“Sfumato”

By Robert Docherty

        Anders picks up his buzzing phone. "Hello?"

        Silence.

        "M-Michel? That you?" Anders asks.

        "Yeah." The line hisses, barely audible.

        Anders sits in a chair by the window, hand against his forehead. "Jesus," he says, a chuckle escaping him, a forced indication of lightheartedness he doesn't feel. "Good to hear from you, obviously, but uh, where ya' been?" Another, unspoken question lingers on his tongue.

        "Good. Been alright." Michel's voice is slow, tired, preoccupied.

        "Well, we've been hoping to hear from you again. This is, what, the third call? In two months?"

        From Michel's end of the phone, there's a noise of inhaling. "Think that's right," he affirms.

        "Not sure if you know this Michel, but, uh, your timing is, is, it's funny, I'm waiting for Eric Snyder and a cab. It's your opening tonight at The Abacus, in New York. First night of this month's exhibition."

         "Is that right... " Michel says, detached from the conversation.

        Anders fidgets for a moment. "I don't think you'll be the re, but just curious if there's anything I can tell the attendees."

        "Like what?" Michel asks, innocently.

        "Well I just figured, since you called tonight. Got a lot of people coming tonight, people that would hope to see you and, you know, chat a bit, talk about the work. Might get some offers on a few things, too." He swallows. "Might be a good time to announce when you're getting back." He delivers the last sentence in a rush, as if trying to slip it past undetected.

        "Back to what?" Again with the innocence, the detachment.

        Anders runs a hand through his hair, his expression that of a general who's just realized that enemy archers are watching all the angles of retreat. "I don't mean to pressure you, obviously, I only care that you're, you know, happy, satisfied with the work and with life and everything. I just get questions, that's all. Since you haven't been at the last two exhibitions."

        Silence.

        Anders taps his foot, a dam breaking in his mind. "Michel, I've got other clients. I've gotta give time to other artists, and you're the best of them, I won't lie about that, but there's no way I can neglect them for a guy that doesn't show up to his own exhibition openings." He laughs shortly. "I can't sell these paintings for you forever, so I gotta be blunt. I've given you a lot of time but if you're not back in New York, what, in a week, I can't do this man." More silence from the other line. "I'm not trying to be a hard ass or anything, but you've gotta see where I'm coming from, right? I'm not trying to push you, but next week is two months since you disappeared on us so I don't have much other choice."

        "A week?"

        "L-like I said, I'm not trying to be a hard ass here, if you need a break that's cool, but I'm just being honest, if you're not back in a week from, from, whatever this is, then don't count on me still being here to represent you. You understand?"

        "Goodbye Anders," Michel says.

        "Now Michel, wait, we've got a lot more to-"

        But the line is already dead.

#

        Michel sets down the piano-black handset. Exhaling smoke from a joint through his nose, he stands, stretching, and walks to the motel bed. As sleep takes him like the tide creeping up the sand, faces come to him. Ones he recognizes? Some, maybe, but most not. And yet they have a familiarity, as if the recesses of his mind recorded each one in precision detail even while the active parts of his mind threw them out. Each of the floating heads asks a question of him in turn, spiraling around him and forming a tunnel before watching him fall forever through its center.

It's so impressive—so inspirational—that you got out of those homes when you were young.

Do you feel like your mother helps your work? T-the adversity of it, I mean, her drinking, does that fuel you do you think?

My magazine is doing a feature on these transgressive sort of works, the "shocking" stuff, so I was wondering if you could contribute a little line about that, just a few words?

What does it mean?

They're a bit dour, aren't they? Very good though, don't get me wrong!

I was hoping to steal you for a moment, just to talk about a price for that piece in the far corner there.

You're one of the last of the "real thoroughbreds," is what I've been saying, none of these liberal arts colleges or "digital drawing" or whatever the hell.

So is this autobiographical would you say?

I don't see the appeal in it personally, but as long as you're getting the paychecks I can't imagine you much care, do you!

