The Painted Room Page 18

Chapter 15

  The Birth of Venus

  Over fifty attractive and colorful tents made up Venus's encampment, some square, some round. Like a medieval jousting tournament, they were decorated with festive banners sticking out of their striped roofs.

  May was fairly sure Venus would never be too hard to locate due to her large and constant entourage of human lemmings that followed her around. By association, May reasoned that she was unlikely to lose Sheila since the goddess had taken her under her wing. Therefore, she decided to attend to where Venus's serving men were taking Carlisle. The men bearing his body placed him inside a red and white striped tent with two solid red fabric panels for doors and two huge ruddy faced guardsmen in front to match.

  A bustle of male and female servants went in and out of the tent. Carlisle's clothes departed in one attendant's hands, folded linens went in with another. Then basins of water, soap and sea sponges entered, followed by fluffy white towels and linen sheets.

  Confident that Carlisle was, for the moment, in good hands, she noted the location of the tent and turned to go.

  Two women had been standing next to her for some time and seemed to be waiting for someone. They smiled at her when she glanced at them, and it suddenly dawned on her who they were waiting for. They took her arms gently and led May to a purple and white checked tent that they indicated was to be hers.

  Inside the tent were puffy purple cushions and the wonderful smell and sight of perfumed, hot, soapy water in a shell-shaped tub with floating rose petals.

  An hour later, after a heavenly and much needed bath, she found that the servants had laid out a pink silk dress on the purple cushions. It was a full length gown with a low cut empire bodice. Suspiciously, she held it up to the light; just as she thought, it was practically see-through.

  Next to the gown, the handmaidens had placed May's own clothes, washed and blown dry by a Zephyr and smelling of jasmine.

  With no real intention of actually wearing the dress, she still couldn't resist trying it on. It proved to be the right size, but when she looked at herself in the mirror, she saw that the dress puckered on her unflatteringly—and in all the wrong places. The pale pink of the gown washed her out so much that her face appeared almost colorless. As she walked around the tent she felt awkward and ungainly in it, and the hem kept tripping her up.

  May took off the dress and put on her jeans, t-shirt and gray sweatshirt. Her sneakers were so clean that they looked brand new. When she put them on, they looked like spongy marshmallows on her feet.

  The beautiful handmaids, which she couldn't seem to tell apart even though one was dark haired and the other light, brought her a lunch of rich cheese, tasty heart shaped crackers and sliced fruit. The fruit looked delicious, but after thinking on it, she pushed it to the side.

  For desert, there were three moist, heavy pastries. The maids called these 'moon cakes'. Each was about the size of a half dollar around, about an inch thick and saturated with a milky sugary syrup. She sniffed one. It smelled like vanilla and spice. Pulling off a morsel, she tasted it, then made a face.

  It was sweet. Actually, it was overly sweet—cloying, in fact—and the sweetness was followed by a bitter aftertaste. To wash the taste out of her mouth, May ate a dry cracker and drank some raspberry lemonade.

  It looked as though she would be able to come and go as she pleased. And what she most dearly wanted, after almost three days of uninterrupted company, was to be completely alone.

  Unfortunately, as she soon discovered, some handmaid was usually bustling about her tent for one reason or another. With growing irritation, she decided to go for a walk. She could check on the whereabouts of Sheila (hopefully without her knowing), maybe peek in on Carlisle, and then sneak silently off to the orchard to pass the time blissfully by herself.

  It was late afternoon. The day was warm, and a light breeze stirred the leaves lightly. The encampment overlooked a crescent-shaped harbor of clear, aqua-green water. A rainbow shone out on the bay and some Zephyrs were flying and swooping in and around it, performing graceful acrobatics.

  Along the path, May spotted a unicorn nosing the grass under a plum tree. It looked up at her with innocent blue eyes as she approached it, then went back to snuffling a plum on the ground.

  She had almost succeeded in getting hold of its horn when the unicorn looked up suddenly and galloped off. "I'm glad you didn't make it on the ark!" she yelled after it.

  She walked a little farther and stopped to watch some Centaurs playing polo in a field. They hit the ball to each other lazily until one of them accidentally knocked it into some bushes. Remarkably, instead of searching for the ball, the centaurs merely shrugged at one another and laughed. They patted each other on the back and left.

  It didn't seem right to May to just leave the ball where it was. She searched in the bushes and found it along with about twelve other previously lost balls. She tried to call after the centaurs, but they were already gone, and all she got for her troubles was a thorn in her finger.

