When Life Turned Purple (2 page)

Russ stared at the painting.

“I did this one with acrylics and gouache,” she said.

Russ shifted his head. “So, assuming I stood on Titan while facing Jupiter, this is what I would see? Exactly?”

“Yeah.”

He stared at it another moment, then nodded. “That is seriously one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen.”

Lia made a self-hugging motion, her shoulders rising to her ears. “Really?”

He looked at her. “Yeah, of course. That’s so cool that you can do that.” And for once, Russ really meant it. Usually, all sorts of stuff popped out of his mouth when he dealt with girls. He never meant to lie. But getting caught up in the moment, he just blurted out whatever convincing phrases came to mind. “How’d you get into it?” he said. “I mean, I never saw ‘space artist’ presented at a job fair.”

Inviting him to sit down on her charcoal suede couch, Lia said, “I was always interested in astronomy, but I’m
so
not left-brained. Yet I decided to major in it anyway, even though I found out pretty quickly that it’s very math-focused—which is
not
my strong point.” She folded her knees under her and leaned on her elbow across the back of the couch. “I liked learning all the details of the planets—their temperatures, rotations, orbits, and their distances from each other and from the Sun, and everything—but all the astrophysics were getting me down. Like measuring frequencies, wavelengths, and energies, along with ionization? It just wasn’t for me.”

Wanting to look as if he understood everything she was saying, Russ nodded and said, “Yeah, I get that.”

“I’m more of a visual learner,” Lia continued. “So I started drawing the calculations and other stuff to help me understand them better. And my professors noticed. It started from there and just kept on going. So I not only discovered this amazing new career, but I also discovered that I have a skill I never knew before.”

Lia fell silent as she appeared to contemplate her next words. Russ resisted the urge to fill the silence. Then Lia said, “The thing is, as much as I love space and astronomy, it gets sort of spooky and depressing sometimes. These places don’t have much or even any atmosphere and they’re really far from the Sun, so it’s always dark. This means that the whole time you’re creating the image, you’re immersed in night. Daylight never comes.” She slid off the couch and went to the table to prop up an unfinished painting. Russ got up to stand next to her. “That’s why I like the terraforming projects that come along. Like how Mars would look if we played around with its atmosphere and do all sorts of stuff to make it inhabitable? Or the Moon?”

“So what’s this one?” said Russ. “That’s Saturn in the background—so is this one of Saturn’s moons?

“Yeah, this is a terraformed Titan.”

“Someone wants to terraform Titan?”

“No,” Lia said with a laugh. “I just painted it for my own pleasure. Like how I did that painting, too,” she added, turning to point behind her at a sunset scene that held Saturn, Jupiter, and— “What’s that big blue planet again?” he asked.

“It’s Neptune,” she said.

“Why does it have rings around it?”

“Because it does. That’s a newer discovery, so a lot of people don’t know about it. Anyway, I always thought it would be cool if these three planets would be in
our
sky. Well, theoretically cool, anyway. If they were actually that close, their gravitational pull would totally wreck us—we’d lose the Moon, for one.”

As Lia kept showing him her art, Russ got a strange feeling in his stomach and chest.

Staring at another painting, Russ said, “You know…you’re really something special.”

He felt her look at him. Then he looked at her. And the way she gazed at him—well, Russ knew what that meant.

Finally, the moment had arrived.

Leaning toward her, Russ reached out his arms. But Lia pulled away and said, “No—I—I’m so sorry, Russ.” Her head bowed to one side as her shoulders hunched. “I want to, but I just—I don’t want to go there. I just—it’s so hard to explain to other people, but I….” Her voice trailed off, and she just stood there, looking sorry and even a bit scared.

“It’s okay,” he said. But as foolish as he felt, she looked like she felt even worse. And didn’t she just say she wanted him too? “Don’t worry,” he said. “Whenever you’re ready.”

She bit her lower lip and smiled at him, blushing. “Some guys get mad,” she said.

“’Cause they’re turds,” said Russ.

A short laugh burst from her throat. “Yeah…well, it’s like they feel they deserve all of me just for buying me dinner or taking me to a movie.” Her face fell. “Sort of like a two-for-one deal with Rent-a-’Ho.”

