And We're Off

by Dana Schwartz

  I laugh. It’s all I can do. I laugh a bitter, hard, Disney-villain cackle and drop the picnic blanket, ignoring it as it tumbles down the hill like a stupid child in a nursery rhyme, and I swing around to face her. “Really?” I say. “So you’re just sticking around. You’re just sticking around.” I’m repeating myself like my brain is on tape delay, churning through the same few thoughts over and over again. “You realize what you’re doing, right? You’re manipulating me. Again.”

  “Nora, you’re blowing this a bit out of proportion.”

  “I’M NOT!” I shout, louder than I mean to. “I mean, the fact that you’re here in first place and now that you want to stay longer . . . am I just supposed to be fine with all of this? If you were me, would you be fine with all of this?”

  A cow looks up from the next field over, startled by my voice.

  “I thought things were going well between us,” she says, far too calmly. “I thought we were finally on the same page again.”

  “Grandpa’s trip was one thing, but I got myself into this program, and I’m here to work.” I’m close to tears. “I really, really need to focus, and I can’t be . . . worried or tied to anyone else right now. And you don’t even support my art!”

  She pauses and, to my surprise, takes both of my hands in hers. “I will not get in the way of your art, I promise. I know that the DCYA is a time for you to work, and I’m not going to get in the way of your focus. It’s just been so nice being out off Evanston and on vacation. I can’t remember the last time I went on a vacation! I know you need this, Nora, but I do too.” She gives me a hopeful, pleading look, and I know I’m stuck.

  “Just promise that you’re not going to . . . distract me. I really, really need to focus on my art.”

  “I promise. It’ll be like I’m not even here.”

  The cow has gone back to its chewing, bored by our interaction. Now we’re left with the rumbling of distant thunder and the swishing sound we make with each step. My mother picks up the picnic basket. As we make our way down the hill, the air gets slightly thicker—full, I think, of things unsaid—and I can’t smell the mulch or the ocean anymore.

  18

  AS IT TURNS out, the Deece does have more than one studio: A, B, C, and D are scattered along a single dirt road, with plenty of empty farmland in between where cows can be seen reclining behind distant fences on sunny days.

  Monday, Wednesday, and Friday we’re in Studio B with Áine, eight of us together, working at a single long wooden table like we’re making a tableau of The Last Supper. It’s my favorite time—the room takes on the heady smell of acrylic paint, and Áine blasts her heavy metal music in a language I’m almost positive isn’t English.

  We spent all of last week working on still-life paintings: Áine set bowls of fruit, skulls, wine bottles, and sweaters on the table and told us to paint whatever “spoke” to us. The Australian girl, Tess, told me she heard a rumor that we’d be working from live models our last week, although no one has wanted to ask Maeve whether it’s true or not.

  The real academia takes place in Declan’s classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Unlike Áine, who focuses on practical application and experimentation, Declan teaches us the fundamentals of art through PowerPoint presentations. His are the only classes that don’t take place in one of the studios; we meet in the basement of Áine and Declan’s house, where a makeshift classroom and projector have been assembled.

  It’s amazing to me that the two of them ever got married. I’ve already come to dread Tuesdays and Thursdays, when we all file into his lair, where natural light has to claw its way in, and sit on uncomfortable stools all day. The first half of the lesson is strictly lecture, with Declan working on an actual chalkboard to teach us about linear form and the history of certain artistic movements. After lunch, we bring out our own sketchbooks and work through whatever repetitive assignment he gives us. “Repetition teaches your muscles! Art is as much about what your hands can do as what your head can do!”

  Áine might tell you to add more shading or depth, or draw a line herself on your canvas that somehow makes the entire thing infinitely better, but no one has ever left one of her lessons feeling bad about their art.

  Today, though, we’re away from the mysterious Irish power couple of the art world. For the first time, we’re told to go to Studio D. To my surprise, it’s equipped with eight giant wheels, for sculpting, in two neat rows like the orphan girls in Madeline books.

