Intaglio: The Snake and the Coins

by Danika Stone

  “Hey!” she called, but he didn’t turn back, just kept walking away.

  For a moment she was annoyed… he was the one who’d been pursuing her. As Cole’s silhouette moved further off, she felt her irritation slipping. She understood the feeling of things not quite working. She had been fighting with her own painting lately… hoping for the dream to come back so she could catch her flow again. ‘Maybe I just need a break too...’ she thought. She bit her bottom lip.

  When he reached the corner of the Health Sciences building, she broke into a jog. Reaching his side, she slouched the bag to her other arm, not looking up.

  “Don’t think you’re getting out of your end of the bargain,” she said to him, her strides matching his. “I’m thinking you now owe me some serious posing for this… and I get to choose the when and how.”

  “How?” Cole asked, raising his eyebrows.

  She gave him a hard stare, then provocatively dropped her eyes down his body, letting her gaze linger. When her eyes rose back up, Cole’s face was flushed.

  “Oh, I know how to paint nudes too,” Ava said with a snort.

  Cole laughed and Ava shoved his shoulder, happy with the sound of his laughter, and the two of them continued down the sidewalk, side by side.

  Chapter 7: Roughing Out

  Ava had been standing in Cole’s studio space for hours and her back now ached. She had a sudden, immense respect for the models they hired for figure drawing classes. Holding a pose was far harder than she’d ever thought!

  Cole had started their session by sketching her. Shapes and forms – bits and pieces of her neck and shoulders, face and arms – now surrounded her on the white walls of his studio. She was amazed at his ability to draw; though it made sense that his artistic skills would translate elsewhere, too. Ava needed to stay motionless, but Cole could talk, so she asked him questions and he told her stories about his childhood, pausing now and then as he drew.

  By the time the light disappeared from the windows, and they ran down to the Students’ Union building for subs, she knew that his father was ex-military and that his stepmother was a retired journalist, now a freelance writer for several small magazines. He didn’t talk about his mother and she didn’t push. (Ava didn’t talk about her mother either.)

  When they had eaten, they headed back to the studio. Cole drew like an architect, with simple, controlled lines and measured distances, not at all like Ava did. Her scribbled searching lines wandered here and there on a page, shading as much as following the shape of an object, roughing things out in bold splashes. She asked him more questions, discovering a passion for school and a three-generation background in the Army. His father was a retired Sergeant Major.

  “So why didn’t you go into the military then?” Ava asked, laughing.

  Cole looked up from his sketch pad and shrugged, a half-smile on his lips.

  “It’s a family thing, but not mine. My sister did.”

  Ava smiled, dropping her chin to look at him, but his gaze was back on his page, his body hunched over the drawing board.

  “I didn’t know you had a sister. What’s her name?” she asked.

  Watching him, she saw Cole’s face close off like a slammed door, flipping into something painful. There was something about that brief but violent reaction that left her heart pounding. Something more to this story.

  “Her name was Hanna,” Cole said carefully, not looking up. “She was four years older than me. She died when I was fourteen.” His words were measured, taut.

  “Oh my god, I’m sorry,” Ava mumbled. She wasn’t sure what to say other than that, so she stood and waited while Cole continued to draw. There was a tension in his shoulders now – and between the two of them – that worried her.

  When the sketching was done, Cole snapped a few pictures at different angles, then began to work away at the stone, knapping off chips with a mallet. He gave Ava safety glasses to wear even though he was working with small tools and she smiled his caution for her. She blushed as he helped her to fix her pose: his hands on the back of her arms, fingers tipping up her chin. Her skin buzzed where he touched her.

  Ava was amazed by how much he’d already sculpted. (Couldn’t help but think that it looked more than half-finished to her.) The back was still the square-formed shape of the quarried stone, but the front had been completely carved down into a woman’s face, torso and legs. They were rough and loose, but the forms were still clearly recognizable. Stranger than that, Ava found them familiar.

