Back Again, with a Big Decision

Or maybe not so big.

It's about my work-in-revision, Free Souls, and its serial publication on this blog.

In my last post on the subject, I considered some improvements to the novel's plotting and characterization.  Well, I implemented those.  I also rewrote Chapters 19 and 20 so they'd have more action and less introspection, more showing and less telling.

Having rewritten them, I submitted them for critique on WritingForums.org.  And the tough love I got there has brought me to a decision.  No, I'm not going to cut the nested story of my MC's past out altogether as one critiquer suggested. Too much in her present is not intelligible without it (at least, I think it's not).  And I won't rewrite the whole thing chronologically starting with her high school or college years, as another urged.  That would mean ditching the thriller plot, which is necessary for Sandy and Eric to become the people they need to be so they can love each other as they should.

The advice I will take is to cut out all or most of the introspection, and the way I'm going to do that is by rewriting the nested story to set it entirely in the past and not coming out of it till it's done.  And making a distinct break between it and the parts set in "story present."

Book 1, Book 2, Book 3 . . . rather pretentious for my piece of fluff, but I think that's the only way to make it work.

I haven't started the work on the Big Rewrite.  Instead I've skipped ahead to a working on few chapters from Eric's point of view.  I wish they were getting themselves written faster, but with me putting in twelve to fourteen hours of (minimally) paid work a day my mind isn't always at top speed even when I do get a chance to write.

All this has an impact on this blog.  Posting this novel (as previously-conceived) was a way of generating content for it, right?

But not any more.

No, as much as I've enjoyed posting the book chapter by chapter, as much as it's been an incentive to stay hard at work and produce, as much as it galls me to give in to it, no more chapters of Free Souls will appear on this blog until it's reasonably done.  With the revisions I've made in the typescript, the ones that are up already need more alteration than I have time to do.  And I can't just tack the next chapter on and pretend those revisions don't exist.  That'd  be the same as assuming no one would bother to go back and read from Chapter 1.

Once the novel is completed, God willing, I'll put the whole thing up as a pdf on a separate page on the blog.  It'll be better for the readers that way.

Meanwhile, I've been experimenting with flash fiction.  And there's always the poetry.  I should be able to come up with something for regular posts.

And It'll Never Bring Me a Dime

More thinking, more critique forum input, more thinking again about my problem-child chapters in my work-in-revision Free Souls.

One reason they’re weak, I’ve decided, is because they’re trying to answer the wrong question.  I’d had my main character verbalize it as “Why am I so afraid?’  That misses the mark.  The real issue for her is,

“What do I love so much about the status quo between myself and [the hero], and why am I afraid for it to change?’

That got me thinking about what her status quo is.  Ah, yes, she’s his office wife.  No sweet nothings and no actual sex, but plenty of secret thrills for her whenever they’re working literally close together.

This poses a question for me, the author:  Do the prior relationships I’ve given her logically bring her to a point where she’d settle for that and not want to see it jeopardized?

Yes.

Next question:  Does she have a reasonable fear that it might be jeopardized, as the draft is currently written?

Hmmm.  Come to think of it, I don’t know.  Where did we leave her in Chapter 9?  The hero has paid her a personal compliment or two; he’s offered her a promotion and she’s grudgingly accepted it.  Maybe she’s just borrowing trouble when she fears that either of those will disturb the homeostasis she has established!

Ooooh.  Not good drama.  Not effective in holding the reader.

Let me think some more.  How to ramp up the drama?

Well . . . I could expand a couple of paragraphs in earlier chapters of the book, to make readers more aware of the happy status quo with the hero and how much she enjoys it and what’s at stake for her if it ends.  Don’t spell it out, show it.  Yeah.

And maybe I could intensify the conflict in Chapter 9, in the car where he offers her the promotion.  Leave her acceptance of it up in the air, and make it clear that if she refuses, things will not go back to the way they were.  That should increase and justify her anxiety.

That might do it.

You see what this means, don’t you?  Last November when I started serializing this old novella of mine on my WordPress blog I figured I’d slam it up, with a little tarting up here and there. I wasn’t going to publish Free Souls anywhere else.  I can't market it for publication, since it's available online gratis.  Now here am I, treating it like a real work of art.  And neglecting my “real” novel, Singing Lake Farm.  

I’m committed to this stupid book, chained, stuck, and my income tax return isn’t even done.  

Aaaaaaaaagggghhhhh!

Free Souls, Chapter 18

"Damn!"

Sandy looked with disgust at the empty plastic container.  It was 3:00 AM one night a week or so past the middle of April and she had a project due at noon that same day.

"What is it?" asked Mike, who sat the next table over.  "You put a hole in your vellum?"

"No, I'm out of F leads.  You have any I can borrow?"

"No, I prefer HBs.  The store downstairs should be unlocked, with all the studios that have deadlines tomorrow."  He grinned.  "They trust us not to steal the place blind, I can't imagine why!"

"I guess so," Sandy said.  "Thanks."

She ran down to the basement, alone, to buy what she needed.  Her money had just clinked into the lock box on the counter when she turned and there was Jeff Chesters, of all people, standing with his hand on the knob of the now-closed door.

