Play With Me

by Ananth

  Thinking about Cara always made me think about sex but there was a lot more to her than that (and he makes it sound like an afterthought, the pig!).

  She had converted one of her bedrooms into a studio, smartly breaking down an entire wall and installing bay windows so the room was filled with natural light. This was where she practised two forms of art: drawing nudes in charcoal and pottery. Her nudes, all of which her best friend Rhea had sat for, were astonishingly real and beautiful, and her delicately thin, intricate works in clay, which she spent hours painting laboriously in various hues of black, were scattered throughout the house.

  If one knew her one would know that her works were a reflection of her personality and it’s because I know so little of her, in a manner of speaking, that I will have to resort to an analogy (the first one that comes to my mind as I type) that one might call cheesy: she was like polyfloral honey, delicately multilayered, sweet with a strong aftertaste and blessed with a sensuous viscosity.

  Now go ahead, dip your finger in her sun-soaked valley and lick (and there you have it, we’re back to sex again. With Cara you can’t escape it).

  I had finished my drink and read a couple more chapters of the book before I decided to call it a night. Just when I had put my head down on the pillow, almost as if she knew the precise second, Nat messaged to remind me to take my pills. Standing in the kitchen, drinking water afterwards, I counted my blessings. Constantly thinking of someone while being constantly thought of by someone else was a pleasantly warm place to be.

  But things were about to change. This chapter is sort of a midpoint, think of it as an intermission.

  15

  We were standing on the sidewalk with Central Park behind us. The white building in front was unusual and awe-inspiring.

  ‘This is so beautiful,’ said Nat who couldn’t stop gawking at it.

  ‘It is, isn’t it?’

  ‘When was it built?’

  ‘Began in the early forties if I am right, they should have many books on it in the store. The thing I do know is that Wright, the architect, died before he could see it completed, as did Guggenheim. It’s one of the buildings he is most famous for.’

  ‘It is so beautiful and pure genius! Did you realize we didn’t have to retrace our steps or wonder whether we have already been inside some room, like it happens in the other museums? I love the gentle sloping corridors that wind down, and the view into the atrium is just pure art,’ Nat said admiringly.

  I couldn’t agree more. When we arrived, she had waited outside while I queued up to buy the tickets. She was flipping through some postcards and gallery literature. For the first fifteen minutes we walked through the rooms together, moving from image to exhibit to image. Then she began to lag, spending more time on some while I drifted ahead, focusing less on the image itself and more on how it had been framed, why it was hanging there, with or separate from the others, why this room and why that size, and why it had been chosen for the exhibit and so on. At one point, when I had walked away to another room and it seemed like I hadn’t seen her for a while, I retraced my steps only to find her in conversation with another visitor in front of the sculpture of a grotesque, moaning man. I left her to it and continued the rest of my tour. Twenty minutes later it struck me that she might have thought it rude of me to leave her alone and walk away. I hurriedly went looking for her. I didn’t find her on the floor I was on, so I turned a corner into the next floor and ran straight into her.

  ‘There you are!’ she said, with a relieved look on her face.

  ‘Sorry,’ I mumbled, and after that we walked around with each other in comfortable silence.

  It was just after noon on a clear day and the sun made the Guggenheim look bright and cheerful, in stark contrast to the grim art decos it was sharing space with. Nat and I had spent the last two hours exploring its exhibits. I had made a long list of things to do but we decided to take it easy, spending as much time as a place warranted rather than rush about through the city like mad tourists. Next on the list was a walk through Central Park followed by lunch on the Upper West Side, and then we were going to trace our way back downtown, walking through SoHo.

  The JWT meetings had been a success. Matt, who played a gracious host, and his team, loved the idea and said that it was as good as anything they had seen. Nat thought they were paying lip service until Matt invited their senior creative team into the conference room, which overlooked the gleaming glass tower which was to be Tower One, and showed them the animation video all over again. Their faces didn’t lie.

  The team also loved a lot of the other work we had done for Indian clients. It was an extremely successful meeting despite the fact that they had not made any kind of commitment to work with us. Yet. They were of course going to wait for a lot more ideas from their various agencies and partners. The worst case scenario was that JWT wouldn’t use our pitch but would pay for it anyway so that we didn’t sell it to another company. That was my deal and they agreed. I liked that about them.

  This morning Nat and I had had breakfast at our hotel. Nat had come down wearing a white linen shirt paired with peach-coloured linen trousers and gladiator sandals. Normally she wore her long hair loose but this morning she had tied it up in a neat bun, making her look like a sexy science teacher. I smiled.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘What’s what?’

  ‘Sid, c’mon, I saw it in your face. Something wrong with what I am wearing?’

  ‘No. On the contrary, I wish I had a teacher fetish.’

  ‘Shut up,’ she said and punched me lightly on my shoulder.

