“No. It’s on for tonight.”
“Oh.” Hopes dashed.
“Zachary will meet you at 7:30 at the Neon Green Gallery.”
“Isn’t that the green cone-shaped building downtown?”
“Great spot, huh? Turns out Zachary likes surrealist art — and that’s not all he likes. I think he has a secret crush on Alyce. When I suggested a date, he not only knew who she was, but said he’d been in an art class with her. He raved about her acrylic gothic paintings.”
“Really? She never mentioned him to me.”
“Do you expect her to tell you everything?”
“Well … yeah. I tell her everything.”
“I doubt there was anything for her to tell,” Dustin said. “It didn’t sound like Zachary ever admitted his feelings to Alyce. He was surprised, then excited when I hinted that Alyce might want to go out with him.”
“I’ve got to hand it to you. This matchmaking stuff could actually work out.”
“Did you ever doubt the accuracy of my computer?”
I nearly reminded him that his computer also tried matching Alyce up with a girl, but I appreciated all he’d done for me, so I thanked him. I was relieved that my date wasn’t going to happen at some cozy romantic restaurant or theater. Going to a gallery would be more relaxed. I’d heard that the Neon Green Gallery showed avant-garde works by local artists. Not my taste, but so very “Alyce.” Maybe there was more to Zachary than good grades and an uptight attitude. The art show could turn out to be very interesting.
It also turned out to be near the downtown arena, where a mega concert had jammed the streets with pedestrians and traffic. I couldn’t find a parking place near the gallery, so I ended up parking about a mile away. And walking in Alyce’s three-inch boot heels was agony — how she managed not to fall in these shoes was a mystery to me. But they did look great under my swirling gypsy skirt, and I could tell by the way Zachary’s black eyes lit up when he saw me that he liked how I looked.
He was waiting outside the gallery on a wrought iron bench, looking stiff and clean-cut in a navy blue jacket, a blue button-up shirt, and dark, pressed slacks. When he stood up, I realized Alyce was two inches taller than he was.
“Hi, Zachary,” I said, a bit shyly.
“Hey, Alyce. Here.” He offered me a small wrapped present.
“You didn’t have to get me anything.”
“I wanted to.”
“Well … thanks.”
“I didn’t think you were the flower or candy type so I gave you—”
“Breath mints,” I finished, as the wrapping paper crinkled. “That’s really … um … thoughtful.”
“You can never have too many breath mints. I always give them to my teachers, too. I hope you like spearmint with lemon.”
“Sure.” I almost made a joke about it being a “sucky” gift — but Alyce always groaned when I made puns. So I asked him if he’d been ever been to this galley.
“No, although I’ve always wanted to check it out.” He shook his head, his black hair so short and slicked with gel that not a strand moved. “It has a great reputation with displays of surrealistic, 3-D, and neon art. But of course you know that.”
“I do?” I gave him a startled look as he opened the Neon Green Gallery door for me.
“I heard you talking to Tobey.”
Tobey, otherwise known as Mr. Toben, was Alyce’s art teacher sophomore year. He had this open-door policy with students, so when she couldn’t deal with crowds at lunch, she’d hang out in his classroom.
I knew next to nothing about art, so I wisely didn’t say much as Zachary pointed out sculptures and paintings, most of it too strange for my taste. The paintings ranged from depressing images of despair and horror to colorful splashes of color that could easily have been splatter-painted by my little sisters. When I looked at a random price tag, I nearly gasped at the five figures. I mean, who in their right mind would pay that much? I could frame my little sisters’ finger-paint art and make a fortune.
I struggled not to yawn as Zachary explained his theories on conceptual and visionary paintings — things like inner conflicts depicted in physical form represent suppressed longings. Blah, blah, whatever. Who cared about a bunch of globs that was supposed to represent an ailing planet?
My interest returned when Zachary led me to a room titled “About Face.” Across the walls a world of photographs smiled, frowned, cried, rejoiced, and raged in full color, black and white, or sepia. I remembered that when Alyce experimented with black and white, an ordinary chair would turn into something fascinating. When I’d complimented her work, she’d frowned and said it was crap. I found out later that she’d burned the chair photograph.
I was studying a portrait of an old man, his eyes wide open yet lifeless, like he was dead, when Zachary called me into the next room.
The room reminded me of a cave with its low ceiling and dim lighting. The only illumination came from spotlights flowing across individual paintings. Zachary led me over to a painting titled “Bones.” At first glance I only saw a never-ending void of nightmare black, until I looked closer and saw curves of white and silver, brush-strokes that blended together to form a single image — of a skull.
“I knew you’d like it.” He mistook my gasp as appreciation. “Dark art isn’t usually my thing but when I saw this I thought of you. It’s like the style you used in class for the self-portrait assignment.”
Well, it should, since Alyce probably painted it, I thought. I stared hard until I found a signature — not the name I expected, just initials that meant nothing to me.
“Who’s SAM?” I pointed to the initials in the bottom corner.
Zachary shrugged. “No idea, but I could ask if you want to buy it.”
I laughed. “At $1,700? Noooo. It just interests me.”
“You know what interests me?”
“I hope it’s not that picture,” I joked, pointing to a painting of a giant glazed donut swallowing a man.
He didn’t even look at the cannibal donut, shrugging like he had zero sense of humor. But then Alyce could take serious to the extreme, too.
“That’s not what I meant,” he told me. He reached out and grasped my hand, pulling me close to him. His face was so close to mine so that the smell of peppermint nearly made me gag.
OMG! He was going to kiss me!
But my push was quicker than his pucker. “Zachary! No!”
“Why not? I thought we were getting along … that you’d like to … but I guess I was wrong.” He drew back sharply as if insulted.
“It’s not that I wouldn’t like … ” God, I was so bad at this. “I mean … we’re in public.”
“We haven’t passed anyone since that old couple in the neon room.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “You’re the one who asked me out.”
“I did? Oh, yeah. I did.”
“If you don’t like me, why even ask?”
“I never said I didn’t … ”
“You pushed me away like I have some contagious disease.”
“I like to take things slow. I barely know you.”
“You sat next to me in art for a whole year.”
“But we were never really alone.”
He looked at the nightmare skull then back at me. “Alyce, what does it take to crack that shell you put up? You go around school like a hater, but I’ve seen your passion for art, and it’s not about hate. When you work, you focus so intently that you shut out everything. Everyone. I wanted to tell you how I feel … but you always blew me off.”
What would Alyce say to this? Would she care enough to explain herself or would she shut him out? Now that I thought about it, Alyce