  Taking a moment to shake the feeling back into her limbs, she came to stand next to the stone, where Cole waited, staring at his rough work. With a gasp, Ava realized he’d already “caught” some element of who she was within the coarse shape. It was both gratifying and disturbing. By his own admission, Cole was struggling with the arms. He’d reworked them a number of times so that they were now pushed back slightly, as if the woman in the stone was leaning forward. Cole frowned and began to explain about the permanence of mistakes when sculpting.

  ‘Sometimes there are things that can’t be fixed...’ an internal voice prompted. Ava didn’t share the thought, just nodded and watched him work. It fascinated her. In a minute, he glanced back up. He smiled, reaching out to touch her arm.

  “Thanks for coming,” he said quietly. “I shouldn’t have taken off last weekend, but there was some stuff going on at home.”

  “It’s no problem,” Ava said, shrugging. “I needed a break anyhow. I’ve been going full tilt for a while and my big piece is at a bit of a standstill. Really sucks when that happens.”

  He laughed, and she took her pose again as Cole went back to work. The two of them talked as the hammer and chisel chinked again and again, revisiting their teen years. Ava admitted that she was a bit of a handful for her dad. She told him how she and Marcus had become friends – the two of them hanging out together non-stop from the time they hit high school, though they’d known each other much longer. She hinted about her parents’ divorce, mentioning that her mother was no longer part of her life, that she hadn’t even seen her since her father got full custody when she was six. Ava stopped for a half-second, her voice swallowed up in her throat. But then the moment passed and her tone lightened again.

  “Lots of anger issues,” she admitted, “got in trouble with the law. Think I must’ve driven my dad almost crazy. God, I was such a badass when I was a kid. I think he must have wanted to strangle me sometimes.”

  Giggles broke into all out cackling, and Ava dropped the pose again. When her laughter subsided, she caught Cole watching her, his face intently focused, almost sad. It left her feeling self-conscious and awkward. She smothered the last of her giggles, standing straighter.

  “Sorry,” Ava said, moving back into the pose, “I’m not making this easy for you to work.”

  Cole smiled as he lifted his mallet, starting again. His next words surprised her.

  “Nah. It’s okay… You’re really beautiful when you laugh.”

  She blushed and went silent, so he took over telling stories. He told her how his parents got divorced when he was in his early teens. She asked why, but Cole didn’t answer, just scowled, working mutely. She was about to ask him what was wrong when he stopped working altogether and looked back up at her.

  “My older sister, Hanna,” he said tightly, then dropped his face as if the pain was present once more, “her death… changed them.”

  “Sorry,” she said quietly, fighting the urge to walk up to him.

  Cole nodded and kept working. He was using a small chisel, removing the excess from the face in thin flakes, lowering the planes of the forehead and scoring under the cheeks. Ava wanted to see how it was going, but she sensed that Cole was close to getting something right, so she stayed where she was, closing her eyes and listening to the repetitive tapping. It felt comforting.

  Nearly an hour later, Cole finally dropped his tools, rubbing his hands slowly. It was close to midnight, the time having disappeared.

 
; “Think I’m done for now,” he said, nodding to Ava.

  “Thank god,” she said tiredly, then smiled and stretched, her back popping loudly.

  “That’s disgusting,” Cole said with a horrified laugh. She grinned, shaking her head in dismay.

  “That’s what you get for making me pose for...” she glanced at the clock on the wall, “seven hours!”

  He gasped.

  “Shit, Ava. So sorry! I didn’t realize it—”

  She stepped forward into his personal space, watching as his gaze dropped from her eyes to her mouth and back up again. Her lip curled mischievously as she saw the flare of lust. Worry gone, replaced by longing.

  “You owe me, Cole,” she said boldly, poking his chest. “I’m going to make you pay for it.”

  “So should I… uh… make it up to you?” Cole asked, his eyes heavy lidded.

  Ava smiled, stepping closer. Her breasts now brushed against the front of his shirt, eyes twinkling in anticipation. She could feel his breath starting to race in time to hers.