“Well, well, well,” he drawled, in a voice that was slightly slurred. “If it isn’t little Sandy Beichten.”

She couldn’t speak. Immediately she knew it was all wrong. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be, how he was supposed to be.

“Hi, Jeff,” she finally managed to croak out. “I, uh, came down for– I mean, congratulations on your– I have a deadline, I need to– ”

But before she could move he’d taken three strides across the little room and had pinned her against the wooden counter. “Little Sandy Beichten,” he said again. “I’ve seen how you look at me. You’re horny for me. You want me, don’t you?”

She shook her head dumbly. Not like this. Not like this!

“You’re lying,” he said, his face close to hers, his voice rasping in her ear. She could smell the weed on his breath as the stubble of his beard abraded her cheek. “You want me, and tonight I’m going to give you what you want, right here, right now!”

She was trapped, bent backwards between the hardness of his body on one side and the cruel edge of the counter on the other. She tried to push him away but he caught her wrists in a single iron grip.

“It’s no use trying to leave,” he said with a leer. “I locked the door, the key's in my pocket, and there’s nobody down here anyway.”

Even so, she tried to scream, but her voice, her limbs, every part of her was paralyzed. Her breath came in short gasps; no, of course she couldn’t breathe, he was pressing the breath out of her. Pinning her arms behind her, he shifted his weight and thrust his hand into her jeans.

It couldn’t be happening. Gone, flown into non-existence were all the romantic visions of art and love; she only knew this outrage couldn’t go on. “You like that,” he was muttering. “And that, don’t you? Your first time, isn’t it? I can tell!” His other hand was entangled in her long hair, tilting her head painfully back; he was trying to kiss her, and the marijuana smell from his arrogant, wet-lipped mouth was making her retch. She tried to turn her face away, and as she did, out of the corner of her eye she saw an open X-Acto knife lying on the store counter. Absorbed by his own performance, Jeff didn’t notice as she wrenched her right arm free, grabbed the razor-sharp blade, and plunged it with all her strength into his left biceps.

He screamed in pain and jumped away from her. “You filthy bitch!” he said, his tone low and ominous as a snake ready to strike. “Just for that, I’ll tear you. I’ll tear you bad!”

“Hey, what’s going on in there?”  A male voice, out in the corridor.  Whoever it was shook the door handle, trying the lock.

Sandy held the blood-smeared knife up where Jeff could see it. “Leave,” she said in a whisper. “Leave now, or I’ll scream. Or I’ll cut you again.”

Clutching his bleeding arm, Jeff looked at her hard, as if to decide if she really meant it. Then he called to whomever it was outside, “It’s ok, I just tripped over something in here, nothing serious. Door must’ve locked on me when I came in, sorry.”

“Chesters, is that you?” the voice said again. “We were looking for you. We’re going to make a donut run. You in for it?”

“Sure,” he responded easily. “I’m right behind you.” In the corridor, the footsteps shuffled. Thank God, whoever it was was waiting.

Sandy stood out of the line of sight of the door as he opened it and stepped into the hall. As he did, he turned on her a look of sheer hatred, then he was gone.

She was never sure how she completed her design that night. She only knew that that night and the rest of the semester she threw herself into her work, trying to blot out the memory, trying to forget.

She never told anyone what happened, not even Tracey, certainly not her friends back home. And neither, to her knowledge, did he. She had no idea how he explained the wound in his bicep and she didn’t care. A month or two later he graduated and moved to New York City or someplace she never intended to work, and now she could only wonder how many other women he’d abused in the same way in the years since then.

She should have reported it, she knew that. But back then, at eighteen, it simply wasn’t possible. She had been afraid she’d be expelled for stabbing him. And even without that, how could she let anyone guess what Jeff had taken from her? The attempted rape of her body had been appalling enough: the destruction of her dreams was more unbearable still.

______________________________

by Catrin Lewis, 1983; revised 2013 & 2014.  All rights reserved

Free Souls, Chapter 17

"Sandy," her Design professor said to her one day in March shortly after Spring Break, "I'm happy to let you know that your University Chapel presentation will be displayed in the school gallery at the next change of shows."

She straightened up from her drafting table to face Professor Ruben.  "Thank you very much," she said respectfully.

"No, thank you very much," the teacher said.  "It's a privilege having you in my studio. You showed good promise when you started this semester, and you certainly have surpassed all expectations."

"Thank you," she murmured again.  "Do I need to run another set for the exhibition?"

"Yes, that would be a good idea.  The one I have in my office might be a little crumpled at the edges."  Professor Ruben smiled and said, "I hope you realize, Sandy, that only the best work in this school is displayed in the gallery. We do not select projects simply to be representative of particular studios and years.  It is very rare that a freshman presentation makes it in, so when I say your chapel design is among the best of the best, you may believe it is true."

"Thank you," she said once more, beginning to feel like a broken record.

Professor Ruben assumed a hearty tone.  "Well, your hard work is paying off.  And I hope you will understand me when I say that it reflects credit not only on you, Sandy, but also on me and on this school."