  “Oi,” comes a voice from the back of the studio, and we see a girl in a tank top and two long pigtails haul a wad of clay up onto her own wheel. Her arms are muscular, like she’s training to star in a new action-thriller alongside Matt Damon, and her ears look practically metallic from the sheer number of piercings she’s managed to fit onto a relatively small area of flesh.

  “I’m Bekka,” she says. “And I’m going to teach you how to sculpt.” She wipes her hand across her forehead, leaving a trail of gray-green clay on her skin. “First rule, don’t be afraid to get messy.”

  One of the boys in the class, Rodger, strides forward toward Bekka’s giant mound of clay. Rodger has a face locked in a perpetual smirk and a curl of hair frozen over his forehead like Clark Kent. If Rodger were in a movie, he’d play the pastel-sweater-wearing prep from across the lake trying to take over the camp populated by lovable misfits.

  Rodger grabs a handful of clay. Bekka slaps it to the ground.

  “Second rule,” she says, “you’re not ready to actually work with the clay until you know the fundamentals.”

  Rodger rubs his wounded hand as if it is still sore and slinks back into line.

  “Oh, come off,” Bekka says. “That didn’t actually hurt.”

  She speaks with a heavy accent that could be Australian, but I’m not quite sure. She says she’s a “kiwi,” which doesn’t exactly clear things up for me, but it’s just amazing that a woman who doesn’t look that much older than me can be teaching across the world and slapping jerks’ hands down because she’s just that badass.

  Turns out, there are a lot of fundamentals. Bekka brings in tiny models of famous Roman sculptures, and she projects pictures from all around the world onto the wall and points out each one until we can all tell the difference between a Rodin and a Bernini in our sleep.

  “Look at the way Bernini allowed the scene to be conveyed in a single instant, if you view the piece sideways,” Bekka says, showing a projection of Apollo and Daphne on the white wall.

  The sculpture shows Apollo, the Greek god of light and music, reaching toward the nymph Daphne with the full intention of nonconsensual activity. One foot in the air, one hand on her waist, Apollo is mid-chase. Daphne is looking back in fear, her eyes contorted with worry and her mouth slightly agape in a silent scream. Half of her body is being transformed into a tree, her final method of escaping her rape-y pursuer.

  With a click, Bekka brings up a close-up image of Daphne’s fingers, slightly elongated, branching into delicate laurel leaves.

  Click. A close-up of bark creeping up Daphne’s legs.

  “We think of sculpture as static,” Bekka says. “But it’s an artist’s way of capturing movement in the most profound manner. There’s a story here: tension, suspense, and then resolution.”

  She uses the tiny model for emphasis. “Start at the back of the sculpture, and you just see Apollo pursuing. Then, you walk around counterclockwise,” she says, twisting the model, “and you see Daphne—the fear on her face, the desperation. Finally, turn to the front, and you see the story’s end: Daphne transformed into a tree. It’s a three-act play in a single sculpture.”

  I almost want to clap at the end of the end of her mini lecture. I’ve never been remotely interested in sculpture before. The last time I sculpted, I was in elementary school, making hand-sized bowls by rolling out clay like snakes and coiling them. This . . . this is completely different.

&n
bsp; Finally, once we’ve proven to Bekka (who I learn is actually from New Zealand) that we’re sufficiently versed in the fundamentals, we get to touch the clay. “We’re just doing bowls today,” Bekka says, almost in warning, eyeing Tess, who has already built her sample of clay into a humanoid shape in the fourteen seconds since Bekka turned her back. Tess rolls her eyes.

  “I’ve been making bowls since I was about four,” Tess says in her thick Sydney accent. I expect Bekka to punish her for being so rude to a teacher, but instead she just flicks Tess’s tiny figure and sends it crumpling into a clay puddle.

  “And I’ve been sassing Aussies for a lot longer,” Bekka says, and they both laugh.

  The best part about class with Bekka is whether or not I’m terrible at sculpture makes no difference: There’s no real way to tell. My bowl on the potter’s wheel is elongated and slightly asymmetrical, but it looks beautiful nonetheless.

  “That’s great,” Bekka says when she comes up behind me. “You have real hands for this. Just a little softer.” She puts her hands over mine, like a platonic Patrick Swayze. “Here.”