  “Yeah, you should...” she purred.

  “You want me to pose for you?” he asked, his fingers running up her arm. Ava shivered at his touch, wanting him to keep going.

  “No,” she said, beaming. “I’ll call you on that later. Tonight I want you to come paint with me.”

  His face flip-flopped in confusion.

  “Sure...?”

  Ava knew he had been expecting her to say something else (and she certainly had considered it) but the driving need to paint – ‘Paint big!’ – was rushing through her veins. She was desperate to get out of the studio.

  “Great,” Ava said, grabbing her jacket. “Let’s head to the train yards.”

  Chapter 8: Other Side of the Fence

  Ava stood, grinning up at Cole in excitement, her hair a golden halo under the street lamp.

  “You drive a fucking motorcycle!?” she laughed, her eyes dropping back down to the black helmet he’d just passed her.

  Cole shrugged, a smirk pulling up the edges of his mouth. He was so glad it wasn’t snowing tonight that he could have jumped up and down for happiness. Something was transpiring to make things work out and he wasn’t screwing it up this time.

  He wanted her.

  “You’re not the only one who ever rebelled, you know,” he answered smugly, lifting the spare helmet above her head, and brushing long strands of hair back from her face as he did. She giggled, smiling up at him.

  “Really, Cole Thomas, were you a naughty boy in your teens...?

  Cole snorted, adjusting the fit of the helmet down onto her head, his fingers lingering against her cheek for longer than needed.

  “My dad hates the bike,” he answered dryly, remembering endless arguments. “Always has.”

  Ava nodded, pushing forward into his space the same way she had at the studio, the unfamiliar helmet making her head wobble.

  “But I like it,” she murmured.

  Cole held back the urge to kiss her. This thing – whatever they were doing tonight – was important to her, and he intended to make it work. The last two weeks of being next to her in class, not reaching out to touch her, had been the longest in his entire life. He’d picked up the phone and put it back down a hundred times since that night in the diner.

  Never called.

  He swung a leg over the seat, waiting as Ava took her place behind him. As her hands settled around his waist, he kicked the bike to life, revving the engine and heading into the nighttime streets.

  “Faster!” she yelled into his ear, the words whipping away as the air rushed past his ears, reminding him of the pounding surf near his family’s home.

  Grinning, he obliged. In seconds they were moving so swiftly it felt like flying in the dark, rekindling Cole's childhood memories of being out on the water at night. Ava huddled against him as they swerved along poorly-lit supply roads near the industrial park, heading out toward the train yards on the far side of the city. She claimed she had a bunch of “art supplies” in her backpack, but the familiar swooshing and clicking sounds of the spray cans told the truth.

  Cole didn’t care.

  His entire attention was on her warm arms reaching around his chest, wrapped tight as the bike swayed and wove its way along the narrow roads. Ava hadn’t said exactly where she was taking him yet… but Cole had a sense of what was about to transpire. It left him smiling that she trusted him enough to take him along.

  They got to a branch in the road and Ava leaned over his shoulder, gesturing up ahead to a gravelled road. Once there, he slowed and then turned off the bike. He placed the two helmets onto the back, and then walked the motorcycle the rest of the way. Cole was now perfectly aware of her intentions. They weren’t just going for a show and tell of her colourful past… she intended to do work. To paint. To break the law.

  He wasn’t sure how that made him feel. But he was here.

  In minutes, they’d reached the chain-link fence with the no trespassing sign; the “NO” obscured by obscene smears of graffiti. Ava tossed her jacket atop the exposed metal spikes of the top of the fence, then climbed up and over with the ease of practise. Cole clambered up behind her, his muscled frame slower than hers, trying to quell the pounding of his heart. Ava was beaming at him, and she grabbed his hand, dragging him along.

  “If I tell you to run,” she warned, her cheeks flushed, “just drop the cans and run. Don’t ask me any questions and don’t look back. I’ll catch up with you. Okay?”

