Julia's Chocolates (21 page)

Lara laughed, but it was that bitter laugh I was getting so used to with her. “At school the next day, Sharon, the Rutulskys’ oldest, came up to me and told me that her family had prayed for me and my mother at dinner. I was so offended by that at first. Why did they need to pray for me? They were the ones my father said were going to hell. But I looked in Sharon’s eyes, and it seemed like she was going to cry. So it made me feel like crying because I hated my life and my father and even my mother sometimes for not protecting us. Sharon invited me to spend the night, but of course I couldn’t.”

“Why not?” I didn’t realize I was holding my hands together so tight until I noticed the fingernail indentations on my hands.

“Because the Rutulskys never came back to church, so my father considered them to be heathens. Absolute heathens. My mother said to him, ‘William, I don’t think they’re heathens. Carolly brought me some flowers the other day and—’”

“My father held up his hand about six inches from my mother’s face. ‘Stop, woman. Stop now. I will not have you defending the Rutulskys in front of the children. Save your ridiculous comments for when we’re alone so I can pray for your confused and unworthy and rebellious soul. You are so easily led astray, Susanna, and your compassion is misplaced, as usual.’”

Lara shook her head. “My mother shut right up, her head hanging about seven inches away from her plate.”

“So, your father, a minister, someone who is supposed to love God and love Jesus and try to be kind to others, terrorized everyone who came into contact with him.”

“Oh yes. Almost everyone was damned to hell. A couple of times, when someone stood up to him, questioned him, he would put his hands together as if in prayer.” Lara showed how he did it. “And then he told the person that he would pray for them, that he would pray that God would show them the light, take away their ignorance, that they were unworthy to speak of His name until they repented. He used prayer as a weapon all the time. A way to make people feel bad about themselves.”

“Yes, childhood does suck,” I agreed. Lara had a raving lunatic for a father, and I had a raving bitch for a mother. Perhaps we could introduce them to each other one day. Either Lara’s father would become my mother’s sex slave or they would kill each other.

“And, of course, gay people just sent him into a tailspin,” Lara continued, her gaze still fixated out the window. She reminded me of someone looking out through the bars of a jail. “I had to stand outside shopping malls with him handing out anti-gay literature. So did my brothers. I read the pamphlets with my brothers at night. They presented as ‘facts’ that gay people had over a hundred partners each, that they were predators against children, had fetishes for animals, particularly sheep, and were otherwise perverted and gross. The literature also had detailed information about the fragility of rectal walls, the dangers of oral sex, and how gays were destroying America and had hidden agendas to take over the country and teach children how to be gay in the schools.

“A few times people would shake his hand, but almost everyone dropped the literature on the ground, in the trash, and kept going. Sometimes people swore at us, swore at my father, and he would simply stand there with his Bible and quote from it at the top of his voice. Half the time there was such a commotion that the store owners would beg us to leave. My brothers and I were always so relieved to see a store owner. We couldn’t wait to get out of there. And all the way home in the car, my father would talk about how revolting gay sex was, and he would regale us with the physical details of gay sex, things no child should hear.”

Lara turned to face me, her face flushed. “I cannot even begin to tell you how furious my father was when my brother called him from New York City and told him he was gay and had realized he was gay since he was fifteen. I thought my father was going to have a coronary right there in our little holy rectory.”

“What happened?”

“He disowned my brother. Hasn’t talked to him in ten years. Isn’t that Christ-like?” Lara made a choking sound in her throat. “My brother used to send cards and letters, but my father would send them all back. Now he just calls me and my other brother, who lives in Oregon. Jerry and I see Peter and his partner about twice a year. We go to museums, walk in the park, go out to eat, meet their friends. They’re great people, certainly better people than my father.”

I didn’t know what to say. As someone who has also had a rotten childhood, I know that silence is sometimes the best comfort. No one can really say anything that will take the pain or inbred fear away.

