The New Place
               Christie Wilson

 

 

 

 

     His eggs sat, leaking Saturns, passive to their own deflation. The yoke poured into streams, invading the toast and transforming it into something else. But the shift toward soft in the crust of bread, the little show of elasticity, gave David a thought. He rose, scraping his late attempt at breakfast into the trash, and went back to the desk in the living room.

     He marked through the calculations from earlier, but he couldn’t see clearly and the numbers pushed together, colliding and overlapping, competing for his attention. He ripped a new sheet from the pad on the floor and pushed everything else on the desk aside, taping the large sheet corner by corner. As he populated the white space with formulas, the math rewarded him with a new trajectory. He worked through hours in bliss, the room moving from the gentle light of morning into the more concentrated rays of midday before gaining the pixelated haze of late, late afternoon. On the paper in front of him, the numbers were only a fragmented representation of the beauty he visualized spiraling around him. Galaxies, dancing in a symbiotic embrace, freed from impending collision and the fate of birthing some new place.

     But then he saw it and couldn’t unsee it, and Andromeda rose above the desk, surged forward, and crashed into the Milky Way. Planets cracking and crumbling, everything on fastforward in his mind until nothing but pieces remained. He slammed his hands, wood meeting flesh, loud and painful, before pushing his chair back and rising to his feet in the almost dark. Angry, he paced. It was a problem for him. If he accepted the predicted collision as truth, he had trouble working forward. Expected patterns and behaviors shaped everything, and time was always pushing toward violence. No matter how he framed it. The right ascension always caught him in the end, forcing the prediction towards certainty. Galaxies will collide. The degree of his resistance to the idea did nothing to change it. Hands now on the back of the chair, he started to sit again, but a glance at the clock stopped him. He did not have the time.

     In the bedroom, he pulled off his t-shirt and took a shower, shaking his head as he held it under the water to rid it of the residual implications of the day. He dried himself and buttoned a dress shirt, trying to let his frustration dissolve into social resignation. An imaginary flu, an impromptu trip, a simple lie; the ubiquitous reasons he couldn’t make it rushed past him, testing him, but he could not let himself consider the possibility of calling to cancel. He was determined. And, with this being an anniversary and a house warming party all in one, he was sure that it would serve as his social engagement of the summer.

     Outside he felt calm, though the humidity threatened to break his skin into a sweat. He would be home in a few short hours, tomorrow back to work to make the Milky Way traverse a path that was not predetermined, a time that was in constant flux. A night out might do him good. It would just be a party, with some of the same people he had been drinking with at parties since he was first away from home, across the country and thrust into ivy corridors where money and academia collide. These were the same people that had pulled him along to their vacation homes and into their spring break dramas. At first he had feared their pity, but that had dissipated with the realization that it wasn’t pity which caused them to include him; he was the friend they all brought home because he could intelligently converse with parents, show them that their own children had chosen proper social companions and weren’t drinking away the family inheritance; he was the buffer, and he had accepted that role, though it had worn thin as their adult lives had begun to take shape.

     His hands were empty as he walked. He had shipped the gift straight to the house from the gallery downtown and had received confirmation of its arrival in the form of several erratic text messages. Mandy gushing, ecstatic over the colors, the bio of the artist, which she must have looked up online. He imagined her, years from now, hosting receptions for artists whose work she neglected to understand. She would dress her children in matching colors, and they would play in between the feet of the prominent adults of the community, and she would feel that with her marriage to Christopher, with her children, with her shear and unflinching presence, she was a vital and contributing member of the society in which she had always wanted to dwell.

     But dwelling here felt like suffocation to David. He had been surprised when Chris and Mandy had bought the house and remained so close. Though he was the only one still at the university, his friends continued to rotate around the edges of campus as they selected apartments and bought houses. He knew he judged them, perhaps too harshly, for their need to remain in places and gather pieces of preselected identities. Inertia he understood, though he hoped it was pushing past and beyond and not into a mold.

     Checking his watch and measuring the blocks ahead made him realize that he had been walking too fast. He could see the lights of the pizza place at the corner and considered stopping there for a beer. One beer equaled approximately fifteen minutes. As he walked, he watched a disembodied hand draw the formula out on his chalkboard. The crudely formed shape of the bottle before the hasty lines of the plus sign, the one and five, carefully formed next to the abbreviated mins. He stretched the letter “m” in his mind. Seeing the first hump crest at the edge of his vision, he had to work hard to finish the letters and draw the equal sign. He didn’t know the answer, relished that freedom, and took hold of the door.

