“Ha, now you really do sound like your father. Well, whatever you two think, Chet is a real artist, and we are all doing the art world a huge favor by allowing him some space to focus this summer. Keep that in mind, Lily, that it’s not all about you all the time.”
I had gotten what I wanted to get from my mother. Chet didn’t have a car, and had arrived here by train, which meant that he could easily pack up his stuff and leave for good. That made my job a whole lot easier. I began to prepare, spending time in the meadow next to the old farmhouse, gathering the largest rocks that I could carry. I also made myself visible to Chet, dragging one of the old lounge chairs out to the sunny patch of yard between the main house and the studio. I didn’t want him to keep avoiding me, since it was crucial that he trust me to a certain degree, crucial that we establish some sort of relationship. The first few days when I lay in the sun, reading, my headphones on, Chet did not make an appearance. Once or twice I thought I saw his silhouetted frame in the slatted glass door of the apartment as he watched me. But one day he wandered out to smoke a cigarette, standing on the top landing in his paint-splattered overalls, no shirt on underneath. I peered over the top of the Agatha Christie I was reading and he nodded in my direction, raised a hand. My gut reaction was to ignore him, to not give him the pleasure of a response, but I forced myself to raise my hand and wave back.
The next day when I went to my reading spot, it was hot and muggy, the kind of day when you wake up sweaty and take a cold shower, and start sweating again as soon as you get out of the shower. I pulled on my green bikini. I’d had it for two years but my body hadn’t developed much. It fit up top, although it was a little tight down below, where I now had hips. I pulled on a pair of shorts—ones I’d asked my mother to buy me earlier that summer. They were madras plaid and she said they made me look like a Kennedy, but she bought them for me anyway. I took my book and a bottle of sunscreen to the chair that faced Chet’s apartment. I hated the sun, and I hated heat. I had red hair and freckly skin so all the sun did was make my freckles darker. I slathered myself with the sunscreen, trying to remember if the high number on the bottle was a good thing or a bad thing. I kept an eye on the apartment and pretty soon I saw Chet peering through the window. I could make out the orange tip of his cigarette winking on and off. Fifteen minutes passed, and I was listening to my tape of Les Mis and reading Sleeping Murder when Chet emerged with a mug of coffee, descended the studio steps, and casually wandered toward where I was lounging.
“Hi there, Lily,” he said, standing about five feet away, the already high sun lighting up the hair along his bare arms and shoulders so that he almost shimmered. He smelled like he hadn’t showered in days.
I said hi back.
“What are you reading?”
I started to hold up the book cover toward him dismissively, then remembered that I needed to be a little bit nice so that he wouldn’t suspect anything when I came to his apartment later. “Agatha Christie,” I said. “It’s a Miss Marple.”
“Cool,” he said, and slurped at his coffee mug. Like everything else he owned, the mug was covered in paint. “Things okay with you?” he asked.
I knew that what he wanted to ask was if things were okay with us, with what had happened the night he came into the room. He wanted to know if I remembered him being in there. “Yeah,” I said.
He rocked his head back and forth. “It’s fucking hot out here, man.”
I shrugged and returned my eyes to the book. I’d done enough and I really didn’t want to talk to Chet anymore. I pretended to read but I could feel him still studying me. Sweat had pooled where the two triangles of my bikini top met, and a single drop was inching its way down my rib cage. I willed myself to not wipe the sweat away with Chet watching, even though the unbearable progress of the drop felt as though Chet’s eyes were slicing me with a razor. He took another loud sip from his mug and wandered off.