Someone to Love (17 page)

The thin-lipped girl from “Professor Elton’s”
class sits two seats over to the left. Perfect. She’ll probably be
moved to overanalyze my work, and all roads of critical
interpretation will inevitably lead to the fact I gave love the
middle finger. And, really? Who the hell cares about my opinion?
Well, apparently, she does.

A girl with a svelte red coat zips in and
fills the space between us. Already, I like her for acting as a
buffer between me and Miss I Will Find Love and it Will Prosper.
Let’s see who’s so hot on love after a few volatile divorces and a
bitter custody battle that spans states or, God forbid, countries.
One day she’ll add divorcee to her personal roster of achievements
and will mark my words as the only truth she’s ever known. Of
course, my mother never referred to herself as a divorcee, she
simply said she was “out on parole.” And the whole custody battle
never materialized for her either since technically both parties
would have to
want
the child for those evil shenanigans to
ensue. My father was far too busy procreating with the candlestick
maker to deal with the family he left an entire state behind.

The girl in the crimson coat turns and gives
a curt smile, so I take the initiative.

“Kendall.” I offer her a quick handshake.
Everyone at Garrison has been so nice. Back home, life was all
about hard looks and keeping to yourself, but here, everyone feels
like family. “Liberal arts.”

“Blair Lancaster.” She pulls her cheeks back
without a smile. “Journalism, but photography is my passion.”

There’s something strangely familiar about
her, and I just can’t seem to place it.

A loud shuffling comes from the front as an
older woman makes her way to the center of the room. She wears a
long damask coat with a vomit-inspired color palate and layers and
layers of beaded necklaces as though she robbed the accessories
department at the mall and decided to don all the loot at once.
There’s an overall bohemian appeal to her, and innately I know this
is Professor Webber. Her wiry red hair sprays out in every
direction, and it’s not until she turns my way do I realize she’s
taken liberty with cosmetics that should be restricted exclusively
to Broadway plays and Halloween. She hands out a syllabus without
so much as a hello, and I gawk at the list of essential
supplies.

“I’m going to need a storage unit to house
all this,” I muse. “Let alone make nine trips from the bookstore to
lug everything.”

“Tell me about it.” Blair cuts a glance my
way. “But I bet a pretty girl like you has a nice strong boyfriend
to help out.”

I make a face before turning the paper around
and gasp. The list goes on for another entire page.

“This is going to cost a fortune,” I say,
mostly to myself. “She is aware most of us have yet to outfit
ourselves with a six-figure income.”

Blair scoffs. “You’d think the only thing we
really need, to sketch a bunch of nude models, is a number two
pencil.”

“Nude?” I swallow hard. I can’t do nude. I’ll
laugh, or cry, or run out of the room screaming. I’ll have human
private parts permanently seared to my inner psyche, and who knows
where this will take my nightmares?

“What did you think this was?” She tucks her
chin in and gawks at me, appalled by my naïveté.

“Um art…” I take in a quick breath. Shit.
Study of the human body literally translates into drawing the human
form? “I thought it was statues and stuff.”

“Nope.” She picks up her pencil and points
over to the center of the room where a middle-aged man and woman
emerge without much fanfare, outfitted in thin purple robes.

Oh crap.

I have a feeling their bare legs and arms are
all signs of overexposed things to come. They slip off their
makeshift kimonos and reveal a tidal wave of flesh before neatly
folding their robes as if it were perfectly sane to do remedial
household chores in the freaking nude with a live audience of newly
emancipated minors.

They’re naked!

Naked
.

I turn away as if I’ve just witnessed a
horrible car accident complete with gallons of blood and severed
limbs only it’s miles of wrinkled skin and sunspots in places where
the sun should never ever shine.

I sneak another quick peek.

Bits and pieces!

Bits and pieces!

Shit! Shit! Shit! I
knew
I should have
read the class description a little more thoroughly. I was so
worried about not getting a full load that I glossed over the
specifics. And the fact I was a transfer student meant I would be
left with the crappy classes the rest of the student body didn’t
care for if I didn’t act fast. I thought for sure I made safe
choices, unlike the dicey decisions I’ve engaged in since my
arrival, like asking my newfound “Professor” to tutor me in the
fine art of one-night stands—and for damn sure I wasn’t gunning to
stare at geriatric penises for an hour straight, three times a
week, in the name of art of all things.

“You can stop freaking out,” Blair whispers.
“He’s completely turned the other way.”

I peer over and confirm her theory. He’s
older with a hairy back and a furry ass to match. I don’t really
mind all the fur, seeing that it creates a simian effect, and that
sort of takes the edge off the whole naked human thing. To his left
sits an equally garmentless woman, woefully seasoned by time. Her
heavily puckered face boasts a thousand wrinkles that wink in and
out as she frowns. Her copper hair is in need of a touch-up at the
roots as evidenced by the four inches of silver sprouting from her
scalp. And I’m betting she’s had enough experience with the Unhappy
Hair and Nail Salon to know to stay the hell away from that place.
Her skin is dutifully leathered, leaving her unusually smooth and
perky breasts to glow like lanterns in contrast to the rest of
her.

“God, it’s like her boobs never aged,” I
whisper to Blair.

“I bet half the boys in the class are hitting
DEFON five with their erections right about now,” she sneers, and
we share a laugh.

“They should’ve mentioned the arousal factor
as a disclaimer for the class. Not that I’m even slightly
aroused.”

“Not with that beefcake you’ve got lying
around.” She glides her pencil across her paper with a marked
aggression.

Beefcake? She probably has me confused with
someone else. Technically, I’m not with Cruise, although he does
more than qualify for the beefcake category.