She again returned some polite nothing, and the teacher continued on his rounds among his students.  As she watched him go Sandy could barely suppress a raucous laugh.  "Reflects credit, on you, Professor Ruben?  Oh, no, all the credit belongs to a certain man whose initials are J.C. and he's upstairs with Gabriel!"

For a split second the idea was the funniest thing in the world.  Then she realized the implications and made silent, frantic confession:  "Sorry, Lord, that was bad, I shouldn't say that about Jeff, You're the only Lord, You're my only Lord, really, Lord, I'm sorry, please forgive me!"

But despite her protests of contrition her effective church continued to be the school exhibition space on the first floor, and her primary act of worship was haunting that room, hoping against hope that Jeff would come in and admire her work and accept the offering she had secretly made to his glory. 

One time he was there when she was. He was approaching the place where her chapel design was displayed, he seemed to be slowing down to look at it . . . And then Professor Ruben, curse the man! came up wanting to talk to her about something or other. He took quite a long time about it, and his bulk was between her and her spot on the gallery wall, between her and the object of her adoration. By the time he moved, Jeff was gone.  At that moment she knew what it was like to want to kill with her bare hands.

“Lord help me, what an idolater I was! I worshipped him! I even called him my Apollo . . . ” 

There was no excuse for it. Not for her. She of all people should have known better. 

“And it got worse.” 

She grew tired of weaving fantasies about married life with Jeff. They were always set in the vague future, and they were nothing since they might never come true. What it would be like to actually know him physically now, before they lost their time together here? What would she do if he were to take her in his arms some spring evening here at the school, someplace private, and overwhelm her with his love? Would she say Yes? Would he need to ask her to say Yes, or would her Yes already have been said?

By that time she looked back on her pledge of the previous spring as naive innocence. How silly they had all been! A soft nagging voice in her gut occasionally reminded her that the standards she had committed herself to hadn’t been made up by a gaggle of romanticizing schoolgirls.  The voice was easy to ignore. She hadn’t been to church since she was home for Christmas vacation, and as for reading her Bible, why did she need to do that? She knew what was in it already and with all the demands of Architecture school, she rationalized, she simply didn’t have time.

Besides, God must have meant her to meet Jeff, just as she was sure He meant her to be happy– overwhelmingly, deliriously, divinely-- happy with him.

The roof of the Architecture building, that would be the spot. Up there with the starry night spreading its mantle over them . . . “Jam nox stellata velamina pandit . . . ,” as the words of a poem she’d picked up in high school put it, and Jeff Chesters like a young Caesar taking possession of her body, her heart, her soul . . . “veni, vidi, vinci,” . . . a happy country he had conquered a long time ago.

Back then she never realized what a hypocrite she had become. “There I was, despising and condemning the Christys and Elspeths and Martinas, while in my heart I was just as bad as they were! Maybe worse, because I knew better!  Heaven help me, I was sure my beliefs were Christian as ever, just more enlightened, more mature!”

But they had suffered a revolution. By late winter of her freshman year she was convinced that love, True Committed Love (she had thought of it in all upper case), sanctified sex. Oh, of course, marriage would have to follow. Some day. But there was no hurry. The mutual declaration of true love was what made a marriage, not a public ceremony or a piece of paper. God certainly would understand, even approve. After all, wasn’t God love?

“Yes, blast me, and love was God and Jeff was Love and Jeff was god, and sorry, Jesus, seeya later!” 

She thought she truly loved Jeff Chesters, but in truth she was infatuated with the man, besotted by him, and couldn’t tell the difference. She hardly knew where she ended and her image of him began. Early that spring one of Jeff’s projects won the Senior Design Award and Sandy’s joy and pride knew no bounds. “You would have thought I’d won the damn thing myself,” she thought now. He was her Apollo, her god of the sun, her sustenance, her shield; and though she was only a very minor planet in his orbit, she was convinced the day would come when he would notice her and her work and make her his own.

The day came. Or rather, the night.

Free Souls, Chapter 16

"Oh, Jeff, Jeff!  Yes, oh, yes!  Do that again, oh, oh, yes, yes, yes!"

It was a warm night for February, and the windows in Professor Ruben's second-floor studio were open to counteract the unabated blast from the steam heating system. Sandy's table was elbow-deep in rustling yellow tracing paper as she sketched out alternatives for the current assignment, a new campus chapel. But her mind wasn’t entirely on her project. She was in the middle of an elaborate fantasy in which she and Jeff, the divine Jeff, were living together as artists and lovers as in La Boheme. 

It had crossed her mind that this might be fudging on the vow she’d made with her friends to maintain a pure mind as well as a pure body.  But how could it hurt?  She always imagined them as being married, so of course that made it all right. And not the consumptive Mimi role for her! No, she cast herself as a strong and equal partner, pulling her weight so together they would make the architectural world sit up and take notice.

Not for the first time she was fantasizing about their conjugal lovemaking. What Sandy lacked in physical experience she made up for from novel reading and her own imagination. As outwardly she coolly worked out the relations between the various program requirements, inwardly she was feeling all the fiery passion of their sexual relations as she dreamed they must be. What it must be like to have him kiss her, to caress her, to initiate her into all the glorious mysteries of love!