        Wide smiles and too-white teeth. Bleached skin and red-bottomed heels and jeweled cuff links. Checkbooks in breast pockets and accountants on speed dial, appraisers on retainer. But through it all the synthetic laughter of calculated camaraderie.

#

Michel wakes to grey light filtering in. Without much hesitation he slides out from the sheets and moves to the shower, the lack of water pressure made up for by the searing heat as he turns the dial as far as it'll go.

        Once the scalding water is exhausted he steps out.

        On the dresser in front of the bed sit three duffel bags. He unzips the first and pulls out a Ziploc baggie from it. With deft fingers he takes rolling paper and pinches of already-ground marijuana. Careful to not let his still-wet hair drip and ruin it, he rolls a joint and lights it, taking a full breath and exhaling with a look of serenity. He opens the second bag and dresses. Boots, tight black jeans, a collared shirt open at the throat with the sleeves rolled to the elbows. He unzips the third bag and stares into it, joint dangling from his lips, momentarily forgotten. The bag was full when he left. The teller at the bank had been slightly incredulous until her superior took over, but once they verified his driver's license and information, they filled the bag as requested. It was heavy on his arm as he walked out of the bank, but now the stacks only cover the bottom. It won't be long before it makes sense to ditch it and put the remaining bills under the clothes in the second bag.

        Michel sighs and inhales the last of the joint before tossing the evidence in the toilet and flushing it. He surveys the room before picking up the three bags and walking out the door, acutely aware that the third bag is less of a stress on his arm than it was even two weeks ago.

        He starts south, taking I-5 from the outskirts of Portland, only stopping for cigarettes and coffee when needed. But always he sits in the car. Judging the parking lot, watching through the windows of the cafe or convenience store. Always giving it a minute, seeing if the crowd inside would disperse or not. Otherwise he throws the car back into gear and tries again a couple exits later. His passenger is a giant paper map of the West coast, and any town he can't blot out entirely with his thumb is too big to even bother stopping.

        Somewhere in California the sun finally sets. Orange and purple fingers creep up from the horizon as if trying to ensnare the world. Trees cast distended shadows onto the side of the road, and Michel eases off the throttle and takes an exit ramp into a small town even his pinky finger can practically cover.

        The manager of the motel looks dubiously at him as he pulls bills from the third duffel bag, counting as he goes. The manager double checks the signature on the check-in form with Michel's driver's license before handing across the room key. With the first two duffel bags stowed on the dresser and the third bag sequestered in an air vent, Michel leaves and crosses to the bar next door.

        It's not exactly a dive, but asking for a cocktail menu would get scoffed at.  A couple groups sit around tables, another set plays pool, and the rest of the patrons are at the bar itself. As he walks in, Michel scans quickly and nearly decides to leave, considering whether it's more crowded than he wants, until he sees an empty corner. He drifts to the end of the bar with the fewest people and waits. "Rum and coke," he asks simply, nodding when asked if he wants to start a tab.

        Minutes tick by as Michel drains the glass only to have it replaced with the same. He takes one napkin after another and a ballpoint pen, absentmindedly drawing portraits, finishing them, balling them up and starting another.

        "Who's that?" a voice asks over his shoulder.

        Michel looks up at the speaker, a woman. "An old friend."

        "It's good. Especially for just a ballpoint and a napkin."

        "Thank you," he says, dipping his chin and returning to the drawing, lightly pressing to start shading in the cheek of his subject.

        After a pause the woman asks, "Can I join you?"

        "I don't make for much fun," Michel replies.

        She circles the table and sits across from him, a smile playing at her lips. "But you'd tell me if I were really intruding?" She cocks her head, coxcomb hair falling across her shoulder.

        "Probably not."

        "I'll leave if you want me to, but I'll make you say it."

        Michel's brow furrows. "Why sit down at all?"

        "Because I've been noticing you all even and hoping you'd do the same to me." She smirks.

        "I'm…that's not really what I came in for. Not a people person."

        The woman is unhurt, nor particularly effected at all. "Nothing wrong with that. So why are you here?"

        "For a drink," Michel says, picking up his glass and taking a sip to illustrate his point.

        "A drink?" she says, elongating the A.

