The Color of Home: A Novel (14 page)

Did she come? He glanced up. Eyes closed, smiling. A little more to be sure. Gradually, every muscle in her body released and stilled. Done.

He crawled up next to her. “How did I do?”

“Well, on a positive note, I came. This isn’t horseshoes, man. Almost doesn’t count.”

“And on a negative note?”

“You need a lot of work. You clearly didn’t have an older woman in your life when you were young. Forget the war draft, man. I think all eighteen- year-old boys should be drafted into the League of Older Women so you all know what the fuck you’re doing before you go out into the world.”

“Make love, not war.”

She rolled her eyes as if she expected, welcomed the comment. “Luckily, you’ve got a good teacher now. We’re done for today. ”

“So soon?”

“You’re such a girl.”

“I’ll leave.”

She sat up, pulled the sheet up over her, and pointed across the room. “Take that book at the end of the first row of my bookshelf.”

A moment later, he was dressed. He kissed her good-bye, crossed over to the bookshelf, and pulled out her copy of the
Kama Sutra
. Thumbing through the pages, he occasionally stopped on a picture. Her teacher. “You practice this stuff?”

“Every day, man, every day. Don’t worry, I’ll get you there. Tonight’s preview barely scratched the surface.”

Nick flipped back and forth between two pages of the
Kama Sutra
. Rachel. How did she get her body into those positions? She would teach him. In bed with her, he’d been amazed, scared, embarrassed. He’d wanted to run. But he’d hung in there. Rachel. He reached for his phone, placed it back down on the coffee table. Seconds passed. He reached again, this time to call Sassa. He shook his head. No contact for a year. He skid the phone on the table and watched it spin.

A moment later, it rang. He shut his eyes and lifted the phone to his ears.

“Hey. It’s me. Let’s make plans.”

“Why don’t I finish your tracks first?”

“That’s lame. Why?”

“I want to prove myself.”

“No need.”

“Really.”

“Okey dokey. I get it. Call me when you’re ready.”

He tossed the
Kama Sutra
on the floor. She knew. She knew and she didn’t press. A lightness overtook him. Vaulting off his sofa, he grabbed his tablet off the end table. Jumping from chapter to chapter in a tantric sex book he’d downloaded,
Tantracize Your Life
, he practiced in his head for a long time. It was easier there. Later, he hurried out of his apartment for a walk, determined to do better, like a boy learning to play guitar who’d discovered that the pain and callouses on his fingertips were fuel.

Days passed.

One morning, he was reading on his sofa about a new position, trying to imagine contorting his body so that it matched the picture. Tantric origami. Lifting off the sofa, he tried to shape his legs, hips, and arms. Instead, an idea took shape. They never failed him. This one, particularly simple. He’d live with the results of flipping a coin. Heads, he would end it with Rachel; tails, he would continue seeing her. He pulled a quarter out of his pocket and flicked it up high in the air. The quarter landed and roadrunnered under the sofa. On his hands and knees, he blindly patted the floor until he located the coin, then slid it into view. An eagle stared upward at him. Three out of five? No. He owed her that much.

A few hours later, she clocked in at the studio. “Let’s hear it.”

“Here you go.”

He played “Gordian Knot.” He’d recast her song from a singer/songwriter acoustic-driven piece into a Zeppelinesque polished production. The drums boomed, masculine, as if Jon Bonham had played on the track himself. An acoustic introduction led into crunchy electric guitars and a melodic bass riff, both of which complemented Rachel’s original guitar line. A Hammond B3 organ differentiated the chorus and bridge. Preoccupied with his work, he glanced her way. She had to love it.

“It sucks,” she said.

“What?”

“The master is too polished, too lush. There isn’t enough edge. I want a rougher feel, with more dissonance. I want the acoustic guitar more front and center. I don’t want to sound like a female version of Led Zeppelin or anyone else.”

“You don’t like it?” he asked.

“I’m looking for something more original, more unique. I want to sound like Rachel Lyst. I hoped you might help me build my sound, but I may have been wrong. Maybe we’re too different, man. The song needs to open up and soar. You lost all of the emotion.”

“Wow. And I thought I’d nailed it.”

