Simon Says (18 page)

It's not right, somehow.
The perspective is wrong...
But I shake my head, knowing it's more than perspective.
It doesn't have the ring of truth that reverberates in my sketch of Adrian, and I don't know why. If I could only speak to him, know he's all right, know what he's writing. He said he loved what he saw in my paintings (
loved me
), and I long to draw that love. But the sketch isn't working.

I pick up the phone.
Graeme is like a hermit when he's writing...
I punch in my parents' number, but of course they're at work. I leave a message on their machine. Why did I call? Perhaps just to hear my mother's recorded voice. To remind me of—what?

My copy of
Lord Jim
lies on my bed. It's not Introductory Programming I'm in danger of flunking, it's English. I think I have a paper due on the book at the end of the month. I wonder what day it is. I wonder if the English teacher would accept the computer program instead of a paper?

I've already read the book, but I don't know what to write. It's a frightening book—spare, rhythmic words that lull the reader the way the sea lulls its passengers. But dangers wait in the sea, and in the pages—reflected images rippling in the waves. Jim self-destructs because of the image he's created of himself. He can't live up to it, but he can't betray it, either. I wonder if I can turn in a paper proving that Robinson Crusoe's desert island (
with no Friday—no one playing Simon Says at all
) is preferable to Jim's admiring paradise of deadly expectations.

Which is true—the endless images, or the (
lonely
) self within? Which will Graeme choose, in the end? Or—the thought unsettles me—do we choose who we are,
or are we born that way? If Graeme was born a mirror,
can
he choose to change? Or did he choose to become a mirror somewhere along the way, and can he revise that choice? Did he already revise it, as he stood in my studio? Is that why the new sketch isn't working, because I don't know what he chose?

I toss
Lord Jim
aside and get up, pacing to the window. How can I make it through this semester, until he finishes the book, poised on the edge, not knowing whether he'll join the wolf pack or be my way out? I tell myself to concentrate on nothing but the steps along the way—write the paper about Jim's failure, paint still lifes for Mr. Wallace, paint landscapes (
not cityscapes
) for Ms. Katz, paint portraits (
not Graeme
) for Mr. Thornton. Survive until spring.

But I can't focus on meaningless schoolwork. I want to hope that spring brings Graeme out of his writing seclusion transformed—the phoenix risen from the ashes. Ill know as soon as I see him. Ill know, the way I knew the truth at the party, on the roof (
in my studio
). IH know whether I can let them all (
Rachel, Adrian, Alona, everyone
) into my studio, or whether I have to give up the dream forever.

Excerpts from
Graeme Brandt's Journal

November 27 (Senior Year)

Finally back at school, and it wasn't the day I'd hoped for-it was better.

I thought Thanksgiving would never end. Family I hardly ever saw as a kid, and never see except at holidays anymore, and all those huge bowls and platters overflowing with food, and Kyle waiting while I tried to be polite to everybody but kept wanting to escape. Then I'd try to slip away, and they'd catch me staring out the window or sitting in my room, scribbling notes, and tell me it was supposed to be a holiday-well, Dad said that, and Aunt Theresa wanted me to tell everyone the story I was working on, and Uncle Kurt just rolled his eyes. Mom told them all to leave me alone-l was "writing." She must have told them to be quiet so as not to distract me-they were all practically tiptoeing along the hallway whenever they came upstairs.

Aunt Theresa tiptoeing is something like an earthquake ... and I wanted to forget about Kyle and Whitman and Charles's paintings and go out in the hall and hug her. She thought my stories were so cute when I was little. I used to love to make up a new one to tell her, and she'd listen as if it was even better than her "stories" on television-she's so serious about her stories, she's even got the soap opera updates as the first number on her telephone's automatic dialer. She wouldn't care what Kyle did-she'd just listen, wide-
eyed and nodding, and sigh at the end. I almost shoved the notebook under my mattress and went out to her. But I couldn't.

This book-l know what I want to write, I know what I want to have happen. I want Kyle to stop reflecting what other people want and to become someone better than them-better than they can even imagine. But it's not happening that way. Kyle won't do what I want him to. When I wanted him to face down the metal shop teacher, he wouldn't He ducked out when he heard him coming into the shop room so that the other guys got caught, but after class he wired the welder so that it arced when the teacher touched it the next day. It didn't burn him, but it was a nasty shock-and it frightened him.

