We spread, p.9
We Spread, page 9
“Oh, I don’t know. Like what you did before working here.”
What did he do to upset her? Why is she confronting him, in front of us, like this? Is it possible she saw him the same way I did? Upset, scared, wretched, drinking wine. Is she trying to make a point?
“I was unemployed,” he says.
“Were you living with anyone?”
“No.”
I don’t like how she’s talking to him. It’s aggressive. I’m feeling uncomfortable for Jack. For all of us.
“What was your place like?”
“Where I lived?”
“Yes.”
“Small.”
“Cozy?”
Ruth is about to speak when Shelley holds up her hand. “Just let Jack speak for now, Ruth.”
“No,” he says. “It was a crappy place.”
Shelley stands and walks toward the window. She stands there in the sun, looking out at the forest.
“Do you like it here? With us?”
“Yes.”
“What do you like about it?”
“I get to work and live and be part of the group.”
“You get to work here. Earn a real living. It’s a privilege. Everyone needs a purpose. Our work fulfills us.”
“I’m lucky to have this job,” he says.
Shelley turns back with a bright grin on her face. Her eyes are glowing. I’ve never seen her smile so widely.
“I’m so happy you feel that way. And we feel lucky to have you.”
Jack stands. Without looking at Shelley, or any of us, he rushes out. I’m in shock.
Once he’s gone, Ruth stands up.
“Jack is still one of us, right?” she asks Shelley.
“Of course he’s one of us,” she says. “We all need a little encouragement from time to time. That’s all. To remember where our priorities lie and what’s most important.”
What was that? What just happened?
Was Shelley mad at Jack?
Was she trying to embarrass him? Make a point that she’s the boss, that she’s always in control, that he needs this job, that he can be replaced, that he doesn’t have anything without us, without this house?
I don’t know Shelley. Not at all. I live with her. She bathes me and washes my hair. She looks after us. But it takes time to get to know someone, to understand their motivations and beliefs.
I keep replaying what she said to Jack in my mind. I’m sitting in my chair, in my room, my bed to the right, when all of a sudden it dawns on me: this isn’t my room. It’s someone else’s.
I came straight here after the meeting. I walked in alone, used the washroom, sat down, and am only now understanding my mistake.
This must be Ruth’s room.
What a stupid mistake to make. How foolish I am.
I wonder what Ruth would think if she saw me in here like this, sitting in her chair. She wouldn’t like it. She would be very upset. The room looks almost identical to mine. The most obvious difference is that she has a French-English dictionary on her desk where I have my tin of brushes.
I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t resist. I’ll be quick. I sit down on her bed. It’s soft and supportive like my own. I can’t tell the difference. I lean back, roll over onto my side, and smell the duvet.
I stand and walk over to her dresser. Instead of a framed photo and sculpture, she has a small glass bottle. I pick it up. I open the lid and smell it. I recognize the scent immediately. It’s a perfume I used to love. I had the same kind. I only ever bought it once, and I wore it sparingly. The bottle lasted me for years and years.
I remember he never liked it. That’s the reason I stopped wearing it. I’m sure it was this one.
He never specifically said to get rid of it, but I knew not to wear it around the apartment when he was home. It wasn’t worth it for the comments I’d get. I’d only wear it when I was going out without him. He would get very dramatic about it. I can see his eyes, his slumped shoulders, the way he’d sigh, his exasperated expression as if my wearing perfume was somehow an affront to him.
I take another sniff. The scent hasn’t changed over all these years. It’s uncanny.
As I take a long inhale of the perfume, I remember. I remember us talking about this place, Six Cedars. We did discuss it. We talked about how beautiful the house looked. How nice it would be to live so close to a big forest. That I’d always wanted to live somewhere near a forest. I’d completely forgotten this until right now. I wanted to live here.
I take another sniff.
I listen to make sure no one is coming down the hall. I dab some on my finger, behind my ear, my wrist. I rub my wrists together. I can’t help myself. I replace the lid, set the perfume back down, and walk out to find Hilbert.
“Did you know that n is the mathematical reference for an uncertain number?” says Hilbert.
“No,” I say.
“Such a small thing, just a letter, but it is necessary.”
“You have such a different way of seeing things from my way,” I say.
“That’s how I feel about you,” he says.
“There are things that you understand that I don’t.”
“And vice versa,” he says. “After we talk, I keep thinking about the things you tell me,” he says.
I feel a warmth spread across my chest.
“How many days have we known each other?”
“I’m not sure. Does the sum matter?”
“I was wondering if we might try something,” I say.
“When?” he asks.
“Today,” I say. “Now.”
“Right now?”
“Yes.”
“What do you want to try?”
“I want to keep it a secret. Just between us.”
“Okay, Penny,” he says.
“Come with me,” I say, reaching out and taking hold of his long, heavy hand.
We shuffle along the hallway in our slippers, hand in hand, to my room. Just us. We can be alone in here. It’s quiet. I ask him to sit in the chair while I prepare my paint. He’s fidgeting with the cuff of his jacket.
