Still Life

by Lush Jones

  Still Life

  By

  Lush Jones

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Still Life

  Copyright© 2013 Lush Jones

  ISBN: 978-1-60088-846-5

  Cover Artist:n Rebecca Sterling

  Editor: Leanne Salter

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

  Cobblestone Press, LLC

  www.cobblestone-press.com

  Dedication

  To any woman who’s ever doubted herself.

  “You’ll have to spend at least two hours without any clothing,” said Professor Roberts on Sara’s voicemail, his voice brisk and friendly as if he were inviting her to a real estate seminar. As though spending time naked was so ordinary, it was an afterthought. Sara, on the other hand, had listened to the message seven times, yet so far that was the only sentence that had managed to sink in.

  Growing increasingly mortified each time she heard those words, she finally grabbed a pen and a sticky note and wrote down the remaining details: Fill out paperwork in Personnel, followed by the first Life Drawing class at 10:00 in Dutchman’s Hall. Professor Roberts will be the instructor and there will be one ten-minute break. Bring a bathrobe.

  Professor Roberts—Sara imagined an older, stooped man wearing a dusty jacket, pockets crammed with charcoal and pencils, sighing as he waved around a cigarette. Maybe professors had changed in the twenty years since she’d enrolled in art school. Or maybe not.

  She’d certainly never imagined, when she herself had sat behind an easel and drawn countless undressed strangers, that she’d ever become one. Yet here she was, taking down notes about spending two hours naked in front of a room filled with college kids.

  When Sara’s divorce was finalized, she had felt a sense of such profound relief that she’d overlooked a few key details about her finances…such as the disparity between her income and her bills. Money was tighter this year, and Sara was learning how to be creative with each dollar. She told herself this divorce was a good thing, forcing her to look for a better-paying job and stand on her own feet again. Divorcing Haven had been an excellent idea, but being poor was not. Reconciling those two concepts was never going to be easy, no matter how well she timed it.

  While she polished her resume and crafted cover letters, her best friend had offered a suggestion. Ivy was a teacher at a local art school and she’d recently heard several colleagues complain about the lack of models for drawing classes.

  “It used to be retired people and other students would jump at the chance to make some extra cash, but nobody wants to do it anymore. They’re all afraid it will end up on YouTube, I guess.” Ivy twirled a strand of curly red hair and pointed at Sara. “But I said I might know someone interested in posing for a few classes.”

  “Are you out of your mind?” Sara snorted. “I’m thirty-nine years old, and I just legally dissolved my relationship with the last person to see me naked. I’m pretty sure that means I don’t want to stand in front of some kids half my age in my birthday suit. Plus, I’m a mother. Moms don’t pose nude.”

  “Oh, please,” Ivy scoffed. “Nobody will ever find out. You could do day classes during the week and then pick up some weekend nights when Haven has the girls. They’re paying a hundred bucks a class.”

  Sara had raised an eyebrow. “Right. They used to pay models twenty dollars back when I was in school.”

  “I’m telling you, they literally can’t pay anybody to do it. You’d get hired right away!”

  “Ivy, the last time a room full of people saw me naked, I was giving birth.”

  “Come on,” Ivy urged. “You’re in fantastic shape; you’ve got the body of a thirty-year-old, and who cares anyway? They’re not having sex with you. It’s life drawing. It’s a bunch of people with charcoal, trying to get the shadow right on your elbow.”

  Sara had shaken her head, but then the latest credit card statement had come in at the exact same time the mortgage was due. So she’d called Ivy and made the appointment to come in and interview. A friendly woman about ten years older than Sara had met with her, given her a brief once-over and smiled. “You’ll do fine.” She had winked. “It’s easy. Just take off your clothes and don’t move.”

  That had sounded pretty easy. But now, listening to that message, Sara wasn’t so sure.