  We ordered the Grand’s famed banana waffles with syrup, arguably the best waffles I have had anywhere in the world. Even the maple syrup, which was usually served from an assembly line bottle in most places, was organic here, and was delicious. In fact I ended up feeling a bit ill after greedily consuming a full American serving sandwiched between two cups of cappuccino. Nat on the other hand picked through half her plate and smartly let the other half go. After breakfast we walked down to Canal Street and jumped into a cab going uptown. Around 25th Street, Nat saw a board to the Highline, which we said we could come back to after the morning jaunt at the museums.

  It was a beautiful day and as we entered Central Park, a gust of wind brought with it the lovely smell of leaves and moist earth. Nat undid her bun and let the wind play with her hair; she looked unbelievably beautiful, ethereal almost. I didn’t want to lose the moment and quickly took a couple of shots of her.

  We walked along the Jackie O Reservoir, watching the ducks in the water until the fountain in the middle caught my eye. The wind over the water was making the spray from the fountain dance, literally. At one point it began a slow curve beginning at water level before it slowly climbed up, swung left at first, then twisted to the right and then swayed with the wind before coming back to rest on the water again.

  I smiled, happy in the knowledge that some of life’s most beautiful things were actually very simple.

  ‘Did you see that?’ Nat asked, her eyes riveted on the fountain.

  ‘Beautiful, wasn’t it?’ I replied, pleased that she had noticed the same thing I had, realizing again that the simple things became even more beautiful when you had someone to share them with.

  We stood there quietly for a while before continuing on in unspoken agreement. We soon found ourselves in a little clearing of emerald-green grass surrounded by a cluster of large American elm trees.

  ‘How lovely! Let’s sit here,’ said Nat and, walking ahead of me, found a nice patch of grass and sat down. I joined her.

  ‘This is just awesome. Why can’t all cities be like this? Everyone goes on and on about how crowded and noisy New York is, and yet, look at this! I can’t think of a more beautiful place.’

  ‘I love this city,’ I replied. ‘I am surprised you haven’t been here before.’

  ‘No, we go to Chicago once a year, for Thanksgiving, and that’s because Rajat and his fr
iends get together. We go to the same pubs and have the same barbeques. We went to see the Niagara Falls once but that’s about it. I am not complaining, I love coming over, this is a great country.’

  ‘There’s so much more to see, Nat. You will love San Francisco, Miami. Beautiful cities and they are so sound culturally, different individually yet American as a whole. There was a time when people would crib that it’s all just the same burgers and fries and Coke and McDonald’s. But America is not that at all. Unlike in Europe where you see one city and have seen them all . . . Okay, the food is different.’

  ‘And the languages,’ Nat said.

  ‘Yeah, but still how much of Renaissance art and architecture can a man take?’

  ‘When did you go around America?’ she asked. And I noticed she ran her tongue over her lips, wetting them. I pulled out the bottle of blueberry Snapple I was carrying in the bag and gave it to her.

  ‘Thank you. How did you know?’

  I smiled.

  ‘I took two months off and travelled all over. Remember when I came here to study photography at the ICP? Oh, why will you remember, this was before Alpha.’

  ‘Nice,’ she said, before taking a second swig from the bottle.

  ‘It was fantastic! I was living off savings. This friend of mine and I took buses and trains around the country. We even made a road trip book, which we digitally printed; I’ll show it to you next time you are home or I’ll bring a copy to work.’

  ‘See, this is the kind of thing my husband will never do. He likes things structured and will never veer off a path.’

  Lying on the grass, aiming her conversation at the clouds, she continued, ‘I love this, I am so glad we did this, Sid.’

  And then the most beautiful thing happened. From behind the trees came bounding the most gorgeous golden retriever I had ever laid eyes on. He was pure gold, with a long, flowing coat, and full of the unmistakable energy of a dog that is happy and having a great day. In his mouth was a bright red rubber duck.

  ‘My God!’ Nat exclaimed, standing up.

  The dog heard her, ran up to Nat and dropped the duck at her feet. He backed up two steps and started wagging his tail vigorously, obviously asking her to play with him.

  ‘You want me to play? You do? What’s your name? Such a handsome fellow you are! Come here, come here,’ Nat kept talking to him in a soft, happy voice.

  The dog crouched on his front legs, indicating he wanted to play, and started yelping.

  ‘You want to play, you want to play,’ she kept saying to him as she picked his duck up and threw it for him to fetch.

  The dog scampered off, picked up the toy and brought it back to her.

  ‘He’s gorgeous, Sid, look at him, he’s s-o beautiful.’

  ‘He is,’ I agreed, and picked up my camera to take pictures of him, and equally, of Nat with him. I had never seen so much joy on her face before.

  She threw his duck again, and as he dashed away, she ran after him. When she caught up with him, he rolled over on his belly and she obliged by kneeling down next to him and rubbing him all over. The dog was deliriously happy.

  ‘C’mon Sid, come here, how can you not play with him?’ she called, laughing helplessly as the dog turned over, looked straight into her eyes and began licking her chin. She gave him a big hug and lay down with him on the grass. Nat was so happy and had made this instant connection with the dog. Their happiness was infectious.

  ‘C-H-A-R-L-I-E! Charlie! Get off her!’ A teenager came running towards us and went straight to Charlie.