  And like magic, my bowl gets better. She gives the piece dimension and an elegance that I hadn’t seen before. One small change and things come together. A wheel amplifies every touch, making every gesture that much more important.

  I leave her class covered in clay and glowing with pride.

  * * *

  “Hey!” Callum calls from his car when Tess, Rodger, and I come back from dinner. The car idles, the only one in a dirt parking lot. Maeve is already in the backseat with her legs in Michael’s lap.

  “We’re going to figure out a way to get into the lighthouse,” Michael calls through cupped hands. “Come on, hop in.”

  The three of us start running. Tess gets to the car first and pulls her body into the passenger seat, planting a wet kiss on Callum’s cheek. I run through all the ways they could know each other, but I’m coming up empty. Rodger and I end up knee-to-knee in the backseat with Michael and Maeve.

  Tess puts her feet on the dashboard and is nearly jolted through the windshield when Callum has to stop suddenly to let some ducks waddle safely across the road.

  “Easy there, mate!” Tess says.

  “It’s just a good thing I’m driving instead of one of the Deecers, or we’d be eating duck for dinner,” Callum says, winking at Tess. I suddenly notice how pretty Tess’s blue eyes look and how Pinterest-worthy her braid is.

  Maeve kicks the back of Callum’s seat. “Hey! I’m a good driver!”

  “Suuuuuuure you are,” Callum says, looking back at me and smiling. “Do you want to tell Nora how you nearly drove us off the cliffs, or should I?”

  When we finally make it to the lighthouse, it’s almost dark. Michael cracks a tall can of Guinness and tosses one to Callum, who catches it with one hand.

  “I’d give one to you, mate,” Michael says to Rodger, “but Cromwell ruined this country, and the English caused the potato famine, so . . . retributions.”

  “It’s a good thing I’m from Wales, then, mate,” Rodger says and snatches the beer from Michael’s hand. Michael raises an arm, giving the international signal for touché, and reaches in his bag for a third beer, which he offers to me. I decline. He shrugs, pops it open, takes a long swig, and then shares it with Maeve.

  Tess is already halfway to the lighthouse, her long hair streaming behind her like the tail of a kite. “Come on, you buttwads, my grandma could make it quicker than you!”

  Michael covers my ears. “The American isn’t used to such harsh language.”

  I pull his hands down to his sides. “Oh, this American needs an education,” I say.

  Michael grins like a lunatic. “In that case, last one to the lighthouse is a buttwad.”

  He runs off, hand in hand with Maeve, who gives me an apologetic look over her shoulder before racing full speed ahead, her laugh echoing in the wind.

  Callum swings back for me, and before I know what he’s doing, he picks me up over his shoulder like I weigh ten pounds. “What do you say?” he calls up to his friends—our friends. “American in the ocean? I think the American goes in the ocean.”

  He wades forward as I shriek and pull at his arms until he’s knee-deep in the water. Finally, he lets me down.

  I make the completely mature decision to trip him, and he falls face-first into the water, but not before yanking me down with him.

  Before long, Michael, Maeve, Rodger, and Tess abandon their own pursuit toward the lighthouse and join us in the ocean until we’re all soaking wet and splashing each other.

  “It’s always locked anyway,” Michael says dejectedly, looking at the lighthouse in the distance.

  “Besides,” Callum says, “the snacks and beer are in the car.”

  “That sounds like a much better plan,” I say, dragging myself from the water, the weight of my clothes threatening to pull me back with every step.

  * * *

  The six of us sit, butts in the damp grass at the edge of the sand, in a semicircle looking at the water: Rodger, Maeve, Tess, Michael, and then me and Callum, his arm around me. The tide is so low that I can see the sand through the water, stippled with melting sunlight. We’re all still damp with seawater and spilled beer.

  “You going to miss us?” Tess asked suddenly. Her question is ostensibly directed at Maeve, who’s seen probably a dozen classes of Deece students come and go, but it feels as though it’s directed at all of us. What is our relationship going to be when we scatter back to our home countries, for college or careers, without seeing each other for daily studio time?

