Chapter Twenty-Six The Performer
Chapter Twenty-Six
The Performer
For the first time, I couldn’t find Arkady at his studio.
My foot tapped involuntarily, accompanying an awkward slouch as I sat on his mattress. My fingers brushed over the fabric; dust collected and puffed into the atmosphere, shimmering in the morning light.
I reserved my judgment for his previous living conditions, try as I might. It helped to romanticize it a little. Arkady could make even the worst environments enticing.
I might be exaggerating—this was far from the worst.
The studio was becoming a familiar comfort. I could imagine myself reading a book up in the loft while the chimes of a chisel sang from below. Or the smell of clay and cold coffee on days when we stayed up until morning.
The window was irregular and large, quite old as it was.
It was facing east, so the light would be this soft every morning.
Oh, to be a muse, bare-skinned and bathed in the light.
Nowhere to be contractually, smelling of earth and cologne, arms to pull you back into the warm nest of blankets among the chill from the poorly insulated hideaway.
I can’t say I snuck in to surprise him, but I found myself almost looking forward to seeing him. Before I knew it, I wore a smile as involuntary as a jacket in the cold, kept warm by the thought of him.
Yet, he was nowhere to be found.
Stupid, getting your hopes up. Don’t be a girl.
An empty paint can clattered along the floor as I stood, then I kicked it farther on my way out.
Even as I descended the stairs, the mass of sculptures made up a daunting crowd. I didn’t like to look them in the eye. They would tell him I was here.
Though, they became less intimidating with each visit. Soon I knew their poses, their expressions, even some names that had been inscribed on their pedestals.
One in particular was new.
It was a woman, lying on a slab in bliss. Her arms through her hair, moths coming from her chest and all over her hair and body.
They were coming out of her skin in a familiar pattern across the torso.
I would never compare myself to art, never in the slightest, but it was hard to convince myself that this wasn’t a sculpture of . . . parts of me.
All the humility in the world couldn’t compete with the idealistic vision of a lover. To him, I was art. But only to him, and I believed that was enough.
And just like that, as if to remind me of my true belonging, a memento mori beside her.
A table . . . full of knickknacks, tools, cloth. And Vincent’s silver cigarette holder.
I picked it up, rolling it in my palm. My fingerprints smudged over the patina of past hands, reflection distorted from dents and other proof of love. Only the most prized treasures were used so reverently. The dust collected in the identifying V.M.C. etched on the flat of it.
I almost felt warm until I looked closer at the pile. The familiar item wasn’t enough to distract me from the rest of the strange collection.
Each item seemed odder than the last. Belts and buckles, various sizes of cigarette cases, rosaries, artisan hooks from walking canes. Though, none of these gave me any heartache . . . not until I saw the chatelaine.
At first I thought it was my own. No, of course it wasn’t. Mine was on my hip, I was touching it right then. This belonged to someone else.
The back of my scalp became hot, right where the spine connected to my head, threatening to let it roll off.
No, this means nothing. These are knickknacks. He collects.
Still . . . this chatelaine wasn’t like mine. It was nicer. Too expensive to be discarded, too polished to accept it was forgotten. A souvenir from another woman?
Like there was a last-minute pull, I dug through the pile again. Knacks clattered to the floor, tangled together, screaming for me to stop looking.
There they were.
Vincent’s keys.
I grabbed the small loop full of tiny assorted keys on a large round ring.
I recognized them from every time his long fingers gripped them, fiddled with them when he was trying to fake a confident stride—which was often.
I suppose it reminded him of the world he held in his palm. And now it was in mine.
“You smell like earth.” Lorelei’s lip curled into a sneer.
“My husband touches me with the same hands he sculpts with.” The muscle in my jaw twitched. I couldn’t help a small smile. “I suppose that is why you smell of cheap booze?”
“You know what cheap booze smells like?” She gasped. “Maybe your pauper is rubbing off on you.”
“I’m sure you wish yours would rub you off.”
“Not for free, he won’t.”
“Is this really how you’re going to act?” I hissed, my arm tightening on hers.
“I’m not acting any different than you,” she replied innocently, twirling her parasol above us. On her arm, a new purse. The handle most notably unscathed. “Perhaps we both bring our men out. Long walks are encouraged when keeping dogs in shape.”
“Arkady isn’t a dog.”
“Yes, Petre, I know he isn’t a real dog,” she scoffed. “Can I not tell jokes now? Have you become that soft?”
“Perhaps I’ve outgrown your humor.” I shrugged. “Or it could just be that your joke is in bad taste.”
“Like you would know good taste.”
I dug my heels into the pebbled walkway, tugging her arm back. “Why do we keep doing this? Why are we going in circles?”
“It’s a promenade, we walk one big circle.”
“Don’t get smart with me, child,” I snapped.
Lorelei’s eyes widened, some sort of delight. She clicked her tongue against her teeth, a smile gracing her painted lips. “I almost heard your mother right then. You might be growing into your maternal figure sooner than you thought.”
“I know you must be feeling smug. Between your patron—”
“He is my intended.”
“—and whatever associating with my mother is getting you, it isn’t worth it,” I finished.
“Who said I was talking to your mother?”
“Come now, Lorelei”—I laughed—“you were wearing her brooch, her gown pattern from two years ago, and you had her old purse last I saw you. Did she let you raid her past-season closet? What did she ask you to do in return?”
“Unlike some people”—she paused, a twitch in her brow—“she has asked nothing of me in return, just my company.”
“Company? Or has she offered to mentor you?”
Lorelei lifted a shoulder, twirling the parasol as she turned away. “Keep up, or I’m leaving you behind,” she chimed.
