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“So are you really just a waitress?” Jeremy asked, chin propped on one hand and legs folded up in the too-small passenger’s seat.
Pam shrugged. “I’m a lot of things. Waitress is one of them.”
“Oh good Lord, you’re not an actress, are you? Because you really don’t seem the type.”
She raised an eyebrow and snorted. “No. Definitely not.” Barret’s came into view, and she flicked her right turn signal on.
“I don’t think you’re a writer,” he tugged at the sleeves of his blazer, brow furrowed. “Starving artist, then?”
“The waitressing keeps me from starving, but yeah, I’m working on this artist thing.” Somehow, saying it aloud to this virtual stranger was easier than she expected. There was no need to be self-conscious or explain further. She was trying to be an artist, simple as that. “What about you?”
“I’m a writer,” he said.
Pam perked up. “Are you any good? What do you write?”
“Tolerable, and probably nothing you’ve heard of. I’ll show you sometime if you ever show me your work.”
“Perhaps,” she said evasively, turning her attention to parking.
Six beers later (three and three-quarters for him, two and a fourth for her) they were sprawled out a table in the corner of the dim little bar, laughing like old war buddies. They had tacitly agreed to put off any talk of heartache till later; it had been a good night so far.
Jeremy was an excellent conversationalist who turned out to share Pam’s love of the absurd, albeit with a much more acerbic, almost cutting wit. Even more surprising was Pam’s own willingness to talk and her ability to hold her own end of the conversation so well. She found herself sharing stories about work, her opinions on impressionism, her (disastrous) attempts to cook Thai food, and felt like a different person. Perhaps it was Jeremy, and his perverse way of poking, prodding, teasing – anything but agreeing with anything she said. There was something exciting, though not a little alarming, about having to defend all her choices, even down to her pick of beer. Perhaps it was all the living she’d done in the past year, how much more doing than thinking.
“Do you want another?” she asked, watching Jeremy toy with his empty bottle after a particularly long lull in the conversation. He didn’t answer for awhile, simply looked down and kept spinning the pale green glass between his hands, and the easy mood of banter they had upheld throughout the night died away quietly. He answered finally, still deliberately not meeting her eyes.
“Once, many years ago, I fell in love with a very lovely girl. She was spirited and kind and monstrously clever, but we were both very young and very muddled.” He looked up at her then, jaw clenched and brows tight. Pam said nothing, and merely set her own bottle down on the damp wood. “She was about to start law school in London, and I was still chasing my writing career and trying to prove that it wasn’t just a pipe dream. I had been trying unsuccessfully for years when an opportunity arose that seemed like it would be my last chance. But it was in the states, and I had no idea how long I’d be stuck there.”
“She didn’t want to wait for you?”
“She did! That was the problem. I couldn’t let her do that. It was just the horrible uncertainty of it all. Odds were exceedingly high that I would come back to her, after Lord knows how many years, as an utter failure, and I just couldn’t do that to her. I couldn’t come crawling back, expecting her to simply take care of me as usual. She would have been making a name for herself, and being brilliant and wonderful, and I would have had nothing to offer. I would have just been holding her back.”
“She would have been holding you back, too,” she blurted out. Jeremy looked at her quizzically, and she took a deep breath to explain. “You…wouldn’t have been free to just throw yourself into whatever crazy dream it was you were trying to fulfill. She would have always been there in the back of your mind, making every failure just a little worse because you would have been wanting to succeed as much for her as for yourself. And you wouldn’t have been able to change yourself, or take any sort of desperate chances, because that tie, those expectations, would have always been there.”
“Are we still talking about me?”
“Yes. Mostly. Sorry.” She sighed. “Continue.”
Jeremy scowled. “Not much else to say. I left, thought about calling for years but never did, and a mutual friend told me last week that she was getting married. Today.” He slumped down, putting his head in his hands. “You’d think…I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. Only that I loved her very, very much, and I loathe the man who’s getting her instead.” Pam put her hand on his arm and squeezed gently, biting her lip in sympathy. “And me. I hate myself, too.”
