Judy was all those things. She was watching the movement of his lips as he addressed the group, the way he walked up and down as he talked, seeming to pluck the words from the air, as if he hadn't given this exact same talk a dozen times. She wondered if his ease came from practice or from not being concerned about the outcome. His confidence was magnetic. The others felt it too. She could tell. The room was disappearing and there was just him and them. Then there was just him.
She could listen to him for hours and not hear a word.
That turned out to be true, because what seemed like a moment later, Andre was clicking his fingers in her face.
She hated that. People used to do that at work when she was concentrating on a particularly satisfying, perplexing problem.
“What?” she said.
“Stand up,” Andre said.
Judy noticed that everyone else was standing and waiting for her to join them.
“Are you okay?” Mark said.
“Of course,” Judy said.
He explained that the first exercise he was going to ask them to perform was to dispel any fear of the canvas in front of them. He asked them to stare at it. There were a number of things that could come between them and their artistic vision and he identified fear of the blank canvas as one of them. The fear of making a mistake. The fear of wasting resources and wasting time.
“That's nothing,” he said, “compared to wasting your talent.”
Judy looked at him and hoped to connect with his eyes, but his eyes were everywhere but on her.
“We're going to dispel any fear of beginning,” he said. “I want you do destroy your canvas.”
“What?”
“No.”
“What with?”
“The canvas is your tool,” Mark said, “not your nemesis. You own it. You can give it life. And you can take it away.”
The group looked at each other.
With Andre's help, Mark removed the red covering in the middle of the room to reveal a canvas and easel and chair, smashed to kindling. The paper was torn and ragged, a great spike going through it like a stake through a vampire.
“Here's one I destroyed earlier,” Mark said.
“What do we use?” somebody asked.
An easel clattered to the ground and everyone looked to see the rock chick putting her booted foot back on the ground.
“Excellent, Maggie!” Mark said.
Judy felt a flare of jealousy. It shot through her with more force than she could have expected. She was normally in good control of her emotions and it took her by surprise, so that she wanted to take it out on her canvas. She wanted to pretend that it was Maggie and pummel it.
“Kill it,” Mark said. “Plastic chairs are expendable too.” He left the room.
“No, they're not,” Andre said to the group and ran after Mark.
Maggie was stomping her canvas into the ground.
“Oh my God, this is great,” she laughed.
One by one, others began tapping at their canvases, which made Maggie laugh, considering that she had kicked hers into submission in one go. Not to be outdone, Judy pulled a hand back and punched her canvas square in the face. The easel only wobbled.
“Ow!” she said and clutched her wrist.
Her head was hurting more than ever with the noise of wood snapping and canvas being ripped from its frames so she was pleased when Mark returned and took them to the next stage.
Having stirred the entire room into a frenzy of destruction, he had them look at what they had done and then had them set up a new canvas—and a new easel where necessary. Nobody but Maggie had destroyed their chair too. Bernard might have done, but Mark had returned too soon.
Staring at their fresh, unsullied, unbruised, white canvases, Mark reminded them that they were the masters and mistresses of their destiny. The canvas was not in fact an enemy. It was cloth stretched over a wooden frame and was to be bent, quite literally if necessary, to their will.
It was the first time in weeks that Judy felt strong, and this despite being hung over.
Finally, he had them sit down—Maggie sat on the floor—and close their eyes.
Judy had listened to guided meditations before, but nothing so powerful as this. Mark kept it very simple and grounded and his voice was hypnotic.
When he told her to breathe in, she obeyed.
He asked her to think of a place in which she felt safe and immediately she was back in the gallery, where she had felt that she could do anything as long as she was by his side, hand in hand, practically floating from room to room.
When he told her to breathe out, she obeyed.
He told her to let go.
Of me, yes, she thought. Of you, never.
* * * *
When she opened her eyes, the room was empty except for her and Mark. He was sitting next to the only remaining easel and canvas in the room, making it seem as though a hurricane had ripped through and left only him standing. That seemed appropriate. He came across as being bomb-proof, not because he was tough, but because he was mostly lucky, and when he wasn't, he kept coming back anyway.
The phrase: “You can't keep a good man down,” came to mind.
Followed by her conscience's edited version: “You can't keep a good man.”
She unfolded her legs, wanting to stand, but unable because she had pins and needles from her toes all the way up to her knees.
“You finally let go,” Mark said.
“I finally fell asleep,” she corrected him. “Nothing mystical about that. Why didn't you wake me?”
“Why would I?”
“Because...because...everyone's gone.”
“I'm here,” he said.
“And because I snore.”
`“You don't snore,” Mark said.
“Yes,” Judy said. “I do. I have it on good authority.”
“Peter?” Mark said.
She had been thinking of Peter, but also Lisa, and thinking of her made her feel sexy again and for a split second she felt as though she had the capacity to draw Mark to her, not the other way round. A moment later, however, Mark put his pencil behind his ear and somehow that gesture disconnected them, as if he had hung up on her.