His eyebrows shot up when she said that. “No,” he said. “That’s not—” He frowned. “If you give me their names, I’ll go ‘talk’ to them.”

Her smile returned for a moment when he said that. Then her mouth drooped again and she said, “Or they think that because I’m smiling or laughing a lot, then that means I want them.” Her forehead creased. “And then if I don’t give in, I’m being a tease.” She went back to chewing her lower lip, then said, “But it’s hard to always have to hold back and gauge exactly how much I’m smiling or laughing. Well, I guess you thought something, too, but you’re still not mad at me. Right? You don’t seem mad at all.”

“Nope,” Russ said. And he wasn’t. Disappointed for sure. But not mad.

Lia’s shoulders relaxed and she gazed at him for a moment. “Anyway, it’s not like you read me wrong,” she said. “I—I feel attracted to you. But I just don’t want to get back into the whole thing. I don’t want to go back to being that person again.”

A suntanned blonde sashayed into the store. She’d been here twice already this week. She’d checked out different equipment, asked some questions, and flirted with him. It turned out she was visiting from LA. He gave her a nod and a smile as he finished ringing up the purchases in front of him. She came up to the far end of the counter and leaned against it on her arms.

“Great to see you,” Russ said to the last customer. “Hope to see you again.”

“With service like this, you can bet on it!” the customer said with a grin.

When he left, Russ turned to the girl. “And what can I do for you today?”

She flashed him a big smile. “Today’s my last day in Seattle. I’m leaving tomorrow afternoon.”

“Hm,” said Russ, nodding. Underneath her tan, she had freckles. Lots of them. It gave her a friendly, spunky look with her streaked poofy hair. She was dressed casually, but her T-shirt sported the Guess logo.

She continued to smile at him, bouncing on the balls of her feet. Russ bet that she didn’t have issues with her very essence “being dispersed by random touch.”

“I’m closing up soon,” he said. “Wanna go get some coffee after?”

“Sure,” she said and her smile widened.

Hot damn!

As they chatted, Russ learned that her name was Alex and she worked in a beauty salon. She was in Seattle for a cousin’s wedding.

Then a sorority girl popped in and asked lots of questions about thermal socks, but decided she needed more time to think about it and left.

After locking up, Russ and Alex picked up some coffee and walked around. But Russ kept comparing her to Lia. He didn’t mean to, but when he looked at her tanned freckled skin, he automatically thought of Lia’s smooth ivory skin. When Alex looked up at him with her light green eyes, he immediately thought of Lia’s rich purple ones. Alex was cute and peppy, but Russ felt like he was walking around with a magazine cut-out instead of a real person. And he missed the conversational curveballs that kept him on his toes with Lia—like how she could be totally normal one minute and then suddenly blurt out something like “diffraction grating” or “the electromagnetic spectrum.”

Russ figured he could have a lot of fun with Alex that evening, but strangely enough, he wasn’t sure he wanted to. Chatty and smiley, Alex kept bumping up against him. But it just left Russ cold. Why had he asked out Alex? He could have called Lia and been with Lia right now.

But now, Russ was stuck and couldn’t blow Alex off after he’d invited her out. Finally, Russ decided to take her to where he usually hung out with his brother. Maybe Evan would be there and take some of the load off Russ.

Alex’s shoulders sagged and her mouth retreated into a straight line at the suggestion, but Russ just said, “C’mon. It’s a cool place to be.”

Evan was there and he had a girl with him. Well, not a real girl, of course, but a geek like Evan. But she was cute with perfectly straight and shiny black hair. Russ introduced them to Alex, who by now seemed less chatty and less perky.

“Nice to meet you, Alex,” chirped Evan. Then, holding out his arm toward his date, he said, “And may I now introduce to you both the Grand Game Mistress?”

Evan’s date chuckled, her eyes disappearing into cheerful black curves above her round cheeks.

Evan leaned toward Russ. “I mean, you have
got
to hear these RPG plots she comes up with! And the
weapons
…Russ, I’m telling you—” He turned to his date. “Genius, Edison. Sheer
genius
.”

