“Will gave you a hard time Friday, Heather,” Anne said. “Why did you let him?”
She and Heather were showering before entering the sauna.
“Actually, he was just doing what all artists do, Anne. I´ve lived with it all my life. It´s the price you pay for working in a new medium.”
“You mean computer graphics?”
“Yes. And I guess it´s not just artists that do it. I suppose, if you sell beans and a guy starts selling peas, you´re going to think he´s crazy and wonder if peas won´t make you sick.”
In the sauna, they spread towels on the top shelf and lay down. Saul came in, spread a towel and perched on the same shelf.
“Okay then,” Anne went on, “how come computer graphics? Why not traditional media?”
“I never got a chance to try it. See, I got my first computer when I was eight.”
“How come? I thought girls don´t like computers,” Saul said.
“Sexist thinking, Saul,” Heather replied with a smile. “But I was also a special case. Dad´s been in computers since Christ was a pup. He got one for my big sister, and when he upgraded hers, I got the old one. It´s not just clothes that get handed down.
“Well, this clunker of mine had a paint program on it, and somehow, I started drawing, playing with the features and stuff. When Dad noticed, he started feeding me every paint program he came across. I learned them all, got some neat things going. By the time I was ten, I could work with all the vector graphic stuff from Corel Draw on up. I never took to CAD. By then, I knew I was an artist.”
“What sort of stuff did you do?” Anne asked.
“Of course at first it was easy stuff, then graffiti, then the kind of work Peter Max used to do, psychedelics and stuff. But that bored me; it was too easy. Pretty. Joyful. But too easy... Don´t tell Max I said that.”
“I don´t see him too often,” Saul observed.
“Now, understand, I was good at it. I got all kinds of prizes and awards and stuff. But I got to a point where I really wasn´t doing much any more because it wasn´t much of a challenge, as I saw it. Mom and I talked about it a lot. She critiques my work, even today. She´s not an artist, she teaches gynecology. But she has good taste, knows how to evaluate things. I really trust her because her responses are right from the marrow... She kept suggesting I draw the cat. Or a flower. Or anything natural. So, I tried.”
“And?”
“Anne, the first three hundred times were awful. The second three hundred times weren´t much better.”
“Can´t you scan things, the way Alex does?”
“Oh, sure. But that´s not what I do, Anne. It´s not art: Alex agrees. Oh, there´s artistry in fine image processing, don´t get me wrong. But my thing is recreating reality the way I see it, not the way someone took a picture and I scanned... Creating something new. For me, @that´s art. I do it with a computer. I don´t know one end of a pencil from another, as they say... I´ve had enough. I´m out of here.”
The three of them left the sauna through the outside door and showered in the fresh air. When they were cooled off, they went inside and stretched out on the Big Bed.
“Your folks are special people.”
“Saul, so are yours, and they´re all different. I could do anything I wanted, they backed me up as long as it wasn´t clearly illegal, immoral or fattening. When it was, they let me know it wasn´t acceptable. It happens I got good marks in school, but as long as they thought I was trying hard, they didn´t care. They wanted me to be a happy girl, and I was. Still am.”
“Lot of talk?”
“How else do you do it? We talked all the time, about everything. Dad told me all the scuttlebutt about computers until I was old enough to read the publications. I got hung up on the technology from The Media Laboratory until I figured out that Negroponte was just another Caesar.
“We talked and I drew, sort of like Will. They told me about sex before I had to learn it in school. They taught me to say words like penis and toilet and vagina without turning blue. I learned that sex is good for you, as long as you´re careful. I also started to draw the body. Life Studies. And I practiced on myself a lot, because it´s hard to get models when you´re that age.
Sigrid and Alex came in from outside. They listened for a moment before taking off their clothes and settling.
“I was wondering where you got your open attitude,” Saul commented.
“Well, I don´t have any brothers, and my sister isn´t the playful type. No, I learned the practical side of sex on my own, once I figured out that there was something interesting about it. I was a sort of tomboy, so when I started growing breasts and stuff, I had a bunch of friends who were mostly boys. It was very convenient.”
Heather rolled over and sat up, her legs splayed, leaning back on outstretched arms. “There was one guy I liked because he could climb a tree almost as fast as me. We got talking about sex one day and told each other what we knew. I showed him mine and he showed me his. That was it for a while, but one day we put one and zero together and we both got an orgasm.”