  She began walking again and her thoughts turned inward as she sucked at her finger. Though she welcomed the rest, this malady of Carlisle's caused a rent in her plan to keep pressing forward at all costs. Bathed and fed now, she found herself restless to get going again. But with the sun now beginning its downward descent in the sky, Sheila being entertained by a goddess, and Carlisle half alive or dead (she couldn't decide which) she had little choice but to wait it out.

  It was unlikely they would be starting out before morning at the very least. If Carlisle hadn't recovered by then, she and Sheila would just have to continue on alone.

  She stopped sucking on her finger and rubbed the bruise on her wrist made by one of the pirates. On the other hand, as dictatorial and bumbling as Carlisle was, he had also proved to be useful so far. She began weighing in her mind whether or not it was worth waiting a little longer for him to recover. Maybe they should wait a day (or perhaps two) to see if he would wake up.

  Some people passed her by—equally gorgeous like all the rest. They cast looks at her as they walked past and suddenly, the thought occurred to her that they were not the first. That in fact, other people had been giving her sideways glances all afternoon; only at the time, with so much else to think about, it simply hadn't left an imprint on her mind.

  She smiled crookedly to herself. No, it couldn't be. She must just be imagining things. Being in this dreamy and hauntingly beautiful place was just disorienting her.

  Some more people passed her by and this time she was sure of it. People were peeking at her furtively as though she were some kind of oddity.

  The hair stood up on the back of her neck. She suddenly wanted desperately to talk to Sheila and wondered why Carlisle had to go and eat those stupid golden apples anyway?

  May spied five maidens playing a game around an apple tree. They were chasing each other and laughing merrily. She tapped on the shoulder of a girl whose back was turned—a girl with daisies woven throughout her flowing, honey blonde hair and wearing a shimmering, silver gown.

  The girl spun around with a smile on her face, still laughing from the game she was playing.

  May blinked in surprise.

  "Can I help you?" Sheila asked politely, still smiling.

  "What the heck's the matter with you?"

  "I'm sorry. Do I know you?"

  "Cut it out already, Sheila. The joke's over. It's me—May."

  Sheila said, "May." But she still stared at her vacantly. Then finally with feeling she said, grabbing both of her hands, "May! Oh, May! I haven't seen you all day. Where have you been?"

  "What the hell is wrong with you? You didn't even know who I was for a moment. Are you okay?"

  "Of course I am. You—you just looked different is all, and I didn't recognize you at first."

  May felt a rush of heat to her face. "I look different?"

  She wanted to say all sorts of other things, but since she couldn't figure out a way to say them without it all
sounding utterly petty and catty, May kept them to herself. She suddenly realized that she was red hot angry, and she didn't know why, and that made it all worse somehow. It didn't make any sense to her why she felt the way she did. She didn't like it one bit.

  She sat down, ripped handfuls of grass out of the turf and threw them in front of her.

  Waving her companions away, Sheila sat down delicately next to her. Some minutes went by as May's anger cooled. Sheila was arranging her silver skirts prettily around herself, when a unicorn came up and nuzzled her hand. "Not you again?" she said, petting it and smiling.

  "Unbelievable," muttered May.

  From somewhere, a trumpet sounded. "May, why don't you come to supper?"

  "I have a migraine."

  "You're too young to get a migraine. Come on, I'm starving. Come to dinner. We can talk."

  "Don't you think these people are weird here? Haven't you noticed they're always looking at you. Have you noticed?"

  "They're just curious is all, and friendly."

  "No. That's not it."

  "If you don't like it, ignore them," said Sheila, getting up. "Let's go eat. I'm starving."

  May stood and brushed her hands together. "We just had lunch, didn't we? Didn't we just have lunch? They're probably too stupid to even tell time right here."

  "You're coming, right?"

  "Yeah, yeah, alright, alright," said May. "But they better have something different for desert than those disgusting moon cakes."

  "You don't like them? Can I have yours?"

  "It's a deal."

  Inside Venus's dining tent was a long banquet table at which were seated at least a hundred beings. There were humans, nymphs, Zephyrs, cherubs, centaurs, and other creatures that May wouldn't have known the names of unless someone had told her.

  The girls found seats close to the head of the table next to a handsome centaur eating a baked potato. As soon as they sat down, he requested the butter as though he had been hoping someone would sit next to him just so he wouldn't have to reach for it.

  "Who won the polo game today?" asked May as she handed the butter to him, wrinkling her nose at his horsey smell.

  "Won?" he asked.

  "You know—which team scored the most points?"

  "You mean play against each other?"