     The door wouldn’t move. His eyes rose to meet Matt’s smirk and Kimberly’s shy eyes. He sighed, control relinquished.

     “Hey, buddy. You’re going the wrong way. Party’s this way, and we are all running late.”

     “I’m just stopping for a quick beer.”

     “What, you don’t think there will be beer at Chris and Mandy’s?”

     “Sure, I just.”

     “C’mon, walk with us, and I promise to hand you a beer as soon as we get there.”

     David allowed them some room on the sidewalk and made a conscious move to try and drift behind, but they slowed their pace, and he found himself between them.

     He turned to Kim. “Good pizza tonight?”
     She gave him a smile. “Oh, we didn’t eat. It was my nephew’s birthday party, and I felt like we should stop.”
     “So, Sarah’s coming tonight. I meant to text you earlier, make sure you didn’t dress like an idiot, but looks like you did alright.” Matt slung his arm over David’s shoulder, the edge of his nickel-plated watch grazing David’s ear. “Yep, Mandy says that Sarah’s over that guy, so looks like you’re up buddy.”
     “We tried; it didn’t work. I wish everyone would just leave it, including Mandy.”
    “Oh, you didn’t try. Two months? C’mon, and she’s gorgeous. Just what you need at all those faculty soirees. Little arm candy to spice up your wardrobe.”
     David tried to release himself from Matt’s sloppy grasp, but soon relented, letting him dominate the conversation and allowing the endless stream of words to carry them to Christopher’s newly painted front porch.
     He made it through the greetings and found himself holding a beer and leaning against the wall, always on the ledge of conversation. Everything moved around him; words, jokes, accusations, glances, nudges. He contributed nothing and kept his eyes focused above the mantle. The painting rested there having not yet been mounted to the wall, but staking its claim on the space nonetheless. There was a sheen across the canvas, almost like the artist had ensconced it in an invisible plastic coating to protect it, to let the spiral in the center only widen so far, or perhaps to keep the viewer from falling in. Staring at it now, David wished he had kept it for himself. He could have given them any painting. They would have been just as happy, just as inattentive. Christopher hadn’t started that way, but Mandy had made him a convert to the religion of placemats and boat shoes.
     He felt a presence at his shoulder. It was a woman who looked to be in her early fifties. She smiled at him.
     “I’m Wilma Butler, the realtor.”
     “Oh, hello.”
     “You bought the painting, right? I was here when it was delivered. Fascinating work.” She paused and moved her head slightly closer to his ear, not as if she were imparting a secret, but more to make sure he could hear her. “Turning and turning in the widening gyre the falcon cannot hear the falconer.”
     His look must have read surprise.
     “I saw the title.”
     He nodded.
     “You’re a physicist?”
     “Yes.”
     “Art and science, quite the Renaissance man.”
     “They seem the same to me.”
     She looked him over and patted his arm with a matronly touch. “Well, great gift.”
     The party continued through toasts and inane conversation. It kept going after someone spilled beer all over the new rug and an army of volunteers rushed to clean it up. It pushed gracefully past awkward pauses and trips to the bathroom. It forced itself to conduct tours until every last guest had seen the custom tile work in the master bath and the bay windows in each of the upstairs rooms. David appreciated its perseverance and determination, the stamina it took to maintain all of the conversations and people without letting the whole set up careen into madness. But it didn’t dull his need to slip the loop and abdicate his position in the procession of comparisons, the line of backhanded compliments.
     Christopher caught his eye from across the room, looking trapped between his own mother and another lady who kept stroking his bicep as if he were her pet. David moved forward, and Christopher’s mother pulled him into a tight embrace.
     “Now here’s my David.”
     “Hello.”
     “Have you saved the world from impending doom yet?” She looked over at her companion. “This one is worried about the future of our universe. Comes to dinner talking about sideways galaxies and all those numbers. I keep telling him you have to break things to make something new, so don’t worry. Just marry a nice girl that you can bring to dinner. Actually, Mary here has a niece starting at the university in the fall. Maybe you could show her around?”
     “Sure, of course,” David smiled. “Christopher, I think Mandy needs you to move that table upstairs”