  Still, she found herself reporting for duty the next morning after she dropped the girls off at school. She’d felt so weird getting ready. Did it matter what she wore to work when her job was getting naked? As she brushed her hair, she looked at herself in the bathroom mirror. She was okay with her body. She was tall and slender with a curvy bottom, but naked and exposed in front of strangers? She wasn’t so sure. She brushed on a coat of mascara, threaded long silver hoops through her ears, and dressed in jeans and a silky white cotton T-shirt.

  She kissed the girls goodbye, feeling a little Hester Prynne as she slunk off into the carpool lane, headed for her new life of vice. Too soon, she was standing at the door to the classroom, duffel bag in hand.

  A tall man in his mid-forties with short silvery-brown hair arranged a cloth over some boxes in the center of the room. Stools and easels circled the boxes where, Sara realized, she’d be sitting. A thrill of horror shot through her as she looked at the soft linen sheet draping the surface her bare bottom might be sitting on moments from now.

  She cleared her throat.

  The man looked up. He had dark eyes and slightly flushed skin, and he smiled at her, extending a chambray-clad arm toward her. “Sara?” he surmised.

  “Professor Roberts?” She stopped herself from saying, “I presume.”

  He smiled again. “John.” He gestured as a couple of students entered the studio, motioning for them to enter. “They call me Professor, but you can call me John.”

  Then he glanced up at the clock on the wall and nodded toward Sara’s bag, saying, “You can change in the ladies’ room and bring your bag back here.”

  Sara bit her lip. “Sure.” She walked out into the hall and tried to catch her breath. She watched as girls who looked ridiculously young chattered as they headed into the classroom, toting heavy leather portfolios. She cursed herself for feeling ten times more insecure than they could possibly ever be.

  She pushed open the door to the bathroom and entered a stall, fumbling with her clothes as if she’d just learned to undress. She shoved the shirt, jeans, panties and bra into the duffel bag and shook out the thick, fluffy robe. Somehow, she’d thought a giant, white robe would make her feel protected against the situation, but as she stepped out of the stall and looked at her reflection in the mirror, she just felt worse. Instead of looking casual, as if she’d just grabbed a simple wrap, she’d made it obvious how much she wanted to conceal.

  “Well, fuck it, Sara,” she said out loud in the mirror. And then, taking the deepest gulp of air she could find, she grabbed the duffel bag like a life preserver and left the bathroom.

  When she entered the studio classroom again, she almost fainted. The class was full, all easels taken.

  Professor Roberts was lowering the window blinds. “Nobody can see in,” he assured her with another kind smile, which should have made her feel better but didn’t. She stood frozen until he pointed to a small stack of metal cubes in the corner. “Please feel free to stash your stuff in one of those.”

  She did, and then took a hesitant step toward the middle of the room.
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  She started sweating.

  Glancing to her left, she spied a young man with a short blond ponytail, tattooed forearms and silver hoops in his eyebrows. He was laying out stubs of charcoal on his stool and whistling when he looked up and noticed her noticing him. He scanned her briefly, and then he nodded and looked toward the center of the room. “I think he’s ready for you,” Blondie said in a soft voice, pointing with a ringed finger to the center where Professor Roberts waited.

  She blushed. This was horrible. She could not possibly do this. She’d have to explain. The humiliation would kill her, but if she could only leave this room right now she’d do anything.

  “Sara?” Professor Roberts gestured to the boxes, acting as though nothing was out of the ordinary and his life drawing model was not about to run away or have a heart attack. “If you step over here, I’ll arrange your pose.”

  Sara’s legs moved in spite of her brain, and she walked over to the boxes.

  “Now, let me take your robe.”

  She let him slide the terry cloth from her shoulders and with it, her dignity. She shivered, fighting the impulse to cover herself with her hands, but he didn’t notice, or pretended not to.