  Cole nodded, watching her face for clues.

  “The guys from the yards are older and slower,” Ava continued. “You give ‘em a good run for their money and they’ll probably just ignore you after a bit, and let you go.” She paused, her lip caught between her teeth. “The police now… that’s a different story. They’ve got dogs.”

  Cole frowned, his attention on the heat of her palm against his.

  “You were caught,” he said quietly.

  She gave him a wink.

  “It was worth it, though.”

  : : : : : : : : : :

  A few minutes later and they stood under one of the train-bridge overpasses, staring up at a huge expanse of wall. It was illuminated by a series of streetlights that shone down at intervals. Though designed to light the tracks above, they conveniently provided plenty of light for night-time painting. Part of the wall was still pristine and clean, but thirty or forty feet of the bottom – as high as a person with no ladder could reach – was covered with swirls and splashes of colour. Oscillating shapes, half-finished renderings and beautifully created script.

  The first portion was dark and grey, abstract and multifaceted. To Cole, it looked almost like the paintings of ancient cities he’d seen in Wilkins' class; cobblestone streets with recesses, buildings listing perilously overhead. Shadowy shapes emerged from the base. Horrible images of death and destruction; people starving and dying. Cole recoiled, but the painting wasn’t static. A few feet in and colour began to seep into the shapes and words, transforming them into swirls and shimmering splotches of colour and darkness – blues and greens and gold – reminding him of the sun shimmering brightly on water. The abstract eddies of colour told some story he could almost understand.

  ‘The sea spray tasted of salt on my tongue...’ Cole’s mind whispered, ‘the land receding until it was only a dark line on the horizon, then nothing at all...’ Eyes swirling with the colour, the unexpected thought got no further.

  The furthest – and newest – section was painted brighter than the others, the darkness of night sky and stars exploding with light. There were fields of wild grasses, trees and rolling hills. Cole stumbled as his eyes dragged across it, his mind trying to put it into clean boxes of meaning. The old and the new blended together in Ava’s painting. Sea and shore, night sky and brilliant day, fighting for precedence. He stepped up to the wall, struggling to understand the abstraction blurring with hints of reality to make something even more meaningful. Across the mural, words an
d phrases appeared over the pictures, layering the image with intention. The tag ‘Booker’ was proudly displayed in extended text at the bottom. Cole paused, his hand atop the curve on the ‘r’.

  “Is that you?” Cole asked reverently, tracing the tag.

  “One and only,” Ava answered with a smirk. She dropped her bag to the ground and picked up two colours. “C’mon,” she shouted at Cole, walking over to the open, unpainted space. “You’re going to help me with my mural.”

  He frowned.

  “I don’t...” he paused. For a moment he was still, weighing something inside him. Swallowing hard, he made his decision.

  He selected blue and black from the spray cans and walked over to the wall.

  “I’ve never done this,” Cole said earnestly. “I don’t know the right way to do it.” He looked at her apprehensively.

  Ava laughed, leaning in and dropping her voice.

  “You’re breaking the fucking law, Cole… there is no right way to do this.”

  He shook his head, following Ava to the area she was working on, her movements fast and steady. Great arcs of colour spread up and across the dull grey of the cement like splashes of blood and ochre. There was something about the way she was looking over at him as she worked – little glances now and then – as if this was a test that he had to pass. That made him nervous. He found himself trying to read the challenge hidden in her eyes.

  Cole dropped to a crouch and began sketching in a cube with short bursts of paint. He was about to start shading when Ava looked down at him. Cole swore he could feel her rolling her eyes before she walked up, hands at her hips.

  “Bigger,” she growled in exasperation. “Just… let yourself go. Be bold, Cole! Stop trying to plan everything.”

  He chuckled sheepishly and shook his head, standing beside her and following her patterns. Matching the same lines one hands-breadth under hers, like a shadow of her work. Cole liked how that felt. For a long time, he worked beside her, feeling that same shift he sometimes got just as things started flowing in a sculpture.