The Color of Light

by Helen Maryles Shankman

  But when I felt her soft red mouth on my eyes, felt her soft white hands on my face, a chasm opened under me; all rational thought fell down and down into its shadowy depths. I closed my eyes and gave myself over to her completely.

  When they threw us out of the place at closing time, it was three or four in the morning. We emerged from the fetid air of the bar to find it had stopped raining. There was a thin rime of ice on the cobblestones and the sky had cleared to a brilliant Prussian blue, littered with an anorexic sliver of a moon and cold white stars.

  Sofia had had two pastis, just enough to affect her ability to walk a straight line. Lightly, she rested her hand on my shoulder as I maneuvered her into a taxi, slid in next to her.

  Now I remembered the expression on her face as she searched for me in La Coupole earlier this evening, a hundred years ago.

  “Sofia,” I said, just loud enough so her eyes would flicker open. “Last night. You looked like the world was coming to an end. Is everything all right?”

  A deep, heartfelt sigh. “It doesn’t matter anymore,” she muttered, her eyelids fluttering down like shutters. She yawned charmingly, covering her mouth with her gloved hand. “Tell me, English,” she murmured. “I didn’t see the paper this morning. Tell me something funny that the monitor said today.” And she closed her eyes and leaned her dark head against my shoulder.

  Now I wished I had taken her someplace farther away; we were in front of Sofia’s apartment in a matter of minutes. I touched her arm. She stirred, cried out anxiously in a foreign language. A brief bad dream.

  “Look,” I said gently. “We’re here.” She sat up rubbing her eyes, adorably disheveled, stared dully out the window at the chipped plaster and rusted wrought iron balcony of her building. I put my hand on the door handle, meaning to go round the car to open the door for her.

  “No,” she said, laying her hand on mine. “Better you stay here.” We sat in the back seat with the car running for a little while longer, hip to hip through the layers of clothing, touching but not touching, until the windows of the taxi fogged over with our breath and the heat rising from our bodies.

  Obediently, I let her slide out of the taxi, watched her walk on unsteady legs to the door and take her key from her bag. She put it in the lock, turned it till it clicked. The metal gate swung open. For one more moment she was in my sight, framed by the darkness of the courtyard beyond. And then she was gone.

  It came from nowhere, a torrent of sickening, gut-wrenching panic. Flinging myself out the car door, I caught the gate before it could clang closed, then seized her, pulling her into my embrace, as if by doing so, I could lock her up inside of me.

  I can still feel the heavy silk of her dress sliding through my fingers, her body yielding, melting into mine, the sweet, sweaty, intimate smell of her skin, the salty taste of her mouth. And when she crept her arms around my neck and shyly gave me what I knew to be the first kisses she had ever given any man, shining visions of a new life opened up before my eyes; and in my heart, I was wedded for eternity to her unforeseeable fate.

  I couldn’t sleep anymore than night; I told the taxi driver to take me to my studio, then gave him all the money I had in my pockets.

  I felt burdened by new responsibilities and light-headed with happiness. By the leaden light of dawn, I finished my painting of Sofia. Every stroke of the brush was a caress; every daub of cadmium red on her lips a kiss.

  By seven-thirty it was done, and I meant to go out and have coffee at the café round the corner before class. Instead, I promptly collapsed onto my couch and slept till noon.

  When I awoke, the sun had slipped past the midpoint in the sky. It was a hard, bright afternoon, one of those late-winter days that you can actually smell spring. I had missed my morning classes hours ago.

  For the remainder of the day I roamed the streets of Paris, plotting out our lives together. We would keep separate apartments to satisfy her family. But every morning would find us at the same café. From there, we would go to class, spend the early part of the day working, then break for lunch. There, we would stare hungrily into each other’s eyes as we nibbled on our midday meal. Then we’d tear ourselves away from one another, go to our respective studios and paint until dark. As evening fell, we would meet at one of the restaurants in the Fifth for dinner, and from there we would go to the theater, or a concert, or stroll the boulevards, it didn’t matter so long as she was by my side, her arm safely tucked under mine.