     “Oh, right. I’ll need your help probably.”
     “Well, it was nice to see you David. You don’t have to wait until my son comes over to be a guest at dinner. We are only a couple of hours away, you know.”
     David said goodbye and followed Christopher up the stairs.
     “Thanks, man. I was dying in there.” Christopher opened the door to an extra bedroom, closing it behind them. “Mom’s friend had me cornered for the last half hour. ‘Do you know anyone that can show my niece around, she’s new, blah, blah.’ Then, she tries it on you.”
     “Yeah.”
     “Maybe she’s hot, though.”
     “Who?”
     “The niece, but doesn’t matter, you’ve still got it for Sarah anyway, at least according to my wife.” Christopher sat down on the bed with his elbows on his knees.
     “Your wife wants us all to live like characters in a sitcom, and my marrying Sarah and moving in right down the street would fit so nicely.”        “So, you aren’t then?”
     “Aren’t what?”
     “Interested in Sarah?”
     “Hardly.”
     “She’s moved closer, you know. I’ve been helping her.”
     “Yes, all of you just keep hanging around. I’m ready to be somewhere else.”
     David walked slowly around the room. Even in this, an extra room, he could see the money and care that Mandy had taken to dress the bed, match the curtains. She was building a life for her and Christopher and wasn’t that what she felt she was expected to do?
     He found himself walking the path of a figure eight, his feet tracing an analemmatic pattern in the carpet. But he no more wanted the role of the sun in this house than he wanted the diagrams on his desk to reveal an unbending future where even galaxies had no choice, where even they were set on a path that was already there, hovering and waiting for them to trace it.
     “What are you doing? So drunk you can’t walk straight already?”
     David paused mid-stride and then stumbled to get his foot down. “No, I was just thinking.”
     “I envy you. All that thinking you do.”
     “Yeah, I’m sure you do.” David flashed him a grin.
     “No, I mean it, but aren’t you afraid if you think too much about it, that it will all come apart?”
     David laughed. “Now you’re the one who’s drunk.”
     “Maybe.” Christopher sighed. “Mandy wants a baby.”
     “Oh, yeah? Well, don’t sound so surprised. That’s typically where this path goes.”
     “I guess. Hey, that painting was a nice gift.”
     “I’m glad you like it. I’m glad Mandy feels it fits well enough to be included in the décor.”
     “Oh, give her a break. She’s not as bad as you think. She’s trying so hard with the new house and our anniversary. It’s me that needs to try harder.”
     “Speaking of your wife, she’s probably missing you by now.”
     They reentered the noise, and David moved to the kitchen and tucked his beer bottle into the corner of the overflowing garbage can. Then, feeling guilty for contributing to the potential mess, he took the lid off and pulled the drawstrings, stuffing his hand inside to catch the falling bottles.
     Sarah was suddenly beside him. “Here, let me help you with that.” She opened a cabinet door next to his leg, pulling out a fresh bag. He wondered at her intimate knowledge of Mandy’s cabinet space and felt far away from these people. The bag floated between them, keeping her face hidden as she flapped her arms to open it. Everything was a plastic wall.
     “How’ve you been?” She bent to retrieve the lid.
      David let his eyes rest on the tips of the fine hairs along her forearm. Even they were beautiful. “Good, I’ve been good.”
     “Good.” She paused. “I’ve moved back out here. Down on Sutherland. Right past the donut place. The one you like that has the blueberry.”        “Oh yeah? Good.”
     “Yeah, Chris actually found the place. It was a little rough at first, but he’s been helping me fix it up. New paint and stuff.”
     “Oh. Good.”
     David shifted his weight. “Christopher’s good for that, I guess.”
     “Yeah.”
     “I’d better take this out.” He looked toward the bag.
     “Ok, well call me sometime. We can catch up, maybe have lunch, or blueberry donuts. You can fill me in on your newest theories.”
     “Yeah, okay.”