And so why am I still so hung up on you? She thought.
“The others are in the recreation room,” Mark said.
It sounded like a dismissal.
“Thanks,” Judy said, rubbing the life back into her legs, but she hovered in the doorway.
“If you don't want to be with them,” Mark said, “why do you care so much what they think of you?”
“It's not that I don't want to be with them,” she said. It was that she wanted to be with him. “What are you doing over there? What were you doing while I slept?”
“Come see.”
The room seemed impossibly large. Her footsteps echoed on the tiles like a drummer keeping time. She was aware of his gaze on her legs, though she was wearing trousers, against Lisa's advice.
When she reached him, she realised that she would forgive him almost anything and the feeling frightened her. He smiled at her and she smiled back, almost laughing, almost relieved. She wanted to slap herself to regain control of her face.
She glanced at his canvas and then did a double-take. Blood rushed to her head and she felt as though someone had twisted a knife in her. Mark had used charcoal, chalk and pencil to sketch out the outline of a woman, seated, with her knees to one side, floating on water, eyes downcast, perhaps sleeping, her hair suspended in the air as if falling, though the woman appeared to be otherwise still. Her body was youthful and sensual, fluid lines from head to waist, thigh to calf, calf to toe.
“She's beautiful,” Judy admitted grudgingly.
“Yes, you are,” Mark said.
“That's me?” Judy said “I mean. Is this really how you see me?”
“You're more beautiful than anything I can create.”
They were close enough to touch.
Judy check
ed that they were alone. They were. And yet she couldn't move.
“I have two problems today,” Mark said.
“What are they?”
“The first is that I'm going to kiss you again and Peter's not going to like it.”
Her hands were shaking. No. She was trembling all over.
“He's real,” she said, “but we're just friends.”
“That leaves me with one problem,” said Mark.
“What?”
“Tutors can't go round kissing their students. People will think that the only reason you're here is because I fancy you. It's not the only reason.”
Hearing him say that he fancied her gave her confidence.
“Nobody needs to know about us, but what makes you think I want you to kiss me again?” she teased.
“You don't snore in your sleep,” Mark said. “But you do talk.”
Her mouth opened in shock and he took that moment to steal a kiss, their tongues entwined. Just like that, their bodies were one.
It was not enough.
“How do you feel now?” Mark asked, looking into her eyes.
She’d once heard that when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you. This was how she felt now.
“I feel better,” she said, massaging his arm and then stroking his chest. “Better and better.”
She was emboldened by his touch. She felt her body come alive under his hands, which cupped her breasts and claimed her waist.
She nuzzled her cheek against his neck, kissing his shoulder, forgetting the doubts that she had had about them that day.
He reached under her sweatshirt and into her track bottoms.
“I didn’t shower this morning,” she admitted. “Someone forced me out of bed and onto a minibus before I had a chance.”
“That person doesn’t care,” Mark said and turned her round.
She rested her hands on the back of Mark’s chair and looked over her shoulder to see what he was up to aside from massaging her breasts from behind with one hand. With the other, he was shoving her track bottoms and knickers down around her thighs.
Cool air circulated around her naked skin. She leaned against the back of the chair, wondering if he was going to spank her or slide his cock into her.
Both, she thought. Wouldn’t both be wonderful?
As she thought this, her tiny hairs standing on end, anticipating Mark’s touch, she kept her eyes on the door at the far end of the room.
Mark threw his wallet aside and tore open a condom wrapper. The sound of Mark’s preparation made her heart race, but the fear of the door opening and somebody walking in on them had it’s place too.
Eventually, she said:
“Is that door locked?”
Mark eased his cock into her.
“Did you lock it?” he asked, knowing that she couldn’t have done, because she didn’t have the key.
She was distracted for the moment, because she was so tight around him and his cock felt delicious as he penetrated her, deeper and deeper until she felt his balls against her too.
She arched her back, getting comfortable, while Mark pushed in and out of her, her pussy so wet that she felt a cool trickle down the inside of one thigh and heard the squelch of his cock entering her repeatedly. The legs of the chair slid on the tile floor. One leg was shorter than the others and it rocked and clacked against the floor whenever Mark pushed into her.
She added her own moans to the sound of their play.
“Hold me,” she said.
He gripped her waist firmly and maintained his pace, fucking her hard as if he were banging a drum. She felt herself falling apart, her reason like loose change spilled over the floor.
She had reason enough, however, to keep her eye on that door at the other end of the room. Was it opening?
If so, Mark wasn’t paying it any attention. His attention was entirely focused on Judy. Her pussy. Her ass.
His hands slid over her spine and he drew his fingers down her back as he thrust inside her hard enough to shove the chair forward a few inches.
“Yes!” she cried.
He plunged his cock into her again and again and she backed into him each time to maximise the depth of his penetration. She wanted to be as close to him as possible and she wanted to come with him inside her. She was close. So close.