  “Well, we’re all Facebook friends,” Michael says.

  “You’re all invited back to my place for my eighteenth birthday,” Tess says. “It’s going to be massive. Street-wide. A full rager.”

  I turn toward Maeve. “Do you keep in touch with other Deecers?”

  “Sometimes,” she says. “It gets harder when they go away, but I have a few friends I talk to every day. One in India. One in California. I dunno. A few.”

  And then Callum moves his mouth so close to my ear it’s almost like he’s kissing it. “We’re going to stay in touch,” he whispers, and the sensation of his breath on my skin is so electrifying that I can’t help but giggle. Soon all six of us are giggling for no reason at all, and as the water fades into a deeper and deeper blue, I nuzzle up against Callum. “You better not forget me,” I say.

  And in a voice so quiet I’m not sure if I imagine it, he answers back: “I couldn’t if I tried.”

  When I return to Evelyn’s place, dripping wet, my mom doesn’t say a word. She simply looks up from her book, sighs with a small smile, and goes back to reading.

  “Try not to drip on the carpet!” Evelyn calls cheerfully from the kitchen.

  * * *

  The days of Deece pass in a blur—between meals, studio time, lessons, keeping in touch with Lena via sporadic and shallow Facebook messages (“off to rehearsal, hope you’re having fun!—L”), and sulking quietly around my mom and trying not to let her see my notebooks, I have less time for Callum than I’d like.

  I head to the studio after hours, with the goal of finishing work on an assignment for Declan— chalky pastels and tempera paint used together to create a waxy effect—when Callum comes through the door.

  “I had a feeling I’d find you here.”

  I decide to play it cool and pretend like I haven’t been thinking about him for days. I tilt my head toward my painting. “I think I might actually be getting close to not terrible at this!” I take a step back. The cow skull I’ve been painting almost looks three-dimensional. I’ve never painted anything like this, in this style, at home.

  “You didn’t answer your messages,” Callum says, waggling his phone.

  “I was working.” I turn my phone off when I work. That was one of the lesson
s Declan gave us on the first day—eliminating distractions—but for once, he taught me something I already knew. I never paint when there’s the possibility that my phone is going to light up and pull me away from a project right when I’m making a crucial line. Art is when I get to escape from the real world.

  “C’mon,” Callum says. “I’m taking you away.”

  “But I’m not done yet.”

  “It is”—he checks his phone—“eleven P.M. on a Friday night. If you don’t come out with me now, I’m going to become incredibly depressed for the both of us.”

  “Fine. Let me just clean up.”

  Callum absentmindedly fingers a few of the brushes on the counter. “Your mum isn’t going to care if you’re out later than midnight, is she?”

  I begin washing my palette in the stone sink and trying to get the pastel from my hands. The water runs rainbow for a few seconds. “No. Luckily, with her whole ‘I’m staying in Ireland’ thing, we have a pact where she’s not allowed to comment on my life or life choices.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Callum says. “Because tonight your life choice is getting into a truck with a boy you barely know and letting him take you to a mystery location.”

  “When you put it like that, it does sound slightly problematic.”

  He smiles, and in this moment, I want to kiss him. I want him to rip my clothes off, and I want us to roll on top of the painting, the still-wet residue of my semi-decent cow skull rubbing off on our backs. Instead, I grab his hand, flick off the light to the studio, and say, “Lead the way.”

  * * *

  “A cemetery?” I ask as we pull up outside the gates and Callum kills the headlights.

  “Not just any cemetery,” Callum says. “Well, yeah, kinda like any cemetery, actually.” He grins.

  I take his hand again, partly because I’m desperate for any physical contact with him and partly because we’re at a cemetery in the middle of the night. I listen to the crunch of wet gravel beneath our feet, and as we walk along the tiny winding pathway through the dark grass, I try to catch the names on some of the tombstones. Most of the them are crumbling, too old for their words to be visible, their faces smoothed by time and weather. I see one mausoleum with the name CASSIDY carved in it, but I don’t say anything.