A month had passed, during which time Eric and Lynne didn’t speak about their infertility, or his recent absence. They did share a meal with the Aherns, then another, for the first had gone badly, which hadn’t surprised Eric, or his wife. Renee and Samuel had been flustered, perhaps due to their own childlessness, or just that they hadn’t expected the Snyders to arrive. The second meal, two weeks after the first, had been more light-hearted, as Sam finally gave Lynne the custard recipe, while Renee gently pestered Eric to sell them a painting. Not that Eric didn’t want to part with one, in fact, he had asked them repeatedly to come over and choose one at no cost. But the Aherns wouldn’t dream of letting Eric give them a painting for free. They had attended his last exhibit, and knew the prices he commanded, which were above their means. But Eric insisted that if Sam was willing to part with the custard recipe, then compensation was due. It would be in the form of Eric’s latest creation, and he wouldn’t take any less than ten dollars in the transaction.
That his canvases fetched well over ten times that amount wasn’t noted. Eric had been busy since returning home, but the painting he wanted to bestow upon the Aherns wasn’t that recent. It was from his last series, before he left, although not the final painting of that bunch. That painting, which he had completed moments after returning to human form, had been destroyed, and Eric hadn’t even permitted Lynne to see it. Stanford hadn’t been told, for Eric didn’t keep all his pieces, but this one had been excised for personal, not aesthetic, reasons. The one he had finished right before that depicted three hawks staring into the sun, which set over an open field, the sky bathed in warm yellows, oranges, and pinks. It was now a theme Eric was pouring all his energy into, introducing more vibrant hues to his usually drab palate. He had considered giving that painting to Lynne, but it was too close to the one he had burnt to ash. She had seemed pleased that it was going to Renee and Samuel; better to give such a canvas to friends than to sell it, or keep it at the house.
Lynne had certain ideas about Eric’s paintings; perhaps an artist’s wife was prone to such musings. Eric didn’t associate with other painters; he kept to himself, the rare visits with the Aherns or with Stanford the extent of his socializing. Lynne wasn’t an outgoing type, one of the reasons they had been drawn to the other. Her ideas about art, however, weren’t far from the typical supportive role; she loved everything he did, although she preferred brighter colors. He was incorporating those in part due to her, and to get away from the ubiquitous hawks that touched all he created. In the painting for the Aherns, Eric had focused more on the horizon than on the birds, but fowl were present, he couldn’t excise them. And they remained in the new paintings, as if making up for all that Eric and Lynne wouldn’t say.
But the birds were smaller in size, fewer in number. Sometimes all he included was a tiny outline of a hawk in the upper right corner, while the rest of the canvas evoked the images from his recent trip. He had painted the mice scuttling from the haystacks to the barn; he had depicted trees from a bird’s view, soaring over their branches. He had illustrated vast acreages ripe for harvest, but the shades weren’t merely browns and rusts, golds and grays. The barn was a bright kingfisher blue, the mice were deep burnt orange. From behind emerald trees peered crimson squirrels, their bushy tails flecked in peach. These paintings were a distinct change from Eric’s previous work, drying in the spare room, for the storage room was bursting to the seams. Eric needed to call Stanford, perhaps arrange another exhibit, and not necessarily in their small town. The dealer would balk, not wishing to flood the market, but Eric had more completed canvases than he could catalogue. Maybe he would give, or very cheaply sell, another painting to the Aherns. Perhaps the barn scene, for the blue was similar to the color of Sam’s eyes. Eric pondered that, walking back to the house, his day’s work done as dusk fell across the garden.
Since he had come home, Lynne hadn’t joined him at the end of his work days. Part of it was due to cooler weather. Mostly it was that they had tacitly agreed to not speak of his last absence, or about a baby. Not that they didn’t try; lovemaking was as frequent as before, perhaps more so. As Eric stepped through the French doors, Lynne was waiting in front of the fireplace, her smile saucy. “Are you hungry?” she asked.