  "Yes, of course. Otherwise, what's the point?" May felt annoyed now.

  He shrugged and said, "Gee, we never tried that."

  "Don't you guys get kind of bored after a while?"

  He gobbed the potato with about ten pats of butter and slathered on several large dollops of sour cream before he answered. "I never really thought about it." He looked off into space like a grazing cow as he munched a huge mouthful of potato.

  May gave Sheila a desperate look. "What did I tell you? This place is so weird. I just want to get the hell out of here and get going again."

  "I think it's pretty here," said Sheila with a pout.

  "Pretty weird, you mean. It's gorgeous and all—I'll give you that, but I don't think we should stay here too long. As soon as Carlisle wakes up, we should get our butts out of here." May put a morsel of prime rib into her mouth no bigger than a skittle. She dabbed her mouth with her napkin and pushed her plate away.

  "Aren't you going to eat any more than that?" asked Sheila.

  "It's practically mooing at me," cried May. She stabbed her fork into the thick slab of meat on her plate, lifted it up and gave a look of revulsion at the puddle of thin red liquid underneath.

  "It's just some kind of sauce—o juice, I think they call it," said Sheila, before stuffing in an enormous bite of her own prime rib.

  "Au jus," May corrected, "and it's just a fancy word for blood. No thank you."

  "What could be wrong with the baked potato at least?" Sheila said with her mouth full.

  "I ate it," May said defensively.

  "You did?"

  "You know I don't eat the skin. You never know how well they wash it when you eat out. Can we just get off the subject?"

  Sheila shrugged and went back to her meal.

  She watched Sheila eat in silence, but there was something on her mind, May could tell. She doubted it would take long before Sheila came out with it, and she was right, it didn't.

  "May? Do you think he'll be alright?"

  "I don't know," May said honestly.

  "Well, if he does wake up, don't you think we should tell him about his wife? I think he should know, don't you?"

  "I knew this would come up."

  "Well, don't you?"

  "I've really thought about this a lot, Sheila. We don't even know if his wife is actually going to be in her own painting. I mean, she died! You, me, and Carlisle went into his painting alive. And even if it turns out that she is in there, what if she doesn't remember him? Do you see what I'm saying?"

  "But there could be a chance! We have to try."

  "But what if we never make it as far as his wife's painting? What if we tell him about it and he gets his hopes up, and we just never make it that far?"

  "I would want to know if it were me, no matter what—no matter if I made it there or not. Just to know there was a chance."

  "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but just because you would want to know, that doesn't mean everyone would. I wouldn't. Too much of a disappointment if it didn't happen. Look, I'm not saying that we never tell him. I'm saying that we tell him after you open the door, and we are absolutely certain that we are in his wife's painting. If there's a door at all, that is."

  Sheila was quiet.

  "Well? Don't just stare at me like an idiot. Do you see what I'm saying?"

  "I do. And you're right."

  "Good, I'm glad we got that settled."

  "No, I mean you really have thought about it a lot."

  "And what's that supposed to mean?"

  "Nothing." Sheila mulled it over and then said, "Okay. I'll go along with it, but I still don't think it's right."

  "Well, it's not wrong either!"

  "I'm not so sure about that."

  "At this point, I think the best we can do for him is get out of here and get moving again once he wakes up. Maybe if he's lucky we'll reach his wife eventually. But I'll be honest with you, Sheila—his wife—that's his business. Our business is finding our way back home again. Maybe you've forgotten that, but I haven't."

  "I haven't forgotten. But since we're stuck here for now, can't we at least enjoy ourselves? Look around, May. Have you ever seen a more beautiful place?"

  "Yeah, it's beautiful, I'll give you that. And everyone does everything for you, but have you noticed? After a while, even though they all look different, you just can't seem to tell anyone apart? It's just creepy.

  "Like the two maids in my tent. One has dark hair and the other's got light hair, and for the life of me, I can never remember who brought me what, or who I was talking with last. They just blur together somehow. And, I'm sorry, but the staring is driving me crazy!" She turned and glared at the centaur next to her who took his eyes off her finally and went back to eating his meal. "Can't they just mind their own business? I just want to be rid of this place—the sooner the better! They can keep their disgusting moon cakes, their mooing meat, and their freaky eyed goddess, thank you very much. Sayonara and good riddance."

  Sheila's eyes went as big as saucers suddenly.

  "What's the matter? Was the sour cream bad?" May looked at her potato skin with her stomach sinking. She quickly took a sip of her fruit punch.