“You can relax,” I say.
“I’ve never done this before,” he says.
“That’s a good thing.”
As I prep, I glance at Hilbert, how he sits, the slight tremble in his hands, how he’s peering around the room. He’s still curious at this age, still thoughtful.
“Were you married, Hilbert? Before you came here?”
“I was married. I’m a widower.”
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“We had a long time together,” he says.
He has settled, and I start painting.
“What was she like?”
“She was smart,” he says. “Intensely logical. That was the first thing I loved about her. Were you married?”
“No, but I had a partner for many years. We lived together. He was an artist.”
“Did you study how to do that?” he asks.
“Painting?”
“Yes.”
“No, not formally, just on my own. Reading books, trying things, going to galleries. I don’t like saying ‘self-taught’ because so much has influenced me.”
“That’s probably for the best. I studied for a long time, many years, most of my early adulthood—formal, academic study. I never thought I would enjoy teaching, but I did.”
“You taught math at university?”
“Yes, and had my own work to keep me busy. There was pressure to publish. I felt that pressure less and less as I got older but kept working. I’ve filled lots of blue graph paper over the years.”
“It’s like you came back to what got you started in the first place.”
“It was my mom who got me started. She taught me basic arithmetic at our kitchen table.”
I can picture him as a young man, actually see him that way, sitting hunched over a desk, holding his pencil.
“That’s so nice. And that’s what hooked you?”
“I suppose so,” he says. “I never stopped after that. There was always more to learn.”
“Yes, I feel the same, but for different reasons. Painting always felt like a playground, for emotion. Not just my own. It was about borders, physical borders. It always felt like the art I liked found me, not the other way around.”
“Yes, yes, I see. I know what you mean,” he says.
He’s holding his position remarkably well, sitting back in the chair, shoulders straight.
“The one thing I regret about never showing my own work is missing the chance for that process where another person reacts in their own distinct way. It’s not about understanding it, it’s about having a reaction. Any reaction.”
“So you’ve never shown your work? You never had an opening?”
“No,” I say. “I never have.”
He uncrosses his legs and looks at me directly. I can tell he’s wondering if that’s okay, to break the pose. I nod.
“You don’t have to stay in one position,” I say. “Whatever’s comfortable.”
He exhales, lets his shoulders slump slightly, and shifts how he’s sitting.
“Are you aware of the Riemann hypothesis?”
“No,” I say. “What’s that?”
“We’d have to start with prime numbers and go back to Euclid, who was first to prove that there are infinitely many primes. Infinitely many! The Riemann itself has never been proved but…” He stops himself, trailing off. “That’s funny, I’m just trying to get it straight.”
He takes a moment to think.
“I used to know all of this by heart and how to describe it. I’m afraid it’s just not coming right now. I’m sorry.”
He looks down, blushing.
“It’s okay. I thought that I completely understood the point of painting, but as I got older I started thinking that art is about different ways of seeing. I was never inspired by something whole. It was always a fragment, a crumb, a piece of a moment, a half-forgotten impression, one side of a person. Never fully formed because it could only be my view of a thing, not someone else’s.”
“Like me, right now?”
“Yes. Like you. Right now.”
He smiles, runs his fingers through his white hair. “Everything changes,” he says.
“Even just in the last few days, I feel like I’ve changed. I know I have. Drastically. I’m eating more, sleeping better. Meeting you has changed me, too,” I say.
“We’re taken care of here. So we can just live.”
For a while I paint in quiet.
“It felt so comfortable when I first arrived,” I say. “But something is worrying me.”
“About here?”
“Yes. Has she ever talked to Jack like that before?”
“Shelley?”
“Yes. She humiliated him in front of us. It was strange.”
“I’m… sorry,” he says, looking perplexed. “I don’t remember if she has done that kind of thing before.”
“That’s okay. It doesn’t matter.”
“My mind certainly isn’t as sharp as it used to be. My memory seems to come and go.”
“Yes,” I say. “Mine, too. Certain things just fade.”
“I suppose living as we do, it makes the current moment the most important. Each one, until the next.”
“Does it scare you?” I ask.
“What?”
“Living moment to moment. Not being able to remember.”
“Yes,” he says. “It does.”
“Me, too,” I say.
I pause my work as Hilbert coughs into his hand and then clears a dry spot from his throat.
“But maybe that’s not a bad thing,” he says. “Being scared.”
“I really appreciate this,” I say. “Having you in here.”
“I was happy you asked me to sit for you. I’m nervous to go through with it but tickled you asked.”
“I’ve never talked about my memory with anyone else.”
“At least not that you can remember,” he says, smiling.
I’ve never been able to examine him so closely, so intently. His face, hands. His eyes. The dimple on his chin.
“We should keep helping each other when we can,” I say.
“Look out for each other,” he says.
“The more we talk together,” I say.
“The more we understand,” he adds, finishing my sentence.
A door closes down the hall. I pause, waiting to hear footsteps, but there aren’t any. Just quiet.