Her devotions were rudely curtailed when Tracey ran laughing into the studio. “Hey, Sandy,” she practically yelled. “Guess who I just saw just now?” The handful of other students up working raised their heads from their drawing boards in undisguised interest. They were doomed to disappointment, for Tracey dropped her voice. “Christy Mackintosh!” she whispered.

“Yes, so what?” Sandy rejoined. She didn’t appreciate being interrupted right at the climax of her imaginary lovemaking. She knew who Christy Mackintosh was, she was one of the fluffy, tight-sweater-wearing, perfectly-coifed senior girls who, like Jeff, had Professor Gabriel for their second-semester design teacher. In a just world, a girl like Christy Mackintosh would have flunked out two years before and gone into Interior Design. But somehow she always managed to do passable design and keep her studio grades high enough to continue. Oh, well, Sandy knew the world wasn’t just.

“Well,” Tracey giggled, “I just saw her heading into the women’s restroom on the first floor, and her lipstick and hair was all mussed and her sweater was on backwards and one of her socks was missing! And the seat of her jeans had dirt and mud on them! What do you think of that?”

Sandy wasn’t above a juicy piece of gossip, especially when it came from a first-hand reliable witness and involved someone she didn’t like. “Verrrry interesting,” she commented, imitating Arte Johnson's German soldier on Laugh-In. “Anything else?”

“Ohhhh, yeah. After she went into the john, Fred Holloway came slinking in, looking around like he didn’t want to be seen (I was behind that column near the telephones, if you want to know), and get this! He had grass and mud on his clothes, too. The knees of his jeans were positively gross!”

“Oh, really!” Sandy raised an eyebrow. “Did you stick around for the rest?”

“Of course I did, silly,” her friend said with a grin. “Got to get all the facts. Fred went into the men’s room and in a minute came out with his jeans cleaned off, more or less, and this really smug look on his face. Then he went down towards the snack bar. Then a couple minutes later, out Christy waltzes from the women’s john all put back together, except she’d taken off the other sock, too, and up she goes back to Studio like nothing has happened whatsoever!”

“Where do you think– ?” Sandy wondered.

“Down by Dishler Lake, most likely,” Tracey theorized. “That’s where it usually goes on.”

Dishler Lake was actually a small reservoir lying not far from the Architecture building. Surrounded by groves of trees and clumps of bushes and bordered by winding footpaths, it was a popular spot for lovers.

“But I didn’t know Christy and Fred were dating,” said Sandy.

“They aren’t! That’s what makes it so funny! Haven’t you heard about the scheme some of the older girls have going? We know Christy and Elspeth and Martina can’t design their way out of a paper bag, right?”

“Right.”

“Well, how do you think Martina happened to get her last project pinned up in the school gallery?”

It was beginning to dawn on Sandy where this was going, “You don’t mean– !”

“Yep. Scout’s honor.” She grinned mischievously. “I have it from a very good authority, a guy I know in Gabriel’s studio, that some of the senior girls are bribing the boys with sex to get them to do their designs for them! I guess Fred helped Christy out and she was out by the lake paying up! . . . . Oh, don’t look so shocked!” Tracey chided her as she saw Sandy’s horrified reaction. “You know as well as I do that some women sleep their way to the top.”

“It’s– it’s not the sex,” Sandy sputtered. “It’s– how could Christy and Martina and all of them turn in someone else’s work and pretend it was their own?”

“Oh, you and your artistic integrity. You are such a throwback. Now me, I wouldn’t do it, because what if I get hired someday on the strength of say, David’s work” (she named one of the boys in their studio) “and David wasn’t around to help me? Now you, you’d never need to do that. Your work is good enough on its own. But isn’t it funny?”

“Yes. Very funny.” But Sandy was anxiously wondering if Jeff were involved in this scam. She hoped not. God, she hoped not.

“I don’t imagine Jeff Chesters is in on this,” pronounced Tracey, as if answering her friend’s unspoken question. “His ego is too big to let him share his work. He likes women well enough, that’s clear, but I doubt he thinks he should have to pay for one!”

Sandy was about to come to his defense when it occurred to her she didn’t know anything about his dating habits. So she merely said, “I wonder if Professor Gabriel knows?”

“Well, if he’s too stupid to notice I’m not clueing him in! Hey! I wonder who the bigger whores are, the girls or the guys?” Tracey paused. “Oh, well,” she said, “I think I’m heading home soon. What were you going to do?”

“Oh, yeah, what time is it? After 10:00? Yeah, you want to leave now? I’ll come with you. See you down at the bike rack?”

“Ten minutes? OK!”

Tracey left. As Sandy organized her table and got ready to go she thought with disgust of those senior girls. If they knew anything about design they’d be learning from Jeff and be able to pass on their own. At the very least, how could Christy settle for buying work from someone like Fred Holloway? His designs were slick and commercial and had no imagination whatsoever.

“Jeff, oh Jeff,” she breathed to him within her soul, "I honor you, I adore you, I love you; you don’t know it, but I’m the only woman in this school who really understands and appreciates you. Tracey says you have a big ego. No! It’s your integrity that wouldn’t allow you to prostitute yourself like that. And you wouldn’t prostitute anyone else! Oh, Jeff, I’m working on it! Give me time, and one day I will be worthy of you!”

