The Woman Who Fell To Earth

Chapter 27

Mercury

Art's first daytime speaking event took place two hours away. David was feeling better, offered to come, but Art declined. "It's a four-hour round trip," he'd said. "You might want to stay here."

She didn't mind terribly, said she needed to work on a very important project. Art left her then, relieved at how happy and alive she appeared.

The event went just as well, if not better, than the first. Angie sat in the audience and gave Art feedback from the seats. She reported that people were genuinely moved by what he said, some to tears. Several had friends or family they would recommend for his next event. The news write-ups and interviews had served him well, with a full house and A-list audience members.

He returned home in the evening, drained but elated. David was overjoyed to see him. "Art, love, how did it go?" she asked enthusiastically, throwing her arms around his neck. She was back in her rabbit shirt romper, her fingers blackened by charcoal, a gray smudge on her cheek.

"It was great!" Art replied. He let her go and walked to the kitchen for a glass of water. "They loved me. It was amazing. Then Angie and I went to dinner, and the maître d' said someone bought our drinks for us. It was just like that time at Ice, or The Ritz. I guess I can do this without you."

David's smile didn't match her down turned eyes, but she said she was happy for him.

"This is what I was born to do," Art continued. "It's in my marrow. I mean, I always knew I had it in me, but to see it in the faces of all those people, wow! It's exhilarating! And I'm helping them, I really am." He absently set his water glass on the table.

David rushed over and picked up the glass. "Oh no, now it's ruined," she said.

"Huh?" Art looked down. "Sorry, I didn't see that there."

David scowled, looked at the drawing she had made, now with a large water ring in the center, the charcoal bleeding, distorting the image.

"You need a more dedicated workspace for your drawings," Art said, taking the paper from David's hand. "It's not bad. Anyway, it's not like you were going to sell it or anything."

"How do you know?" David asked defensively. She sighed. "I worked all week on that piece."

. "Here, we'll hang it up to dry." Art placed a magnet on the drawing and it clung to the refrigerator. "Then you can turn that ring into a wreath or something. Good as new. So, is that what you did today?"

David's mood instantly changed. Her eyes lit up. "Let me show you what I worked on today. You're going to love it!" She clasped her hands together and smiled wide, all of her teeth gleaming like a jester.

"Oh yeah?"

"I made it just for you, love. I had such a stroke of genius this morning after you left. It was as if the artistry sprung from within me, like a lightning bolt from all that pent up electricity inside. Oh, Art, come see, come see!" Art looked bewildered as she took both of his hands in hers and led him through the living room, into the bathroom.

She clicked her teeth, smiling all the while, took hold of the closed shower curtain, like a stage curtain. "Ta-da!" she exclaimed, and pulled the curtain to the side.

Art peered into the white porcelain tub. He narrowed his eyes, trying to comprehend the scene before him. Scattered in the tub were hundreds of tiny, dark pieces of fuzz, or tufts of fur or...

"What in the...." He looked incredulously at David, who, in turn, looked at him, eyebrows raised expectantly, mouth upturned in anticipation. Art looked more closely. His lip curled in revulsion as his eyes made the realization that these were not tufts of fur, but tiny curls of body hair. He turned impulsively to the trashcan. It was his body hair, trimmed into the trashcan this morning to groom for his presentation.

Speechless, he looked back to the tub. The hairs weren't sprinkled haphazardly, as he thought initially, but grouped in an intricate pattern of....letters? I-I-O-U-E-V. Wide-eyed, gape-mouthed, Art turned again to David, who smiled with glee. "What the...?"

"It says 'I love you!'" she exclaimed.

"What? Why?" He could not wrap his rational mind around what his eyes were telling him.

"It's an artistic declaration," she said proudly. "I took something you discarded as ugly, unwanted, and turned it into something beautiful. Something to show you what you mean to me." She beamed at him. "You're my best mate."

Art was speechless. He looked back in the tub, and if he turned his head just so, and if the breeze from opening the shower curtain hadn't rustled any of the hairs out of place, he could read "I love U." In discarded chest hair and pubes. Art spoke slowly, in a dream. "You wrote 'I love you' out of my shaved chest hair?" It sounded even more absurd coming out of his mouth. He hoped he had misunderstood.

He hoped David would cry out in laughter and say, "No way! What are you? Insane?" But she didn't. Instead, she cried out merrily, "I think it might be my best work yet!"

"Wow," Art said. He could barely form thoughts, much less words. "I don't know what to say."

"It's bloody fantastic, don't you think?"

"It's...uh...bloody something."

"I told you I had something brewing inside me today. I knew today would be the day I could be free again. Come on, love, let's have a gin and celebrate. Your big presentation, and my return to greatness!" She laughed aloud and left Art staring at the tub while she poured the drinks.

Art couldn't look away. He felt ice on the back of his neck, his pulse raced, his heart hammered in his chest like it was trying to find a way out. His palms were wet. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and exhaled slowly. He opened his eyes. The message was still there.

He could hear ice clinking in the kitchen and knew he had to do something. He hid behind the bathroom door and peered out at David in the kitchen, fussing over the drinks. He watched her shaking hands as she measured out three nail-less fingers of liquor in each glass. He couldn't explain her alien features, but this was no angel. This was clearly an unpredictable, possibly dangerous, real woman, a stranger, in his apartment. He shut the door to the bathroom, flushed the toilet, ran water in the sink while he dialed Angie on his cell.