Stargazer

Chapter 3

7

Aurelle spent her morning in Twentieth Century American Literature. It was a fairly large class in one of the bigger buildings on campus. The lecture hall was traditional: slanted downward slightly towards the stage, where there was a podium for the professor. The desks were wooden and old-fashioned, and Aurelle thrilled at the feeling, the smells – like she was in Dead Poets Society – as she tucked herself into a desk near the back of the hall. The students were all surreptitiously looking at one another, checking each other out, chatting amiably with those around them. Aurelle pulled the first book they’d be discussing out of her bag and examined it. The Sun Also Rises. She’d read it as soon as she’d bought it, charmed by the title and by the notion of reading Hemingway while preparing for going off to college. She enjoyed the economy of his writing, the plainness of it unlike so many other authors she’d read, and she looked forward to talking about books with other people who loved to read as much as she did. She felt happy, normal.

Just then she felt the familiar sensation of being watched. Looking around her, she saw two girls talking quietly and looking her way. She smiled shyly at them, and they looked sheepish, moving away to sit elsewhere. Soon the room was almost full. The person who sat beside her ignored her completely, and that was fine by her.

Evening. After her first day of studio classes, Diana decided to stay late, working on a painting study they’d started in their last session. She was alone in the studio when Grace emerged through a small door nearby.

‘Ah, burning the midnight oil already?’ she asked, approaching Diana’s station.

Diana nodded. ‘I wanted to keep working. It’s nice to have this space available.’

‘Yes,’ Grace agreed, looking around them at the large open room. ‘Some other Fine Arts programs employ lockers for students to put away their work so that many people can use the studios. We made our program small so as to nurture a particular culture. A means to stretch out and live with each other’s pieces, styles. It allows students to get to know one another by their work; it fuels a hunger, a healthy competition.’

She winked and nodded at Diana’s canvas. ‘You’re clearly skilled.’

It was a simple still life, one based on objects that Grace had set up for the painting class earlier that day, yet Diana’s attention to light and darkness made her own study stand out among the others on easels around the room.

‘You will find that other students will take notice of this quickly.’

Diana studied her professor’s face, saying nothing. She was a tiny woman, impish. Freckle-faced. Diana could imagine what she’d looked like as a girl. Outside, a chorus of students calling out to each other made its way through the windows. Grace smiled at Diana, and turned to leave. She paused, looking back.

‘People think that artists are open-hearted,’ she said, her face stony. ‘But when we are at our best, we are quite competitive.’

The sound of her shoes echoed in the space as she disappeared through a doorway connecting the studios.

It was a warm evening and Diana felt a lightness as she left the Den, the sense of the evening opening up. She would find Aurelle, see how her first day had gone. It didn’t worry her that she didn’t know exactly where Aurelle was; they always managed to locate each other. Students wandered in pairs and groups, but Diana was happy in her own company. There was a phone booth at one of the intersecting paths between buildings. It was charmingly built to fit in, its walls made of wood with no door. It looked more like an outhouse than a phone booth. Diana watched as a girl put a coin into the phone and stood, the phone against her ear, waiting.

She heard music playing nearby and headed through the forest of trees towards it. The Fugees’ ‘Killing Me Softly.’ She hummed along quietly as she walked up the path of a house party at a modest cabin. There was a circle of students smoking outside and Diana walked over. They nodded at her and opened the circle, and a joint was passed her way. What program are you in, what year, where do you live, where are you from? She turned her head, bored by the conversation, casually looking for Aurelle. And then, again, as always, there she was, speaking to a tall, older-looking boy, his fingers fiddling with the ends of her long, blonde hair, her face looking up into his.

‘Hey, stranger,’ Diana said, taking strides over to the porch where they stood. Aurelle’s face was flushed and beautiful, her lips parting in surprise. She looked delighted to see Diana. She reached up and hugged her fiercely, like a child. Diana looked over Aurelle’s shoulder at the guy as they embraced, and nodded in greeting.

‘Hey,’ he said. ‘I’m Dave.’

‘Of course you are,’ Diana said, letting go of Aurelle. She retrieved a cigarette from a pack in her pocket and put it in her mouth, then flicked her lighter. ‘So what’s your story, Dave?’

‘I’m, uh, not sure. What’s your story?’

‘I’m on the first draft. Not sure how it ends yet,’ she deadpanned, lighting her cigarette and inhaling. Aurelle moved in close, and Diana slipped her arm around her shoulder and stared expectantly at Dave. He looked from one to the other.

‘Do you guys like to party?’ he asked.

Aurelle raised her eyebrows and looked up at Diana happily, as though asking permission. Diana laughed.

‘What d’ya got?’

Two hours later, Aurelle sat on the dock, her legs crossed, the water moving restlessly beneath her. She lay back, hair falling through the dock boards, the slats hard but not uncomfortable. Her mind wandered over thoughts, bumping and tripping and taking flight. Mushrooms, w**d, beer. It was all fairly new to her, but she found she enjoyed it. Taking leave of her life, of control. Having an excuse for being silent, for just watching and feeling nothing but the tremors of her own breath. She looked up at the sky, taking in its beauty. She loved being outside in the woods and happily closed her eyes against the breeze.

She had made out with Dave a bit. He had a strong, hard body. Had Diana also? She remembered seeing his hands on her. Diana biting his ear. He had told them, she thought, that they were sexy. He asked them to kiss each other, and Diana had told him maybe another time. They left. When was that? An hour ago? A minute? She didn’t remember coming to the dock. She had floated here.

I don’t even have to make any effort and things will be fine. I am part of the forest, the trees.