_________________________________

by Catrin Lewis, 1983, revised 2013 & 2014.  All rights reserved

Free Souls, Chapter 14

"Hey, Sandy, over here!"  Tracey's voice cut even through the hubbub of the entire Architecture school student body assembling in the School Commons.  "Hey, Sandy, I've saved us some seats!"

Sandy met her eye and had to admit defeat.  She hadn't been planning on sitting with her friend for this Thursday's weekly all-school lecture; at least, she wasn't planning on sitting where Tracey had established herself, in the upper middle and towards the center of the semi-circular, raked hall.  

These events were one of the few times she knew she could get a good and sustained view of Jeff Chesters.  He usually sat down towards the front on the right hand side with some of his male friends from Sutpen's studio, so the left hand side about ten rows up, that was the best place to gaze at him and contemplate the beauty of his genius and the genius of his beauty.  From there she could see and delicately drink in most of his Grecian profile while ostensibly having her eyes on the speaker at the podium.  Up where Tracey wanted to sit today, all she would be able to see would be the back of Jeff's shining head, if that.

But unless she wanted to be the subject of Tracey's good-natured but ribald humor, she had to join her there.  Two weeks before they had sat together in Sandy's favorite spot, and just as the students were quieting down for the principal to introduce the speaker, Tracey had followed Sandy's eye to the object of her admiration. "Oh, there's your Apollo!" she had exclaimed, loud enough for the entire section to hear. Then followed it up with a wolf whistle. Sandy could have died of shame. Thank God "Apollo" had a perfectly innocent art history connotation and no one around her seemed to connect it with Jeff. But it had been a close call.

Well, thought Sandy with resignation, there was no danger of that happening where Tracey wanted to sit today.  She trudged up the aisle steps and excused herself through the row till she gained the seat the other girl had saved.  

Settling into it, she found that she was wrong.  "Thank you, Jesus!" By moving her neck just a little to the left and sitting up very straight, she could direct her gaze without obstacle between the ranks of student shoulders and heads until they rested on her inspiration.  True, it was only the fall of his tawny curls and a sliver of his sun-bronzed cheek she could see, but it was something.  Tracey was paying no attention at all to what Sandy was up to; if anything she was seeking out boys she thought were cute so she could point them out to her friend.

The speaker, one of the principals of the famous firm of Richardson & Greene in Wapatomekie, was a little late.  As they all waited Sandy rested her eyes on that hair and that cheek and thought with awe what a beautiful mind lay under it.  All the ideas that were emerging from it at such a young age!  She thanked God, not for the first time, that Jeff had pulled a high draft number and so escaped being called to go to Viet Nam.  What a tragic waste it would be if he were to go there and be maimed or killed!  What a contribution to the architecture of the world would be lost even if he were to come home safely!  For she couldn't imagine anyone being exposed to the horrors of that terrible war and returning with his artistic vision intact.

Suddenly, even as the thought was in her mind, Jeff turned and looked straight up the lecture hall, right at her.

She felt her face flame red.  But had he, really?  No, it wasn't possible.  Not at her.  Surely he could not have felt her eyes on him and turned around to see who it was.  Surely, he was looking for someone else, someone in some row above her.  

In her alarm and confusion Sandy wasn't going to sit still to find out.  She bent her head down, pretending to find something in her notebook, and tried to breathe till the warmth in her cheeks could subside.  Then resolutely turning to her friend she said, "Hey, Tracey, isn't it great that Stanford Richardson is going to be speaking to us this afternoon?"  Just now she was glad Tracey was with her, breathlessly glad!

Sandy's tone was over-bright but if Tracey noticed she wasn't saying so.  "Sure," she replied.  "I hope he talks about the new Federal Street Building.  I hear the site was almost impossible!"

"I heard that, too!" she replied with a shade too much enthusiasm.  And she kept her friend in conversation until a general shushing went around the room signalling that the great man had arrived.

She was safe.  Down towards the front on the right hand side of the Commons Jeff was again facing forward, his eyes harmlessly on the speaker.  Had his looking her way been on purpose, or mere coincidence?  Surely the latter.  But she was more careful after that.  No one must catch her staring at him in All-School Lecture or anywhere else.  It might be misconstrued.

And she must not be misconstrued.  What she loved about him was his intellect and his ability.  His exterior was merely a worthy vehicle for his brilliance.  To regard him as an attractive man or to assess him specifically as a male creature seemed . . . disgusting somehow.   And it would be a breaking of her vow as a Knight of the Single Eye.  How could she demean him so? She wouldn't!

But that didn't stop her from wanting to be where he was. Or from being absurdly thankful to gaze on him every chance she could.

______________________________

Catrin Lewis, 1983; revised 2013 & 2014.  All rights reserved

Free Souls, Chapter 13

An afternoon towards the middle of her first semester, hardly five months later.  In the large lofty space just off the entry hall of the School of Architecture building, Sandy stood gazing with particular absorption at a set of drawings signed with the initials “J.C.”  