“In fact, I miss Peter and Steve. Sometimes I feel like they’re the only people I can talk to.”

“What do they do in New York?” I asked.

Lara’s face brightened. “They have this fabulous loft in Greenwich Village. Peter is a vice-president of a financial firm, and Steve is an artist and a teacher for the public school system, and they have all these liberal, wonderful friends who are always holding these great parties.”

“They must know a lot of artists, then.”

“Oh, yes, they do.” As her face lit up, a new Lara emerged. “Yes, they’re friends with artists of all types.”

“You must have a lot in common with their artistic friends, then, Lara, since you’ve told me that you like to paint.” I would later discover that saying Lara “liked to paint” was like saying Beethoven liked to fiddle with piano keys.

“Oh, yes, I like to paint.” She looked at me, those huge blue eyes awash with tears so big a small squirrel could swim in them. “Hell, Julia, come on up. I’ve never let anyone see the attic except for Jerry, so don’t laugh.”

“I won’t laugh.” I couldn’t imagine laughing. But, then, I couldn’t imagine what was up there, either.

I trooped behind her up the stairs. We walked down the hallway, past two bedrooms. One was definitely an office for Lara’s husband, and one was a sewing room. I peeked into their master bedroom. Again, it was perfect. And barren. And bleak. I just could not imagine someone who looked and acted like Lara sleeping in that room. It was like dumping an orchid into a bagful of needles.

She took a key off the top of the door trim, inserted it into the lock, pushed the door open, and we climbed about ten steps into the attic. “Can’t have any of the church ladies coming in here, I’ll tell you that,” she said, before a little hyena-like laugh erupted from her lips. Lara turned on the light, and I followed her in. Then stopped at the threshold.

I froze when I saw what was in that room. Stunned beyond stunned

In front of me was the most expansive, colorful artist’s studio I could ever imagine. Every inch of it looked like Lara—the real Lara. “The previous owner had the room remodeled and the skylights put in,” Lara said, looking relaxed for the first time. “He needed a third-floor office. Apparently he had a porn business. At least that’s what two of the neighbors told me. He was a deacon in one of the local churches here, too.”

On each of the four walls of the attic Lara had painted a mural. One was of the New York skyline, the way it would look if you were sitting on the top of one of the many tenement buildings. On all the other buildings, other people of all races and ages were out on the rooftops, too. Some were playing instruments, others were dancing, many were alone, staring at the sky.

In another mural, Lara had painted a group of people at a picnic together, only all of the people were famous historic and present-day figures: Abraham Lincoln, Rosa Parks, Tina Turner, Oprah Winfrey, Bono, Sandra Day O’Connor, Nelson Mandela, and Amelia Earhart.

On another wall, she had painted a huge quilt, and in every square of the quilt, she’d painted families from all over the world—Japanese, Chinese, African, and so on. Some were laughing, some crying, some looked tired, others happy.

On the fourth wall, she had painted a scene from an art gallery. Every painting on every easel was different. And all the paintings had Lara’s name in the corner.

The ceiling was painted a light blue with sunflowers. The sunflowers looked like van Gogh’s sunflowers: distressed, unhappy, living, breathing things, caked with paint.

And scattered all about, against the walls, up on two different easels, were paintings that Lara had done herself. I walked around the easels, stunned at the paintings, then looked through the art stacked against the walls. I knew brilliant artwork when I saw it—had, in fact, been praised many times by my boss for noticing the quality of a new artist’s work, or the lack of it.

One painting made me catch my breath. It was of a naked man, wrapped around a sunflower. The sunflower was taller than he was. It was exactly as Caroline had described it during one of the Psychic Nights. It had sounded ridiculous then, even though Caroline had said it with such seriousness.

The floor seemed to shake a little beneath my feet. Of course, maybe Caroline had heard Lara talk about her latest painting, but I had seen Lara’s reaction to Caroline’s statement: she had been shocked, but not surprised, and Lara had said she didn’t let anyone up here, so I knew Caroline couldn’t have already seen it.

