Dedicated to a college swallowed alive and its abducted students. Rage against the machine. Create despite them.
Atlanta, Georgia. 1988.
Emma's foot shook impatiently inside the big black boots she wore in all her waking hours.
'If that woman says it one more time...' she gritted her teeth as the professor did indeed say it one more time.
She wanted nothing more than to jump up and shout, "Manet! It's Manet, not Mayonnaise, you big-haired, wanna-be Southern belle!"
She didn't do it. Munch's painting flashed in her mind as she mentally covered her ears and let out a silent scream. She smirked as the lecturer caught her eye, seeming to sense the energy that flowed from her corner of the room.
'Would you like fries with that?' she thought, reminding herself of her alternate destiny should she lose her scholarship to the College of Art.
Being a gathering of the almost purely artistic ilk, they were tolerant, but they wouldn't be that understanding. Candace Burnett had tenure; Emma Jones was a lowly second-semester freshman in the painting department.
Emma alternated her attention between the thick, heavy, picture-laden textbook and the small window to the world beside her. She'd made it 'her' desk early on just for that reason. She might have to pass the history classes, but she didn't have to be attentive to them. She'd always learned what she needed to know on her own. Even she knew it was the quality that made her the most talented student in her department and the worst of pupils.
Noah Garrity shook his head as Emma made it into his studio class just before he stood to make the announcements. The nineteen-year-old redhead gave him a variety of pains, in the head, the heart, the stomach, and, oh yes, the ass. He'd been at the school for eight years, teaching to support his lifelong art habit, and he'd never seen the kind of raw, unadulterated power her work displayed from any other student. She had more than potential.
Emma was a tightly bundled bright ball of creative energy just waiting to find its full release. It sat right there under her always paint-stained, always black t-shirt. It weaved its way out through the rips in her Levis. It curled and twined itself around each and every one of long, red, wild curls.
Ah, and her work, he'd catch a glimpse of it from the corner of a canvas, in the eye of a portrait, in the very visible brush stroke that strode straight from that canvas to his soul. He sighed. He knew that the big E that graced the lower right corner of each work would be famous someday.
At thirty-five, he was bordering on no longer being one of the young, cool teachers. He knew in another five years he'd be considered one of the out-of-touch, wacky coots whose studio classes were to be avoided by all but the most adventurous and the ones who enrolled so late that they couldn't get into the hip guy's class. He felt lucky now that the combination of his good-looks, a sprinkling of successful gallery showings and a prestigious award or two maintained his status in their eyes. Well, most of their eyes.
Emma could feel his eyes on her as she maneuvered quickly to an empty corner of a worktable. The metal stool squealed as she attempted to sit, and she cringed. "Noah" as he insisted the students call him, really hated her constant tardiness. What had he said to her in his office last week?
"Everyone knows your talented, Emma. I know it. You know it. You know it too well. You think sheer talent will carry you through life? It won't. Real art requires more...it requires discipline and commitment. Keep thumbing your nose at those things, and your talent will take you right back to the suburbs. Two kids and a Volvo...is that what you want?"
His tirade proved to her how little he knew about her life, but she knew a not-so-veiled threat when she heard it. If he flunked her for disregarding anymore of his dumb ass assignments, the ones meant to "expand her mind, test her abilities and train her eye," blah, blah, blah, she'd lose her place in the program. Understanding as much, she reached into her large, awkward-to-carry, paper portfolio and pulled out the piece of painted cardboard. She couldn't resist a furtive glance around the room at the work the other students had produced at the behest of Noah.
Two days earlier enough cardboard had been stacked at the corner of each table to accommodate the needs of each student. Cardboard. Pieces of old boxes. She'd hmphed at it. Six weeks into the class and they'd barely touched a real canvas.
"You may use this piece of cardboard and whatever type of paint you think best suits it. Add nothing to it but the paint. Create the sky."
Emma had watched as those around her stared in wonder. They loved the great Noah. Create the sky? She was certain he'd seen her roll her eyes, but he didn't acknowledge it. They'd jostled around her, opening the tool boxes that each lugged through the hallways of the school containing the supplies they might need that day. She'd eyed the cardboard suspiciously, grabbed a piece and then left. He didn't seem to acknowledge that either.
Noah smiled to see her pull the assignment from her case. She'd left early, as she often did, but he took note that she took the cardboard with her. He pulled an easel to the front of the room and was momentarily tempted to call on her to present first. But, he didn't.
He did as he always did, offering up the floor to volunteers. There was never a pause, never a need to call on anyone. Each was still young and arrogant enough to believe they'd created something genuine and new and, in that same arrogant, young spirit, wanted to present it to the world for their awe and envy.
Four had been cut into the shape of a puffy childhood cloud and painted white. Two mimicked Van Gogh's Starry Night. One was awash with planets and moons and what he guessed to be far off galaxies. He had to bite his tongue at the one that appeared just as blank and brown as it had when he'd passed out the assignment.
The longhaired boy, the one who bedded the girls quickly and easily, announced, "The sky does not reflect in the cardboard," and sat down.
Several of the girls gasped and one guy said, "Wow, man, I never thought of that."
Emma bit her tongue. 'That wasn't the assignment, idiot.'
Every encounter with Vaughn had left her wondering how he ever got accepted into the program at all. She was certain that his family must have helped finance the museum's overhaul. It was the only thing that made sense. She was busy contemplating this when she felt eyes on her again, but many eyes this time.
'Damn,' she stood quickly.
She hated to seem like she was hesitant to present. It would only bring out the sharks and their inevitable, envious criticism. At least she told herself it was envy. That made it sting less.
She cleared her throat as she sat the thick work on the easel and readied herself to explain her thoughts, to defend her work, to not die because she had to stand in front of so many people yet again.
It was Noah who bit his tongue when she sat the work before the class.
"Um, it's looking up at the sky while lying under a tree."
It was that. It was more than that. The cardboard had been sawn neatly in two, leaving a rippled background. Onto it she placed branches of a tree with the textured side up, painted to a give the illusion of curves and knots. Small green shoots of leaves appeared at intervals. Placed on a branch was an almost three-dimensional Robin, orange breasted. And, the sky itself. She manipulated the ripples into a combination of smoothness and lines to create clouds. Shadows were cast. It was a study in perspective and color. Looking at it, he could see the sky.
Noah made no comment, and there was a long pause as he examined the work. It took him a moment to realize she'd said nothing beyond the one sentence. She shuffled her feet, appearing unbearably uncomfortable.
Before she could grab her project and retreat to her seat or out the door, he asked, "Any thoughts?"
