Page 68 of Alone With You in the Ether

He deliberately placed the emphasis ondraw, notme.

“Yes,” she said. “I’d paint you, but that’s more things to carry around. Maybe another time.”

So it had been impulsive, then. Or compulsive. “What are you going to draw?”

“I don’t know. You, I guess. I figured you wouldn’t mind.”

“I don’t.”

“Well, there you go, other people would.”

“Fair.” He paused. “Are you doing some kind of anatomical study, or…?”

She froze, pivoting to look at him.

“Yes,” she said, so slowly he wasn’t sure her brain and her mouth were actually in agreement. “Yes,” she confirmed, more conclusively that time, and then, with a lift of her chin, “Yes. So you’ll have to take off your clothes, probably.”

He blinked. “Oh.”

“Just your shirt,” she assured him, and then grimaced. “Well, no, actually. All of it.”

“All of it,” he echoed slowly, and she nodded.

“I don’t want to do fabrics right now,” she said, stepping conclusively away from his closet. “They’re an illusion, and besides, I don’t like any of yours. I want to show how the shadows really fall.”

“And you want me for a model?”

“Of course. Who else would do it?”

“How do you know I will? I haven’t said yes.”

“Well, I know,” she said firmly, and he considered that for a moment.

“What are you going to do with the drawings?”

“Hang them in the Louvre,” was delivered with perfect solemnity.

“They have higher standards,” he said, “I presume. I hope.”

“Well, maybe you underestimate me, hm? Besides, you said you wanted the art key,” she informed him, shutting the door to his wardrobe and advancing in his direction. She’d made up her mind; clearly this was happening. “This is the closest thing to having it,” she said, daring him to argue, “isn’t it?”

“I picked the art key because I was almost positive you wouldn’t give it to me,” he said, which was true. He was capable of devoting his thoughts to any number of impossible problems. He was also, as it turned out, a seeker of unavailable things.

“Well, you were wrong,” she said.

Then she flicked a glance over him that said, Go on, strip.

He relented, giving his t-shirt a tug over his head, then paused for, “Where do you want me?”

She eyed his space again. “The bed, I guess.”

It was as neatly made as a bed of its bare elements could be. She strode forward and pulled back the duvet, arranging the sheets, then propped his two pillows against the wall. “Here, sit here.”

He slid out of his jeans, his boxers, folding them carefully and placing them on the floor before doing as she asked. That he was naked felt somehow much less relevant than the fact that she would be analyzing him, theorizing him in her own way, clothes or no clothes. He felt suddenly very conscious of what it was to be an equation.

He eased himself down on the bed, leaning back, but she quickly stopped him with a hand on his sternum, readjusting the pillows behind him. Her fingers on his skin were diligent and impassive, shifting to his shoulders, lean this way, chin up slightly, no down, okay now put your knee up like this, yes, bend it like that, good, perfect. She paused, eyeing him again, then took his elbow, resting it on his knee. Like this? Yes, like this, all their communication silent, him looking at her while she arranged the pieces of him. She glanced over at the window, up at the lights, back down at him. Should he look away? He turned his chin, angling it in the same direction as his outstretched arm, and she corrected the motion by dragging him back, taking his chin firmly in her hand.

“Look this way,” she said aloud, and angled his chin over his shoulder, directing his gaze to her. “I’m going to do some studies on your hands,” she explained, jiggling his fingers to make sure they were draped loosely, “and on your legs, but then I want to do your neck, too. And your face.”

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