“Only for you,” he smiled, as his stomach rumbled. He approached her, then pulled her toward him. She reciprocated his embrace, then seemed to melt into his skin. Eric closed his eyes, not seeing colors. He noted this woman’s warmth, and her unstated but underlying questions. They might not have spoken about his last disappearance, but still it lingered.
Instead of talking, they went to their room and made love. Then they came back downstairs, and ate a simple dinner in front of the fire, which Eric had rebuilt while Lynne fixed sandwiches. They drank hot cider, otherwise their meal was a cold one, but the room was toasty, and both still showed the effects of intimacy. Lynne was especially flushed, her ruddy cheeks as if on fire. Eric finished his dinner, then set his palm on her face. She wasn’t feverish, but so warm, and he knew why. Her questions were burning from the inside, and soon would need to be released.
He took his plate to the kitchen, then returned for hers. She left the last bite, and he set it on the coffee table. Then he sat on the floor, in front of the fireplace, patting his lap. She joined him, and they rested as crackles and pops made the only sound. Her breathing was smooth, but her heart raced, which he could tell from setting his hand on her chest. “Ask me,” he said softly.
She shook her head, then burrowed into him. But soon, she moved back. “Will it be like that from now on?”
“I don’t know. The one before that….” He sighed. Then he had sensed the impending change, but the lag-time was only a few hours. Now there seemed to be no warning at all. “I wish I knew more, I wish….”
She nodded, then gazed at the fire. “Why do you eat right before you return?”
To that query, he had a response. “Because I’m starving, and all I want is to get home, then….” He smiled. “Make love to you. And I can’t do that on an empty stomach.”
“You used to do it,” she said quietly.
“Well, I’m not as young as I used to be.”
She smiled, then her eyes were clouded with tears. “Do you think, oh Eric, you’re not gonna….”
“Die soon? I don’t know, I hope not.” He sighed. “Honey, I have no idea how this affects me at all, except for….”
“That’s not your fault Eric.”
“How can it not be?”
They stared at each other. They had first made love not long after they had started dating, which had seemed quite improper, but their feelings were so intense. And what she knew about him seemed to broker intercourse far sooner than what typical moral codes would have permitted. He had used condoms back then, but as soon as they married, birth control wasn’t necessary. Within two years, they came to the horrible conclusion that perhaps it never had been. Lynne’s cycles were regular, both were healthy, yet, Lynne never conceived. After she began working with Renee, Lynne finally spoke about it, she hadn’t even seen a doctor. Renee had been the one to urge Lynne to address the situation, but Lynne hadn’t wished to reveal this to any of the men with whom they worked. Renee knew of a woman physician, who practiced at another hospital in town. Lynne had undergone a full physical, but no defects had been noted. Lynne told one fib to Dr. Salters, that Eric had been seen by his regular physician, and that he had checked out normally. Dr. Salters had no answer for Lynne, other than sometimes infertility carried no explanation. Lynne was satisfied with that diagnosis, for it was much like how Eric suffered. And for all he endured, their troubles must be her fault. She never once assumed it was him.
While Eric refuted her beliefs, Lynne didn’t budge, in part that it was an ingrained concept that women must be more responsible for such maladies. If men could father children well into old age, how could they be blamed for the absence of conception? Only in a case like Samuel Ahern, where obvious trauma had o
ccurred, would a man not be able to impregnate his wife. Eric considered that school of thought both outdated and sexist. In nature, often it was the male who had to woo a partner, and in the case of hawks, the female bird was larger than the male. But Lynne wouldn’t be convinced otherwise, and while most times she was accepting of their fate, occasionally it made her cry. And when it did, she blamed herself for not having moved on. After all these years, wasn’t there a point when the truth must be faced?
