Matching Wits with Venus

by Therese Gilardi

  Jennie put her arms around Amelia. “I’m calling your parents. They have to know what’s going on.”

  “Not Dad. He’ll just worry.”

  “Especially your dad. He adores you. And he’d want to do the whole dad thing, protect you and all.”

  Amelia looked over at Jennie. “You know that he’ll just end up feeling bad about himself because that’s exactly what he knows he can’t do. I guess I didn’t tell you but he’s in and out of his wheelchair again.”

  “All right then not your dad. But I’m calling Stella. She can go with you to my parents’ house in Palm Springs.”

  “Your parents’ house?”

  “Yeah. That’s where you’re going to spend the next several days. They’re up in San Francisco watching my brother’s kids for the next two weeks. They won’t care. They’ll be glad to have somebody in the place while they’re gone. You just have to remember to feed their tarantulas.”

  Amelia laughed. “That sounds almost as dangerous as the psychopath who’s after me.”

  “No. And don’t you worry! I’m sure this will turn out to be nothing.”

  Amelia frowned. “I’m not so sure. Don’t you remember? For two nights Petal’s barked like there was somebody in the yard. And then there were those drawings in my trashcan. And I forgot to tell you, when I went outside last night someone had knocked over some of my potted flowers. No, there’s definitely been someone lurking around.”

  “Well then it’s all the more important for you to get away. I’m not going to tell anyone where you are.”

  “You know, you need to work at home. What if they try to come to the shop?”

  Jennie nodded. “Good idea. Now you’d better get packing. My dad put in a new lap pool. You guys are going to love it.”

  ****

  With her long blonde hair extensions, surgically sculpted pillow cheeks, and a trout pout that only the most skilled application of lip filler could provide, Stella Sweetwater Coillard Wentman Smith looked about thirteen years older than her daughter.

  The large shoulder pads inside her acid washed jeans jacket, lacy leggings and denim mini-skirt made it clear that this was a woman who adored the 1980’s. That’s when Stella had reached the apex of her acting career. She’d starred in a string of straight to video B movies, which, while not overly successful, still provided her with regular royalty checks and the right to continue her actors’ union membership.

  Those small connections to the film industry, as well as regular interactions with the tiny but loyal fan base who always recognized her (thanks to her wardrobe and the successful freezing of her face) and never failed to buy her free drinks and dinners, were a few of the reasons why Stella continued to believe that her big break was imminent, despite the fact that she hadn’t acted in anything in over twenty-five years.

  But it was her belief in Apollo that was the main reason Stella was certain her star would rise once more. She’d been devoted to the Roman god of the arts ever since she’d learned of his existence at her first acting workshop. At the workshop she’d purchased a golden lyre, which was Apollo’s symbol, from one of the other acting hopefuls. When she’d worn the lyre to her first audition and beaten out dozens of other seasoned actresses for a small film role, she’d been convinced it was due to a combination of her own talent and Apollo’s intervention. She was always certain that the day would come when the Roman would decide to visit her once more.

  “Look at you, darlin’, give your mama a kiss,” Stella drawled as Amelia opened her wooden front door.

  Amelia rolled her eyes. Although Stella had never lived within two thousand miles of the Deep South, she insisted on using the accent she felt she’d perfected for her favorite role, that of a chaste middle school teacher who ran off with an evangelical minister.

  “And how is Miss Petal?”

  “Could you please just grab her basket?”

  “Let’s go darlins, time’s a wastin’,” Stella said.

  Stella led Amelia and Petal out to a black Ferrari.

  “Where’d you get this?”

  “Don’t y’all just love it?” Stella asked as she slid behind the wheel and turned up the volume on a Journey CD. “Fernando said we could take it to Palm Springs.”

  “So he finally left his wife?”

  Stella waved at the other drivers as she eased the car into a lane of traffic. “Not exactly.”

  Amelia sat back against the smooth leather seat. It was no use saying anything. Her mother had always preferred a man who belonged to someone else. If there was one thing Stella loathed, it was a man like Amelia’s father, one who offered uncomplicated monogamous devotion.

  “We’ll stop in Pasadena for lunch and you’ll tell me all about why we’re undertakin’ this covert trip to the desert.”

  As soon as they were settled at an outdoor café, Petal tucked away at Amelia’s feet, Stella turned to her daughter.

  “So….”

  “It all started with this man.”

  Stella smiled. Amelia flinched as she noticed the red lipstick on her mother’s front teeth.

  “It always starts with a man. So what does he look like?”

  Cupid’s face floated into Amelia’s mind. “A Roman god.”

  “And this is a problem because?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just part of what makes him so annoying. He came into my shop saying he wanted a match.”

  “And since y’all run a matchmakin’ business this offended you?”

  “Ha ha ha, very funny. No. There was just something off about him. I could feel it.”

