The Muse.
"I once truly fell in love with an unseen friend-- who refused to meet me in real life, who became the object of my every desire, my muse, the reason I walked this planet-- with every cell of my heart."
He stands at her window and although she is supposed to review his photographs, she cant help but want to show him her own. She opens the blinds by flicking a switch located on the wall across from where he stands. She walks over to the couch and sits down, patting her dress down and tucking the trim around her slim ankles. She wonders if he notices how thin her waist is, how her stomach paunches from two pregnancies and a miscarriage.
He sits beside her and pulls a large black portfolio from his bag, spreading it on the table.
"This, mostly is my portraiture." Men with grey folded skin peer up at her. "Mostly derelicts, street kids, druggies." She is marveled by the precision, the thought of the photos, but holds her tongue.
“What is it, James, about them, that makes you want to take their portraits?”
James rests his elbows on his knees. His pants are gathered around his crotch, enough so she can see his groin bulge. She stares long enough to allow him a response.
“James? You know I ask you only for your benefit, but what makes you think that your photos will stand apart from the hundreds of other photographers who do the same thing?” She stands up and pulls a cigarette from the silver case on the table. “You can’t think that this is an innovative idea?” Kids with anarchy tattoos light up half smoked cigarette butts. Teenage girls hook at street corners. A nine year old boy is but a blur as he dodges through traffic.
. . . .
“Its not about the photo Liz, but the story behind them.” James stands half naked at the edge of his bed as the girl slides on her black panties, using the bed as a shield, careful not to expose too much.
“Well, James, you are a photographer, not a writer, so I don’t know what to tell you… Will you hand me that bra?” She points to the pink under-wire that is draped over an office chair. James runs his hands through his hair and pulls his binder over his head as Liz too hides her breasts.
“Well fuck that. She’s stupid and doesn’t get it.”
. . . .
“The boy, in this picture…” he points to the blur of a boy. She inhales deeper than intended, admiring his long fingers. “He was not hit, but almost. The car that almost hit him had to slam…”
“James?”
He looks up. Large eyes, even larger lips, and she suspects a bit of Japanese blood.
“You are a fool Mr. Reed. Your audience will never actually know what happened. There will be no caption, unless editorial, and might I add, this is not editorial work.” She waves the cigarette close to her face, an act of pure drama, and he follows the wand of smoke. “There will be no long drawn out explanation; a little behind the scenes. If you want to tell a story you must do it in one shot.” She emphasizes the last syllables and poses her hands up to her face again, mimetic of the clicking of a photo. James shuts his portfolio, stuffing it into his bag and stands up.
“So I need to just trash these then?” His voice is annoyed, yet there is still a shyness that she knew from class. She sits back down, patting the sofa beside her, and discreetly rolls her shoulders to expose her bust.
“No. You don’t ‘trash’ this collection. You need to find a muse. Something that moves you. What is it, that you love more than anything? That could entertain you for hours at a time, that you lose yourself to?”
She leans back. He opens his mouth to speak.
“Shh” She presses her finger to his lips. “I needn’t know Mr. Reed. Just show me.”
. . . .
“So like, then she asks me to do yard work for her.”
“What?” Liz sits at the vanity painting black rings around her eyes. She feels a kin to the photo of her great grandmother wearing a black dress and a long string of pearls. The eyes make her feel like the flapper her great grandmother was. She turns around and looks at him. He has his hands down his pants and is adjusting his pack.
“Yard work. We started in the living room which was fine. But then her cats meowed at the door, and she asked me to let them in. Honestly if she wasn’t my Professor I would think she was hitting on me. I totally thought she was a lez too, until she mentioned an ex husband and two sons.”
Liz turns around in her chair.
“Hitting on you? “ She smiles. “I mean, James, the thought of you being seduced by a much older woman is incredibly hot.”
“Babe, she has a 27 year old son. That is how old she is for Christ’s’ sake!”
“Hot.”
“No. Not hot.”
“I think your lying.” Liz stands up and sways over to James, She runs her hands up his shirt and kisses his neck. “If I dress up like an older woman, can I seduce you?” James grabs her hands and pulls them away.
“Well to spoil your fantasy she is not hot. She is like 5’0” and probably close to 200 lbs”
“Oh… “
“Yeah, Oh.”
. . . .
“James?”
“Yeah baby?”
“How did you even end up at Carols today?”
He laughs and kisses her cheek, and puts her head on his chest.
“well I was upstairs in my school, which is like a huge house, sitting on this black leather couch with my laptop in my lap and playing halo. Remember how I had to borrow your adapter.?”
“Oh yeah.”
“You know how it’s bigger than mine? Well Carols ex husband works at apple, so she comes over and starts bitching at me for having the wrong power supply or some shit.” James nudges her head off his chest and lights up a cigarette. “I told her mine was broken, and this was yours and blah blah. Anyway…” Liz sits up letting the blanket fall away from her, and grabs his cigarette. “She tells me to make an appointment at apple with her ex husband
“Well then she sees me later on and starts talking up this thunderous storm about how her cats have been acting really weird, and bitching about the internet not working. Then like, totally non-sequiter she asks me if I would like to review my portfolio with her later on because she is a part of the Review board…anyhow. So I say yeah, and after my Lit class I meet her in the Library. She asks if I will give her a ride home since she walked and that’s pretty much it.”
“ So she is a crazy cat lady, and then she ripped your portfolio a new asshole?”
“pretty much.”
“oh. Just wondering.”
. . . .
“I want you to pose two ways. One with your cock and tits, and one with your back turned.”
Her dress is loose, but it is obvious to him that underneath she is laced. He steps out of his pants letting them fall, revealing his already erect dick.
“May I keep my shirt on?”
“No. You may not.”
He un-buttons his shirt and slowly peels off his binder, conscious of the release of his breasts.
“ Don’t you need more light Mrs. Cochran?”
“No. And Shut up. Hopefully with this low of exposure we won’t see the harness, although if we do, it shouldn’t be such a bad thing.” She walks up to him, and sees him in a way she hadn’t before. He is a real boy. Or could be. His jaw is tight and sharp around the edge. His neck is long and extends down to broad shoulders, thin but toned arms, and if she squints, his breasts disappear.
Through the Lens he is a girl posing as a boy. Through the lens he is pale and scared, his shoulders look weak and his cock is fake. The areolas are dark and only enhance the shadows of his tits, but she hits the button anyway. She hits him anyway.
And he is like a child. He cries in slow motion and moves in waves, and in her a piece of him exists. She lets him cry in solitude, and perverts this sadness by the presence of a lens. A double shutter capturing more than what is human. An intangible existence stripped of everything but truth.
She learns his name was Jennifer. He puts his hands in her, and in her he is nearly crushed. A woman. A muse.