  ‘I am so sorry,’ the girl began apologizing.

  ‘Please!’ Nat stayed her. ‘It’s no problem at all, we love him. He is gorgeous!’ (Did she say we?)

  Charlie picked up the duck and ran away and Nat and the girl went after him, walking away from me. I picked up both our bags and followed them. Nat turned to make sure I was coming, our eyes met momentarily and she smiled, and then she continued chatting with the girl. Her trousers were streaked with mud, her shirt full of paw prints and she looked happier than I had ever seen her. (I wish I could show you the pictures of her and Charlie together.)

  At a crossroad ahead the girl turned, waved goodbye to Nat and walked away, Charlie following on her heels. I quickened my step and caught up with Nat, who linked her arm through my free arm.

  ‘Did you see him? He was such a beautiful boy! I wish I had a dog.’

  I nodded, smiling.

  ‘She’s his walker; they come here every morning. He’s such a happy fellow,’ she said. ‘I wish they’d stayed longer,’ she added wistfully.

  ‘I know. He looked like a lot of fun.’

  ‘And did you see, at one point when I was talking to him he looked straight into my eyes . . . it was like he understood what I was saying. I am so glad we came here. Thank you!’ She wrapped her arms around me in a hug and I hugged her back.

  ‘Are you hungry, can you eat now?’

  ‘What did you have in mind?’

  ‘There’s a very nice Japanese restaurant called Ozu, couple of blocks down,’ I said as we slowly walked our way up to the west side of the park.

  ‘Erm . . . Japanese . . .?’

  ‘What are you thinking?’

  ‘No, I was wondering, if you don’t mind, can we go back to the hotel? I’d love a shower and maybe we can eat somewhere near there?’ she asked, looking down at all the havoc Charlie had wreaked on her clothes with a grimace.

  ‘Oh totally, I could do with a shower too,’ I agreed.

  ‘You are fine with that, right?’

  ‘C’mon, Nat, of course!’

  ‘Great! Thanks, Sid,’ she added, wrapping her hands around me again, leaning into me as we continued on our way.

  Near the exit, as we walked up the incline on to the sidewalk, the display board on an ice cream cart looked so good that we ordered double scoops for both of us. ‘That settles the lunch decision,’ she said, grinning.

  At the corner of 83rd and Columbus we jumped into a cab and as soon as she got in Nat demanded, ‘Show me the camera, I want to see the pictures.’

  She started flipping through the photos. ‘He is so beautiful. I love you, Charlie,’ she said suddenly, stroking the surface of the screen as if scratching him, when she saw the image of her and Charlie in conversation.

  ‘What next?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s late afternoon now . . . are you going to stay in your room, or do you want to hang around Greenwich?’ I asked, wondering if she wanted to shop. The truth was that I didn’t want to let her go; her joy was infectious.

  ‘I don’t know. What do you have in mind?’

  ‘I don’t know. Do you want to walk the Highline? We could rustle up an appetite for dinner.’

  ‘The Highline or the Brooklyn Bridge?’ she asked, and I could see she wanted to go to the bridge.

  ‘How about we walk across the Brooklyn Bridge after dinner, and if it rains we find a nice bar for a couple of drinks?’

  ‘Sounds good! Though we can walk even if it rains, I am sure we can borrow hotel umbrellas.’

  ‘If you don’t mind, I don’t mind,’ I replied, incredibly pleased that I was going to spend the whole evening with her.

  ‘Great! You know, I could get used to this. Why don’t we move to New York? You can easily set up shop anywhere. I’ll spend the mornings in the park with Charlie, our own Charlie, and we can spend the weekends walking in the city while you take lots of pictures. It’ll be fun!’

  I didn’t know if ‘we’ meant Alpha or she and I, and I realized with a start that I was hoping it was the latter and, even more bizarre, I quite liked the idea.

  In the hotel when we got off the lift on our floor, she gave me a warm hug, saying thank you with it and skipped towards her room. ‘See you at six,’ she yelled and gave a backward wave but I stood there watching her, knowing she would turn and look before she went in. She did. We both smiled.

  16

  In the room I chucked my ruck into a cor
ner, powered up my laptop and transferred the pictures from the morning. The shots of Nat in the park were simply beautiful. I had overexposed some frames allowing her to be bathed in light and I wondered if she would notice too that they went beyond a candid everyday shot and exposed my growing weakness for her. I jumped into the shower deciding I would take a long, luxurious bath. For the first time in a very long time, I wanted to smell good, and wear something nice, for it was an evening out with her.

  As I pulled on my khakis, I wondered why I had never fantasized about Nat. She had a great body, was a gorgeous woman and a wonderful person, in every way. She didn’t have a single malicious bone in her body and was truly capable of giving love. I didn’t know if this came out of the professional respect I had for her and her work, or because she was a married woman, but the things I could think of doing with Cara, or indeed was doing with Cara, I just couldn’t associate with Nat. And yet I adored her and, increasingly, wanted to spend time with her more than with anyone else I knew. I pulled on a black shirt and headed for the bar, texting her on the way down. She replied with a simple smiley.