Except the mirror wouldn’t have a shadow if it were a montage.
And the pieces of glass wouldn’t be blank, waiting for Loris to draw the shattered reflection of the waves.
‘This isn’t art, this is witchcraft. Patty is helping you!’
‘If she had powers, I’d get her to mind-sharpen these five-hundred pencils.’
‘How do you do this? Can I watch?’
‘I’d rather not. That’d be distracting, having you stare from behind my back.’
‘Yes, of course.’
Charles would hate it if someone read a work-in-progress over his shoulder. His brain needs sharpening too.
‘What about you? Do you draw? Or paint?’
‘No…’ Charles collects the beers and an opener poking out of the pen holder on the desk. ‘Well, sometimes, but I’m not good at it.’
‘Says who?’
‘Me. I wasn’t born with a natural gift so there’s no point.’
‘There’s a point if you enjoy it,’ Loris says, applying masking paper onto the completed parts of the drawing fixed on the plank.
‘It’s… It’s like piano. Or sports. It’s fun, but in my home, hobbies that can’t be anything more than hobbies, they’re not encouraged and— But it’s nice to do a bit of everything, depending on my mood.’
Charles shrugs offhandedly.
He can’t lament to Loris, who had his childhood dream snatched away from him, needs to play Tetris with his furniture, has so little time to devote to his passion that it infringes on his social life, and seems content with his lot.
Not to Loris, who has no reason to worry about him and needs to remain ignorant. Charles doesn’t want pity or concern from Loris. He wants teasing, gloating and childish grins that might uncloud more memories.
‘And writing?’ Loris grabs the beer that Charles is holding out to him. ‘Another pointless hobby?’
‘I guess it’s my natural gift. Next year, I’ll start submitting papers to economic magazines.’
‘Sounds smart. But what about fiction?’
‘Fiction?’
‘You said you write stories.’
‘No, I never said that.’
‘Oh, my bad... Anyway,’ Loris raises his bottle, ‘cheers to natural gifts. And speaking of fictional stories, should we talk about The Mind of Wonders?’
Charles lets himself fall onto the sofa with a dramatic gasp. ‘Low blow of an opening shot! But yes, argue your point. I’ll take it apart.’
‘The book makes my point. It’s extremely naive to believe it’s an autobiography.’
‘And it’s very cynical to distrust Pavel’s own words.’
‘I trust his words.’ Loris flips a silver pencil and tackles his drawing. ‘I trust everything he claimed until the day he released the book because he was shit-scared to pass into oblivion.’
‘He couldn’t have known it would happen.’
‘It was happening already.’
‘From his perspective or yours?’
Loris looks up, amused. ‘Can I lecture you for five minutes? To explain my perspective on his perspective?’
‘Suit yourself. You’re dying to.’
Charles smirks for show, but he’s dying to be lectured on Olwinski, regardless of the accuracy of the lecture.
‘Okay, so…’ Loris takes two more pencils and clears his throat.
‘Bratislava, 1923. Pavel Olwinski is a young aristocrat, freshly back from travels across post-war Europe. Really inspired, he creates six extraordinary paintings, inventing a flourishing world around his favourite cities. His well-connected father doesn’t waste any time and generates a lot of buzz around his son’s work.
So less than a year later, Pavel and his Lands are invited to Prague, Vienna, even Paris. ’
‘Incroyable!’
‘Our Pavel fascinates crowds,’ Loris continues, smiling at the interruption without losing track.
‘He spreads his optimistic views at exhibitions, balls and royal courts. In 1928, the six Lands of Wonders are sold during a lavish auction. That same night, Pavel comes up with another stroke of genius. He announces that he’s never gonna paint anything else and, just like that, the value of the Lands triples.
Over the next seven years, some of the paintings change hands frequently, and each sale is a social event where Pavel can shine and boast. Until… Drum rolls please!’
Poker-faced, Charles keeps on sipping his beer.
‘You’re no fun. Until the Olwinski frenzy dies down.
His glass-half-full views were refreshing at first, but now they’re out-of-touch.
The owner of Budapest sells off the painting for half its price, because nobody wants to spend that much on an Olwinski anymore.
One, then two, then three of the Lands are acquired by museums, which destroys the exclusive aura around the collection.
So Pavel gets very frustrated. He puts on his thinking cap, and a solution hits him!
He’s gonna write a book to explain the Lands with the saddest, darkest backstory he can think of.
The goal? Twist the meaning of his art and astound everybody.
He writes about parental abuse, mental disorders, traumatic events during his travels, and he claims that everything was noticeable in the Lands from the start.
It’s well constructed, because genius once, genius always.
The “wonderless truth” behind the series attracts a lot of attention, and Pavel fascinates again.
Sadly, the world goes to shit in 1939, everybody stops caring about anybody else’s misfortune, and Pavel gets critically ill.
So he jumps headfirst into the Danube, to die the way he lived.
On his own terms, pain-free, spectacularly. And I rest my case. And my wrist.’
Loris puts down the pencils and grabs his beer.
Charles sighs, clapping faintly on his bottle. ‘Your disbelief in Pavel’s backstory is entirely subjective.’
‘No, it’s common sense. The Lands scream joy and hope, there’s no way they were built on hurt and despair. The only part of the book that’s real is his forbidden passion with Matthew Burton, the rest is plain—’
‘You’re cherry-picking what’s believable? I call bullshit, Professor Loris.’
‘There’s a big difference when it comes to Matthew.
Pavel doesn’t tell us about their relationship.
He couldn’t, back then. It’s to be read between the lines whenever Matthew is mentioned.
Plus, it’s been backed up by the letters published by Matthew’s descendants.
You’ve read them too, right? So let’s point out that when Pavel wrote about his life and the Lands to Matthew, it was all sunshine and rainbows. ’
‘Because Matthew was his safe, peaceful place. Pavel didn’t want to bring his demons into the room.’
Loris takes a black pencil with a shake of his head. ‘You’re making assumptions.’
‘What about his relatives who confirmed his depression and the fact that his father was an utter arsehole?’
‘Pavel might have… bought their support?’
‘Who’s making assumptions now?’
Charles raises an eyebrow, waiting for the next argument that won’t be one, but it doesn’t come.
Loris has disconnected from the conversation. His eyes are fixed and narrowed, his lips are pinched, his face is contracted.
Charles observes him, amazed by his concentration that verges on trance, and a little bit envious. If only he could dissociate because of surges of inspiration, and not just when he—
That’s what he said happened after he zoned out at the pub on Sunday. That’s when he alluded to writing fiction.
Feeling stiff all at once, Charles stops slouching, and the move catches Loris’ attention.
‘Sorry, I tend to do that when I draw. Where were we?’
‘Can I ask you a personal question?’
‘Shoot.’
‘When you had to quit rugby, it was a dark time for you, wasn’t it?’
‘You can say that.’
‘During your healing process through art, did you only come up with gloomy ideas mirroring your frame of mind? Or did you find comfort in distorting your feelings? In turning them into calming pieces where your pain had no room to prevail?’
Loris carries on drawing without reacting, until his lips stretch into an incriminating smile. ‘You make a good point.’
‘Always.’
‘But what I went through wasn’t as bad as what Pavel said he endured.’
‘Objection overruled. Pain is pain.’