The Latent Powers of Dylan Fontaine (10 page)

“Sure.”

“Are you and Nick, like…together?”

“Ah, Nick. Yeah, more or less. Why?”

“Well, when I first met you, I thought you and Randy might hook up. You must have figured out he likes you.”

Chloe is quiet for a long time. Finally, she says, “Has…Randy ever
said
anything to you about me? You know, in that way?”

“Well, no, but that’s just Randy. Believe me, I can tell. He’s crazy about you.”

Chloe stares out the bedroom window. “Dylan, I know you don’t think much of Nick, but he and I are a lot alike. We both want the same things—to make it big, be famous one day. Your brother is different. Special. He doesn’t care about any of that, he just loves the music. The other night I heard his original stuff, and it blew me away. I told him he should keep writing, that he’s got a gift. Anyway, if he and I ever got close, I’d disappoint him.”

“No,” I say. “That’s not true. You’d never disappoint him.”

Chloe shrugs and lowers her eyes. From the look on her face I can tell she doesn’t want to talk about this anymore.

“Chloe?” I say. “Can I ask you one more question? It’s kind of important.”

“Sure, Dylan. What is it?”

“The weed, under the floorboards in the studio. Do you believe that I saw it?”

She nods slowly. “Yeah, I do. But I don’t know how it got there, and I don’t know how it disappeared. That’s a mystery.”

“Okay, but…any ideas?”

She ponders this for a moment. “I don’t think any of the guys are stupid enough to deal, and since no one’s owning up, I hope it was a one-time mistake that’ll never happen again.”

“Hmm, I hope you’re right.”

“Now.” She points to my guitar. “Will you play me another piece?”

“Sure.” I take a seat in the chair, and Chloe lies down again with her back facing me. After a few pieces I notice that her breathing is slow and steady. I set down my guitar, and when I see that she’s asleep I go to cover her with a sheet, but then I stop. Instead, I grab a stick of charcoal, open my sketchbook, sit down, and begin to draw the lines of her back with quick, loose strokes. When I finish the sketch I rip out the sheet, ready to do another, but the noise wakes Chloe. “Dylan?” she says. She sees the charcoal and paper. “Oh…”

“I’m sorry,” I say, “it’s just…you looked so beautiful, and I—”

“Wait,” she says. “Here, try this.” To my surprise, she slides off her halter top and lowers her jeans, arranging the sheet so that I can see the full curve of her back, the rise of her hip, and the slightest swell of her breast. “That’s better,” she says.

“Yeah,” I agree. “It sure is.”

Eleven

T
HAT EVENING
, while Chloe falls asleep on my bed, I sketch her long, beautiful, seminaked body from multiple angles in all sorts of media—charcoal, pencil, conté crayon, and pen and ink. I even incorporate what I learned from my da Vinci drapery sketch and draw the ruffled sheet surrounding her with lots of depth and shadow. By midnight I’m exhausted, so I throw a sleeping bag onto the floor and pass out on top of it. When I wake in the morning, the bed is empty, the shower is running, and Randy is sitting at my desk, flipping though my sketches.

“Dylan, these drawings, they’re…incredible,” he says.

I sit up and rub my eyes. “Thanks. Um, what’s going on? Is that Chloe in the shower?”

“Yep. She slept here last night. In your bed. But I guess you already know that.” He gives me a wry smile. “Tell me, dude. How’d you do it? How’d you get her to pose nude for you?”

“Oh, come on, Randy,” I say. “Chloe didn’t pose
nude
. She just kind of slipped off her top and arranged the sheet so I could get a few interesting sketches for art class.”

“A few
interesting
sketches, huh? I’ll say. Wiseman’s gonna be in art-teacher heaven.” He holds up one of the pen-and-ink drawings and takes a closer look. “Listen, Dyl, do yourself a favor. Don’t let Nick see these. He’ll
freak
.”