        "If you've been paying that much attention, then how many have I had?" he asks.

        "If I'm right can I stay? Since it proves I was paying attention?"

        He thinks for a moment. "Fine."

        "Then that's your sixth, by my count. And he doesn't do light pours, either," she says, nodding in the direction of the bartender.

        Michel goes quiet, settling back in his chair and finding he's not annoyed that she's right. Not annoyed she's staying at his table, either. "Six. Yeah."

        The woman leans forward. "And I suppose that's really why I wanted to join you."

        "Because I drink a lot?"

        "Because when you got up to go to the men's room before that one arrived," she nods at the glass his hand rests near, "you didn't look as if you'd even had two, let alone twice that."

        "So not because I drink a lot but because I, apparently, do it regularly?" He takes another sip. "I'll admit that doesn't seem like a good reason to approach anyone."

        The woman shrugs. "People that drink like that are interesting. Not virtuous, but interesting."

        Michel chuckles. "That's hard to argue with."

        The bartender arrives behind the woman, cocktail glass in hand, dark liquid and ice swirling together. He sets it down and walks away.

        "So you're not virtuous then either?" Michel asks, a wry smile on his face.

        "Hardly." She takes a sip. "No judgment on anyone, but being virtuous is boring. Although even worse is not  being virtuous and not knowing it."

        As she speaks, flashes of his nightmare return to Michel. He tries to find the virtuousness in those faces but comes back empty. Anders and the steadily emptying third duffel bag loom, pushing him toward those faces again, the uncertainty of how long the remainder of the bag can last and, once it's empty, whether those faces are worth going back to.

        "You okay?" the woman asks, eyebrows raised.

        "Sorry. Thinking about a…something I've got to do."

        "Am I keeping you from anything?"

        "No, no, that's not what I meant. I've got a place to get back to, just don't know how soon." He exhales and fakes a smile. "Not looking forward to it."

        That piques the woman's curiosity. "What's brought you here? Not here-here," she says, gesturing at their surroundings, "but here in general."

        Michel makes a noncommittal gesture.

        "What, just…running?"

        "Sounds simple if you say it like that."

        "Is it not?"

        "I don't know. It probably is. But it doesn't feel like it."

        The woman searches his face. "You smoke?"

        He nods.

        "Share a cigarette with me." She stands and he follows, fishing a crumpled pack from his pocket and dropping his napkin sketch in a trash can.

        The smoke of their cigarettes curls into the evening air. "You're more interesting than I expected," the woman says.

        "What did you expect?"

        She shrugs. "Nothing specific I guess. Like I said, I was just hoping you'd glance my way." She takes a drag and looks up at him, smiling as if issuing a challenge.

        "You know one of the things I like about you?" Michel asks, and she cocks her head to tell him to continue. "You don't know me."

        "Should I?"

        "That's what I like. You don't know me, but I think you'd like to."

        "Get to know you as in…?"

        "Not as in take me home, I mean really get to know me."

        "So that makes me ask—again—what are you running from?"

        "People that don't actually want to get to know me," he says. He smiles and she laughs, putting the cigarette to her mouth and stepping closer to him.

        "You know," she takes another drag, letting her hand fall to her side. She looks at Michel, her gaze meeting his with a sudden hardness. "I would be happy to 'get to know you' in more than one way. If you're open to it."

        Michel returns her stare. Something in his chest lightens like a bird taking off, a warm blossoming in his chest. "As long as you tell me one thing."

        "What?"

        "Your name."

        A smile spreads across her features and she gets closer to him, wrapping her arms around his waist. "Sarah," she says. "My name is Sarah. What's yours?"

        "Michel," he says, flicking away his cigarette.

        "Michel," she repeats quietly to herself, trying it on. "Are you staying nearby, Michel?"

        He nods backward over his shoulder. "It's not exactly upscale, but it's warm."

        She pulls him closer and rises to her toes, hand snaking up behind his head and pulling him down to her, their lips meeting in the middle. Michel lets Sarah guide him before she breaks off the kiss, her lips to his ear. "Then let's get to know each other."