The Art Of The Heart (5 page)

Spring came late with a slow thaw after one last hard early March freeze. Green things finally peaked warily through the mud. It was going to be a late planting season. With the warmth came the rain, but at least the people of Sweetwater could move about freely again and the annual ritual of
spring cleaning commenced in every household. The unburying felt somehow larger this year with the families having been trapped like bears in their caves for three months. The McHenrys had fought the worst of it. Somehow their household had become infested with a variety of insect pests over the season of seclusion. Everything from cockroaches and water bugs to spiders. Simple spray cans of insecticide were no longer effective against the creepy crawlies. The multi-legged critters survived and flourished. The family’s last resort was to call in a professional exterminator from Kansas City. Their house would have to be fumigated and that required them to vacate the premises for an entire weekend.

As it happened, the weekend the
McHenrys needed to be away from their home coincided with the adult Westons’ plans to travel to Saint Louis for a farm equipment show. The McHenry parents decided it would be to their advantage to accompany them. It was time for the farmers to update their equipment to stay in step with the changing times.

The McHenry children would camp for the weekend with Zac in the Weston home during their parents
’ absence. Rory was the adult in charge. Zac was simultaneously filled with dread, longing, and excitement to see his idol again. He hadn’t set eyes upon him since Thanksgiving. It had been that long since he’d tucked his sketchbook away in a drawer. He expected Rory to ignore him, but he was accustomed to that from most people. He just looked forward to his presence under the same roof.

School being out, the four girls and two McHenry boys piled into the Weston house with their individual suitcases early on a Friday as their parents loaded up the
McHenrys’ station wagon to head for the Gateway to the West. Rules and instructions were left in handwritten notes held in place by magnets on the refrigerator. Everyone had their individual responsibilities assigned to them; from dishwashing to cooking, and assisting Zac with the care of the farm animals. He wasn’t surprised to find that Dale had been paired with him. The girls did the cleaning; the boys did the dirty work.

It was a great relief when Rory greeted Zac as he always had, with his
“Hey there, Two-Tone!” If he was disturbed by anything he’d seen last Thanksgiving in Zac’s sketchbook, he didn’t show it. He did seem preoccupied with his responsibilities. Doubtless, he probably had a thousand other things he wanted to do, and a dozen other places he’d rather be, but he was shouldered with a weekend of babysitting. By that night they had all chosen and settled into the rooms where they would sleep. Earlier the oldest McHenry daughter had made them a dinner of spaghetti and grape Kool-Aid. Everything seemed to fall into a calm order under Rory’s supervision. Up until bedtime the boys played cards, the girls had gotten out their make-up and nail polish. Zac watched them all quietly from the top of the stairs. For the most part they didn’t even notice he was there. The two McHenry boys had taken his parents’ bedroom down the corridor from him. They both said “Goodnight” to him as they passed his room. It was amazing how such a simple gesture could feel so good.

That night, perhaps because of seeing Rory again, he dreamt of him for the first time in ages. It was a simple dream. Nothing anyone else would have thought spectacular. In it, Rory told him he was his best friend in the whole world
. It made Zac’s whole soul smile.

Saturday morning the skies had turned the color of gunmetal. Charcoal clouds scudded low. The winds had stirred up and whistled through the cracks in the old house. The temperature dropped quickly
. Everything beyond the windows bore the threat of dangerous weather. It was not uncommon for the flatlands to get hit by tornadoes several times a year. Sweetwater had only experienced serious devastation once, long before anyone’s memory, in the Nineteen-Twenties. So far it seemed there was enough clear land and space for the funnels to make a track without touching the homes or their inhabitants. That didn’t mean they didn’t take precautions. Every house had a root cellar dug out in the back yard. Not just to store food, but to provide shelter in ominous weather. Rory kept its padlock key in his pocket as he sat at the kitchen table listening to the weather report on the radio.

