The Swan Thieves

At breakfast the second morning, I braced myself to avoid Robert's eyes if I met them, but to my relief he wasn't there, and even Frank seemed to have found someone else to talk with. I hunched over my coffee and toast, stupefied from painting and a lack of sleep, reluctant for the day to begin. I had twisted my hair up out of the way and put on a faded khaki shirt with paint on the hem, Muzzy's least favorite. The hot coffee helped steady my nerves; after all, it was nonsense for me to think about this man, this unavailable, strange, famous stranger, and I planned not to. The morning was depressingly clear, perfect for a landscape excursion; when nine o'clock came, I was in the van again. Robert drove, and one of the older women consulted a map for him. Frank was nudging me from the neighboring seat, and it was as if the night before had never happened.

This time we painted at the edge of a lake with a run-down cottage on the other side and a lacework of white birches around its shores. Robert cautioned us humorously not to put in any moose. Or women in long dresses, I could have added through my headache. I set my easel as far away from his as I could without allying myself with Frank. I certainly didn't want Robert Oliver to think I was pursuing him, and my one gratification was that he studiously avoided looking at me the entire afternoon and did not even come by to critique my painting, which was a disaster in any case. That meant that last night's conversation was still in his bloodstream, too; otherwise he would be bantering with me, his old student. I couldn't remember what I knew about trees, or shadows, or anything else; I seemed to be painting a muddy ditch in which I could see only my own shape looming, stirring the water, something familiar but ominous.

We ate lunch in a huddle at two picnic tables (I did not sit at Robert's), and at the end of the day we gathered around Robert's canvas--how did he make water seem actually alive like that? -- and he talked about the shapes of the shoreline and the color choice he'd made for the distant blue hills. The challenge of this scene was its monochromatic nature, blue hills, blue lake, blue sky, and the temptation to overdo the white of the birches by contrast. But if we looked hard, Robert said, we would realize that there was incredible variety in those muted shades. Frank stood rubbing a finger behind one ear, listening with an air of respect-but-I-could-tell-you-something-more that made me want to slap him; what made him think he knew more than Robert Oliver?

Dinner was worse; Robert came into the crowded dining hall after I did and seemed to choose a seat as far away from me as possible after letting his eyes slide across my table. Later the bonfire was lit in the dark yard, and people drank beers and talked and laughed with a new level of abandon, as if friendships had solidified already. And what had I solidified? I had hung around with Frank the Perfect, or gone back to my room by myself, or thought about and avoided our genius teacher, when I could have been making friends. I considered seeking out one of the women I liked in our landscape class, bringing over a beer, and settling on a garden bench to hear about her life at home, where she'd gone to school and where she'd had a group show, what her husband did--but I felt weary before I'd even started. I scanned the crowd for Robert's curly head and found it; he was towering above a group that contained a couple of my classmates, although I was pleased to see that this time Frank wasn't glued to his side. I collected my sweatshirt and slouched off toward the stables, my bed, and my book--Isaac Newton would be better company than all these people having too good a time together, and once I'd gotten more than three hours' sleep I'd be decent company myself.

The stables were deserted, the rows of little bedroom doors closed, except for mine, which I'd apparently left open--that was careless, although my wallet was in my jeans pocket and I wasn't worried about the rest of my things. Nobody seemed to lock up much here anyway. I went in, numb, and gave a little screech in spite of myself; Frank sat on the edge of my bed, wearing a clean white shirt open to the waist, jeans, and a necklace of heavy brown beads that was actually rather like mine. He had a sketchbook in his hand; he was rubbing his thumb on a fresh drawing, blurring lines. His tan was breathtaking, his muscled ribs contracted a little as he leaned forward over the page; he rubbed with concentration for a second more and then looked up and smiled. I tried not to actually put my hands on my hips. "What do you think you're doing here?"

He put the sketch down and grinned at me. "Oh, come off it. You've been avoiding me for days."

"I could call the organizers and have you evicted."

He settled his face into more seemly attention. "But you won't. You've noticed me as much as I've noticed you. Stop blowing me off."

"I haven't been blowing you off. I believe the word is 'ignoring.' I've been ignoring you, and maybe you're not used to that."

"Do you think I don't know I'm a spoiled brat?" He put his bristly blond head to one side and regarded me. "How about you?" His smile was contagious, to my dismay. I folded my arms. "Are you one, too?"

"If you weren't a spoiled brat, you certainly wouldn't be here in this totally inappropriate manner."

"Come on," he said again. "You don't think about appropriate and inappropriate like that. I'm not here to jump your snotty bones anyway. I've just thought all along we could be friends, and

I thought you might talk with me if we were alone and you didn't have to show off to other people."

I didn't know where to begin taking him apart. "Show off? I've never seen anyone more concerned with image than you seem to be, young man."

"Oh, now we see your true colors. An anti-snob. That's better. After all, you went to art school yourself, and I know where. Not bad." He smiled and showed me his sketchbook. "Hey--I've been trying to do a self-portrait in your mirror. I was just touching it up. Do I look like a show-off?"

I glanced at the drawing in spite of myself. It was wistful, quiet, a thoughtful face I wouldn't have associated with what I'd seen of Frank. It was good, too.

"Very poor shading," I said. "And the mouth is too big."

"Big is good."

"Get off my bed, mister," I said. "Come over here and kiss me first."

I should have slapped him, but I began to laugh. "I'm old enough to be your mother."

"Not true," he said. He put his sketchbook down on the bed, stood up--he was exactly my height and width and shape--and put a hand on either side of me, against the wall, a gesture he had surely learned from Hollywood. "You are young and beautiful and you should stop being so cranky and have some fun. This is an art colony."

"I should have you kicked out of this art colony, you child."

"Let's see, you would be--what, eight years older than I am? Five? So dignified." He put one hand on my face and began to stroke my cheek, so that a flame leapt from my shoulder to my hairline. "Do you like to pretend you're self-sufficient, or do you really enjoy sleeping alone in this stall?"

"Men are not allowed in here anyway," I said, removing his hand, which went right back to its gentle work around my temple and down my jawbone. I began to long in spite of myself to put that fine, dexterous young hand elsewhere, to feel it everywhere.

"That's only on paper." He leaned in, but slowly, as if to hypnotize me, a successful enterprise. His breath had a pleasant, fresh smell. He stayed there until I kissed him first, humiliating myself but hungry, and then his lips met mine thoroughly, with a restrained strength that made my stomach flip. I might have ended up spending the night against that silky chest if he hadn't put his hand to my hair and lifted a strand of it. "Gorgeous," he said.

I slipped out from under his tanned arm. "You are, too, little boy, but forget it."

He laughed with surprising good nature. "All right. Let me know if you change your mind. You don't have to be this lonely if you don't want to. We can just have a few of those good conversations you insist on avoiding."

"Just leave, please. Jesus. Enough."

He picked up his sketchbook and went out as quietly as Robert Oliver had from the studio the night before, even closing the door respectfully behind him, as if to show me the maturity I had underestimated in him. When I was sure he'd left the building, I threw myself down on my bed and wiped my mouth on the back of my sleeve and even cried a little, but fiercely.