Clear north light beamed through the windows in the clerestory high overhead, indirectly illuminating the displays of 24 x 36 inch whiteprint drawings tacked to the acoustical carpet-covered walls. The room had been specially designed as an exhibition hall and periodically hosted shows of the work of famous architects and designers. Ordinarily, it featured student projects, the best work from the various studios.

There was a movement at her side.  She turned and saw she’d been joined by her best friend Tracey.

“Whose are those?” asked Tracey carelessly, pointing to the plans with her T-square.

“‘Those,’ as you so casually put it, are Jeff Chesters’ plans for the Main Street office building assignment.” It gave her a thrill to be able to say his name, to be allowed to take it on her lips.

“Oh,” said Tracey, unenlightened. “Who’s Jeff Chesters?”

“You don’t know who Jeff Chesters is?” She was astounded.

“No. Who is he?”

“Only the best designer in the whole school!”

“OK, and? Give me some help here!”

Sandy felt a sudden reluctance to impart more than the most superficial of information. To say too much would be a profanation. “He’s a senior, and he’s in Professor Sutpen’s AM studio.”

“Oh, good grief, Sandy, stop playing coy. You’d think you liked him or something. What the hell does he look like? Would I know him if I saw him in the hall?”

“Oh, all right. He’s about six foot tall, he's got curly reddish-brown hair that he wears about shoulder-length [“a luxurious mane of chestnut curls,” Sandy was translating to herself], and blue eyes, a high forehead and a straight nose [“Like a Grecian statue. Perfect”].  Remember that statue of Apollo we saw in Architecture History?  Kind of like that.”

“Oh!” Tracey said. “So that’s Jeff Chesters! I thought his name was Jesse or Jason or something. I’ve been so busy drooling over him the last six weeks I never bothered to find out his real name. God, no wonder you’re all starry-eyed. I think every woman in the school has a crush on him, including Professor Baxter. Rotten for us freshmen, isn’t it, stuck over there in the West Annex and the seniors getting the cushy studios on the top floor. We hardly ever see them.”

Sandy deliberately mounted her high horse. “Well, I care about more than a man’s physical appearance. We women don’t like it when they objectify us and we shouldn’t do it to them. I look at a guy’s mind and his skill!”

The other young woman snorted.

“Tracey,” Sandy persisted, “just look at these drawings. Now I’m only a freshman and not that experienced. But don’t these look like a professional did them?”

Tracey was heard to mutter something that sounded suspiciously like “maybe one did” but Sandy chose to ignore it. She went on. “Now look at the way the space flows in this plan!”

“Space doesn’t flow,” Tracey objected. “Professor Robbins says so. You define it, it doesn’t flow.”

“Oh, all right! Picky, picky! Look at how he’s defined the space between the main entry and the elevator lobby!”

Tracey leaned closer. “Yeah, looks like it’d work all right.”

“'Work'! It would do more than work, it would be gracious, uplifting, inspiring!” Just like its designer, Sandy was sure.

“OK, if you say so,” Tracy said dubiously. “So what else?”

“The South Elevation, the one on the Main Street side. Just look at his South Elevation! Isn’t it exquisite?”

Tracey peered in, assumed a very knowing look, and said, “Oh, yeah, I agree that Jeff Chesters’ south elevation is exquisite. I do admire a tight ass on a man.”

Sandy tried again. “No, Tracey, be serious. We can learn from him. The mezzanine level for instance. Look what Jeff has done with the interpenetration of space!”

Her friend could not resist. “‘Interpenetration of space’? I wish he’d interpenetrate my space sometime!”

Sandy nearly exploded. “Good grief, Tracey, I wish you wouldn’t be so vulgar!”

Tracey affected mock innocence and shrugged. “Guess I didn’t come up with your cultcha. I’m a hillbilly from the sticks, remember? Vulguh’s mah middle nay-um,” she drawled.

Resuming her normal voice, she asked, “You coming back to Studio before heading back to the dorm?”

“In a little while. I still want– ”

“I’ll leave you to your meditations. Seeya later!”

Tracey took herself off, presumably to the West Annex, but Sandy remained before Jeff Chesters’ drawings, now distracted a little by what Tracey had said. It was true: most of the girls were more or less in love with him. And the guys? Some envied him, some wanted to be him, and for some it was a little of both. She, however, honored and appreciated him. Such beautiful work! If only she could design like that someday!

She wasn’t sure why she kept Tracey for a friend. The girl seemed to have sex on the brain. Now she would never dare to think of Jeff Chesters in that salacious way. It would be sacrilege to make him into a sex object, “lust in the heart,” as the Gospel said.

But Sandy had not noticed that, already, her concern was no longer that she not sin against Jesus Christ, but that she not sully the idea of a certain very talented senior in Professor Sutpen’s AM studio.

Free Souls, Chapter 12

One night the spring of her senior year, a little over ten years ago, several of her girlfriends came over for a slumber party.

In the early hours of the morning, when the records had been played and the discarded pizza crusts lay drying in the box, after they’d finished painting each other’s nails and ironing one another’s hair, they’d sat down in the Beichtens’ wood-panelled basement recreation room and gone solemn all at once.