By noon the weather had turned daylight into darkness. They had to turn on the house lights. Dale brought out the kerosene lanterns from the pantry. Power outages in rural areas could last for days. Candles were screwed into holders, with boxes of matches waiting alongside. Cows were pulled into the barn to share space with the chickens. The electricity in the air made it feel like something scary was on its way. The girls pulled the shutters securely over all the windows and latched them.

Zac stayed parked at the top of the stairs where he could spy on Rory listening to the radio at the kitchen table. The girls had gathered on the living room floor to play Old Maid. Dale stood at the open front door staring out at the odd colored landscape. It looked like the sky had lowered itself to the ground. Fog billowed ankle deep and thick.

He
’d never grow tired of observing Rory’s metamorphosis into manhood. He had filled out more during the winter months. His shirts seemed a bit smaller on him, his jeans a tad tighter. He sat at the table, leg nervously jittering under it, toe tapping the linoleum as he listened to the weather report. His summer tan had faded. That made his unshaven band of scruff appear darker over his jawline. He anxiously chewed a thumbnail. The knit of his pale brows showed the extent of his worry.

A peal of thunder rattled the house, startling everyone. Lights blinked. Zac saw Rory rise from the table, disappear into the pantry and return with a small transistor radio. He turned off the electric one and tuned the small radio to the same station. Dale had joined him in the kitchen to check the lanterns.

Rain pelted the exterior of the house. Dale drew close to a window peering through the slats in the shutters. The girls had grown quiet, abandoning their card game to listen to the noises heard from outside. Zac could see the tension in their faces. This contained fear went on for a couple of hours until eventually they adjusted to the persistent percussion. They had a dinner of cheese sandwiches and canned soup as the storm wailed onward into evening.

Around nine o
’clock the winds kicked into high gear again, howling around the old wooden house. Lights flickered, went out, came back on and then extinguished entirely. The girls shrieked and then the house fell into a deep hush as the two McHenry boys lit the lanterns. They distributed them throughout the rooms.

The storm slammed the house steadily as everyone turned in for the night. Whispers turned into snores. Zac lay still in his bed listening to the sounds, watching the play of shadows on the ceiling from the flickering lantern. It hissed quietly from his nightstand. Sleep eluded him
. His mind raced. Seeing Rory again brought back his inspiration to draw; to return to the story he’d abandoned months ago.

He rose and crept to his dresser, opened the bottom drawer where he
’d hidden the sketchbook under some clothes, and retrieved it. Finding his pencils, he checked their sharpness and carried them to his bed, turning the lantern so it shone across the open book. The first portrait that greeted him was of his idol reclining on the tractor in the field. He closed his eyes remembering the sweltering heat of that day, the smell of the dust from the road blowing into the truck’s cab; the tight fit as he sat between the then boy’s tanned legs. His mind kept every detail as full and rich as if it had happened yesterday.

The next picture was of Rory leaning against the wall of the general store in a wedge of shadow, looking like a long-haired rebel with a cigarette dangling from his lips, shirt sleeves rolled up to display his work-hardened, rounded biceps and shoulders. He had the natural stance of a movie star.

The next few pictures were the ones that had caused his embarrassment. They were of the older boy skinny dipping in Bullfrog Pond in the moonlight; then lying fully exposed on the grass to dry in the cool night air. Done in silhouettes, one showed him pleasuring himself. The curves and shadows revealed every contour of his body arched off the ground, the muscles of his tight butt clenched, and the firm grip on his erection. It hadn’t actually happened. The artist had pulled it from his imagination. That was what had been so humiliating when Rory had seen it that Thanksgiving day. He’d had a glimpse into Zac’s mind.

Zac sighed. Even though he
’d been embarrassed, it was again difficult for him to not lust for the real human behind the fictional comic book character. He flipped through the pages of the storyboard, realizing he hadn’t yet finished it. There were only a few more scenes needed to complete the story. Picking up his pencil, he began to draw in the wavering lantern light. These final scenes would come from his heart. They would complete a true love story.

Shutters hummed like a toneless harmonica against the storm. The world was like that sometimes, he thought.
Harsh, wild; without harmony. It needed an Eros to deliver the worry-wearied and lonely hearts to someplace warm and kind and caring. A world which harmonized with love’s music.