“You can’t work on my songs on your own, Nick.”

Fuck. Nick was done with her. Time to move on. He’d recorded parts that he loved and had mixed those parts perfectly, using his full array of high-end audio processing equipment, which Rachel would never have had access to on her own. High-quality work. And cheap. What was her problem? Why all the blunt, gruff feedback? Why had she dissed his version?

Days passed. Anger settled. One morning, as he hurried toward the studio for a session, two words hit him like Jimmy Page smashing his Les Paul at the end of a concert. His version. When he arrived, without hesitation, he clicked the delete button on all the tracks he’d created for “Gordian Knot.” He called Rachel, asked if she could join him in the studio later in the afternoon, and promised the visit would be worth her time.

Breezing into the studio just before 4:00, she put the top of the baby grand down, and perched herself on the lid, palms down for support. “Well?”

“I realize my mistake,” he said. “I didn’t see you clearly enough to make my work an extension of yours. I changed the feel so much that you ended up a guest vocalist on your own song. If the roles were reversed, if you had performed heart surgery on one of my songs, I would’ve had the same reaction. I apologize. I acted like a jerk.”

“I would have said asshole, but close enough. I banned the word
should
from my vocabulary a long time ago. Way too much judgment.”

“Asshole, then.” She was softer, more alive, prettier, vulnerable, as if he’d just met her for the first time. What had happened to her? “I finally understand what you’re looking for. I wonder if we might work on the song together now to see if we’re in sync.”

“Go for it.”

“The intensity and anger in the lyrics need to come through.”

“It’s an angry song, especially on the chorus and bridge.”

“I was struggling with how to support the anger with the electric guitar part, but now I have an idea. What do you think of this?” He picked up his Les Paul, flipped the standby switch on his amp, played a new guitar part for her. Like some of his best work, the idea came from someplace soft, deep, spiritual. He was just the channel.

“Much better. A little more atonal.”

“Like this?”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m looking for.”

Together, in a few hours, they hammered out the song and crafted a “Gordian Knot” that went well beyond Rachel’s original vision. And Nick’s. He’d never written with anyone before, and he found it surprisingly satisfying. How could two completely different people create seamless music?

At around 8:00, Rachel planted her arm on Nick’s shoulder. “Why don’t we stop now?”

“Why?”

“We just decided to be longterm lovers. I want to celebrate the occasion.”

“I’ve been reading.”

“Good. Maybe this time we can move on from paint-by-numbers and start creating some original art.”

Naked on Nick’s bed, Rachel propped herself up on one arm. “Take off your clothes. I want to try something.”

He stripped and joined her.

“Come on top of me.” She reached down and helped him enter her. Wrapping her legs around his waist, she whispered, “Let’s stay like this a while and see how we feel.” She raised her lips to his and gently brushed them. Eyes wide open, she joined with him, barely moving, for a long time.

“Good?” she asked.

“Nirvana.”

“Do you know that tantra means ‘to expand, to be free, to liberate’? It’s my definition of nirvana. Wanna go for it?”

“I’m game.”

“It’s not a game, you know. You talk a lot about truth and honesty, but what do you think that means when it comes to sex?” she asked.

Since he’d met her, he’d thought a lot about that question. She’d pushed him, pulled him, caused him to read even more than usual. Taught him that his body didn’t lie. “That sex is sacred, healing, a way toward enlightenment. That trust and honesty are foundational to getting there.”

“You have been reading.”

“One of those overachievers, I guess.”

“You’re not overachieving yet.”

“Honestly, I’m trying hard.” He really was. He’d never worked at sex before. Until Sassa, the women were more for him. With Sassa, the sex— great, effortless—focused on love, not expertise. With Rachel, he aspired to that place where skill—honed, perfected—enabled them to find a feeling neither could reach on their own. Generative sex. Who would have thought?

“On honesty, do you know there are three of us in our bed?”

“Three?”

“Yes. You, me, and Sassa.”

“That’s not true.”

“Yes, it’s true. We need to get her out of here. She’s in the way, man.”

He couldn’t argue the point. Often at the most inopportune moments, a memory with Sassa would wander through. Kissing Rachel on the same subway he’d kissed Sassa on. Watching a movie with Rachel he’d already seen with Sassa. Often in bed right after he’d finished. “How?”