Shaking her head, Edison just chuckled some more.

Alex stared at Evan and Edison, and blinked.

Then Russ excused himself to the bathroom.

When he came back, Alex was gone. He looked from Evan to Edison, then back to Evan.

“What happened?” he said.

“She wanted to know if you were gay,” said Evan. “So I said yes. Then she asked me why you asked her out. And I said because you were hoping for some good waxing tips for your hard-to-remove toe hair. And that maybe she would know.”

Edison passed her hand over her mouth as she held back a smile.

“Whatever,” said Russ.

Evan sat there with his arm around Edison, smirking at Russ. “Then I enthused about your idea to re-skin the Wiccan collecting dragons as a vampire collecting
zombies
. Which is really wacky because zombies have no blood, right? So why would a vampire be interested in zombies? Then I went into the different breeds of zombies and the different levels of zombieness—which is even wackier. I mean, how can you be only a
partial
zombie?”

“What?” said Russ. “I never said a damn thing about zombies. Or vampires. Or any kind of gaming. Gaming is for weirdos.”

“I know,” said Evan. “The zombie-vampire re-skin was my idea. But I get codependent with you sometimes. It’s hard for me to tell where you end and I begin.”

Now Edison chortled so hard, she needed to support herself against the table with both hands. Russ wondered how much she’d had to drink.

“Where’d you two meet?” Russ asked.

“You’re okay with your date ditching you?” asked Evan.

“Sure. I wasn’t so into her anyway.”

“Hmm,” said Evan. “That’s telling. Because she
is
your type.”

“Nah, I wasn’t so into her.”

“I love seeing you in love,” said Evan. “It makes me feel in love with you too.”

Russ scowled at Evan and said, “Go jump.”

Evan looked at his date. “See? He’s even cleaned up his language.” He looked back at Russ. “Presumably so that he doesn’t accidentally forget himself when he’s with…
her
.”

Edison looked at Evan. “Who is she?”

Evan raised his beer mug. “
She
is a violet-eyed astronomy geek who won’t let him boff her.”

“Oh, is she a Christian?” said Edison. “I used to be a Mormon myself.”

Evan shook his head. “Nope. She’s a Torah-tinged monotheist.”

Edison’s head turned to face Russ again. “Really? That’s so cool. I’ve never heard of that before.”

Russ snorted.

“Well, okay. Since you asked....” said Evan, putting one arm around his date and gesturing toward her with the other. “Do you know who this fine lady is?”

“Sure,” said Russ. “You just told me.” He gave her a nod. “You’re cute,” he said. “My little brother has good taste.”

Edison just smiled and shook her head.

“Yes,” said Evan. “But she’s more than just a cute Grand Game Mistress.” Evan looked down at her. “This incredible woman revived me at least
five
times as we tracked down gremlin-troll mutants for bounties. Yes, she rescued me across three magical forests, one underwater world, and also when I fell off my dragon steed near a cliff.” Evan gave her shoulders a little squeeze with his arm. “How often do you find a girl like that?”

She chuckled yet again and said, “You’re a pretty amazing gamer yourself.”

But while he was happy for Evan, Russ couldn’t stomach the whole Geeks-in-Love shtick. He gave Evan and Edison a goodbye salute, then went out to call Lia. She was home and after some small talk, he asked her out.

“I guess I’m supposed to hem and haw,” she said. “Really, I should pretend that I’m oh-so busy so you don’t think you can just call me up at the last minute to ask me out again.”

“Well,” said Russ. Then he couldn’t think of anything to say after that.

“But the truth is,” she continued, “I’m not such a poser. Where should we meet?”

“I’ll pick you up,” he said. “Then you’ll have time to get ready.”

“Great,” said Lia.

Russ hurried through the drizzle to his car, trying to think of where he could take Lia. One of the rough things about dating in Seattle was always trying to think of good places indoors for a date. Strolling through a park often became a sloshy, muddy experience. In fact, taking a walk anywhere might end up being too cold with no place dry enough to sit down.

A lot of dating took place in cars.

Which wasn’t such a bad thing in Russ’s eyes.

He always made sure his silver Ford Mustang was clean and smelled good.