“Us talking together, even if we’re not going anywhere, is our own little uprising,” I say.
“Our private revolt,” he says, and we both laugh.
After some time, I stop, set my brush down.
“I was thinking maybe…”
“What?”
“No, it’s silly.”
He gives me an encouraging look.
“Maybe,” I say, “you could take off your shirt?”
I hadn’t planned to ask this. The idea hadn’t come into my mind until right now. This moment. He doesn’t say anything. His expression is ambiguous. I shouldn’t have suggested it.
“No,” he says, after a long pause. “I don’t think you want to see an old man with his shirt off.”
“I do. A body is more fascinating with age. It’s more honest.”
To my surprise, he nods.
I stand up, walk over to him until I’m about a foot away. I start to untie his tie, but I fumble with the knot before I’m able to slide it off. I remove his jacket. I start at the top, slowly unbuttoning his shirt, my hands becoming steady again. I feel my cheeks growing warm as I get to the last button. I see the same reddening of Hilbert’s cheeks.
“I can feel my heart beating,” he says.
He takes my hand and puts it on his bare chest. His skin is hairless and soft. I can feel he’s perspiring, just a bit.
“Thank you,” he says.
“Thank you,” I say.
I feel my own heat, my own heart beating, the way Hilbert’s is.
“Would you mind standing?” I ask.
He does, and for a moment we just look at each other. We take each other in. His skin is wrinkled and droops. An old man’s imperfect torso. Years on display in that sagging skin: quiet moments of pride and shame, excitement and fear, joy, guilt, desire, happiness, loss, love. I can see it. All of it and more. Just like my own.
We don’t say anything else as I continue my work.
I can’t say for how long he stands there like that, shoulders straight, hands at his side, shirt off. His eyes fixed on the floor, or out the window. Certain moments he looks deep in thought, at others he cracks a smile for no apparent reason. It’s impressive that he can stand for so long. It must be an hour. Maybe more.
At one point he says to me: “7 ÷ ⅔ = 7 x 3/2. If dividing by a fraction, you can reverse the fraction and multiply.”
I ask if he’s tired, if he’s cold, if he wants a break. Each time, he says no. He says I should just keep going.
I do. I keep painting, losing myself in the work. I’ve been adding details to his chin and lips until I feel a shift in the room. I hadn’t noticed it before, but now it’s unmistakable—the feeling that someone else is here with us. Another presence.
“We should take a break,” I say.
I slip my cardigan over my shoulders and help Hilbert with his shirt.
“What’s that?” I ask, noticing something, a bump, on the back of his neck.
I reach across his shoulder to touch it with my finger. What is it? A mole? A pimple? It looks like some kind of strange growth, like a cluster of tiny mushrooms. He flinches when I touch it.
Shelley walks in without knocking. She looks at us, standing together, Hilbert’s shirt half-unbuttoned, my hand on his neck. I have an urge to hide my brush, the paint. I want to cover the portrait. This was supposed to be our secret. From her. From the others.
“What are you doing in here?” she asks Hilbert. “I’ve been looking for him. It’s time for his nap.”
“Already? What time is it?”
She ignores me.
“Come on, Hilbert. Let’s go.”
“But he has some marks,” I say. “On his neck. Raised bumps.”
This stops her in her tracks.
“Marks?” she says.
“Yes, they look sore.”
Hilbert reaches up and touches the spot on his neck.
“That’s enough now, Penny. Don’t upset Hilbert.”
“I’m not upsetting him.”
“Yes, you are. You have an overactive imagination, which is good for your work, but I don’t want that to get the better of you.”
Hilbert leans in to me, speaking softly, so Shelley won’t hear.
“I want you to paint marks on me if that’s what you see,” he whispers. “Paint what you see.”
“Come,” Shelley says, and she ushers him out.
It’s not until they’re gone that I realize I can hear Pete playing his violin.
Now it’s just me. Single. Solitary. Unattended. A hermit. Alone in my room, just like being back in my apartment. No Hilbert. No one to talk to. No one to touch. No one to paint.
I walk into my bathroom, run the warm water, and splash some on my face, neck, and on my wrists.
What did I just see on Hilbert’s skin? Was it there when I was painting? If it was, I didn’t notice. Maybe I’m imagining it. Perhaps it was only a shadow. We can’t always trust our senses.
I slowly turn in a full circle, looking at the walls of my room, then down at my arms and hands. I have a strong instinct to crawl into my bed and get under the blanket, to lock my door. I play around with the door handle.
There is no lock on my door. I can’t lock my door.
I go into my bathroom again and check the door and frame. No lock here, either. I inspect the area around the sink and mirror. I open the shower curtain. I walk back out into the room and over to the window, the fading daylight.
I haven’t been outside since I’ve arrived here. Not once. I want to breathe the fresh air, feel it on my face.
It’s been too long. We’re all breathing the same air in here. I used to go outside, walk to the park, sit on the bench near the path. Fresh air is essential to humans, to animals, to plants and trees.