  We would become one of those art couples you envied in art history books, like Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, or Georgia O’Keefe and Alfred Stieglitz. I would paint her again and again, with and without her clothes on. She was the only model I would ever need, like Edward Hopper with his Josephine.

  We would end each night falling into each other’s arms, and here, I really embellished. Afterwards, exhausted, spent, sleep would find us, our bodies twined together in the blue moonlight sneaking through the blinds.

  I would heal every wound her family had inflicted on her soul. She would be all the home I ever needed.

  I was crossing over the Pont de l’Archevêché as the sun dipped low in the west. Above me, the sky was deepening to ultramarine. At the same time, lights were blinking on all over Paris, sparkling across the city like a diamond necklace. A pink neon sunset seared the horizon, turning Notre Dame’s array of soaring Gothic windows into mirrors, shattering the restless face of the Seine into glassy shards of brilliant color.

  When the last garish hues had faded regretfully to gray, I checked my watch. Seven-thirty. Dinner time. The boulevards would be awakening, blazing with light and music and bright chatter and steamy good smells.

  Time to head back to Montparnasse. Sofia was waiting.

  I found them at Brasserie Lipp. Under the undulating ceiling paintings of African scenes, Colby was rubbing shoulders with a leggy blonde, an American student I had met before. Havasi was with a man I didn’t know, arguing in Mlotek and smacking a newspaper laying open on the table. Sawyer was looking very natty, wearing one of his better jackets and a bowtie. Margaux was surrounded by a coterie of brilliantly attired fashionistas, chattering excitedly in French. Leo was hovering behind her, speaking with a heavyset Russian diplomat who kept running his fingers through a pomaded shock of dark hair. Erlichmann looked festive, his round face scrubbed and pink. He leaned across the table, shouted to me above the noise, “Sinclair, you have missed everything!”

  I pulled out a chair next to Colby. “What did I miss?”

  “Margaux and Leo got married this afternoon.”

  I leaped up, extended my hand across the table. Leo, beaming, pumped my hand up and down enthusiastically, if politely. He even seemed a little tipsy, which was for him, unheard of.

  I wished Margaux well, kissed her on both cheeks. She accepted my congratulations, looking at me from beneath hooded eyelids with that speculative gaze of hers.

  “Good luck,” I told her, meaning it. I was genuinely happy for them. It seemed like a good omen. I sat back down, took out my sketchbook. I always took a seat facing the door so that I could see Sofia the moment she arrived. A waiter set a glass in front of me, filled it with champagne, topped off the other glasses, and disappeared in the crowd.

  Greta Garbo made an appearance. Marlene Dietrich came and went. Coco Chanel stopped by, embraced Margaux like a sister. Elsa Schiaparelli swept up to the table in a gloriously silly hat shaped like a shoe. The three of them hugged and kissed, conferring a glittery aura of glamour upon our little party.

  Checking my watch for the hundredth time, I waited for Sofia to make her appearance. It was already nine o’clock. Beata noticed my impatience. She lost her festive expression and shot me a look of compassion, just before she leaned over the table to Leo and Margaux.

  “I’m sorry, I completely forgot to tell you!” she exclaimed. “Sofia couldn’t be here tonight. But she wanted me to tell you how thrilled she is for both of you. She says she has never seen two people so perfect for e
ach other.”

  “Where is she?” asked Leo pleasantly.

  “She has a visitor from the United States,” she told them. Then, her lips curved up in a delighted smile. “Her fiancée.”

  I didn’t make it to class the next morning. Nor the next day, nor the day after that. Art, the blessing that had raised me from the grim monotony of my sad beginnings, ceased to hold any interest for me. I remained closeted in my flat, unshaven, undressed, unbalanced.

  A week went by, then a month. Towards the end of April, I received a phone call.

  The furtive female voice on the other end had an Eastern European accent, and for a moment my heart leapt at the possibility that Sofia was calling. But it was Beata. Sofia wanted to see me, she said. I could imagine her delicate lady-like features, the corners of her mouth turned down, her grave gray eyes distinctly disapproving. She gave me a time and a place. Café de Flore, the upstairs room, four o’clock sharp. If I wasn’t there by four-fifteen, she would leave. Then she hung up.