“This might be our last slumber party,” said Brenda, a little black-haired gamin whose curls defied all efforts to straighten them. Her tone was fatalistic.

“Oh, no, no!” some of them protested. “There’ll be plenty of time in the summer!”

“I don’t know about that,” stated Felicity, with her usual thoughtful stolidity. “We’ll have a lot to do over the summer, getting ready for college, and some of us will be away.”

They all paused to let that sink in. The silence was broken by Carole, whose blonde beauty could deceive the shallow-minded into overlooking her prodigious intellect. She said, “I know I won’t have time for parties. I’m headed to Stanford for Pre-Law and I need to do all the reading ahead of time that I can. I’m not letting anyone–” (and they all knew she meant “any boy”)– “get ahead of me!”

A murmur of appreciation passed among the girls, then Pat, a brown-haired girl in John Lennon wire rims, spoke up with, “You know I’ve been accepted to Oberlin. I’ll be majoring in Political Science.” It was her ambition to become the first female Congressional representative from their district, and they thought if any woman could make that happen, it was Pat. “And Elise has been accepted to do Biology at Johns Hopkins, so she can get into their MD program.” Elise nodded. “And Sandy, we all know what Sandy intends to do.”

At which Brenda blurted out, “Sandy’s going to be a knight in the cause of Architecture!”

The other girls laughed, but Sandy said slowly, “Actually, Brenda is right. That is the way I feel about it. Architecture isn’t just a profession or a career for me, it’s a calling. I’m convinced it’s what God wants me to do.”

“With a T-square instead of a sword!” said Brenda, who was planning to study Electrical Engineering at IIT.

“You know,” said Carole, “I’m with Sandy on this. It doesn’t matter one damn bit that I’m a woman, when I become a lawyer I’m going to be a knight with Jesus as my liege Lord.”

Carole was a fellow-member of Fourth Presbyterian, but it didn’t take Dr. Wallace’s preaching for any of these young women to embrace the idea of serving God through their professions. To a woman, that night they all affirmed the same.

“You know, I like the concept of knighthood,” said Pat, quite earnestly.  “Particularly the idea of total dedication. You had your life, of course, you took care of your manor, but really everything you did you did in the name of your lord and king. So if Jesus is my King . . . It seems to give more meaning to life, you know?’

They knew. They also knew they were swimming against the cultural tide that pushed the New and rejected the Old, but they were Blakewell Public Academy Classical Honors students. Being countercultural against the counterculture was what they revelled in.

To the annoyance of their less-favored schoolmates, Classical Honors students feasted on Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Austen; they quoted Ovid and Aquinas (in the original Latin); they were into Shostakovich as well as Steppenwolf; they attended plays, operas, and art exhibitions; they wrote poetry even when it wasn’t assigned; and at times between the boys and the girls they even affected an ironically sincere parody of the conduct and speech of the knights and ladies of Medieval legend. “We must have been insufferable,” Sandy thought now. “We would have been the better for a good scare.”

But in spite of all their self-admitted posing and deliberate irony, Sandy and her peers believed in the high standards their education called them to meet. More than that, they were fully confident they would meet them.

It was no different that spring Saturday night.

“And purity,” said Sandy. “Don’t forget they pledged themselves to purity.”

“Of mind, soul, and body,” confirmed Pat.

“Don’t you think purity is the same as focus?” proposed Felicity, who was going on a full scholarship to Juilliard to become a concert pianist. “Focussing on what’s really important and not letting other things get in the way?”

“‘The single eye,’” said Carole, echoing Jesus in the Gospel of St. Matthew. “That’s about keeping your focus on God . . . And knowing your real treasure is in heaven.”

“Felicity, you have a point, ” said Elise. “And you, too, Carole. But focus– purity– the single eye– whatever you want to call it, it’s going to be harder once we get to college. You guys keep me honest. Once we’re scattered all over the country . . . Where will we ever find a group like ours? I hope I won’t be tempted to let my standards slide.”

“Especially when it comes to purity,” said Carole.

“What kind of purity are you talking about?” inquired Brenda. “Saving yourself for marriage?”

“Well, that, but– ” began Carole.

“Yes, that, and also– ” Sandy spoke up at the same time. She apologized. “I’m sorry, Carole, go ahead.”

“No, you, Sandy. You’re the one who mentioned purity in the first place.”

“Well, all right. Yes, purity of body, for certain. But, I mean . . . ” She groped for the right words. “I mean, I don’t think we should make ourselves into some golden trophy to be awarded to some guy when we marry him. I mean, there’s something obnoxious about remaining a virgin just to remain a virgin, don’t you think? But I guess it gets back to the knighthood idea. Abstaining from sex, fasting, all that was part of getting them focussed on serving their king when they went to war. If they were too busy slipping in and out of ladies’ bowers why would they ever want to put their armor on?”

“Or in our case,” agreed Pat, “getting all distracted by who’s dating who and who slept with who last weekend and love triangles and breakups and all that drama.”

“Which you will notice that our crowd doesn’t get involved in,” said Brenda, airily. “We just stand above it and let the common herd of hormone-ridden high-schoolers run themselves to ruin, misery, and rotten grades!”

