Part 21 (2/2)

He says, ”My friends with babies tell me life doesn't even start till you have them.”

I say, ”My friends with babies tell me that life ends when you have them.”

”Oh, you're just being weird,” he says.

The discrepancy is moving in on me. He wants; I don't want. He expects; I have given up on expectations. I accept, and he just desires, late into the night, scanning the ceiling with his young and hopeful eyes.

When I start teaching Lance, I start staying at the store later and later. I have started teaching him two nights a week, more often than I usually teach students. He has soccer practice three times a week, so I have to make allowances. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I stay until seven o'clock, teaching him. That means I don't get home until eight. Sometimes I find Clive pacing in front of my trailer, smoking, irritated, anxious.

He doesn't reprimand me, and I always joke him out of his bad mood or lift his spirits by bringing home pizza or Chinese food. He is so young he can actually be won over by such things. Young people have short attention spans, and I have learned how to use this in my favor. We don't fight much because I can deflect his anger or frustration without much effort, and in the rare instances when he clings to something, I can always coax him away from it with s.e.x.

It's so easy, I think sometimes, daydreaming as I drive to work. It's almost too easy. There can't be any future in it because I have too much of the upper hand.

I am looking for reasons to destroy this. Because it feels too much like happiness. I'm no stranger to it, of course. I was happy with Mark. I don't want to go there again.

WHAT'S THE HIGHER CALLING- art or music?

This is the discussion I wander into right before Lance comes in for his Wednesday session. Josie has taken the side of art, just to annoy the others, I a.s.sume, and I opt to side with her for the same reason. But for a long time, I just listen.

”How can you say that?” Franklin asks, taking the bait. ”Art is just slopping paint on a canvas. Music is really creative. It serves an actual purpose.”

”Purpose my a.s.s,” Josie says. ”It's all bulls.h.i.+t.”

”Did it ever occur to you,” Franklin says, his eyes turning beady with rage, ”that music is the only thing that makes any sense and the rest of the world is bulls.h.i.+t?”

”I used to think that, too,” she says. ”But I'm the one who's actually had some success as a musician, and I'm telling you, it's ultimately bulls.h.i.+t.”

”Oh, I haven't had any success?” Franklin spits back at her. ”I'm in a band.”

Ernest rescues him from that flimsy defense by saying, ”What would the world be without Stevie Ray Vaughan or Lynyrd Skynyrd? Sure, life would go on, but would you want it to?”

”I wouldn't give a flying f.u.c.k,” Josie says.

”Well, you're just p.i.s.sed off,” Ernest counters, as if it were a medical condition.

”I think what Josie means is that music is a kind of luxury,” I say. ”An accoutrement. It doesn't solve problems or advance evolution or contribute to world peace.”

”Oh, and art has helped us evolve?” Franklin asks.

”Well, you know, the cave paintings are pretty important. They helped record history.”

”Music stopped the Vietnam War,” Franklin says.

I have to laugh. ”Okay, come on. Some good music came out of that era, but it didn't stop anything. The Defense Department stopped that war because it wasn't politically or financially expedient.”

”Whose side are you on?” Franklin asks.

”I'm not on anybody's side. I just see her point. She's saying we elevate music to a level that it cannot support. That's why we're all so miserable. We can't put it in perspective.”

Josie nods at me, as if I'm the only person on earth who understands. She doesn't realize I'm only supporting her to keep the argument alive, because I am a person who enjoys fireworks.

”Art,” Patrick suddenly says from across the room.

We all turn to look at him. He's leaning casually against the wall, his arms crossed, smiling at us with that anemic expression of his, from that superior middle ground.

”That's just bulls.h.i.+t,” Ernest says in his tw.a.n.g. ”You can't even talk about this because you aren't even a musician.”

Patrick ignores that and looks deliberately at me. ”Explain it, Pearl,” he says.

”Me?”

”You know how it goes. Sound waves vibrate at a lower frequency than colors. Art requires light. And what's the speed of sound compared to the speed of light?”

”I don't know the exact numbers, though I'm sure you do.”

”They aren't in the same ballpark. Sound is r.e.t.a.r.ded compared to light.”

”But who says faster is better?” I ask.

”I don't think we're talking about faster. We're talking about higher. What's the higher calling? Colors vibrate on a higher frequency.”

Franklin looks dumbfounded. He says, ”You two are just babbling now.”

”Music is math,” Patrick says. ”Art is vision. You tell me which is a higher calling. Music requires instruction. Art cannot be taught.”

”Sure it can,” Franklin says. ”You've never heard of art school?”

”No great artist ever went to art school,” Patrick says. ”Every great musician went to music school.”

”Hendrix didn't,” Franklin says. ”He couldn't read a note of music.”

”Well, that opens up the debate as to whether or not he was great.”

”It's all bulls.h.i.+t,” Josie says, wanting back into the argument, though she is lost.

”What about playing by ear?” I ask Patrick. ”What about the people who don't need the math?”

”I don't believe those people exist,” he says. ”I think they are lying.”

”But you claim to be one of those people,” I counter.

”I never did.”

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