  Frantically, I raked a comb across my hair, slapped on scent, pulled on a clean shirt and tie. Outside my flat, I waved down a cab. My watch ticked off the last minute as we screeched to a stop and I threw the driver too much money. Sprinting out, I bulled through the front door and took the steps two at a time to the second level, where only foreign tourists and the unfashionably dressed were seated.

  She was still there, wearing a little green hat and pulling on her oyster-colored gloves, getting ready to leave.

  “Hello, Sofia,” I said.

  She startled, looked up. “Hello, English,” she said softly.

  I took a seat opposite her. I noticed she had a chic new haircut. “You look lovely.” I tried to sound casual as I struggled to bottle up my emotions; despair, rage, betrayal, desire. “Really. Smashing.” My hands were shaking. I folded them in my lap. “Have you ordered?”

  “I only have a little while. I have to catch a train.”

  Her eyes were moving over my face, her dramatic eyebrows drawn together. She was looking at me the way only lovers do before embarking on a long journey. I didn’t know it then, but I think she was trying to memorize my features.

  “So, you’re engaged. What’s the lucky fellow’s name?”

  “Arthur. Arthur Weiss. His friends call him Skip.”

  “Wonderful! What’s he do, this Skip?”

  “His family owns a poultry processing company. In Toledo, Ohio.” She pronounced the unfamiliar names carefully.

  “Poultry processing! But that’s brilliant! When’s the big day?”

  She dropped her eyes. “Soon. A few more weeks.”

  “Well then! Let’s have some champagne. We should celebrate.”

  She ignored the savagery in my voice. Or perhaps she didn’t hear it. “I wanted to…I have something I want to give you. Have you got a cigarette?”

  I patted down my pockets till I found one, then handed it to her. She put it between her lips and leaned forward as I struck a match, held it till the tip of the cigarette glowed red. She inhaled deeply, then leaned back and let a stream of smoke drift into the air over her shoulder. I got the feeling that she didn’t smoke around her precious fiancée.

  “Come on, Raphael. One more game of Exquisite Corpse.”

  I had not carried my sketchbook since that awful night. I flagged down a passing waiter who brought us some writing paper.

  Pencil in hand, she bent over the paper, giving me the chance to observe her. There was no mistaking it. Sofia was transformed. She looked happy. Of course she was happy. So much to look forward to. With a husband, she would be back in her family’s good graces, and I was just a last stop on her way to a life of luxury in the United States.

  I wanted her to hurt as much as I did. “What does Skip think of your drawings?” I said offhandedly.

  She took her time answering. “He thinks they’re very…nice.” She finished the top, folded it over and passed it across the table.

  I sketched quickly and forcefully, passed it back. She frowned, curling and uncurling a ringlet of hair while she thought, then smiled and began to draw. I watched the sure way she clasped the pencil, watched the point bite into the paper, watched her pretty white fingers make strong, sure lines, as natural to her as breathing.

  “You open it,” she said, sliding it forward. I unfolded the paper and glanced at it. Sofia had drawn a soldier wearing a helmet and a look of grim determination, to which I had attached a nude female torso. She had given it the legs of a tightrope walker, slippered feet sliding along a rope suspended over a precipice. She laughed nervously.

  “You haven’t shown him your work, have you.” I said.

  “No.” she said shortly. She opened her bag, fished around inside and took out a set of keys, which she slid across the table. “These are the keys to my apartment.”

  I stared down at the keys.

  “I left some things there. Things I will have no use for in America. My paints, my brushes, my easel…my drawings.”

  I nodded, unable to speak. It hit me like a fist. She was really leaving me. I bowed my head, unable to continue this charade of civility. She reached across the table and took my hand. “Raphael,” she said softly.