  Stella put her long fingers over Amelia’s hand and dug her russet nails into her daughter’s skin ever so slightly. “Honey, you’ve never trusted your feelin’s. Even when you were a little girl and Gran and I were teachin’ you penny poker, tellin’ you how to study your opponents and bet based on your gut, you insisted on keepin’ one of Gran’s bridge tally pads next to you so you could take notes and make up some sort of program that would tell you how you should bet.” Stella laughed. “Y’all were like a shrewd casino owner, calculatin’ your odds.”

  Amelia chuckled at the memory. “I know. I’ve never trusted my intuition about anything. Not since I thought it was telling me you and Dad were going to get back together.”

  “Well, I’m sorry you called that one wrong. But it’s no reason to give up on your instincts. Come on, tell me why else y’all think this guy is so bad.”

  “He wrote down all these flippant answers on his personality profile.”

  “Did you speak with him about them?”

  “Briefly.”

  “And how did he act?”

  “Like he couldn’t understand why I was so angry.”

  Stella smiled. “Did it ever occur to y’all that maybe he just wanted to get to know you, and comin’ into the shop and fillin’ out a profile was the only way he could think to do it?”

  “No way.”

  “It’s possible, Amelia. I’ve always said your front window is like a birdcage showin’ you off to everyone on the street. Maybe he walks by all the time and didn’t know how else to approach you.”

  Amelia shook her head. “That’s not it. But what you said about the birdcage is right. Several clients saw him sitting in the window and have demanded to be fixed up with him. So after I get back from our trip, I’ve got to find him and beg him to come back.”

  Amelia tilted her head to one side. “I know I’m being ridiculous. So I don’t like him. Big deal. This thing about this disgruntled client is really what I should be focused on.”

  Amelia sighed. “The guy who said someone is after me claims it’s an unhappy former female client. I know it’s a coincidence that that happened right after I met this guy. After all, Jennie and I should be glad something like that hasn’t happened before. There are a lot of people who go really crazy when their love lives don’t work out. It was bound to happen. Besides, this guy’s so hung up on himself he wouldn’t waste two minutes
thinking about me or my business.”

  ****

  “You’re really getting good.” The petite brunette at the Norton Simon museum smiled at Cupid as he sat before one of the Edgar Degas paintings.

  Cupid looked up and smiled. Unlike most of the other docents, who seemed to be retirees giving their time so as to help the Norton Simon minimize its operating costs, Diana Moriyoko who seemed to be around Amelia’s age.

  She smiled at Cupid.

  “You know, I’d been dreading coming in to work this morning to face another group of Japanese tourists with all their questions about Impressionism and their disbelief that I don’t speak their language just because I’m of Japanese descent. But you’ve changed all that.”

  The woman looked at Cupid’s sketch and smiled.

  “You’ve got real potential.”

  “You really think so?”

  Cupid had decided he would give drawing a second chance. He rubbed his hands together and looked up at the docent. He watched as her pupils dilated, her lips parted slightly and she took a step closer to him. He sighed. Her input about his work was clearly meaningless; he could’ve been drawing on Degas’s canvas with a crayon and she would have praised his efforts.

  “Definitely. I’m here most days of the week, and I tell you that sketch is better than anything I’ve ever seen.”

  Cupid gave her a look that implied she’d gone too far.

  She returned his gaze and laughed.

  “Okay you got me. I confess I’m trying to flatter you.”

  Cupid turned back to his sketchbook.

  “That’s what I’m trying to do.”

  “Really?” The young woman asked.

  “Yeah. I’m trying to flatter the woman I love by giving her this drawing.”

  Cupid looked up. He saw the young woman frown.

  “Well, if you like I can steer you towards some artwork….”

  “No thanks. I’m going to keep trying here.”

  “How do you do it?” Inuus asked a minute later. “I can’t get a woman, and you can’t get rid of women.”

  Cupid grunted.

  “What do you think?” He asked as he held up his drawing.

  Inuus shrugged.

  “What’s it matter? Whoever you give it to will think it’s perfect so what do you care?”

  “I’m trying something different, Inuus.”

  “Hmmm. Listen, when are you going to shoot the matchmaker?”

  Cupid shook his head.

  “You know, I think I’m gonna do something else.”

  Cupid erased the long line he had running across the bottom of his sketch and replaced it with a series of intersecting shapes. He used the side of his palm to give the new border a smudgy look, the way he’d seen the art students doing a few minutes earlier. When he looked up Inuus was gone.

  ****

  “I am really looking forward to seeing my altar,” Venus told the elevator operator as he held her hatboxes while the lift shot her from Prague back to her California home.

  Although she’d enjoyed her trip to Bath, Venus couldn’t help feeling that the other gods and goddesses were gossiping about her, whispering behind her back as she slipped in and out of the warm waters. Of course she might have been paranoid, but she didn’t think so.

