Meringue 151

       I climbed up on my high stool, looked down on Coral sitting on her folding chair. My, how warm the Fiber artist looked in the cold Drawing Studio. And on her lap, the book I gave her; what a priceless painting that. No, you want to paint the last word in art, paint two blue hands holding a yellow book closed on a lap. 
       "My," I said, "how blue your hands are."
       "Dyeing accident," she said.
       Dying accident.
       No, you want a writer to break out in a fit of story telling just drop a load like that. Then again, I was no exhibitionist--I was a monk. Yes, time to come out of my cave, spread some sage. Of course, if no sage comes to mind, one can always sit back and muse over the obtuse course of life.
       "I don't know, Coral, sometimes I just have to sit back and muse over the obtuse course of life."
       Coral drummed her book.
       "Take your course in life: Of all the places for an Alaskan to end up, you end up here, in my neck of Eden."
       Coral opened Pan.
       "Who knows how you and I are mixed up in the bigger scheme of things, but here's a thought: You just opened the book some guy from a past life saw fit to put in your box in this life."
       Coral started dog-earing Pan.
       Coral's silence got the monk-in-me thinking of silence. How driven we humans were to fill it. And yet silence was perfect. And what we filled it with, wasn't. Oh, what asses we humans were; believing we could improve upon silence with what perennially failed us--words.
       Coral stopped dog-earing Pan, said, "What you just said; about my course in life. I liked that."
       Then again, once silence is broken, what further damage can be done with a word or two more? "Yes, just think of it, Coral; all the forks in the road it took you to get back to me--I mean, back to me, here, in this life."
       Coral got back to dog-earing Pan.
       "No, really, Coral, who knows what kind of relationship you and I had in a past life. Hell, you could have been married to . . . I mean, marred by me in a past life."
       Coral thought on this. "No," she said, "I don't think we were married in a past life. But, as for some kind of abuse, that seems likely."
       The boy in me wanted to say, 'I've abused no one, never!' But I was in monk-mode, so I said, "Sounds like you have insights into our past lives."
       "Not at all. It's just that I've looked into relationships in this life, and from them I've learned relationships are about using one another. And therein lies the danger; it's all too easy for use to cross over into abuse."
       Was this true? Were relationships about using one another? Not only was it true, it was a stone-cold truth. Just the kind of stone this seasoned elder should have stumbled on over the obtuse course of his life. No, nothing puts an end to the Elder faster than the Younger stoning him with truths.
       Then again, what was the alternative? Conversing with women my age? Hell, no end to the stones in their bags.
       Before I could think of what to say, Coral said, "But you're right; forks do play a role. Take me, back in high school, something happened that . . . It was nothing at the time, but, you know, looking back, I would not have ended up here at this college had . . . and then you and I . . . our paths would not have crossed . . . in this lifetime, anyway."
       Back in the driver's seat, I rocked my stool like a schoolboy. "Boy, Coral, what a lot has happened to you this past year. I mean, you move out of your parents home, move out of state, move in with your boyfriend. That's big stuff."
       "No it's not," she said, her eyes all business. "This, here, what you and I are doing right here--this is big stuff."
       I ached inside; wanted to consume her. Thank God, the Drawing door opened again. In came Robin, the Fibers artist-in-residence.
       Walking by, Robin gave me a look. A look I'd seen before somewhere. I looked at Coral sitting invitingly below me. That's where I'd seen that look. It was the very look my mom used to give me when I was about to stick my finger in the meringue.

       

       One wouldn't think the eye of a mother could stop the finger of a son who had reached the dawn of his middle age. Nevertheless, I hopped off the stool my buttocks had been rocking like a schoolboy, took a stand like some kind of adult.

       "Coral," I said, "have you met Robin?"

       Robin stopped.

       "No," Coral said, standing.

       "Robin's the Fibers artist-in-residence."

       "Oh," Coral said. "I heard we had an artist-in-residence, but I couldn't figure out where your studio was."

       Robin pointed. "Up the stairs--in the crow's-nest."

       "Why is your studio in Drawing?"

       "Ask Anton."

       The two looked at me. 
       "Hey, now," I said, "if you think I'm going to touch on gross errors in judgement on the part of certain administrator's named Hayward, you got another think a coming."

       I leaned Robin's way, cupped my hand so Coral couldn't hear. "See," I said, loud enough for Coral to hear, "Coral here's a client of ours. It's best if she's kept in the dark."

       The two didn't laugh; just gave me the look my dad used to give me just before he gave me the back of his hand--Hey, how was I to know mom would call dad into the kitchen after I stuck my finger in the meringue?

       "OK," I said, "it's like this: Because Fibers has the most floor space of any department on campus, the president's cabinet keeps walling in this and that corner for non-Fibers needs. So now when Fibers gets a resident artist they have to stick her in some other building, defeating the whole purpose of the residency program--having a working artist under the same roof so students of said department can access said valuable resource."

       Of course, the two had started talking Fiber Art well before I'd finished.
       Listening in, I thought of Robin's art--the art I'd helped haul in the other day. Robin had spread silk fabric under the campus fruit trees, and schoolgirl Coral, here, really needed to see how rotting organic matter could dye fabric so colorfully. So, I asked Robin if Coral and I could have a look.

       "Go on up, the door's open." Robin raised a pail. "I'll be right up--got to fetch some water."

       Always the gentleman, I insisted Coral ascend the steep steps before me.

       With Coral ascending before me, I checked out her calves. But, damn, couldn't see her calfs for her calf-high hiking boots meeting up with her calf-low wool skirt. Never the less, her fashion statement--Alaskan Chic, wasn't that far from my own fashion statement--Mr. Carhart.
       Oh, what an attractive couple we will make.

       Coral stopped on the landing then, looked down on me climbing behind her. By her look I had an idea of what I was in for--getting shamed for feasting on her backside. But then she smiled slyly and said, "I'm such a bad girl."
       I checked in on her backside. "I'm not such a good boy myself, but tell me, why are you so bad?"
       "I excused myself from Tapestry class to get a cookie. But they were out of cookies. I'm bad because here it is, an hour later, and I'm still not back."

       I shrugged my shoulders. "The way I see it, a girl's got to go where her education takes her." 
       Coral opened the door and we stepped inside the tight quarters of Robin's crow's nest. The overload of visuals got us first. The lure of discovery got us next; Coral started poking around in a pile of dyed fabric, and I started rocking to and fro in hopes of running into a school girl's arm, by accident.
       Damn, here was Robin climbing the stairs already. I rocked all the harder. 
       Damn, here was Robin now, her pale of water fetched, standing between me and my accident. I stopped rocking, watched the girls poring over yards of Pan-dyed fabric. 

       It was then that I had a flashback--a flash back to my childhood. I was down on the kitchen floor; it was in the kitchen where my dad often decked me. What had I done this time?

       Oh ya; I'd up and stuck my finger in the meringue.

      

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