Saul laughed. Anne hugged her.
“Heather, you know, I love the way you dress. Always simple, bold colors that look well on you. You don´t wear much underneath. How´d you get into that?
“I really like the feel of air on my skin. If I didn´t have to, I´d hardly ever wear clothes. I found out in the mirror that I´m not bad looking. I have a really nice body; even @I like it. I like simple shapes, simple forms, and I try to wear colors that make me look good. And simple clothes are easier to take off. Panties are boring, so I don´t wear them unless my clothes aren´t washable. Also seems to help reduce crotch rot.
“When I grew breasts, mine were bigger than most, hung down a bit. They move a lot, but I like that. They´re sensitive and that makes me feel good. I enjoy feeling turned on. The other girls all seemed very up tight about their breasts, never mind the rest of their bodies. They wore bras they didn´t need, and tried to make themselves look like their breasts were made of plastic. I decided not to do that. I´m glad I didn´t.”
“When I was in Junior High, breasts were a hazard,” Sigrid said. “The boys thought grabbing you was fun.”
“Sure. But that´s because they´ve been taught to think they can do anything they want. One of our football players grabbed me one day.”
“And?”
“Saul, I told you I was a tomboy. I´m not small and I´m pretty quick. I punched him in the gut – nearly broke my hand. He doubled over, so I grabbed his ears and kneed him in the face.”
“Wow! What happened then?”
“I ran like hell and found my boyfriend, that´s what happened. The kid never said anything about how he got his broken nose, let people think it was a football injury. I started taking Judo lessons, just in case he took out a contract on me.
“From then on, I went home with one or more of my buddies every afternoon. I thanked them by taking them upstairs every so often and letting them make me happy.
“I take it your folks didn´t object.”
“No. Mom says, ‘Bed is best, floor is nice, anyplace fancy is chancy.´ It´s fun to screw in strange places now and then, but most of the time, she´s right, bed is best.”
“You sit with Will a lot while he´s sketching us making love.”
“Yeah, I´ll say. Right here on this cushion. Watching´s a great turn-on for me. For both Will and me, I guess. I found that out when one of my guys wanted to do it in front of a mirror... I love motion. I love the way women´s breasts move when they don´t wear bras. I love the way muscles move. Saul´s and your swimmer's muscles, Tom´s carpenter muscles. Mary´s famous legs. Buttocks are fantastic, the way they rotate. I absolutely love watching people – including myself – have sex. That´s why I rigged up that capture system Alex told you about the first time I was here. Drawing Erotics and Explicits is another turn-on. Since I´ve been here, I´ve been on a sexual high I can´t believe. The other side is, I´ve got eight models for my images. Will sketches, and I sit here and think about how to recreate what you two are doing. Before long I have to get down and try it myself.”
“But your stuff doesn´t move. Isn´t that frustrating?” Anne asked.
“No. Will and I catch life in a moment of time. We can imply motion, catch it, not show it. The modernist painters who tried lost the public. That´s what movies are for.”
Alex said, “We´ve looked at some dirty movies, you know. Mary always says they don´t hold a candle to what we do right here.”
“She´s mainly right. Most of them are well... boring. But some of them aren´t. And real life is never boring. One of these days I´m going to get a camcorder down here. Make our own movie. Umm... I like that idea.”
Anne said, “I don´t think you´d get any arguments about it, but we´re not going to put @that in the catalog.”
“Oh, no. Strictly private turn-on... Say, does it bother anyone that I go around bare so much?”
“Doesn´t seem so,” Saul said. “I rather like it. Perhaps I´ll join you. When it gets cold again, we can turn up the heat a little.”
“Sigrid, I was watching you yesterday in the kitchen, peeling potatoes. You looked so great. That long torso, pretty breasts. I got this idea of doing a picture with your body all different colors.”
“You mean like body paint?”
“Yeah, but that stuff is lousy. Takes too long to put on, comes off on everything. Not worth the trouble. If we could figure out a way to do it better, we could sell @that, Anne, and make a fortune. And I´d never have to wear clothes again.”
“Might be fun. Let me know if you figure it out. Or, let me know if you want to try something out.”
Heather changed the subject. “Anyone ready for another go at the sauna? Then, maybe one of you will help me put out this fire I´ve got going in my crotch.”
“Why don´t we do that first and then do the sauna?” asked Saul.
“Anne, he has such good ideas.”