That wasn't what I meant for Kyle to do at all. I didn't want him to be-well, to put it bluntly, sneaky. Or mean. I don't know, maybe he's not really mean. Maybe he has to start out sneaky before he can get brave enough to stand up for himself. Or maybe I've got it all wrong. I only know I can't tell Aunt Theresa about Kyle. And I can't tell my parents this new book isn't working. I've got to make it work. I
will
make it work.

I dumped my stuff in my dorm room before anybody noticed I was back, and left a note for Mr. Adler that I was going to be in my studio working on the book. But I didn't want to read through Kyle's pages so far. I wanted to work out how he was going to change. So I just grabbed a reporter's notebook that would fit in my back pocket and took off. I wanted to think. I wanted—

Admit it I wanted to ask Charles how he does it How
does he paint like that? How did he find that bell tower inside himself and realize it in paint? If I could understand how he did it, I think I could see how I could do it with Kyle.

I was really hoping I'd run into him. Somehow, I thought he might come back early after the holiday himself. There were a few kids around, but they weren't Charles, and I didn't pay any attention to them. I was thinking about Kyle. I can't just move him around in the plot, like a pawn in a chess game. Or even a knight Or even the king. They all get moved by the player, no matter how high they rank. But Kyle's got to do it naturally, or the book won't work. Why won't he do it?

I was striding down a gravel path, and poking and prodding at Kyle, knowing there had to be a way inside him, a way to make him work, and watching for Charles (trying not to look like I was watching for anybody) and I heard a girl call my name. Except I didn't recognize it at first—the name. She called out "Graeme," but I didn't feel like Graeme right then-l didn't even feel like Kyle. I was striding for a start, really stretching my legs, and 1 don't do that often because most people can't keep up with me. I stroll. But I was striding under barren tree branches, like someone else, someone I couldn't place. Then she called me again, and I realized it was Rachel Holland, and she was calling
me.
Graeme. The writer who can't write....

I wondered at first if I'd missed a deadline-but I'd turned in my essay to
Ventures
before I left for Thanksgiving. It was an opinion piece about whether writers of one culture should be allowed to write literature about a different culture. It was good-Mr. Adler gave me an A on the original paper. So I just smiled at her and waited to get an idea of what she wanted.

Rachel didn't smile back. She looked at me and frowned. She's got this strange way of staring right into your eyes, instead of glancing at you and then looking away, like most people do. "Are you okay?" she asked me. "You look thinner."

I felt-l don't know-warm inside. It was a nice thing to notice. "Maybe I'm growing again," I told her, and laughed, because I'm tall enough.

She smiled a little, but not with her eyes. They still looked concerned, and I felt the faintest shadow of the affection in Aunt Theresa's hugs. So I gave Rachel a better answer. "No-its just, all that food at Thanksgiving, ifs kind of a turnoff." I shrugged. "And I've been writing. I guess I just haven't been thinking about eating all that much."

Her eyes had relaxed by then, so I added, "Besides, you can't ever be too thin."

"Or too rich," she finished, and her eyes were definitely smiling. "So-that's what I wanted to ask you about How's the book going? Will you really have it finished before you graduate? Another contract? Rich and famous? I'd like to do an interview with you about it for the graduation issue."

That'd be great," I told her, suddenly feeling how wonderful it will be to have two books sold by the time I got to college. Not just something excellent to actually
do
when you're still a teenager, not just what my parents hoped for, not just something Mr. Adler expected, but a real achievement-something terrific-something as great as those paintings.

And then I knew what I was feeling earlier, before Rachel had named me. I was feeling like Charles's figure, striding under those trees.

She must have seen my face change. "You look as if
something just hit you," she told me. "I'd better let you get it down on paper before you lose it"

I think I waved, but I didn't see her go. And I didn't pull out my notebook, either. It wasn't something I needed to write down then and there or I'd lose. It was inside of me now, a part of me. I turned back toward my studio, striding again, but this time the pace wasn't accidental. I was deliberately striding like the figure in Charles's painting, not afraid of the rustling cloud of birds overhead.

I hadn't seen Charles, but it was all right Even better, in fact I didn't want to ask him to tell me how to do this. I wanted to show him
I
could do it, myself. I could do what he gave me credit for. I'd seen that painting again, in my mind, and it showed me how. Don't be afraid of striding forward-just do it-just let Kyle grow and the story will follow naturally. Just become the figure in the painting. I lengthened my stride still further. The birds couldn't stop me. I had to get back to the book. I'd write until I found a way to show Kyle it was all right to be himself, to break free. I could do it I
would
do it.