If I let my blood boil any longer, it might come out my eyes, my ears, spewing from my mouth in the form of profanities.
I walked beside her, too disgusted to talk. Though, she didn’t seem to have a problem resuming her gossip as usual. Her expression was so bright, so positive and energetic.
Lorelei did well because she kept her composure.
I supposed she couldn’t afford to fall out of line.
I understood some of my privileges in that sense.
I could throw fits and get upset without losing any stability in my life.
But there were better ways than this, and I didn’t know what would come first: our friendship ending or her inevitable demise.
It made the whole thing quite bleak. I felt like I could see the future, like watching a silver screen.
We arrived at my town house, but I was barely there. Lorelei didn’t notice, she was too busy talking. Even as we crossed the threshold and settled like birds into the living room, she was still talking.
She peeled off her gloves and set her parasol aside, her lips moving feverishly, but I couldn’t hear a sound.
“Eugh.” Lorelei swatted in the air, a moth fluttering by her hair. “You should really do something about these things. I don’t know how you live like this.”
“I don’t remember your living situation being much better.”
She ignored me, leafing through some photographs on the table, smiling brightly at one before pinching it between her fingers. “We should all have a night at the opera! Oh, how fun it would be! Don’t be miserable, let us do it!” she squeaked.
I stared at the photo, all the blood leaching from my body, as if by some type of vampyre.
“You can’t wear your usual—it needs to be nice. William likes to show off. I’m sure Arkady wouldn’t mind if he could show you off as well.”
She turned the photograph toward me. “Memory lane!”
It was a photograph of us. Me and Lorelei. Me, Lorelei, the rest of them. The whole troupe, when we were all whole.
“Petre?”
Her words fading, my focus waning.
Skinny, awkward legs, all at different paces of growth. Lorelei’s bangs curled in the front, awkwardly grown in. I remembered that day. My mother had scolded me that very morning for outgrowing my uniform for the third time that year.
All of us sat on a knee each, as if we were posing for a family photograph. Vincent, James, among other men’s faces I would learn to block out whenever possible.
“You know, it’s really a drag to talk to myself—”
“I suggest you get comfortable with the idea of being alone.”
Lorelei stared, mouth agape. “I’m not—”
“You are.” I slammed my hand on the table, photographs scattering. “You are alone, and you don’t even know it. You are a lamb whose cord was cut too fast by wolves with greedy palates.”
“What has gotten into you lately!” she shouted. “I’m just trying to include you—”
“The sooner you accept that you’re not one of them, the better off you will be.
” I spoke low, rising from my chair and leaning over the table.
“Even in my state, as you enjoy pointing out, I will always be born in a different class than you. They would rather accept me at my most tarnished than you at your finest. Because you will never be one of them. That is the game my mother plays. There is no prize. You will always be the second choice.”
“You only say this because your mother chose me over you.” Lorelei swallowed, her eyes shifting the closer I got.
“You don’t know anything in the slightest.” I looked down at her, and for once, she almost looked pitiful. Such blind optimism. “You wouldn’t know a phantom from a cheap illusion, even if the mirrors were in full view.”
“You are being cruel!”
“I am the only one being honest with you.”
“It seems unlikely that all but one are secretly my enemy. I knew you were pessimistic, but now I truly do think this is a bout of envy.”
“A child’s school of thought.”
“Says the one throwing a tantrum!”
“That’s the problem with you.” I laughed, pointing a finger at her. “You are young. You don’t have to do any of this to get far—”
“I’m farther than you ever got! You are just mad you quit early!”
“No”—I shook my head—“you joined late. You weren’t there for the worst of it. Yet here you are, jumping headfirst before the ink dries on the new catalog.” I slammed my fist on the table again. “You could have made it out! You almost were!”
“Maybe I don’t want to get out!” she screamed back at me, standing from her chair. “What if I don’t want to leave? Not everyone has to feel shame, to feel like this is a burden. I’m a woman in my own right and can choose for myself!”
Even though we had only been exchanging words, our breathing, our posture, my fatigue on the subject made it into a long and weary battle.
This was it. This was the end of us, our friendship. It was clear she would never understand, and she wasn’t going anywhere useful. Maybe it was best that it ended now before I got to see them ruin her.
Leaning against the table, a sharp sting. I flinched away, my blood on the tip of the letter opener resting among a pile of opened letters, the crimson pooling on my finger in a singular drop.
“You know, I thought you would understand.” Her voice was uncertain, like she was struggling to sort her thoughts before she spoke. “Now I realize you’ve hated me this whole time. A by-product of jealousy or otherwise, I do not know.”
The tension in my jaw made each pulse of blood through my temples throb, an ache so strong I thought it would burst through my forehead and sprout horns of a raging bull.
“Poor Petre, so hard to love! Not your mother, not your friends, quite possibly not even your husband! You are lucky he is poor, or I fear he may have run for the hills the minute your personality came shining though. Yet you still think it is the fault of all those around you? Years of complaining about the same hardships in relationships, and you still never wondered if it was no coincidence that the common denominator was you.”
“Stop it,” I demanded. “Stop it now.”
“And the one man who was obsessed with you has suddenly disappeared. Not a trace! By God, I thought once upon a time that Mr. Carlisle was so obsessed, so taken with you, that you would have to kill this man if you ever wanted to be rid of him!” She paused, biting her cheek as she laughed with teary eyes, fiddling with the sparrow brooch on her collar.
My fingers curled around the letter opener, crumpling an old love letter under it within an iron grasp.
One last look to keep her in mind like a picture, unbruised by experience, unsoiled by the desires of man.
I would be free of her.
Then she would be free of them.