Eric wanted to state some of this aloud, but the fire required his attention. Lynne released him, then sat on the sofa as he added more wood. Eric joined her, both watching the rising flames. Eric was enraptured by the colors, and decided that soon, perhaps tomorrow even, he would paint such a scene. But first, he cradled his wife. “Lynne, maybe I should see a doctor, at least about….”
“No. Goodness only knows what they’d find.”
“Maybe they could tell us if I was sterile.”
She shirked back, shaking her head. “Don’t even say that.”
“It’s possible, probable actually. Or maybe I have….”
“Eric, stop.” She scooted to the other end of the sofa, crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m more concerned with how you left last time. What if next time you’re at the store or we’re having dinner with Renee and Samuel?”
“Well, then I suppose on my behalf you’ll have to make one hell of an excuse.”
He smiled and she smirked. Then she uncrossed her arms, cracking her knuckles. “Can you tell me if it felt differently this time, were you searching for something?”
Now her tone was soft, edged with concern. Eric motioned for her to rejoin him, and she did. Then he put his arm around her. “Nothing obvious, although….” At the time, he thought it had been a fluke, or perhaps new inspiration for his work. He didn’t disallow what seeing through a hawk’s eyes brought to his paintings. Better to use those experiences for something worthwhile than discard them. Then he grimaced. Before the falcon had started trailing him, perhaps in the first day of his journey, there had been a distinct purpose to that sojourn. Then he had lost the sensation, overwhelmed with the marvel of flight while observing the patterns of the natural world, all the while missing his wife. Eric stroked her face, then kissed her, which led to several minutes lost to all else. As they broke away, he inhaled sharply. “Oh God Lynne, I’d nearly forgotten.”
“What? Eric, what is it?”
The pain within his chest was as sharp as the falcon’s claw along his…. It had pierced his lower torso, not far from where spindly legs grew. But the scars which remained existed on his human legs. Eric’s heart felt to be similarly marked, then he grasped Lynne’s shoulder. “I was trying to find my….”
He paused, hard to even conjure that image.
“Eric, who?”
“My dad,” he said hoarsely. “I was on a journey to find my father.”
The next day they walked hand in hand through the garden, dressed warmly, for the autumn breeze was tinged with winter’s chill. Or perhaps the iciness was due to who Eric had been searching for, in the guise of a hawk. Maybe that was safe, for to even think about his father stirred unpleasant memories, all of them making Eric’s blood run cold. He hadn’t seen his father in over two decades, but then, his father had spent all of that time in prison.
Eric never knew from whom he had inherited his artistic talent. It wasn’t from his mother; Emma Snyder had possessed no creative notions, had barely been literate. Howard Snyder had never shown any propensity toward the social graces, in fact, he had been a drunkard, and a brute. Eric carried vivid recollections of how his parents interacted, with rare displays of affection. More often the scenes were steeped in violence, from the time Eric could remember.
He always assumed his gift with paint was an aberration, or maybe it compensated for his deformed left foot, and one strange habit. He hadn’t taken to drawing until after his father was gone, to pass the long stretches that a boy from his background endured. His mother worked full time, even before Howard had left, and after that, Emma expended all her energy into providing her only child with some sort of future. Eric was intelligent, later teaching his mother how to read. He was also blessed with artistic inclinations, but those had evolved at a price, for by the time Eric’s doodles impressed his teachers, he was having a hard time regularly attending school.
Now those years seemed far away, even if Eric could picture their ramshackle house, his small room, his mother. She hadn’t been a pretty woman, but sturdy, and her smile, when it shone, warmed his heart in such a way that when he met Lynne, finding the same lift in her joy, Eric wondered if perhaps he might indeed be blessed. He had loved his mother deeply, and her death, when he was just starting college, had taken a huge toll. He missed several weeks of school, although some of that time was spent flying through the air, attempting to set aside the feeling of abandonment. Two years later, he met Lynne, at a diner, just as he was starting to run out of enthusiasm for his studies. Her grin, partially blocked by a long knitted scarf, revived him, then sent him on a journey that lasted for days. He observed her from above, unable to fathom why she had smiled at him, until he saw she was a nursing student. It was her calling to help the sick, he decided. Then he found it was more than the career she had chosen.