Professor Webber scuttles over. “Start with
the model closest to you.” She leans in over my shoulder, inspiring
me to pick up my pencil and quickly sketch out something that
loosely resembles a cat. “I’d like the models to rotate positions.”
She booms over at the two human skin sacs, and they shift in their
seats.

I wait until she scissors on by before
leaning into Blair.

“Let’s hope he doesn’t offer us the full
frontal,” I say, attempting to sketch out his form. He’s hunched
over and his head is tilted to the side. If I didn’t know better,
I’d swear he were coming to the conclusion this was an egregious
error in judgment.

“You act like you’ve never seen it before.”
She gives a disbelieving look.

My mouth opens to say something, but a shy
smile cinches up my lips, instead.

I suppose it’s odd to find a virgin in the
masses, so I don’t volunteer the fact I’m one of the defamed
mythological creatures. Instead, I happily trace out the half-moon
spread in front of me and try not to dwell on the fact he’s
slightly adjusted himself and now I can see his belly. I simply
won’t look below the fold and safely avert all trauma.

“You know they pay a fortune for these
models,” she purrs.

“Oh, I’m sure they’re volunteers.” I’m quick
to shoot down her fiscally unsound theory. “There are probably
miles of perverts willing to ingrain their junk into our delicate
grey matter. I wouldn’t be surprised if the nudists on display are
having some heightened sexual experience on our behalf. I once
watched this special about people who got off looking at
feet
all day long. Swear to God, every time I see a man
glance at my stilettos, I run the other way.”

“You’re funny.” She says it dry like she
doesn’t really mean it. “But I happen to know for a fact that the
art department at Garrison pays two hundred bucks a pop to anyone
who wants to strut their stuff.” She shrugs. “It beats flipping
burgers. The catch is, you’re only allowed once a semester.”

“Are you going to do it?” I’m completely
intrigued, and for a brief moment, I imagine her perched on one of
those cold steely chairs sans the paper-thin robe.

“Maybe.” She looks to the ceiling a moment.
“How about you? I bet it’d more than cover the cost of the art
supplies. You’d practically make money on the deal.”

Two hundred dollars? Forget the art supplies,
I could pay Cruise for room and board. Take
him
to dinner
for a change.

“Well, I was sort of thinking of getting a
job at Starbucks.” True story. Plus that way I could hang out with
Ally and sip lattes for a few hours each day, and it wouldn’t feel
like work at all.

“At minimum wage?” She balks. “This is
practically a semester’s worth of paychecks in one short hour. It
almost seems too good to pass up. She probably doesn’t have any
spaces left, though.”

The elderly gentleman shifts just enough to
expose us to more of his goodies, then I see it.

Gah
! I close my eyes tight and slowly
peer from around the side of the easel. I was half-hoping he’d be
cleverly holding a book or a magazine or, hell, even a cigar to
cover up his spare appendage, but dear God almighty, he is loud and
proud. Well, actually…not so loud, more like a whisper. It’s sort
of a nub—dehydrated at that, and no bigger than a fun-sized candy
bar. Are they really that tiny? Dear God, it’s almost invisible.
Lauren said it was like a banana, so I’m actually sort of
disappointed. And for sure the Storm Trooper theory just went out
the window. Maybe he needed the money to get one of those
prosthetic jobs? Or maybe he had it hacked? You hear about all
kinds of pissed off wives who go after their cheating husbands with
a hatchet. Or maybe it was just your run-of-the-mill
not-so-fictitious motorcycle accident.

The visual assault goes on for an hour solid,
and to my horror both the male and female models stand around
afterwards speaking to the students like it was some twisted social
mixer with an optional dress code.

“So, are you going to talk to the professor?”
Blair incites the two-hundred-dollar question once again.

“Doubtful. I don’t have the guts to do
something like that.”

She pumps her shoulders. “Two hundred dollars
can make someone pretty brave. Besides, it’s easy cash.”

“Are you going to do it?” I fully examine her
for the first time. She’s pretty in general. Her mid-length hair is
perfectly curled and sprayed into position, making it impervious to
the constant windstorms that reside outside these walls. She wears
a simple strand of pearls and perhaps a little too much foundation
in a shade that gives her an unnatural orange glow.

“I will if you will,” she offers.

“Maybe I will,” I say.

Blair escorts us over to Professor Webber and
fills her in on the fact we’re willing to expose our youthful flesh
in exchange for two hundred hard ones. She’s quick to pull out her
planner at the prospect of two potentially nude co-eds.

“Only a couple more female slots left. I’ve
got next Monday and the following Friday wide open.” She looks up
at us impressed by our decision to bare it all in the name of
artistic enlightenment. For a stunt like this I should be
guaranteed a B in the class for
B
aring it all. But I’m
gunning for the A, so it really doesn’t matter.

Blair looks over at me nervously. “I’ll take
the following Friday.”

“So I guess it’s Monday for me.” That gives
me almost a week to chicken out of the idea. “Wait, Monday the
nineteenth?”

“That’s right. Is that a problem?” Webber’s
fuchsia lips pull into a line.

“No, it’s not a problem.” It’s my
birthday.

I’ll simply be wearing the same outfit that I
did twenty-one years ago on that very day—my birthday suit.

I come home to find Cruise still in his suit
jacket, his wire-rimmed glasses. God its as if he was a total fake
these past few weeks and now his real self has emerged as some
perverted academic.

“Professor Elton,” I say as I walk past him
and pull a bottle of water from the fridge. “Oh, I’m sorry. Am I to
call you master? I can’t remember. I haven’t quite memorized the
syllabus yet.”

“So you’re upset?” He bleeds a nefarious grin
as if this pleased him on some level. His eyes secure themselves
over me with that
get in my bed
seductive stare.