CHARLOTTE
If Zdenĕk was angry or hurt when she told him she’d moved in with Martin, he didn’t show it at first. He just shrugged. They were naked, lying in his bed. His marionettes dangled from hooks screwed into the walls. He propped himself up on one elbow and walked his fingers across the flat of her stomach.
“Zophie says it would be so nice to have another baby in the family. Someone to play with, a little boy who would learn to make puppets, or a little girl, maybe a photographer like her mother. But you know what Zophie says?”
Charlotte didn’t answer.
“Zophie says, ‘Tick tock. Tick tock. You better hurry up.’”
“You don’t understand do you? Martin just lost his lover. The place is empty and it’s huge. He needs someone.”
“And I don’t? Maybe I’d like a wife, someone to wear one of my wreaths.”
Pots of rosemary lined the windowsill. They perfumed his bedroom. A wreath he’d made for a Czech friend’s wedding hung over the arm of a chair in the corner of the room. The plants were blooming, covered with small blue flowers.
“I’m tired of making them for everyone except myself,” he said.
For the first time, in all the years they’d been together, she heard anger in his voice. He got out of bed and started to dress; he turned to her.
“Don’t forget. The clock is ticking.”
He cocked his head. Left, right, left, right.
Charlotte pulled the sheet up to cover her nakedness; the talk about children left her feeling exposed.
“Maybe the little girls will be the puppeteers, the little boys the photographers,” she said. “Maybe.”
So many years, Zdenĕk in one place, Charlotte in another, not because she didn’t love him. She asked herself. “Why are you so afraid?”
“He knows how to live outside of himself.”
“Not like you.”
“You live inside your head.”
“You over-think, you over-analyze.”
“That’s true.”
“And moving in with Martin?”
“What’s that all about?”
“I needed the space.”
“Liar.”
“Then why?”
“Martin’s timing was perfect”
“What better excuse to say no to Zdeněk.”
She knew from the look on Javier’s face when she told him she’d moved in with Martin, and that Martin’s lover’s former lover was living there, too, that he didn’t approve. They were in the gallery, at the front desk, where Javier was trying to untangle the mess his most recent intern had made of a stack of invoices.
“When I was a boy, growing up in Humacoa,” Javier said, fanning through the papers, “the one thing I knew for sure was family counted for everything. Family is different there. To you North Americans, family is something to be avoided except for uncomfortable encounters on national holidays.”
Charlotte laughed. “Thanksgiving and Christmas are nightmares at my house.” She picked up a few of the invoices. “Is there anything I can do to help you with these?”
“Find me someone who can add,” he said, and put the papers aside. “After the big holiday meals, we’d go into town to the plaza to walk together, taking such pleasure in each other’s company, fussing over the babies, playing games with the older children, debating business and politics. Taking such pride in been seen together as a family. You people create new families because you can’t stand your own.”
“You’re right about that,” she said, with an exaggerated a frown.
“I’m serious,” Javier said. “You and Martin I can understand. But that other one. The boy who was the toy of Martin’s dead lover, where does he fit in? You say he is good to look at. Beyond that, what is there? You claim Martin is such a sophisticate, such a gentleman. That Luca, he’s a puta.”
“That is really unkind. Martin is just trying to give him a break, and if they—well you know.” She was embarrassed to be having such a conversation with him.
Javier laughed.
“You straight people know nothing about sex between men. You don’t want to believe it can be so much like your own. Touch is touch, sometimes thrilling, sometimes disappointing. The emotions are still the same: full of hope and generosity when it is good, full of despair when it isn’t. In the end, the connection, the one that will last, won’t be about sex. It will be about caring for someone as much as you care for yourself. It will be about respect. What sort of respect can a man like Martin Harold have for that boy?”
“You’ll just have to see for yourself,” Charlotte said, annoyed that Javier was being so judgmental. From what she had observed of Luca, he didn’t deserve to be judged like that by Javier, or anyone else. “Thursday night. We’re having a dinner party. Six-thirty. Don’t be late.”
Zdeněk arrived first, and quickly inspected Charlotte’s room. Seeing it as barren as her workspace seemed to relieve him.
“Looks just like your studio: no man’s land,” he said, moving on to the living room, where he lifted the fringed skirts of the elaborate upholstered sofas and chairs to see how they were made.
“Very good, sturdy craftsmanship,” he declared.
Javier, Cece and Brad arrived together. After everyone had a drink—in Brad’s case, two—Luca called them in to dinner. He’d set the table with silver candelabras Martin rarely used, and three forks. Martin had wanted to call a caterer, but Luca insisted on cooking. The meal was broiled tenderloins crusted with black peppercorns, an endive salad, French bread heated until it was crisp on the outside, soft and fragrant inside. He’d made a garlic and herb butter for the bread, and mounded it in little individual sterling silver bowls garnished with a few leaves of fresh oregano. After Charlotte and Cece helped him clear the dinner dishes he brought out an artfully iced black forest cake.
It was Cece who made the suggestion during dessert.
“Javier? Aren’t you looking for someone to work in the gallery? Why not Luca?”
Javier looked skeptical.
“What do you think Brad?” Cece said.
Brad had a mouthful of cake, so Charlotte answered for him.
“I don’t think Luca’s experience is appropriate.”
They all caught the tone of her voice. She scrambled to cover up.
“I only meant he has no formal training in contemporary art.”
“What kind of experience does he need?” Zdenĕk said. “You could give him a crash course.” He gave her arm a playful poke.
Javier looked to Luca who was circling the table, serving coffee from a silver tray.
“How are you at math?” Javier said.
Luca set a cup of coffee next to Javier’s dessert plate.
“I got straight As.”
“Your collectors will love him,” Martin said. “Just look at him. What’s not to like?”
“Well, I know what I like and what I don’t like,” Luca said, and set the tray down. He turned to Martin. “May I?”
Martin winced. He knew what was coming.
“Your study. May I show them?”
“That’s music. Not art.”
“Why don’t you let them decide?”
The double doors to Martin’s study were closed. Luca turned the handles and pushed them open. Everyone except Charlotte gasped. She had been so right. Taped all over the walls were pages of Martin’s newest score drawn in vibrant colors on enormous ragged sheets of the rice paper Charlotte gave him. Zdenĕk pushed past everyone to get a closer look.
Cece said, “Well, I’ll be damned.”
Behind her Javier bounced up and down like a greedy little boy.