He gripped her hand, then pulled her close. She wore a handmade scarf, also a hat and mittens. But her scent was warm and healing, helping him back then to set aside his mother’s death. Now it enabled him to consider his father’s existence. Howard had committed terrible crimes, which Eric felt had somehow played a part in his transformations. He shut that aside, grasping Lynne against him. “He’s still alive,” he mumbled. “But maybe something’s wrong with him.”
Then he shook his head. “I have no idea where he is, and I’m sure he has no idea where I am. Maybe I shouldn’t have Stanford arrange another exhibit, not that my father would ever think that I might’ve turned out all right.” Eric sighed, then kissed Lynne’s cheek. “Honey, I was trying to find him, for what reason, God only knows.” He spoke with disgust. “Maybe I should try to locate him, maybe that would put all of this to rest.”
“Maybe,” Lynne said.
He held her hands, giving momentary squeezes. She gripped back, as if using code. She was telling him that he could inquire to his father’s whereabouts, but that would have little recourse on other aspects of Eric’s life. And she was right, he knew that. But did he want to know more?
He wasn’t sure, and Lynne understood that too. Then she led him into the studio. It wasn’t much warmer in there, although the windows were snug, and no wind leaked through. They stood in front of a blank canvas, but finished paintings leaned against every available surface. The colors were bold, as if beseeching the painter to act upon his inner urgings. Usually those were related to Lynne, but something else was brewing within Eric.
“What will you paint next?” she asked.
“Maybe last night’s fire.” Then he shook his head. “I have no idea. What should I paint?”
She pointed to the most recent canvases, awash in warm, summery shades. A tiny hawk dotted the upper right corner of each, with the artist’s name scrawled in the lower left corner, as if correlating who Eric truly was. He had never noticed that before, had Lynne? He asked her, and she smiled. “You’ve been doing that for a long time.”
Then she picked up a brush, lying on a table. It was caked with dried paint, the dark hue hard to discern. She picked at the paint, then set the brush back down. “Eric, what if you painted….”
He shook his head, turning away from her, staring at their garden. The fountain didn’t bubble, and the bird bath was overflowing from recent rains. All the vegetables had been picked, the last pieces of fruit harvested. For the next few months, Eric would come out here, but the temperatures would be nippy, the skies sullen. Lynne wouldn’t join him until spring, and then only on nice days. And by then, he would have again taken leave of her, of this studio, and these c
anvases. Stanford would have probably arranged an exhibit by then, but not for these paintings. Eric was far past the pictures that Stanford would sell, as if those images were like Eric’s memories, a part of him, but long forgotten.
Lynne’s footsteps were loud, as rubbish crackled under her shoes. Eric looked down, the floor littered with trash. He needed to clear out this place, and not merely of paintings. Debris was everywhere, why was he so untidy in this one space? Maybe to conceal what he wasn’t ready to face.
Eric looked at his wife; had she said those words? “What do you think I should paint Lynne?”
How many ghosts lingered, for both of them? He faced his demons, even if the hawk was merely a splash against the canvas. Maybe he needed to paint her holding a baby, him at her side. Perhaps a war scene on behalf of Sam Ahern and others, or a cadre of nurses for Lynne and Renee, or….
“Would you model for me?” he said quietly. He wasn’t sure how he might paint her, but if she could take him turning into a hawk, how hard would it be for her to pose, although with winter approaching, this might not be the best time to ask.
She came to his side, putting her hand on his right arm, from where his talent emerged. Then she shook her head, a few tears falling along her cheeks. It wasn’t winter that discouraged her, or the baby they couldn’t make. It was that no matter how Eric painted his wife, or anyone else, it wouldn’t be the subject most in need of exorcism.
Chapter 6