Chapter 3

The summer seemed to race by. Every day brought us one day closer to Fay leaving for college. There was a dark intensity to my dreamscapes each morning. They were desolate and barren. Except on the morning after a date with Annette.

We didn’t date every week during the summer. We’d done some fun things, though. I love going into the city to the Museum of Modern Art. She seemed to like it, too. She chose to go to a baseball game in July.

“I didn’t know you were a baseball fan,” I said. Fay had begged off this one, so Annette and I took the bus.

“I don’t know if I am,” she said. “I’ve never been to a game. How can I know if I’ll like something unless I go see it?”

“You mean you don’t watch games on TV?”

“I don’t watch TV, Arthur. Why watch a picture of other people having fun?”

“I don’t know. I don’t watch much TV either. I ... My dreams are more real.”

“Will you share one with me?” she asked.

“I, um ... You see ... I mean...”

“It’s okay. It was just a suggestion. If they’re private, you don’t have to talk about them. For sure, some of my dreams would be embarrassing to talk to my boyfriend about. I still dream about our first real kiss when you had your hand ... you know.”

“I know. I sometimes dream about that, too. But that’s not what I mean. I can’t talk about my dreams. Not that I don’t want to, but there aren’t words. I stumble all over and get frustrated. I ... I ... can’t...” Damnit! My throat was closing up on me and words were like balloons that were all let go at the same time and I was running back and forth trying to catch one.

“Shh. Arthur, look at me.” I focused on her eyes. They were a pretty blue. I could make that color in paint. Maybe I should do that. I should paint her. “You don’t have to put it in words for me. Is that where your art comes from?” I nodded. “Then you shouldn’t even try to put it in words. Maybe sometime you could show me. If you’d like to.”

I had a date with Annette on Saturday night. We went to a concert and danced. She danced. I kind of shuffled my feet and bobbed my head from side to side. I guess the music was good. I was surprised, I guess, that we were taking things so slowly. We hadn’t dated every week during the summer. My family took a vacation. Her family took a vacation. We just didn’t always connect. But in the four or five dates that we’d had, the most intimate we’d been was holding hands and a gentle good night kiss. Sometimes that little brush of her lips against mine was enough for me to need tissues later that night.

But this Saturday, I was a little antsy. We left the concert early.

“I need to get you home,” Annette said.

“I’m sorry.”

“I understand. I’m feeling a little unsettled, myself. You only have this weekend. Spend all the time you can with Morgan.” She dropped me at my house and gave me the sweetest kiss I could imagine.

Morgan looked up from the television when I came in and smiled.

“Have a good time?”

“Yeah. I can’t dance for shit.”

“I’m a failure as a sister. I should have taught you!”

“You can dance?”

“No.” We looked at each other and spluttered our laughter. I sat beside her on the sofa and watched a few minutes of the late-night talk show.

“Fay...”

“Pen...” we started at the same time. She nodded at me. I took a deep breath.

“I’m having a terrible nightmare. Will you come to bed and hold me?”

“Yes. Yes, my baby. I’ll hold you. Let’s go brush our teeth.”

“Fay?” I said as she crawled into bed.

“What is it, Pen?” she asked innocently. She cuddled up against me and tugged at my pajama shirt. “Take this off. It’s scratchy.” My heart raced as I pulled off the offending article. It had never scratched before. But Fay had always worn a shirt to bed before. Her skin felt hot against mine. My heart started racing.

“You’re ... naked,” I breathed.

“Just topless,” she said. “But how did Annette put it? Before you touch my boobs, you have to kiss me. Like you mean it.” Fay raised her lips to mine and I touched them.

It’s not like Fay and I have never kissed. She often kissed me when she came to bed to comfort me. She kissed me when we left for school. She kissed me when we got home. She kissed me before bed. Sometimes a cheek. Sometimes my forehead. Sometimes I kissed her ear because it made her giggle. But to kiss as I held her naked breasts against my chest and as she parted her lips to let my tongue touch hers ... We’d never done that.

“Now, Pen,” she said softly. “Now you can touch.” We returned to our kiss and my hand glided up her smooth skin until I cupped her breast and she moaned into my mouth. We stayed like that for an eternity, our lips and tongues touching as I gently squeezed the soft flesh of her breast and felt the nub of her nipple harden against my palm.

“I love you, Fay,” I whispered as I sprinkled little kisses on her eyes and nose. “I’m so afraid I’ll lose you.”

“No more than I am,” she sighed. “Hold me, Pen. Hold me all night long and in the morning, paint me.”

I held her. We changed positions and occasionally during the night, we kissed some more. It was the touch of her skin against mine that kept the fire smoldering through the night. In the morning, I painted her. She sleepily opened her eyes as I got up and arranged the easel. Then she kicked off the covers, threw an arm over her eyes so the light didn’t bother her, and went back to sleep. One arm above her head, one over her eyes. Her breasts standing out in contrast to the slim profile of her stomach and the flare of her hips. Her pink panties. Her left leg bent with the foot against her right knee.

I could see at once why she had said months ago, that she didn’t look like what I’d painted. The breasts were shaped wrong. The nipples more taut against the upturned areolae. The rise and fall of her chest casting me into a hypnotic trance from which I painted this impossibly real dreamscape.