It started out as a tiny wave, but then there was another, and another, tiny flutterings building into one awesome wave that would have bent her double if she hadn’t already been prone over Mark’s chair. Mark continued to move inside her, not slowing at all, demonstrating an athleticism that confirmed all she had hoped about his sexual prowess. He was amazing through and through.
He reduced her to whimpers and it seemed to be this noise coming from her that made him come finally.
She bucked, her final orgasm more or less coinciding with his.
They hardly had time to enjoy an after sex glow before they heard footsteps and Mark whipped his cock out of her and tucked it into his pants while Judy raised her knickers and skirt in one motion.
Andre put his head around the door at the far end of the room.
“Mark,” he said. “You're needed.”
Too right you are, Judy thought.
“I’m coming,” Mark told him and Judy sniggered.
“Hey, Sleeping Beauty,” Andre said to Judy. “How's your head now?”
“All over the place,” she admitted, “but in a good way.”
* * * *
She didn't feel good for long, however, because it transpired that another event had been planned for that evening and it occurred to Judy that Mark deliberately hadn't mentioned it because he knew that she would not wish to go. Though her life seemed relaxed to her, it was in fact strictly regulated. One social event per week, by which she meant a meal with a friend, a trip to the theatre or a walk along the river was enough for her.
Last night had already sent her into overload and she really needed some quiet time now to make up for it, but that was not on the menu. She thought she might be able to cry off on account of still being hung over from the night before, but Andre informed her that it was considered compulsory.
“Since when is all this partying compulsory?” Judy asked.
“When Mark's the boss,” Andre said and indicated Mark who was now surrounded by the other women on the course, including Maggie. Even from a distance, she could see her false eyelashes batting at him and he appeared to be falling for it. Falling for her.
They were all laughing at one of Mark’s jokes.
She's probably laughing, Judy thought uncharitably, to make out that she understands the joke.
Mark seemed to love the attention and Judy became increasingly jealous.
Right, she thought, I'll give you something to be jealous about too.
“Andre,” she said. “Do you think you could help me out to the bus?”
“Of course,” he said, his voice dropping a semi-tone, and he extended his elbow so they could walk arm in arm.
The laughter died off pretty quickly after that. Mark left the girls alone.
“I see everyone's here,” Mark said. “Let's go.”
* * * *
Before letting anyone off the bus at the other end of their journey, Mark held up a bottle of clear liquid and described it as the essence, distilled and diluted, of a mushroom cultivated by a friend of Andre in the local area. He said that it was no stronger than weed nor any more addictive. It would have the effect of relaxing them and removing their inhibitions, without the unfortunate hangover the following day.
He didn't look in Judy's direction, but she felt everyone else's attention on her and she didn't thank him for that.
“I suppose drinking that is compulsory too,” Judy grumbled.
“Of course not,” Mark said. “I'm simply offering you something to help you let go. After tonight there are just four days left until your exhibition and you still have so much to unlearn.”
He stressed tha
t it wasn't alcohol, but a natural material in liquid form for fast absorption into the blood stream. He drank a swig first, as if to show everyone that it was safe.
“What does it taste like?” asked Simon, taking the bottle.
“Nothing” Mark said. “Nothing much at all. Go ahead.”
Simon did.
“I'm definitely trying it,” Maggie said.
“I knew you would,” said Mark with a smile.
Yeah, thought Judy, I knew you would too.
Andre reached for the bottle.
“Not you,” Mark said. “You're driving. Free the mind and the body will follow. Free the body and the bus will follow.”
“Oh, come on.”
“No.”
Maggie took the bottle and upended it, her lips around the neck of the bottle and her eyes on Mark the whole time.
“Not too much,” Mark warned her. Adding: “I don't think you need too much more freeing up.”
“Me next,” said Judy, glad to interrupt their gazing at each other. She had never taken drugs in her life, but here she was, wiping the rim of the bottle with her hand and then chugging it as if on a losing streak in a drinking game.
“Enough,” Mark said. “Enough.”
Judy wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. The last time she'd done that she'd been sent to the headmistress. She’d been upset then, but now being bad felt good.
Their eyes locked and there was no denying that the connection between them was still there, stronger than ever. He chose, however, to break it, saying:
“Who's next?”
Several hands went up at once.
Drinking from the bottle hadn't seemed to impress Mark, which had been the point. She felt silly, shunned and disappointed. She had simply bowed down to peer pressure and he knew it.
On alighting the bus, the night's venue turned out to be an open air bar-disco affair.
“This is so cool!” said Maggie. She hopped up and down in another little skirt, Bernard and Kevin and even Simon drooling over her.
It had been cool when Maggie had downed a mouthful from the bottle. People had wanted to copy her. Judy had copied her. But the fact was, she could never be her.
She decided to be herself.
SEVEN DAYS Page 14