“We’ll never be able to fully surrender to each other if you remain so tense.”

“What does that have to do with Sassa?”

“She’s holding you back.”

“How?”

“Get out of your head and focus on what’s happening between us. You won’t let go of her, and it’s causing you a lot of stress. As long as you’re in your head, she’s here with us.”

He didn’t know how to get her out of his head. He wasn’t sure he wanted to. But Rachel did have a point. Even though he hadn’t seen Sassa, even though a lot of time had passed, she was hanging around. Or he was. It was time. “Do you really think sex is sacred?”

“Only in Western cultures is sex considered something other than sacred.”

“I’m not sure what to do.”

“We need to focus on breathing and clearing our minds. We need to blur our lines to the point where all we amplify is the connection. Think loud music, rock and roll, the Beatles.”

“Then she’ll fade?”

“I hope.”

Despite Nick’s best efforts, the ménage à trois continued for the next several weeks. Although he showed steady progress practicing with Rachel, Sassa’s presence remained. He tried everything to get her out of his head. On occasion he believed he’d succeeded, but just when he thought she was gone, he always found her in a recess, on a pedestal waiting to be rediscovered, as if she knew it was only a matter of time.

“Close the office door.” Nick smiled.

“Your workers and clients use this sofa all the time.”

“All the better.”

Rachel closed the door. She slipped out of her Birkenstocks and pogo danced her way over to him. “You leading?”

He spun her around and pulled her close to him. Slipping one hand under her shirt and the other in the front of her pants, he kissed the back of her neck.

“I like it when you lead,” she whispered.

“I can tell.”

He pushed her onto the sofa. Balancing on her knees, she unbuttoned his pants and dropped them to the ground. Rolling back onto the sofa, she raised her legs as she undid her pants. He helped her slip out of them. With her legs up over his shoulders, they finished within minutes.

“Most efficient,” she said.

“Shhh. Everyone will hear you.”

“Good. That’s a strange look. What are you thinking?”

He tried to look away. Too late.

“Oh.”

“Let’s get away for the weekend,” he said.

“Where?”

“There’s this cool hotel in Rhode Island called Ocean House that’s about two and a half hours away by car. Check out the website.” He reached over to the end table and snatched his laptop. Rachel had been openly patient. She’d understood at some level that it would take time to get Sassa out of his head. Still, her patience wouldn’t last forever. He needed to speed things up.

“Looks fancy. Are you sure they’ll accept a guest like me?” she asked.

More importantly, would they keep Sassa out? “I’m sure you’re up to the task of dressing for the part.”

“I can do New England preppie if I cover my tattoos.”

“That will work.”

Nick and Rachel raced out of the city Friday afternoon in a rented car. They arrived at Ocean House around 7:00, checked in, then unpacked their shared suitcase along with two guitars. The hotel, the ideal counterpoint to New York, was dressed in New England yellow, with a large white wraparound porch, a mansard roof, and a rolling beachfront—it was perfect for his plan.

Starving after the drive, they headed to dinner. On the way down, they paused the elevator. He pushed her up against the back wall and slowly kissed her. Propping herself up on the elevator railing, she lifted her skirt, and wrapped her legs around him. A moment later, his pants were around his ankles and he was inside her. A few moments after that, they were both done.

In the restaurant, she tested out her preppie persona on the waiter. Wearing a brown herringbone jacket with the collar outlined in black and a fake “R” preschool badge covering the left breast; a white blouse; and a subdued green, yellow, and red-printed scarf that doubled as a tie, she said, “I’ll have the lobstah bisque.”

“Very good. What brings you to the hotel?”

“Work. Graduated Hah–vahd Business School at twenty-five. Founded my own boutique shoe company in Vehmont. Meeting folks about a possible acquisition.” Crossing her legs, her skirt slipped up a few inches above her knees. She had beautiful legs. She pointed down to her shoes, which matched her jacket perfectly, with confidence.

Later over coffee, Nick, slightly intoxicated from a three-finger scotch or Rachel’s preppy image, passed right through her eyes on his way to spacing.