I guess you get like that when you hang out long enough with a psychic. They shock you, but you’re not surprised they know what they do.

While Lara had used only paints with some of the canvasses, like the one with the naked man and the sunflower, with others she had used bits of crumbled-up newspapers, buttons, confetti, twigs, a miniature bird’s nest, crayons, pages from books, and dried flowers.

The effect was stunning.

I sucked in my breath. The woman was an
amazing
artist. I looked around the room. This was what Lara looked like to me, not the sterility of downstairs. Not the boring perfection. This room was raw and emotional and throbbing with energy. It was alive, so very,
very
alive, as if a soul had been sprung loose from a cage and erupted with artistic enthusiasm.

“I don’t even know what to say….”

“Don’t feel like you have to, Julia.” Lara gathered up paints and brushes that had been left haphazardly around the room. I could tell by her tone that she had about as much confidence in her artwork as I did in ever permanently escaping Robert.

“It’s incredible,” I said. The words were so soft, I didn’t think she would even hear me, but I was so awed, so dumbstruck, I could barely speak.

“Oh, please, Julia.” She turned to face me, skepticism all over her classic features. “You don’t need to humor me.”

I stopped looking at the artwork, faced her square-on. “I’m not humoring you, Lara. People did that to me in the past, and I hated it. Hated the sanctimonious, patronizing looks on their faces while they lied to make me feel better about one thing or another. I told you your work is incredible because it is. I should know. I worked in art galleries for years.”

“You really like them?” Her tone was so hopeful, so unsure. So like me. I felt myself connecting with Lara where before we hadn’t.

“I’m positive. Your work should be in an art gallery, not hidden up here in your attic. You should share it with everyone, and you could sell it if you wanted.”

She shook her head then, and I could see that latent anger and frustration rising in her features. She spread her skinny arms out, indicating her artwork. “How could I possibly do that?” she snapped. “Have you really looked at these? Some of the men and women are nude. Look at this one.” She held up a painting with two women and a man. They were all lying down, the man between the women. One of the women was older, with gray hair and glasses. Alongside her were miniature smiling children, a house, and older couples that looked like parents and in-laws.

The other woman was young with flowing blond hair and huge boobs. Alongside her were a miniature cruise boat, jewelry, cash, and a fancy car. In between them was a man who was good-looking in a pretty, soulless, self-centered, annoying way. The two women glared at each other over him.

“How about my nude garden series?” she said, snatching up one painting, then another. In one painting, a nude woman, shown from the waist up, stood in her garden holding a birdhouse in front of her. She wore a straw hat and a smile. Birds swirled around her head.

In another a nude man tended his garden, surrounded by cornstalks. In the third painting, three middle-aged women sprawled on a quilt, roses in their hands and threaded through wreaths around their heads. They smiled at one another. “Can you imagine the outcry in this town if people saw this?”

Yes, I could. Small towns are not usually known for their liberal attitudes. But the paintings were so vibrant, so striking.

“My husband is a minister.” She dropped the three women, then yanked up another of a couple naked and laughing and hugging on a bed of marigolds. “He’s the head of a church. I teach Sunday school. I work half-time as the church secretary. I lead choir practice on Tuesday night. A very proper and boring choir practice, I’ll have to say. Sometimes I feel like I’m going to go to sleep directing these people.” Her shoulders slumped. “I can’t possibly let anyone see these. And I’m not even thinking about what my father would do. God. He would probably set up camp here in the middle of my living room, not letting me or my husband out until we all died from starvation.”

I dragged my eyes away from the art and thought about that. It actually didn’t seem out of the realm of possibility. I envisioned myself rappelling down the fireplace to give her food.

“No. I absolutely cannot show these pictures to anyone.” She flung a paintbrush across the wall. It clattered to the floor. Then she picked up another. And another. All of the paintbrushes went flying. I grabbed her as she reached for one of the water cans.