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly.
“Me, too.” His eyes were bleary, but the set of his shoulders was still tense. “Your turn.”
“Well.” She stalled, taking a pull of beer before starting. “I guess- oh!” she cried suddenly. “You wanted to see my work, didn’t you? Come with me.” Without waiting for a reply she pushed her chair back and pulled Jeremy up with her, leading him to a shed a few yard behind the patio. It was covered in all manner of graffiti, and amidst the squalid hearts and phone numbers and profanities, there were several pieces of interesting artwork. Nearby were cans of spray paint arranged haphazardly. “Bill put those out one night just for fun, and it’s sort of a tradition to draw something whenever you come by. He paints over it every few months or so for a clean slate.” She leaned over and grabbed the blue, giving it a shake before finding herself a relatively clean portion of the unconventional canvas.
“Are you trying to distract me? Because I still insist upon knowing about the man who makes you drink. Or is it a woman?”
Pam laughed quietly. “It’s a man. And I’m showing you.” She aimed the can carefully, drawing out what appeared to be a man with a tie, floppy hair, and large feet. “This,” she narrated, “is a man I fell in love with. A tall, sweet, funny man who was also not my fiancé.” She kept drawing, this time a larger, scowling figure with boxes under an arm. She added an unequal sign between the two.
“My god, Morrie, I had no idea this was going to be such a sordid tale.”
She shrugged. “Nothing ever actually happened. He told me he loved me.” Here she paused and put a small heart in the hand of the first figure. “He told me he loved me and transferred to a new city. So I called off my wedding and left town to put even more distance between us.” Pam picked up the red paint and drew a vicious X through both figures. “Haven’t talked to him since.” She contemplated her work before stepping forward and drawing another small X across the heart in graffiti-Jim’s hand.
“That was quite possibly the most entertaining tale of heartbreak anyone’s ever told me. Do you always tell your stories this way?”
“Nah, I just wanted an excuse to do a little vandalism.”
“Understandable. You do have quite a knack for it, you know?”
“Vandalism?”
“No, stupid. Drawing. It’s whimsical and gritty all at the same time.”
She stared at him in disbelief. “It’s a cartoon,” she said flatly. “Done in spray paint. On the wall of a shed.”
“What kind of artist are you, woman? You’re supposed to be a creative soul, for god’s sake. What does it matter where and how you’ve done it as long as it’s got a good punch of emotion?”
“I guess.”
“I really would like to see more of your work. Maybe a portfolio of sorts? I might have a project or two you’d be interested in. No promises, though.”
“Uh, sure.” Pam couldn’t help but be intrigued.
“Don’t you have a business card or anything?”
“I think my number’s on this shed somewhere.”
“Morrie.”
“Stop calling me that,” she protested half-heartedly.
“Where can I reach you?”
“Fine,” she said, reaching into her purse. “This is the art gallery where I work during the day, it’ll be the best place to contact me.”
Jeremy reached for the card and spent a few minutes looking at it before bursting into laughter.
“What?” Pam asked, bewildered. Mabel had very elegant business cards, as a rule.
“You work for Mabel,” he forced out between laughs. Pam nodded, confused. “Mabel Redbanks.” She nodded again. “I take it you’ve been hanging up a bunch of Paul Marset’s work this week?”
“You’re not-”
“I work with him. Maybe you’d know me as Dylan Engdahl?”
Pam plunked down on the grass beside him, trying to deal with the sudden mix of apprehension and glee she was feeling, and the odd, portentous certainty that everything was going to change.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
Oh man...I did not think I'd be back here. But I had an itch to write, so here I am again.
Chapter End Notes:
We'll see where this goes...are any of my old readers even on here anymore?
Kestrel is the author of 4 other stories.
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