An hour later, when he was finished, when the last frame of the story was drawn, he set down his pencil and smiled. It had taken him a long time to complete this special story. He was now glad he did. It filled him with renewed hope. He needed to believe in happy endings.

Whether it was the charge of electromagnetic energy in the air from the storm, or his imagination still absorbed with the fantasy he’d created, he sensed something different around him. Something intangible but thrilling. The hairs on his arm stood on end. His skin prickled with unknown anticipation. Perhaps it was like with ghosts and prayers; it took belief in them to allow a doorway into the world where a lantern glowed on a nightstand and shadows danced on a wall. But he definitely felt the movement of something magical.

He heard the familiar slow squeal of the old hinges on the door to his parents
’ room as it opened. There was the creaking of varnished floorboards beneath bare feet. He looked toward his closed bedroom door. He didn’t need to be able to see through it to know a presence stood beyond it. There was a soft rap of knuckles in its center before the knob twisted and it opened inward. Wavering light played over Rory’s tall form in the doorway. He was wearing a white T and boxers; long hair had been fastened into a ponytail. His face looked like a sculpture in the flirtatious illumination. Blue eyes looked as if he’d just awakened. His expression, seen through Zac’s protective ginger blockade, appeared confused like he’d wandered inside the room while sleepwalking.

“
Hey there, Two-Tone,” his voice was hesitant. “Hope I didn’t wake you? I was…” he looked away as if still confused. “I was just checking on everyone. Everything okay?”

Zac nodded without looking up. His hands gripped the edges of the sketchbook in his lap. There was a long pause between them filled only with the hiss of a lantern and the sound of rain pattering the house.

“You drawing?” Rory asked. He shut the door behind him as he stepped further into the room.

Zac stared at the last few images he
’d drawn, before he closed the book without saying a word. He could see Rory’s bare feet moving closer to his bed. All his toes were perfectly rounded, each nail had a white crescent embedded at its base. Even his feet seemed like art; looked as strong as the rest of him.

The timpani began in his chest again, the beat making its way to his ears. The actual silence between them made him look up. He didn
’t want to, but the curiosity pulled his gaze there. Rory was staring at the closed cover of the sketchbook. His own curiosity held him captive. For the second time their eyes locked. He had no way to interpret what was going on behind the older boy’s gaze, but it was almost as if he were hypnotized. Without asking, he sat next to Zac on his bed. Instinctively the younger boy moved a few inches away. He’d never had anyone intrude this deep into his personal space. It unnerved him. Dressed in his plain cotton pajamas, his leg was mere inches from Rory’s naked thigh. It sent his emotions into a scramble. A tremor pulled like a drawstring, tightening his stomach.

“
Do you mind?” Rory asked, extending his hand toward the book. Zac didn’t answer, didn’t offer, but the book was pulled gently from his grasp. In the next instant it was lying across bare legs. Again, he felt helpless, but remembered the last time Rory had held the book. The end result was not as horrific or as life-ending as he’d imagined, or Rory would not be seated next to him wanting to look at it once more. He opened it to the first page. The portrait of himself lying on the tractor in the sun. This time he allowed his eyes to linger, absorbing every small detail.

Zac
’s palms began to sweat. He wiped them on his knees to dry them and held them there to steady the quaking that had overtaken his limbs.

“
Did you know that I dated Miss Scotts last year?” Rory asked, his eyes never leaving the page.

Miss Scotts had been everyone
’s twelfth grade teacher at the high school in Clarksville that all the kids who lived in Sweetwater attended. Zac had no knowledge that Rory had dated the teacher. But she was young. In her late twenties. Attractive. Very modern in her teaching practices. She even allowed them to bring in their favorite records to discuss what the music meant to them. Everyone had liked her. Miss Scotts had liked him. He felt she understood him. Even though he was quiet, she didn’t press him to speak in front of the class. She always left encouraging notes for him on the homework he’d turned in. He said nothing in response to Rory’s revelation about her.