  "Are you enjoying the dinner, girls?" said Venus from behind her.

  May nearly sprayed her drink all over the table, but she just choked it down instead, leaving a painful lump in her throat. "Yes, Your Highness. Everything is delicious," she said, making a face at Sheila for not warning her.

  Venus sat down at the head of the table and a servant appeared out of nowhere to remove their dinner plates. The man hovered over May's plate a moment, unsure if he should take it or not, until she waved the dish away. Another serv
ant swooped in and deposited dessert.

  May stared at the three moon cakes on the dainty plate in front of her and tried not to show her disappointment. She wondered how she could gracefully avoid them.

  Venus said, "Oh dear, I'm afraid you don't care for the moon cakes."

  May seized on the opportunity of getting out of eating the dreaded pastries. "Well, you have me there, Your Highness," she admitted. "I have to confess that they are not my favorite."

  Venus stared at her with glacial blue-white eyes and said, "I know that some people can find them too sweet. Pardon my saying so, but you seemed the type, so I asked Chef to adjust the recipe for you. I think you will find that this batch is more suitable to your particular constitution."

  Great. It didn't look like there would be any getting out of it.

  May smiled insincerely and stuffed some of the sticky confection into her mouth. It was sweet, but not as sweet as the ones at lunch had been, and it melted in her mouth in such a way that she found herself stuffing in another piece. Before she knew what she was doing, she had eaten up all of the first cake, as well as its two companions on the plate.

  "There now," said Venus. "I thought you would like them."

  What had happened? May hadn't intended to eat them at all. She looked at the crumbs on her empty plate and felt tricked somehow. She was so full now that her stomach fluttered. Feeling suddenly ill, she left Sheila with Venus and dizzily headed back to her tent.

  On the path, May bent over with a sharp pain in her stomach. She was flushed and hot. After a few moments, the heat and pain subsided, and she felt better physically, but then she was overwhelmed by an intense sadness that hit her all at once and permeated her completely down to her toes, so that her knees buckled under her.

  The realization struck her that she didn't really want to go back to her tent and to the handmaids fussing and milling about incessantly. She also knew she didn't want to stay outside in the night of this bizarre place, either. She knew that she wanted to go someplace else.

  Someplace else, but where?

  Stumbling, May found herself making her way to Carlisle's tent. It's probably quiet in there without all those stupid maids running around, she told herself. Meanwhile, her feet trod along purposefully in the same direction as her thoughts, but on some unexplained errand of their own.

  She only hesitated a little when she saw the guards in front of Carlisle's tent. Would they stop her? But when she approached they said nothing at all to her, only stood stonily silent at their posts. They must just be for show, she thought, pulling aside one of the fabric panels and entering.

  When she saw Carlisle in the tent, she caught her breath in sharp.

  He was laid out like he was dead, dressed in white linen clothes and draped in white linen sheets, and it made the sight of him worse somehow.

  A flame burned dimly on a lamp stand, casting flickering shadows on the striped canvas walls. Resisting the panicked urge to shake him awake, she knelt down next to the bed, folded her hands together and started to cry.

  "Oh God, please don't let him die. I don't think we can get home on our own, and I want so badly to go home. This is awful. I swear if we stay here too much longer, Sheila's not going to want to leave at all. She barely recognized me today.

  May opened her eyes and glared at him. "So unless you wake up, Mr. Carlisle, we're going to be stuck here probably forever. Do you hear me?" She pointed a finger at him accusingly. He looked annoyingly blissful. "No way. No way, you hear? You just get that look off your face. You aren't getting out of it that easy. You promised you would get us home, and I'm holding you to it!

  "And I really, really hate this place. Everyone looks at me sideways here. Like I'm messing up their pretty world with my ugly face or something. Everyone here is beautiful and I'm not.

  "Besides, you've got to get to your wife. I didn't tell you that Sheila's mother bought that painting of your wife, too, and if you don't wake up, you'll never get to see her. I don't know if she's even there, or if she'll even remember you, but if you never wake up, you'll never know for sure.

  "And I guess that's it. That's all I have to say." She pursed her lips. "No actually. There is one more thing. I'm really sorry to hear about your mother. Anyhow, I hope you don't blame yourself. It's not like it's your fault or anything, though you really do have some terrible luck with women." She went to get up and knelt down again, "Amen," she said, glancing up at the striped ceiling.

  And since she could think of nothing else to do, she gently brushed back his hair and kissed him on the forehead quickly. He was as cold as ice.

  She sniffed loudly, wiped her nose on her sleeve, and left.