  I pulled my hand away as if her touch burned. I couldn’t stand it any longer. “How could you do it to me, Sofia? Not a word of explanation, not a hint of goodbye.” I could feel my voice rising out of control. In another moment, I’d be crying. “You’ll have to forgive me, Sofia, because after that night, that splendid rainy night…the night I punched Sawyer in his stupid mouth, the night we danced until they threw us out, the night you kissed me…that was it for me, Sofia. I thought we were going to be one of those old couples you see doddering down the boulevard, still holding hands. You should have seen my expression when Beata told me you were engaged. Too bad you missed it. I’m sure it was hilarious.”

  “I was going to tell you,” she said. “But when Sawyer hit you…and I saw your face, your beautiful face…I couldn’t do it. I could not make myself say the words.”

  Then she grew angry. “What did you think, English? That I would stay in Paris forever, playing our little game? This was always temporary, like a dream.

  “All of my life, I have thought there is something wrong with me. That I deserved to be punished for what I did. For the way I see. For the pictures I make with my hands. I thought, ‘No one will ever love a low creature like me. I will be alone forever, and I must get used to it.’ You have shown me that I am…how do I say this…worthy of the love of a good man. You see, Raphael, you are my angel of healing.”

  Her eyes were wet now, her eyelashes clumping together, long and black like spiders’ legs against her cheeks. “I am sorry, terribly sorry that you are suffering. But my family is back east, waiting in Wlodawa. I cannot just turn my back on them.” She put her head into her hands. “How did this happen? I just wanted to paint.”

  “You mean the same people who beat you with a belt for drawing kids playing at a pump? The people who hid their children from you? The people who offered you their cripples? Those people?”

  Her eyes were blazing with emotion. “When I’m with Arthur, none of that matters. You understand? It’s like all those bad things never happened. Like when I was a little girl.”

  She dropped her gaze, stirred her hot cocoa. “Anyway…” she said ruminatively. “Terrible things are happening in Germany. War is coming any day now. We’re leaving for America right after we…” and here, words failed her. She pushed a strand of hair that had fallen in her eyes back behind her ear. She murmured almost to herself. “In America, I can be whatever I want to be.”

  “Oh, really?” I lashed back. “I know you, Sofia. I’ve seen your drawings. They scream, they writhe with sexuality. What do you think they’ll make of that in Toledo, Ohio?” I slammed my hand down on hers, pinning it to the table, leaned forward till our heads were almost touching. “I love you,” I said between gritted teeth. “Did you think I would just keep
quiet? That I would just let you go? I’ve been in love with you since the moment I met you. The first time I looked into your eyes, I saw a story being written there, Sofia. A fairy tale, with monsters, goblins, ghosts, a beautiful maiden. And I always thought I would be the happy ending to that story.”

  Her face blurred with anguish. She leapt to her feet, knocking over her cup, spilling cocoa over our silly drawing and spattering my shirt. As she flew down the steps, out of the café and onto the street, I lunged after her.

  “I wish I had died that night,” I shouted at her back, following along like a dog at her heels. “Died in your doorway. Because without you, all I have to look forward to is a vast, empty landscape; empty arms, empty bed, empty hours till the day I die.”

  Suddenly she spun around. She flung her arm out like a policeman, stopped me with a hand to my chest.

  “There is something you can do, Raphael.” she said in a steely voice. “And we can forget all this. We live together happily ever after, like in your fairy tale. Marry me.”

  I stopped dead in my tracks.

  “Just one little thing. You must become Jewish. That’s all! Such a small thing. And we get married tonight.”

  She waited expectantly. I wavered under the warmth of her hand. Gazing into the depths of my beloved’s eyes, I was torn apart by what I found inside them, one last time.

  I bowed my head. And said nothing.

  “That is what I thought,” she said simply.

  She gave out a small sigh, her shoulders rising and falling just once. “Have a good life, Raphael Sinclair. You are a great painter. Your work will be in museums one day. You are in Paris. Find a beautiful girl. Fall in love. Forget me. Be happy.”

  The spring air was soft and fine and smelled of lilacs. On an evening like this, I should have been strolling down the boulevard with my lover. Instead, I watched her walk away from me into the gathering clouds of evening.

  And suddenly, with a rush, she was back, her hat gone, her hair in wild disarray. My heart lifted like a bird in flight, and my arms went around her, and she held my face in both her hands and pressed her lips to mine.