When he arrived at Lia’s apartment, she met him dressed in a bulky dark green sweater and a long flowing black skirt. They went down to his car and took off.

“We can turn onto some of the less traveled roads,” he said.

“That sounds nice, actually,” said Lia.

Yes!
For a long time, they drove around and talked. The hills and curves made for an interesting drive. Russ enjoyed the opportunity in the rainy darkness to show off his driving prowess on some of the steeper hills and sharper turns.

Finally, he pulled into some shrubbery that overlooked the city. The car was stuffy but cozy and the sound of the rain on the roof and the pattern of the drops sliding down the windows made things even cozier.

When he stopped the car, Russ saw the tension clutching Lia’s face. Her hands fidgeted in her lap as she stared at the gear shift for a moment. Then she gave his face a searching glance before looking away to stare at the lights below.

Russ figured this was not the time to stretch his arm over the back of her seat.

Okay, so she didn’t want to hook up with anyone before marriage. That was weird and old-fashioned, but he got it. But why this all-or-nothing tripe? Why couldn’t they engage in some good old-fashioned making-out?

Russ put his elbow by his window and leaned back in his seat. His other arm rested on the armrest and his knees spread apart to either side of the steering wheel. Mr. Oh-So Cool and Casual: the kind of guy who had no problem sitting next to an exotic hottie and
not
even hold her hand.

He felt her glance at him a few times while he just stared out the windshield. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her shoulders hunch as she lowered her head.

Oh, baby….
He groaned inwardly. Why couldn’t she just trust him? He’d been so patient already.

He turned his face toward her and saw that her eyes were cast downward. They moved and blinked as if she were thinking intently about something.

“Hey,” he said, and she looked up at him. He gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. She watched him for a moment, then gave him a tense-lipped smile back.

“Listen,” he said, “I just like being with you. Okay? No pressure.”

Her smile deepened and her shoulders relaxed. Still looking at him, Lia nodded.

So far, so good....
Russ tried to think of what else to say to put her at ease. So he said, “How’s your art going?”

Lia straightened up at the question and her whole face softened. “Good,” she said. “Really good. The computer stuff is really intriguing—you can create exact scenarios with the right programming. Like, you can get such a realistic idea of how this place or that place actually looks and it’s so amazing to see it come alive like that. And then with the actual process of painting, it’s really cool and really therapeutic.”

“That’s awesome,” Russ said. And he found he meant it.

She flashed him a look of gratitude, though Russ didn’t know exactly why. But he considered it a good sign.

As they fell into silence again, Russ struggled to carry the conversation. By this point in his previous relationships, things were physical, which made conversation less necessary. Until now, Russ never realized how much of his relationships went toward hooking up and how little was spent on talking. Even with Emma (with whom Russ often felt there was still too much conversation), he realized now that a lot of their time together was still physical.

“What are you thinking?” Russ heard himself ask Lia.

Lia’s eyebrows arched as she looked at him. “Well,” she said, “I guess…I guess I’m wondering what you want from me.”

He held up his palms. “I just like being with you. You’re pretty cool, you know.”

Lia smiled as she rolled her lips together, then said, “I hope you mean that. Because if you’re hoping for more, well…I just can’t.”

“Yeah, I understand. Look, you were straight-up with me from the beginning.”

Lia nodded. “Yep. I have to, I guess. Dating has become all about hooking up. And I hate being called a tease. I don’t know why that’s such a painful insult.” She thought for a moment. “I guess maybe because it implies that I’m being dishonest in some way, like I’m some scheming little vixen who’s out to dupe a guy. But dupe him into what exactly? And why should a guy get so angry when he thinks he might get some and then not get any at all? Well, I don’t know. It’s not the worst thing in the world and it’s not like it’s his right.” She swallowed before continuing. “I don’t feel like anyone has ‘rights’ over me. You know?”

Tension inched through Russ. His chest tightened up like it did before a fight. He was pretty sure he knew which snuffling mutts she meant. They were those compact athletic types who looked like real guys on the outside, but when they opened their mouths, the voice of a whiny Valley girl came out. He saw them in his store all the time. He also remembered them from high school.