There's an unfamiliar envelope in my mail slot Saturday, taking precedence over the usual letter from home—impersonal typescript and no return address, but mailed to me, undeniably—sent through the campus post While I ride back up in the dorm elevator, I methodically pry up the flap, in no particular hurry. I slide out the creased sheets and unfold them as I head into my room, wondering vaguely who's bothered to write to me. I have no real sense of curiosity—I feel I've been on hold so long that I can barely remember that first flush of hope....

March
12

Dear Charles,

By the time you read this, you're bound to have heard that I died from a heart attack, you see, that's what I wanted them all to think. I wanted to do something that none of them would ever know, ever even suspect. I wanted to do something that was all my own, for once,
and I wanted you to know because you're the only one who would understand.

I'm going to kill myself as soon as I mail this.

Stunned, I stand rooted to the mottled tan carpet in my room and rifle numbly through the pages to the last one, heartsick with terror that I already know who wrote this letter—and there's his name at the bottom of the final page. Graeme.

Mouth dry, not sure what to do, I look helplessly around me. Am I expecting to see someone appear who can save Graeme (me)? Or someone sweeping in, accusing finger outstretched to mark me, blame me? No sound outside in the hallway—I didn't even see anyone downstairs.

I've got to tell somebody—

I've got to stop him—

Where is everybody? Not even any sign of Adrian. I glance over at his mess and see the Houston paper spread out on top of the scattering of CD cases on his desk. There's the glaring headline—front page:
LOCAL STUDENT FOUND DEAD.

I sink back into my desk chair, the colors in the room smearing into blackness (
the way his eyes went black, turned into bottomless pools when he saw my sketch).
I want to scream at him to wait, to stop, but it's too late. He'll never hear me again. He's already done it
No—not good enough—don't settle for a euphemism, be clear and unambiguous.
He's already killed himself.

The dorm is silent because everyone else knows—
they're already in mourning. I'm helpless to stop him, and I don't know how to mourn.

But what did he mean, wanting them all to
think
he died of a heart attack?
I wanted to do something that was all my own, for once...
I turn back to his letter—black ink on white paper—black on white, drained of life.

I plan to inject a lethal solution into a cut on my hand and toss the needle into the trash outside my studio door-there should be about fifteen minutes left before the janitor collects the trash from our building. I'll die in my studio, no one will ever find the evidence, and they'll all think a heart attack finished me.

Probably none of them paid enough attention to what actually happened in my book to remember how the teacher killed himself when he thought Alan was blackmailing him. And the best thing about it was that the solution was untraceable in the bloodstream. No one's going to have a clue.
Not even Mr. Adler
knew that I tested the suicide plan by actually ordering everything I needed for it, to prove to myself that the teacher would be able to do it in the story. In a way, it's funny.

And not so funny, you were right, of course. I've lived up to their images all my life. And now they'll twist my death to fit their image, too—a kid who pushed himself too hard—a kid who wasn't so great at sports because he had a heart murmur, you know, I really liked playing baseball once—I even wanted to be a professional ballplayer, but that was before I realized I wasn't
supposed to be a jock. I was supposed to be a writer. So what if the condition's rarely fatal and I'm supposed to be taking my medication if I feel any chest pains? I took care to leave the medication in my dorm room, instead of taking it to my studio. They'll say I forgot. They'll re-create me as a sickly student with an obsession, who poured everything into his writing and finally expired after completing his last novel.
Mr.
Adler will remember our talking about burnout at that cast party, and the sales pitch will make a fortune for my publisher.

But that's not the way it is at all.

When I left your studio that day, I knew what I wanted to write. Nobody, not even you, figured it out, but the reason I waited so long to start the new book was that I couldn't find anything inside me to write. I'd said it all in
Storm,
and I was drifting. Not even my short stories were working anymore, and it scared the hell out of me. But when I saw your paintings, that cityscape, I realized what I was missing, what I'd always missed, you created a universe without any interference from the outside, or in spite of the pressures from the outside, I guess, and your vision of just how much an artist could create made me open my eyes at last. It was up to
me
to create myself.

That's what this book was supposed to do—to create Graeme Brandt. I even called it
Breaking the Mirror.
But something went wrong. The main character was Kyle Travis, Alan's kid brother, and he was supposed to escape from the expectations that Alan had used to save and ultimately trap his family. Reflecting other
people's images was the way Alan survived and succeeded, but it was also my way, as you figured out. If I could show Kyle how to break out, then I could break free as well.

