Thirty-seven

“TONY, YOU HAVE TO DECIDE what your final project will be and get it before the review committee.” Doc collared me after class. We were at the interesting point where we were trying to paint images on wet plaster and none of us were rushing to leave after class. It was so foreign for being just more painting.

“When do I need that, Doc?” I asked. “I don’t even have a concept.”

“The schedule is for you to file your proposal the first week that SCU is in session this fall. Classes start the sixteenth. You should file your proposal by the twentieth and present by the twenty-seventh.”

“Doc, I don’t have the foggiest idea. I’ve had exhibitions in New York and Seattle with one scheduled in Las Vegas in October and Los Angeles in December. I’ve painted a whole fucking wall at SCU. What am I supposed to do to top any of that?”

“Don’t think of it as topping what you’ve done, Tony. The purpose of the final project is to show that you understand and can integrate your two majors. Think smaller. Think of something more like Bacchanalia. It doesn’t have to be bigger and better.”

“I’m kind of dead on inspiration at the moment, Doc,” I said. “I’ll think about it.”

“While you are thinking about that, think about your teaching assistantship this fall.”

“Huh?”

“Well, we’ve been having a bit of a bidding war. I want you for my TA, but Bychkova wants you, too. At the moment, he’s winning because I have an alternative and he doesn’t. Cagey old fart. I think he did that on purpose.”

“Doctor Bychkova wants me for a TA? Why?”

“He likes your storytelling and wants to keep an eye on you during your final project. Since he isn’t your advisor, he figures this is his opportunity to influence you.”

“Oh man. Am I going to have to read all those papers for Art History? I’ll just go kill myself now.”

“Well, think about it, Tony. This is a good opportunity. You and I might think of him as an old fart, but he’s well respected in the art community and academia. He’d be good to have on your resume.”

“I’d rather work for you, Doc.”

“Well, I’d rather you did, but frankly, as a TA you are second choice to Kate Holsinger. She’s my first choice.”

“I don’t know if she’ll be back, Doc. We’ve kind of lost track of her.”

“So have I, but until she withdraws from school, I’m assuming she’ll be here on September third.”

“Tony, is this okay?” Penny asked me. I’d stopped by the studio to see the last of our sportswear shipped to Raquethon. They were now the exclusive licensed vendor of Ice Queen Racquet Wear. I was glad the papers had been signed before my blow-up in South America. Raquethon had had also licensed Melody’s three newly-issued patents on the process and would be taking over the dye work as well. No more smell of bleach in the studio!

“What is it, Penny?” I asked.

“Well, we have these orders and I need to get the pieces from the vault.” I looked at the half-dozen papers, all official purchase orders from real galleries. All for Kate’s work. I called Clarice.

“Clarice, we’ve received purchase orders for some of Kate’s prints and we aren’t sure what to do with them.”

“Take a picture and email them to me so I can check them out. If they are all right, I’ll send you a ‘go’ to ship. Keep track of the shipping expenses so I can bill them as well. If they are legitimate, I still have the agency to sell Kate’s work,” Clarice said.

“I’ll leave it to you and Penny to work out the details then,” I said. Penny had already started forwarding the orders to Clarice by the time I’d finished the call.

“That’s a relief,” she said. “I didn’t want to take responsibility for shipping art unless I was sure. Now I know to call Clarice.”

“All the billing of our artwork goes though Clarice’s office,” I said. “So, nothing goes anywhere without her approval.” I looked over to my easel in the corner. I hadn’t painted anything in the studio in six weeks. “And crate that thing,” I said. “You know what to do with it.”

“Oh. I’ve enjoyed having it here. It’s so hopeful. I understand, though. I’ll get it out this afternoon.”

“Thanks, Penny. I guess I just don’t feel that hopeful anymore.”

Adolfo, Morgan, and I had plastered an entire wall and had each created two-by-two-foot frescos by the end of class on August sixteenth. Doc pronounced that he was pleased with our work and that we’d receive full credit for the class—my last requirement for graduation besides my final project.

I hadn’t played racquetball or set foot in the club in the three weeks since I got back from Colombia. Fuck it. I didn’t figure I’d be playing much anymore. I was running, though. In fact, I hardly drove my car. I ran to school and then to the studio and then home. I sure wasn’t gaining any weight. If anything, I was even thinner.

Saturday the seventeenth of August, Allison, Wendy, Lissa, Melody, Damon, Drew and I boarded a plane for Nebraska.

The boys were jumping all over when they got back from Omaha with grandma and grandpa. They’d been to the Henry Doorly Zoo and the Omaha Children’s Museum. They stood beside me as I put the steaks on the grill. Timing things right was essential.

Beth had lined Melody, Lissa, and Allison up at the sweet corn patch and explained what they were to do. Wendy had a big pot of water on and a few minutes after Mom and Dad got home, she stepped out the back door and yelled “Go!” I flipped the steaks and the four girls ran into the field to choose four ears of corn each. They stripped the ears on their way to the house, scattering the husks all over the yard. They rushed into the house and Wendy pulled the lid off the big kettle of boiling water. Five minutes later we were all seated at the table with rare steaks and hot buttered corn on the cob.

“Let’s walk out to see how badly that fence needs mending,” Dad said after dinner. It was a pleasantly hot and slightly muggy evening as we walked out through the fields in companionable silence. We were nearly at the back fence-row before Dad spoke again.

“What are you going to do, son?” he asked.

“Uh ... about what?”

“About your life. Are you going to play more racquetball? Are you going to paint? Are you simply going to collect more women around you and wait for life to happen?”

“Dad, isn’t this the talk you’re supposed to give me when I’m about to graduate? I’ve got a few months to go.”

“I know, Tony. I’m not trying to pressure you, but you’ve been a year or two ahead of the curve ever since you left home. You’re even ahead of your projected dual commencement. I’m worried that things are going so fast for you that you might not be thinking ahead.”

“You’re right about that. You know Lissa wants to start a baby?”

“I had a feeling that was part of the rush to get married.” We walked together out along the tractor path that bordered our property. It was nearly seven and the sun was low on the horizon. There was a windsock on a pole by the fence and Dad took out a notebook and marked the direction on it. “I’ve been thinking that if I learn to fly, I could put a grass landing strip out here.” Dad always wanted to learn to fly.

“I’m a little worried about it. Not much. I don’t mean the landing strip. I mean a baby. I never thought I’d ever be ready to have kids, but then there were Damon and Drew. Dad, I love those boys so much. I can’t see how it would be possible to love another one any more.”