  “Just sit here—that’s it.” He patted one of the boxes. When she didn’t move, he put one hand very lightly on her shoulder. His fingers were warm, but the unexpected pressure made Sara flinch just a little before she sat down. He nodded, continuing, “Then put your arms like this…” he gently tugged one of her arms to a bent position at her side, his fingers brushing her rib cage as he did so. Sara’s skin tingled. He ran his hand along her other arm, elongating it atop one of the boxes, as though she were casually draped across the shoulders of a lover. “Right, now move your shoulder a little over here.” Again he touched her skin, and Sara tried not to think about how awkward this entire scenario was. A strange man touching her naked body was a little too surreal right now. Stop thinking, Sara, she scolded herself. And she did.

  “There—perfect. Think you can hold that for an hour?” Professor Roberts stood back, his dark eyes so friendly, and Sara felt a very slight sensation of relief.

  “Sure. No problem,” she answered with what remained of her ego.

  “Great. If you need to move, just let me know. We’re pretty easy on the new models, right?”

  He winked at Blondie who shrugged. “Professor, we’re just psyched to have a model at all.” Then his eyes met Sara’s for the briefest of moments before he turned his attention back to his easel.

  Several other students nodded, murmuring as they took out their charcoal. Sara took a shallow breath, trying not to move, and her breasts rose. Blondie watched, and he swallowed hard before picking up his charcoal.

  The minutes ticked by and Sara relaxed. The pose was relatively easy—she was half sitting with her back supported by a taller box, and she could almost imagine falling asleep. Her eyelids grew heavy, and she tried to stay awake by sneaking peeks around the room without moving. Eyes flitting from side to side, she saw Blondie squinting as he smudged a line of charcoal on his paper. On the other side, a muscular, dark-haired man in a tattered black T-shirt stared at her intently as he held the edge of his paper perfectly still.

  Ivy was right, Sara realized. They were all art students, simply concentrating on the task of representing the human form. She needn’t have worried at all. Still sleepy, she cast a look at the clock. Ten more minutes till break, she calculated, and tried to find something else to focus on before she drifted to sleep.

  Directly across the room, she spied Professor Roberts standing at the easel of a student she hadn’t noticed earlier. This was an older man, closer to her own age. In his late thirties, she estimated. He had dark blond hair and a navy button-down shirt. His hands were large and clutched a piece of charcoal as he laughed at something the professor said.

  Then both men looked up at Sara.

  Professor Roberts smiled at her, nodding toward the clock and mouthed, “Just a few more minutes.” But his gaze didn’t shift from her body. Probably planning his next pose, she thought, as his gaze traveled down from her neck, to her breasts, to her thighs.

  Embarrassed, she cast a glance toward the other man. He, too, was staring at her with pale blue eyes, appraising her. His full lips curved upward, and he winked. Her cheeks warmed, and then she blushed even more as she realized the flush was traveling down her neck and across her chest. Heat prickled down to her nipples, and she tried not to twitch.

  She shifted her glance back to Blondie, who squinted at her with an intensity that instantly made her stiffen. He peered at her neck as though he couldn’t quite figure something out. She wondered what he was trying so hard to see, and the wonder turned to worry as his brow continued to furrow. She was tempted to open her mouth and ask, “Hey, what are you looking at?” but the idea was ridiculous, given her current state of undress. At this point, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know what he was looking at so intently. A mole? The freckles on her arms? Her breasts? The possibilities made her squeamish. Her skin reddened further, and Blondie noticed, appearing fascinated by the change in color. Then his eyes met hers, and it was his turn to blush.

  The tiniest smile escaped Sara’s lips, despite her discomfort. It had been a long time since she’d made a college boy turn red.

  Mercifully, Professor Roberts called out, “Break time. Everyone meet back here in ten.”

  Blondie stood up, approached the boxes and plucked Sara’s robe off the floor and handed it to her without a word.

  “Thanks,” she said to his back, but he was already out of the room.