It's not that Kyle never made it. But when he tried to be himself, to choose what he wanted, the other kids (and even Alar) didn't want anything to do with him anymore-they treated him like he was some kind of alien. Worse, he got scared that the choices he was making weren't really his own choices, that he was Just choosing what he thought he ought to, trying to be different without knowing why. I know, that probably sounds weird to you. But you'll read the book and understand then. Kyle had to get rid of the only person who blew what he was going through, and then make a choice that was a compromise. In the end, he had to accept a role that was closest to the person he wanted to be. It was the best I could do for him, and better than I could do for myself. But you'll understand that, too.

You see, I'd known for a long time there was something missing Inside of me. That was why I couldn't write another book. I could have written the same story over and over, with different characters and different settings, but they'd all be the same basic book because that seemed to be all I knew, and I couldn't demean myself to repeat myself forever. I thought if I could only fill that emptiness inside of me, I'd discover something new that I could write. And when I saw your paintings, I knew exactly what I wanted to say. When I realized I couldn't make it work in my book, it frightened me. I was afraid
you were right—I was nothing more than a mirror in the end. I was empty inside.

But then I realized that creating myself in the book wasn't the solution. That would be showing them all what I was doing-still just doing it for someone else to see. I decided to find a way that I could do it for myself alone. So I kept on writing the book, because Kyle had taken on a life of his own, even if it wasn't the life I wanted to give him. The book had taken on a life of
its
own, and I wanted to finish it. But I also began trying to come up with a way I could prove to myself that there was something inside of me, filling the emptiness, something beyond their expectations-something just for me, something only I would ever know about. And then I knew.

In order to get away from their expectations for good, I have to die. This way they lose me, you see? My parents, my teachers, Mr. Adler, my editor, the kids who think they're my friends. None of them will have any control over my death,
so
I'm setting myself free from their expectations, if only for one brief moment. But it's
my
moment, and no one will ever be able to take it away from me. It will fill the emptiness for all eternity.

The only thing that hurts is that I'd have loved to see what it might be like to live as myself, longer than just for that moment. I can't quite imagine it, any more than Kyle could, you were right, you know. I searched and searched, but I couldn't find the self I was protecting behind the surface games. I told myself, when I first
came to Whitman, that the secret lay in giving in to people in the little things so that I could have my own way in the things that mattered. But now, when I ask myself what matters, I don't have an answer. I thought-it must be wanting something, knowing what you want. But I can't think what I want that someone else didn't tell me to want. And if there's nothing that matters, there's nothing worth going on living for, anyway.

Why did I let other people shape me for themselves? I can't explain it. I never questioned it, never even thought about any of it until you came along.

But, Charles—what about you? I know why you hide in your studio now. you've let other people shape you, as much as I have, you blame them for making you hide, don't you? you think you pull on that Harlequin mask in order to protect your vision. But it's not anyone else's fault that you accepted their judgments about you or about your paintings-that was your decision, your condemnation of yourself. Why, Charles? Why did you let them cripple you? It's not something they can do without your consent. I have to face the truth that I let them shape me, but you're no different—you let them shape you, too. you have to find a way out of that studio-you
can
do it. And if you stay locked inside, pretending that they're keeping you there against your will, you're lying to yourself and lying to your art.

Are you a coward, Charles? I'd hate to think so after seeing your paintings, but you're terrified to expose the most important thing in your life to other people's scrutiny. Maybe I have so much less to say than you do, but
at least I have the courage to say it out loud, to publish it where they can read it. I'm sure there are lots of readers who don't like what I write, jerks like Tyler, or kids who just don't understand it—but what about the ones who get the point, like you did?

How can you dare keep your vision locked away from the world? I can bear to publish what I see, even though it means admitting Just how limited my vision is. Tor you it would mean confessing your hope, and taking responsibility for showing the rest of us what to reach for. And you need those viewers as much as they need you. you need people to see your art to make your work complete, you need those people who'll understand, and who'll take something from your paintings—maybe the strength to go on, maybe the strength to find a way out.

The artist I saw in that studio is the person you were always meant to be. How long can you deny him?

Good-bye, Charles. I loved you, and you gave me more than love, you gave me a purpose and a gift of being that is so precious it can never be repaid. I wish I could have lived longer with it, but just being myself, even for that moment, will make my lifetime worthwhile. Without you, it would have been meaningless, and I would have known only that I sensed an unnamed emptiness, and left it forever unfilled.

Graeme