     She squeezed his arm in a gesture that was her way of maintaining distance through physical contact, the same as the way she made love. He twisted the red strips of plastic around his fingers and lifted the bag, guiding it through the bodies and toward the back door. Outside he found the trashcan and propelled the bag inside. Through the window, he could see that people were gathering their things, and he felt relief at the impending release. They were beautiful, all of them. He could see Mandy’s fingers dancing at the back of Christopher’s hair. Mandy’s parents and Christopher’s parents made their way around the room saying their goodbyes together, as if their children’s marriage had made them a unit as well. He watched a man he didn’t know make Sarah laugh, her hand landing on her chest as her body gently swayed with the force of her sound. He saw Matt take Kimberly’s hand and drunkenly attempt to twirl her around in a mock dance. Little bits of matter orbiting in a closed system. They were all gorgeous, and he was too, not by extension, just by himself. He breathed deeply and planned his exit as he reentered the kitchen. He stopped in the bathroom for a few moments and smiled in the mirror as he washed his hands. Eagerly, he stepped back into the hallway.
     Yet, the mood had shifted in his absence. He made his way toward the front door, but Mandy intercepted him.
     “Come, sit. Admire this beautiful painting with me.” She tugged at his arm and led him to the living room. Matt and Kimberly sat on the love seat. Christopher was draped across one side of the couch with his tie loose around his stubby neck. Sarah was beside him, just out of reach. Mandy threw her body into the space between her husband and Sarah so that Sarah had to reposition herself to escape Mandy’s flailing limbs. David perched himself on the corner of a chair that had been pulled around to complete the circle of furniture.
     “Look at that beautiful painting. What’s it called again, David?” Mandy slipped her feet from her high heels and tucked them underneath her, leaning into Christopher.
     “Composing a Gyre.” David glanced back over his shoulder at the canvas.
     “You had to go all arty on us. All we bought were napkin rings and placemats,” Matt smiled.
     “But they are just stunning, darling!” Christopher chuckled at his own voice, and the rest of the group tittered.
     As they talked, David put on the glib smile reserved for their company, resenting his own insincerity, though he almost couldn’t help it. He had known all of them for years now, seven at least, and he couldn’t understand why they held onto him. He felt their grip tightening even now, forcing his presence and consuming his time, pushing him towards their version of the world. It was only then that he noticed the wall opposite the painting and behind the couch. “What’s with all the clocks?”
     Mandy exhaled. “Wilma’s idea. Did you meet her, David? She’s our realtor, but I guess she does some interior design too. She was here one day while I was unpacking and wanted to stay and help. I didn’t have the heart to say no. We spread out everything we had for the walls, wedding gifts and things. We had all these clocks. She put them all on the wall. Looks ridiculous doesn’t it?”
     Christopher leaned his head back and looked up. “I just want to know why she didn’t set any of them. They’re all just random.”
     Kimberly shifted. “I think that’s the point if it is supposed to be art.”
     “Oh, I guess.” Christopher’s eyes moved as he inspected the display.
     “We could assign them times.” Mandy twisted her body so that she was balanced along the front edge of the couch and facing the wall. “You know, like that one on the top. That’s counting down until our first baby.” She put her hand on Christopher’s chest and laughed. “And, that red one, that’s counting down until Matt and Kim get married. The blue one is for Sarah. It matches her dress.” She slurred the word matches, and it became suddenly obvious to David how drunk she was. “It’s counting down until her dreams come true, and she can move away from here.”
     David saw Christopher look past Mandy and to Sarah before shifting his gaze and claiming a large clock in the left corner was counting down until he got his motorcycle and a dog.
     “That big brown one is timing how long it takes Matt to fix the leak in the kitchen.” Kimberly looked pleased with herself for joining the game.
     “We aren’t married yet woman. You can’t nag me. But in that case, the silver one with the black face is timing…”
     David stopped listening. The game felt crude to him, too arrogant, almost brash. He wanted no part of this predetermination. It angered him, and he shut it out, until he heard Mandy say his name. She was standing on the couch now, one foot having slid down between the cushions. Her palm was flat against the face of a small clock towards the center. The rim that framed her hand was mustard yellow, and it moved slightly as she lifted her hand and slapped it back down against the glass.
     “David, David. David needs a clock too. This one’s for you, David.” She swayed a bit as she turned to face him. Christopher and Sarah instinctively steadied her legs. “It’s measuring you, David. Timing you.” She leaned back to try and slap it again, but she missed.

