The Originators

CHAPTER 8: THERE IS NO SUCH NO SUCH THING AS A CHANCE ENCOUNTER (LAURA)

I.

Sometimes you crave the company of others. Who would ever think a trip to one of the last inner city malls would accomplish so many things. You don't have to spend your weekend counting the minutes until the Sun disappears, just so you can jump-start your thoughts. Instead of this dull, mute suffering; you can actually see people in one enclosed area, enjoy cool air, dim lights. The malls are one of the last and remaining places money is spent on air conditioning.

I'm also tired of playing "Come out, come out wherever you are!" with the moths and spiders, waiting like some kind of bra-and-panty clad kook with a plastic spatula clutched in her sweaty hand on a Saturday. I now get an adrenalin rush from smashing a slippery spider or chasing a frenetic moth. I dance around, in between kills, to the different instruments signifying the individual characters of Peter and the Wolf. This is another sign I'm losing it. If I did this for one more Saturday, I would have to end it all.

I shut down my computer to stop myself from compulsively checking temperatures; water levels, weather patterns. I need to get out.

My home has become dusty and grey. I rarely turn on my few electric lights anymore; I rely on candle light. I save most of my solar juice for my fans. They are set up strategically with the help of Viktor and Pluto to maximize directional air quality and quantity, depending upon the Sun's placement, temperature fluctuations, and general weather patterns. I could have done it myself, but it made them feel important. Plus, it saved me time.

My quarters have become a bare, decaying coffin of a place. I feel like a witch here really, candles flickering, my odd fancy with female mythical and religious artifacts, minimal furniture, and my John Currin paintings.

With so many people with limited funds, barely surviving, the paintings appeared on the market sooner than I anticipated. My art dealer hunts down broke owners; making them offers they can't refuse. H20, Corp. pays me well.

I'm up to seven Currin pieces. Every time I look at them I shudder inside; my skin, even in the heat, goes all goosebumpy. My favorite today was Sno-Bo. It's as if he took his artistic signet, stamped me, and then spread me across a canvas. That was the one I paid the most for, because it's the one I wanted the most.

His portraits, repeatedly, feature the luminesce of women; the colors more vivid than the color we see all around us every day. I am the blind person who just got her sight back when I stand before his pieces; I see color for the first time. The strange soullessness, alien quality of the faces often causes me to think about life differently than I had seconds before. They are all mine. If I had to save anything in this place, it would be those paintings.

My kitchen is the most complex, used sub-component in the whole place. I cook because I want to know exactly what I put into my body. Plus, it relaxes me.

I start listening to The Nutcracker and think about what I should wear to the mall. When I was a child, my parents decide upon a limited number of symphonies for my sister and me to listen to in the empty room. The empty room was a place for my sister and myself, when my parents, primarily my mother, needed alone time. They equipped the room with the essentials: a single desk, two chairs, and a bookcase all built by my father. There was also an old-fashioned phonograph my father found during one of his never ending searches for the tools of those who lived before us.

There were all kinds of tools available for us to express our creativity: chalk, an accompanying chalk board that we would attach to the desk, paints, brushes, medium papers, and books. Actually, we would check out as many books as we were allowed from the library. All these tools resided in the magical red desk or oak-stained bookcase. The pieces of music we played fairly regularly were Peter and the Wolf, The Nutcracker, Alice and Wonderland, and Sleeping Beauty. Day after day we would listen to the music, sitting on the floor, our backs leaning against the wall, staring at the music player.