The Fall of Never(47)

“I’m working on a series now,” he said, half-grinning. He seemed embarrassed. “I’m afraid it’s a bit morbid, though. Not quite dinner conversation.”

“Do I look like a prude to you?”

He laughed. “No, I guess city life has hardened you a bit, right?”

She flexed one arm jokingly. “Me big strong girl.”

“Have you heard of the German artist Lars Kurtz?”

She shook her head.

“He started out doing modern abstracts but somewhere along the line he got the brilliant idea to dabble in human taxidermy. Particularly pregnant mothers and their fetuses. I mean, of course they were already dead, most from natural causes. They’d previously donated their bodies to Kurtz—or, in the instance of the fetuses, I suppose the parents allowed such a thing, although who could imagine? He found a way to preserve the skin and had them stuffed. Some of his work exhibits a pregnant mother with a section of her torso removed, allowing people to observe the mummified child inside her. Jesus, I’m sorry, this isn’t dinner conversation at all. I must sound disgusting.”

“No, actually, it’s fascinating.”

“Serious?”

“Go on.”

“Anyway,” he continued, “I’d heard about the controversy and became interested. Practically the only place you can view his work now is on the Internet. As you can imagine, not too many galleries want to prop dead people against the walls, put them on display.”

“Imagine that.”

“But something about his worked touched me. I think it was the total originality of it all, the human quality. So I actually started doing a series of paintings titled Rest depicting different people in the positions they died in.”

“Interesting,” Kelly said. “So, like, a woman with a broken neck draped over the wall of her bathtub? Some old guy cleaning his gun on his back porch just as the trigger goes off, pushing the back of his head through the wall?”

“I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic.”

She grinned. “Me, neither.”

“It’s not that gruesome. That’s why I call the series Rest. Death is very peaceful. And I think we as people understand that, we’re just so frightened and saddened by death that we don’t stop and realize it. For many people suffering from terminal illnesses or severe debilitation, death is quite welcome. But for most people—well, I guess that’s not something we’re comfortable considering.”

“Well, I’m glad you stuck with it,” she said. “You were always such a wonderful artist.”

“And a wonderful sentimentalist too, I’m afraid.”

“Oh?”

He smiled. “Remember that week I insisted you paint with me? That it didn’t matter what you painted as long as you painted something? And all you did was bitch and moan…but you finally conceded.”

Kelly laughed. “I remember.”

“I still have them. All your paintings. Packed away back at my apartment, but they’re still there. I hope you don’t think that’s creepy.”

“A little.” She laughed again.

“Would it be even creepier to ask about your personal life? I don’t want to sound pushy—”

“No,” she said.

“Are you seeing anyone?”

Oddly, she thought again of Josh. Then shook her head. “No. But I was married for a while.”

“Married? Are you serious?”

“Collin Rich.”

“Imagine you married.” He seemed unsure how to react. “Let me guess—tax attorney?”

“Textbook editor. But he spoke mostly like a tax attorney, I guess.”

“And it didn’t work out?”

“We both just sort of jumped into it. And I was just a stupid kid.” She smiled in a way that looked like a frown. “He cheated on me several times,” she added, unsure why.

“I’m sorry. He was a fool.”

“No. I mean, yes, he was—but I wasn’t the greatest person to live with, either. Collin was a very proud, very boisterous person. He was proud of his work, proud of the money he made, proud of the long hours he spent behind a locked office door. We were just too different. I was like a scared white rabbit around him most of the time and he couldn’t stand that. Eventually, he found other women with whom he felt more comfortable with. That happens sometimes.”

“You’re not angry with him?”

She shook her head. “Not really, no. It’s more like…I don’t know. It seems like I was more angry at myself back then.”

“And now you’re not?”

I don’t know, she thought, and said, “No.”



After dinner, they walked around the small downtown common area. The evening was chilly but it felt invigorating, and they walked down to the park and sat on an iron bench beneath a selection of fir trees. Ahead of them, a few teenagers were lighting sparklers and tossing them into the air, laughing loudly. A middle-aged man in a Jets sweatshirt and black spandex jogged by them on the narrow trail. Again, their talk was lighthearted. Gabriel seemed aware of the tender areas and refrained from traversing there: Becky’s attack as well as the embarrassing conclusion to their own friendship years ago, which ended when Kelly had been sent away to the institution.