  She remembered how they’d treated Vesta when women had begun going out to work in earnest, leaving their hearths unattended. It had been very hard on her, no longer having a secure, revered position as the goddess of the home. Despite having a large Italian realty chain named in her honor Vesta had never quite recovered her status among the other goddesses.

  All of her worrying had led Venus to make a quick detour to Prague for a bit of retail therapy. Shopping had always been her addiction of choice; it was no coincidence that most paintings depicted her with expensive necklaces rings and bracelets. She’d visited her favorite boutiques in the old town, where she’d filled the hatboxes now held by her uniformed elevator attendant with amber jewelry, silk scarves and several pashmina shawls.

  “Good afternoon, Venus.”

  She smiled as she stepped out of the lift and walked past the tapestries that had been made for her by a group of grateful Flemish artisans during the Renaissance. Her high heels glided along the buffed wooden floor as she strolled toward the long marble topped tables that had served as her altar for hundreds of years.

  “Where…where are my offerings?”

  Venus turned to the woman dressed up like a French chambermaid in a black uniform with frilly white apron who was carrying her hatboxes. Fleur shook her head and looked away.

  Venus’s altars were as bare as when she’d left. Not even an apple core or packet of seeds had been left for her. Stunned, she walked over to the window and looked through her high-powered telescope into the canyons behind her villa. Lone coyotes stood on hilltops below birds’ nests empty of any eggs.

  “It’s happening! I’m losing my powers. Even the animals are not mating. Spring will never come again.”

  Venus cried out as she fell to the floor.

  Chapter Seven

  Palm Springs was both prettier and seedier than Amelia remembered. She’d enjoyed the ride out to the resort city, through the cracked earth that led to the San Andreas Fault. She shook her head in amazement that she had a few friends who actually refused to visit the Coachella Valley, not even for the famous music festival, because they were afraid that the famous fault would simply open up and swallow them in the event of a large earthquake.

  Not Amelia. She adored the small artsy towns that nestled in the bowl formed by the mountains. She liked the cool heat of the desert, the diverse restaurant scene, and the fact that Petal was welcome virtually everywhere. Most of all, though, she loved the feeling of helplessness that came with the knowledge that, should the “big one” hit, her fate would be out of her hands. She would be able to surrender to the whims of Mother Nature, free from the responsibility she always felt for everything around her.

  Jennie’s parents’ house sat at the foot of a tall craggy hill, surrounded by verdant growth. Most of their neighbors were Minnesota snowbirds who had already returned to the upper reaches of the Midwest now that the early spring heat was beginning to intensify. The isolation meant that Stella could play her Bangles CDs as loud as she wanted while Amelia threw raw vegetables into large salad bowls and mixed up pitchers of margaritas.

  Amelia unpacked her bags in Jennie’s room, where she’d spent many nights as a teenager. As soon as she’d folded her clothing into Jennie’s drawers, she pulled the sketch she’d retrieved from the garbage can behind her house from her bag and taped it to the bulletin board where they used to affix their high school photos.

  The sketch appeared to be a poor drawing of Johann Vermeer’s “The Lacemaker”. She studied it intently from several angles. The lace collar on the figure of the woman bent over her sewing reminded her of the collar on her matchmaking sweater.

  Amelia pulled out her notebook. She picked up her pen then stared at the drawing once more. Although the person who had made it seemed to lack conventional talent, there was something about it….

  She looked closer. Passion. That was it. The intense pencil strokes on the paper told of the passion behind the hand that had drawn them. She picked up her pen and let her hand move across the paper as she spelled out all of the emotions that seemed to be behind the crude sketch.

  “Amelia? Would y’all like to join me on the terrace for a swim?”

  Amelia hid the notebook containing the outline for her next sestina beneath the bed, just as she always had.

  ****

  “What’s wrong?” Inuus asked.

  Venus was sitting on her pink silk sofa, where her manservant Renaldo had carried her after she fainted, trying to drink from one of the fine bone china tea cups the Hapsburgs had commissioned for her after she’d married off a member of the family they’d all considered hopeless. The green tea she’d had flown in from Japan sloshed over the cup as
her dainty hand shook. Inuus stepped forward and gently removed the cup from her hand.

  “Look.” She said as she pointed out the window. “No mating. I should have realized it was odd I could sleep so late, should’ve known it meant that no birds were singing.”

  Venus looked at Inuus. “I’m finished.”

  Taking a seat across from her, Inuus hung his head. She was right. If the animal world went a whole year without reproducing, whole species would be wiped out and the order of the natural world would be irrevocably changed. Venus held her right hand up and waved it around listlessly. The large diamond Mercury had given her as an apology for one of his many infidelities caught the sun. Its facets created a rainbow pattern on the wall behind her settee.