A grin spreads across my face as I imagine Nick flipping through my erotic drawings of Chloe. “Actually,” I say, “I was planning to tape a few to the refrigerator. Maybe even slip one into a box of Pop-Tarts.”

Randy looks up. “I’m serious, man. He’ll
kill
you.”

“I’m just kidding. Nick won’t lay eyes on them.”

The shower stops, and from the bathroom I hear Chloe singing Janis Joplin’s “I Need a Man to Love.” I try not to imagine her toweling off, which is almost impossible, and do my best to focus on Randy, who’s studying my sketches and practically salivating. “Hey, Randy,” I say. “Before Chloe comes back I need to tell you a few things.”

He glances up from a sketch. “Oh, yeah, what?”

“Well…” I stand up, take the drawings from his hand, and set them on the desk. “Last night before she fell asleep we started talking, and she told me how she feels about you.”

“Feels? About…
me
?”

“Yeah. When I mentioned your name she got all sad and serious. She said that you’re a very
special
person, and that if the two of you ever hooked up, she’d only disappoint you.”

“What?” Randy looks at me like I’m crazy. “What’s
that
supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know. Pretty insane, huh? It’s like she couldn’t have
you
so she settled for
Nick.
She says the two of them are more alike—they both want to make it big. Be famous one day.”

“More alike?” Randy stands up, runs his fingers through his hair, and starts pacing the floor. “That
is
insane. Chloe and Nick are about as different as you can get.”

From the bathroom I hear Chloe turn the doorknob. “Hey! I’m standing here dripping wet! Can one of you guys bring me a towel?”

I grin. “She’s all yours, dude.”

He makes a face at me, then calls back, “Yeah, sure, Chloe. Hold on, I’ll be right there. Listen, Dyl, Chloe’s with Nick. I’ve already accepted that. Besides, he’s my best friend. I would never do that to him.”

He grabs a towel that’s draped over my chair, and just as he’s about to head out the door, I say, “Randy, wait.” He turns around. “Before you swear allegiance to your buddy Nick, let me ask you one question. Did
he
ever consider how
you
felt before swooping in on the girl of your dreams? I don’t think so.”

He shakes his head. “There are a lot of things you don’t understand, Dylan. And besides, this is none of your business. Stay out of it.”

“All right, but the way I see it, you’ve got nothing to lose. Last time I checked, the Dead Musicians Society didn’t allow girls to come between their members. Even Nick swore that oath. True blue to the end.”

Randy stands in the doorway, watching me. “Yeah, but there’s a big difference. Chloe’s part of the band.”

I shrug. “Minor technicality.”

“Hey! What do I have to do to get a towel around here?” Chloe shouts. “Run through the hallway naked?”

“Keep your shorts on, Clo!” Randy says. “Oh, but I forgot. You don’t
have
any shorts.” The two of us laugh.

“Har, har,” Chloe calls from the bathroom. “You guys are a regular riot. Now. Bring. Me. The. Towel.”

I raise an eyebrow at Randy. “It’s your choice, bro. But I say go for it.”

After playing Cupid, I roll up the sketches of Chloe and slip them into my trusty cardboard tube, wondering what Val and Mr. Wiseman are going to say about my new and improved artistic style: seminaked girls.

“Well, well, Mr. Fontaine, looks like you’ve been busy.” It’s second period and Mr. Wiseman is behind me, breathing down my neck and gazing at the sketches spread across my desk. “Hmm,
excellent
job. Your strokes are loose and fluid—I like that. And your subject, well…” Mr. Wiseman seems to be at a loss for words. “I must say, your subject
is
intriguing.”

Val is sitting next to me, gawking. “Jeez, Fontaine!” She picks up one of the sketches and studies it. “I can’t believe you did this! It’s great!”

By now, everyone in class is surrounding my desk, trying to get a better look.

Val nudges me. “So who is she? Anyone I know?”

Val probably knows who Chloe is, since she goes to our school, so I need to be discreet. “Maybe,” I say. “Or…maybe not.”