She wasn’t sure if she’d said that out loud or not. Not sure where the thought came from. The water lapped against the dock.

Diana?

Was she alone now? Couldn’t remember. A loon called.

It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what I do.

She thought of the feeling of pushing her thumb into clay or mud, an imprint. I don’t know if that would work, if I would make an imprint, if I am even here. Diana is. She is in the world, making a claim on it. A print on it. Diana.

‘Did you say something?’ Diana’s voice. In the water. Aurelle sat up with effort and looked into the dark water. She saw Diana’s head bobbing towards her.

‘Are you swimming?’ she asked.

Diana laughed in her deep, husky voice. Aurelle did, too, and it sounded funny in the wilderness, echoing off the water. There were people deeper in the woods, the campus, and their voices drifted pleasantly through the trees. She wondered if they knew how funny it was over here.

‘Come in!’ Diana called to her.

‘I’m not wearing my bathing suit,’ Aurelle said, laughing harder.

‘Neither am I, Dummy!’

Aurelle stood up, stumbling a little. Oops. She slipped off her sneakers and pulled off her socks. Then the rest of her clothes. Down to her b*a and underwear. She shivered.

‘It’s cold,’ she said, and Diana told her it was warmer in the water. She was doing the backstroke between the floating dock some way off and the dock where Aurelle stood. Her white skin glinting in the moonlight.

OK.

OK, here I go.

She felt her feet leave the dock as she jumped in. There was a moment when she was in the air and, suddenly, painfully full of regret. Then the water hit her hard, a shock, taking her breath away, bringing her to the present. She went under, then up, gasping. She heard Diana cheering. It was so dark. She was aware of trying to breathe.

Where are you?

‘Where are you?’ She said aloud, her voice small. ‘Diana?’ She felt scared. Moved her hands all around her, forgetting what she knew about swimming. It was black, all black in front of her.

‘I’m here, don’t worry,’ came Diana’s voice, deep and soothing, moving closer.

Aurelle started to weep, her body betraying her. ‘I’m not good at this,’ she said in a whisper, her arms making small splashes. She had never been good at swimming. She had taken lessons; they all had. They had a pool, for God’s sake. Her brother was a rower. But she didn’t love being in the water. It was too vast and unpredictable. Her parents had drilled into them that it was powerful and, rather than overcoming that, she shrunk in the face of it. She went under again, her feet useless. Up again. Her heart frantically pounding. She swallowed lake water. i***t. Diana. Crying. Crying hard now. It’s not funny anymore. It’s not funny.

‘I’ve got you,’ the voice in her ear said. Diana had her strong arms around her now. ‘It’s OK, babe, I’ve got you, come on.’ Dragging her, coughing and crying, towards the shore, where suddenly she felt pebbles under her feet. ‘We’re OK, come on, it’s alright. I have you.’

They stood, arm in arm, and staggered to the beach. Aurelle shivered uncontrollably. She watched Diana run over to the dock and get their clothes.

‘Brrr!’ Diana yelled, trying to keep things light. Aurelle smiled a little.

It’s OK, she told herself. I am here. I can tell that I am real because I can hurt. I can drown. I can die. I’m alive. Diana was pulling her own large sweatshirt over Aurelle’s head.

‘Here you go, Tiny.’

‘I like that. Tiny,’ she said quietly.

‘That’s what you are,’ said Diana, rubbing Aurelle’s legs, briskly drying them, pulling her jeans on for her. They kept sticking to her wet legs. ‘God, jeans are the worst.’

‘I love you, Diana,’ Aurelle said, touching her friend’s head.

‘I love you too, Tiny.’ Diana said, smiling at her. ‘But let’s not do that again, OK? I’d better keep an eye on you, so I can keep you safe.’

‘Yes, clearly!’ They laughed. Aurelle lay down in the dirt.

A few minutes passed. She heard Diana dragging something along the ground close to her. Then: ‘Come on. Let’s go home.’ She looked up and saw that Diana had untied the canoe and brought it over. ‘I’ll row us across.’

Teeth chattering, Aurelle wrapped the long sleeves of Diana’s sweatshirt around herself while Diana effortlessly propelled them through the water to their home.

‘Look, you left the lights on,’ Diana said, nodding her chin across the lake. Aurelle looked, and smiled.

‘It’s so pretty. I’m so glad we came here. This is the best place.’

That night, they slept in the same bed, their bodies entwined for warmth, for love, for friendship, for l**t. It wasn’t momentous, it wasn’t surprising. It was gradual. It was relief. It was just where they found themselves.

Most mornings, Diana woke before Aurelle. She would sometimes lie there beside her friend, silently smoking, and think of the very home that Aurelle had been so keen to leave. She allowed her mind to drift there so that she could feel the familiar, sweet sawtooth of envy, the keen rush of ambition it unlocked, the thrill of moving forward. What were they doing there now? Did Marianne think of them? Did she think of Diana? Diana, whose life had been so fully transformed by what happened with Keith on that one, perfectly terrible day. Imagining the Taylors, that family, that house in her mind’s eye, she rarely cast it next door to her own family home, to the Martins. She compartmentalized, as was her way, and barely registered the enormous tree in the front yard that shared the shade of its leaves with both families. She felt a throb of pleasure at her new, choreographed fate and the knowledge that this version of her life was so infinitely better than what might have been. And, looking down at her sleeping friend, the innocent and beautiful face, she’d carefully reach for the sketchbook at her bedside and begin another drawing of Aurelle. Another, another. So many drawings. The sound of pencil scratching into paper the only noise, bringing the girl up, forward, to life. Her cheeks; her hair; her arm, cast out in slumbering surrender.