     The room was still and wide, structured by innumerable contingencies. David’s jaw gave a slight tremble, and he avoided all of the eyes, though he could feel them fixed on his face.
     “Ok, it’s time for bed now.” Christopher rose from the couch and pushed his arm against the back of Mandy’s knees, causing her to fold into him. “Say night, night to everyone.” He turned toward the stairs, nudging Sarah as he did.

     “But, I’m not sleepy. Oh well, Prince Charming says it’s bed time.” She gave a goofy smile with her chin on Christopher’s shoulder and disappeared.

     Matt raised his eyebrows. “And, on that note.” He pulled Kimberly to standing. They all mumbled some goodbyes. On the porch, David promised Sarah a lunch date as he watched her lock Christopher and Mandy’s door and replace the spare key.

     At home, the numbers from his desk diagrams shook the living room. David did his best to turn away from them, though he could feel the heat of their explosions on his back, reshaping the universe while he made his way to bed.

     Sometime in the early morning hours he woke sick. He barely made it to the bathroom and then only to the sink. The liquid was yellow and grimy against the stark white of the porcelain. He thought of the frame around the clock and heard Mandy’s hand slap against it, again and again. Sliding down with his back pressed to the cabinet, he listened to her palm strike the glass.

     When daylight was hot around him, he pulled himself to standing and shoveled handfuls of water onto his putrid tongue. Drying his hands on his pajama pants as he slid them off, he reached for a pair of shorts on top of the hamper. In the living room, galaxies threw glancing blows. He pulled on his shoes and locked the door behind him.

     With every few steps his perception of the sky changed. Swirling clouds that appeared overpowering one moment gave way to revelatory light the next, and he continued to move, kicking his way through the sea of seconds that crowded his path.

     Christopher’s car was in the driveway, but not Mandy’s. David tried the doorknob and then lifted a few pots where he thought he had seen Sarah place the spare.

     Inside he made his way to the clock. His palm was larger than Mandy’s, and he was able to wrap the last knuckles of his fingers around the edge as he pulled it from the wall. The glass was cold against his heat.
     He ignored the sounds he heard from upstairs and turned the clock over in his hands so that his thumbs were on the back, palms cupping the sides, and fingers on the face. He looked for a corner or a sharp edge and found it on the coffee table.

     He brought the clock face down and rested it against the wood as if aiming. Then, with deliberation, he raised it and brought it down, again and again.

     “David! David, what the hell?” He looked over his shoulder to see Christopher’s face hanging over the banister. In the reflection of the mirror at the bottom of the stairs, he could see Sarah. She was standing in the upstairs hallway with her hands cupped over her bare breasts and pink panties low on her hips. Expected patterns and behaviors, they shaped everything. A deep chuckle slipped from him before he turned back to the clock and let his fingers trace the cracks in the glass. The clock hands continued to move.
     His back was to the wall of clocks now so that when he raised his eyes he was staring at the painting on the mantle. Of course. He moved toward it, slamming his left leg hard against the coffee table.
     He was aware of Christopher shouting, but he lost the words in his focus. He grabbed the canvas with his left hand. It was surprisingly light, and it simply moved backwards when he slammed the clock into it. This was going to be harder than he had envisioned. He needed something to brace it on, edges over which to fit the spiral. His eyes landed on the chair that he had sat on the night before. He put the painting down, balancing it on the arms and forced the clock into the center over and over until he could see the black leather of the chair through a small round circle. This vision of a black center for the gyre encouraged him, and he placed the clock on the left corner of the picture and dug at the canvas with his fingers, prying at the spiral until at last it was large enough. He forced the clock through the hole, shoving the chair back against the wall.
     Only now could David feel Christopher’s grip on his right arm, and he turned to face him. In the noise, Sarah must have descended a few stairs and now they watched her retreat in the mirror. Christopher opened his mouth, but then only released David’s arm, rendered silent by this shared vision.

     The anarchy of the past few moments settled down into the seemingly rigid edges of reality. The living room walls still held fast to their shape and to their carefully selected neutral tones, but the shifting of the furniture and the gaping hole, an escape hatch of his own design, made David feel like smiling, like surging forward, like he had at last grasped a handle. Destruction was creation; creation was destruction in reaction to determination, controlling but still pulsing in flux. It was a beautiful system. As David left, he was careful to step over the path of sunlight on the floor where tiny dust particles, like floating debris, were gathering to form the boundaries of this new place.