Val grins. “I get it. You don’t want to say. That’s cool.”

“Okay, everyone.” Mr. Wiseman claps his hands a few times. “Settle down and take your seats. Today we’ll begin sketching graphite portraits. Select a partner—someone you’d like to draw—and begin by framing his or her face. I’ll be walking around the room if anyone needs help.”

While people choose partners, Val stares down at her desk. Last year when we drew portraits, she sketched Mary Flannery with a knife in her throat and one bloody eyeball hanging out of its socket. It didn’t go over well. “Hey, Val,” I say, noticing that everyone is avoiding her like the plague, “you want to partner up?”

She glances at me shyly. “Um, are you sure about that, Fontaine? You might wind up looking like a freak.”

I shrug. “You never know, it might be an improvement.”

“Well”—she studies me for a moment—“all right, but I’m telling you right now, I don’t pose nude.”

When I’ve finished framing Val’s face, I pencil in a hoop where her eyebrow ring will be, and then I get an idea. Instead of your standard carbon-copy portrait, I decide to try something a little different. Behind Val’s face, like a ghosted-in background, I lightly sketch the silhouette of a girl with her arms outstretched. In her left hand I draw the Chinese symbol for life, and in the right, the symbol for death. “Hey, Val?” I say.

“Yeah?” She looks up from her paper.

“Thanks, you know, for giving me a kick in the ass—challenging me to try something new. I needed it.”

“Anytime, Fontaine.”

That night, before going to bed, I take my best drawing of Chloe, walk into my mom’s studio, and tape it right next to my wine, avocado, and cheese still life. For the first time, I realize I’ve created something in the same league as Randy’s. And it’s not just because I had a beautiful, sexy model to work with, although of course that helped. My drawing is good,
really
good—with that quality Mr. Wiseman calls “emotional resonance.” Anyway, the best part is that if you look very closely, in the right-hand corner of the drawing, hidden inside Chloe’s pinky toe, are my initials. D.F. Dylan Fontaine.

“Dylan! Time for dinner!”

Surprisingly, it’s my dad, not Vanya, calling me from the kitchen. Ever since Randy and I almost killed each other on the basketball court, he’s been making a conscious effort to be home a few hours in the evening—share a meal with his sons like we’re some kind of normal family.

“Coming!” I grab my guitar and head downstairs. After dinner I’m off to the Beanery. Jake calls it our weekly gig, but he’s a little deluded. Mostly we sip overpriced chai lattes with a group of guys Headbone calls the Nerd Posse, play our latest pieces, and afterward talk about how much we suck.

The table is set for three, but Randy’s not home. Ever since my dad’s been making these nightly appearances, Randy’s been purposely absent. I can already see the look of disappointment on my dad’s face. “So your brother’s not here?”

“No, Dad, I, uh, think he’s at Moser’s.”

“We’ll save him a plate, Dr. Fontaine,” Vanya says. “No need to worry.”

My dad sighs and takes a seat. In an effort to be cheerful, he says, “Well, I’m glad you’re here, Dylan. And Vanya, this smells wonderful.”

I’m still wary of Vanya’s cooking, but tonight she’s prepared her German specialty—roast pork and sauerkraut—with peach cobbler for dessert. As I’m stuffing my face, my dad is chewing thoughtfully. “So how’s school going?” he asks.

“Fine.” I shove a forkful of food into my mouth.

“That’s it? Fine?”

I swallow. “Well, yeah. What do you want me to say?”

“I don’t know. Expound a little.”

“Um…” I honestly can’t think of anything unusual or exciting that happened in school. Well, except for the unveiling of my seminude sketches of Chloe, but I’m not about to share that with my father. “I don’t know, Dad, my day was pretty boring. How was yours?”

He takes a bite of sauerkraut and thinks for a moment. “Boring too, I guess.”