  “So, Sara, how are you feeling? Back hurt yet?” Professor Roberts was standing next to her, his hand a light touch on her arm. She could smell his cologne, something citrusy and clean, as he inclined his head toward her.

  “I’m fine, really. This isn’t as bad as I thought.” Now why did I say that? She winced.

  But Professor Roberts didn’t appear to take offense, and he laughed, rubbing her shoulder in the type of gesture she normally found overly familiar and off-putting, but somehow seemed comforting coming from him.

  “Good, good. We’re pretty nice in here. We promise not to put you through anything more than you can handle.” And his hand lingered on her back for a moment before he walked back to the man in the blue shirt, who gave Sara a long, hard stare before whispering something to the professor.

  That was kind of a weird thing to say, Sara thought. And then she tightened the belt on her fluffy white shroud before walking out of the room.

  Too soon, the break was over and Sara found herself back on the boxes. This time, Professor Roberts changed the pose to one in which she was draped over one of the boxes on her stomach. He loosened her arms and gently arranged her head atop them, as if she were taking a nap.

  “You can even close your eyes,” he said as he stepped back.

  Sara closed her eyes but couldn’t relax. Her bottom was completely exposed to everyone in the room. An overhead fan turned, and the breeze brushed against her bare skin. The scratchy fabric covering the box chafed against her breasts. She guessed a decent thread count wasn’t the top priority for Professor Roberts and at first, the fabric was an irritant. But gradually, as the air cooled her back, she grew accustomed to the sensation and the tiny nubs in the cloth rubbing her skin began to feel less like exfoliation and more like a light massage. She stretched, and the pressure of the cloth sent little jolts of pleasure through her breasts. Experimenting, she stretched again, teasing her hardening nipples against the stiff material with a sharp breath she hoped no one noticed.

  She became very conscious of the tiny landing strip she’d let the bikini waxer talk her into last week, leaving the rest of the flesh bare. She’d scheduled the waxing only to look neat and trim for the modeling job, and hadn’t planned to go Brazilian.

  “You like. Trust me,” said the aesthetician at the strip mall spa she could barely afford. The woman had winked at her, a gesture Sara had
ignored. She’d been too concerned about where all that hot wax was going to be friendly. But now, that part of her swollen and slick against the box, she understood the woman’s comment. She liked, all right. What if someone were to turn her over and see how wet she was?

  An ache ran through her, and she bit her lip.

  She heard a creaking noise as someone got up from a stool. Squeaks on the hard cement floor told her that one of the students was walking around the room. She remembered taking drawing class years ago and that some students liked to meander through the class, checking out everyone’s work. Those kinds of students had always annoyed her. Never content to sit still or mind their own business.

  The squeaks grew closer, which meant the mystery student was making his way to her. Nervously, she waited. The squeaks stopped. She heard a few comments exchanged, too soft for her to interpret. Probably criticizing someone else’s drawing. Then the squeaks resumed and beneath the breeze of the fan, a sweaty thrill ran through her.

  Squeak.

  Now he was standing right next to her. She was anxious to know who was checking her out, but she refused to open her eyes. That would only provoke conversation, and she did not want to have a chat with anyone while she was naked. She clenched her eyes tighter.

  A teasing voice asked, “Enjoying your nap?”

  Before Sara could answer, the voice murmured, “I know how wet you are.”

  A wave of heat and humiliation spread across Sara’s face, but still she refused to concede anything by opening her eyes. But then the voice whispered inches from her ear, “I can almost taste it.”

  Sara’s eyes popped open and her chin jerked. The man in the blue shirt shook a finger at her. “Don’t break the pose.” And he sauntered back to his stool, leaving her even hotter and wetter than she had been before.

  “Grant,” Professor Roberts called out from his perch on the wide window sill, overlooking the students, “be nice.”

  Grant shrugged, a guilty grin spreading across his tan face. “Sorry.” Sara glared at him with an icy expression she hoped would shut him down. “I promise to be nice from now on, Sara.”