The rest of the meal passes in silence, but as we’re eating dessert, my dad pipes up, “Hey, the Yankees are playing tonight. You want to watch the game with me?”

“Oh, well, I’d like to, Dad, but it’s Thursday. Jake and I have our gig at the Beanery.”

“Oh, yeah, right. Well, maybe next time.”

“Sure,” I say. “Next time.”

When I arrive, the guys are setting up to play, but as I’m about to join them, I see a strange banner hanging from the ceiling. The words are cut from white poster board and sprinkled with gold glitter. It reads
THE LATENT POWERS OF DYLAN FONTAINE
.

I stand there gaping, and a moment later the front door swings open. Headbone walks in. “Dylan! Why didn’t you tell us you were the star of Angie’s new film? We just found out you’re doing a shoot here tonight. That’s big news!” Following behind him is the rest of the band. Chloe, too. They take seats at a table.

I turn around. “Jake? What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” he says. “I was going to ask you the same question. When the guys and I got here, that sign was up. We thought it was some kind of a joke. What’s it mean?”

Doug, the owner of the place, is watching us from behind the counter and chuckling. I guess he’s in on the joke too. I shake my head. “It’s Angie—she’s making this stupid movie about me and…oh, forget it, I’ll explain later. Have you seen her? Or that asshole Jonathan Reed?” But before Jake has a chance to answer, the two culprits walk through the door. Angie turns on her camera and starts to shoot. I march up to her and point my finger right at the lens. “This
isn’t
funny, Angie. Put the camera away.
Now
.”

She sighs, hits the Off button, and hands it to Jonathan. I stare him down until he walks away. “Chill
out,
Dylan,” Angie says. “I just want to get a little background information before we do another shoot in the Village. Kind of like a prologue to the story.”

I throw up my hands. “What are you talking about? What
story
? Look, Angie, I don’t know what you’re doing, but this is
not
cool, okay? Besides, I didn’t even agree to do this film—”

“But Dylan, look around! You’ve got fans! If you back out now there’s going to be a lot of disappointed people here, believe me.”

“Angie, the only
fans
here are my brother, his burned-out friends, and the Nerd Posse.”

“Um…you forgot Jonathan.”

Jonathan is in the corner of the room, setting up a tripod. He looks up and gives me an enthusiastic smile.

I roll my eyes and mumble, “Oh, right, how could I forget? Mr. Cinematography.”

“And me too, Dylan,” Angie says, “your best friend
and
biggest fan. Now, please?” She waves me on. “Play a song. I’ll get some musical footage, and then we’ll start the interviews. Jonathan? Are you almost ready?”

Just as I’m about to rip down Angie’s stupid banner and tell everyone to go home, I see Chloe, wagging her finger. I walk over. “Hey, Chloe. What’s up?”

“Dylan, I think you should do the film. I mean, how many people get this kind of chance? It could be a real adventure.”

“I don’t know, Chloe, I—”

“Just forget about everyone. Close your eyes and play, like you did for me the other night. Angie’s really excited about this. And she’s crazy about
you
. I can tell.”

“Yeah, crazy, maybe. That’s about it.”

“Go on.” She gives me a little push.

Reluctantly I head back, pick up my guitar, and take a seat with the guys. Jake leans over and whispers, “Dylan, this is great! Tonight we actually have an audience.
And
we’re getting filmed.” The Nerd Posse is nodding and grinning like it’s their big night. I guess I can’t disappoint them. I sigh and tune up my instrument, and soon the guys and I are taking turns playing our latest pieces. I run through my Sor study and my Carcassi piece, which surprisingly doesn’t suck, and as the audience applauds I open my eyes and see Angie standing beside an empty chair in the middle of the room. Jonathan’s got the camera rolling.

“Come, have a seat, Dylan,” she says. Angie’s dressed in black and her hair is curled into these long copper ringlets. She looks really pretty. Slowly I walk over. The room grows eerily quiet, and when I sit down I suddenly feel like I’ve been sentenced to the electric chair.