They all laughed.

“Yeah, that’s true,” said Sandy. “We Classical Honors people, seems like we’re all focussed on doing the best work we can, boys and girls both. We don’t distract each other, we work together. Has it ever occurred to you that in our crowd we have a lot of boys who are friends, but few of us actually have boyfriends? And that’s okay?”

“Yeah,” said Carole. “The other kids think we’re weird. ‘Honors monkeys run in packs,’ that’s what they say about us.”

“Well, I like being weird,” said Sandy, laughing with the rest. “Besides, who’d want to date somebody who isn’t in our program?”

“Really,” said Brenda. “I’d want any guy I went steady with to be at least as smart as I am!”

They laughed again, but they knew she was serious. They all felt the same way. “But with the Honors guys . . . ” said Carole, “wouldn’t going steady with one of them seem like incest? Especially if it came to sex!”

“Definitely! Like making out with your brother!” said Sandy, thinking of Larry and Mark and shuddering.

“Sex just complicates things,” Felicity said. “Like Pat said, it’s a distraction from your work.”

“I don’t think guys think of it that way,” considered Elise. “At least, not the general run of guys. For them it’s a ‘creative outlet.’”

“Sure,” said Pat drily, “when it’s not a procreative outlet!”

“I support a lot of what the Women’s Movement is doing,” Elise went on once the laughter at Pat’s comment had subsided, “but I think they’re off-base in thinking that sex is just the same for women as for men.”

“Or should be,” said Sandy.

“Or should be. Seems to me if you have sex with a guy without knowing it’s permanent, it’s like giving pieces of yourself away all over the place. How are you supposed to get any important work done if you’re constantly starting and ending some new sexual relationship? It would be devastating.”

“Not to mention devastating to your reputation,” said Felicity. “It’s so low-class. How would you like people talking about you like they talk about Doreen Steltzer?” Everyone knew Doreen Steltzer; at least, what the boys said about her: “She walks through the neighborhood with a mattress on her back.” She shuddered again.

“You mean the Handy Pass-Around Pack?” inquired Pat sarcastically. “No thanks. I don’t want to be known for sleaze.”

“Do you think it’s different if a girl stops before going all the way?” wondered Carole. “There’ll be plenty of attractive men in college. We’re not planning to be nuns, after all. Where would you draw the line?” She made the statement as if proposing a problem for scientific study.

“Maybe not letting him touch you under your clothes, at least not below the waist or in front?” posited Felicity. “Any farther, and guys get, well, expectations.”

“That’s right,” said Brenda. “It’s not fair to the boys to let them get their expectations up–or other things”--she grinned broadly-- “then say no, you were just fooling. Seems like using them, to me.”

“I totally agree,” said Sandy. “The ‘professional virgin.’ Sometimes I think that’s worse than being an out-and-out slut.”

“Maybe you’re right,” agreed Felicity. “There’s a certain gay abandon about the one. Like they can’t help themselves. The other seems almost, well, premeditated.”

“Not necessarily,” Pat said. “It could be more what we were talking about earlier, loss of focus. I’m not sure girls like that know what they want. So they get themselves into stupid situations. Over and over, which is stupider still.”

“‘Stupider’?” Carole teased. “You of all people’re using a word like ‘stupider’?”

“You know what I mean!”

“Seems stupid to me, too,” said Sandy, getting back to the subject. “That’s why I intend to focus on Architecture until I get my degree and am out and have a good job. Boys as friends are fine. But I’m not letting one of them get in the way of my serving Jesus as an architect!”

“What if Jesus sends you a nice boy you love enough to marry while you’re still in school?” asked Brenda with a knowing look.

“Sure, He can do that if He wants. But it would have to be a nice Christian boy. You think it’d be hard dating someone who’s not in our program. I think it’d be worse being married to someone who didn’t think Jesus was the most important thing in the world. Talk about losing your focus!”

“Some people say that marriage is just a piece of paper,” said Brenda. “I know the Women’s Libbers do. And you can be just as committed if the two of you just decide to move in together.”

“Yeah,” laughed Felicity. “And your report card has nothing to do what how hard you studied in school.”

“What’s that got to do with it?”

“Don’t you get it?” Felicity said. “A marriage certificate, a report card, just two pieces of paper. But they stand for something bigger and more important that somebody has done. Come on, you remember that from when we studied symbolism in Introduction to Philosophy!”

“Oh, yeah,” said Brenda. “True.”

“So, ” said Felicity, “the report card is the record and symbol of how you did in school, and the marriage certificate is the record and symbol of the commitment you made when you promised to love, cherish, and so on and so forth your lawfully wedded husband. Or you will make, when you get married,” she amended.

“Do you guys think it’s important that that commitment be public?” wondered Pat. “Does it need to be done ‘before God and all the neighbors’ for it to count?’”

“‘Before God and all the neighbors’?” questioned Elise.

“Can’t help it,” said Pat. “I have hillbilly ancestors.”

“I think so,” said Sandy, answering Pat’s question. “If nothing else, it proves that your husband is willing to commit to you in public!”

“I think it’s totally essential. It’s what marriage is all about,” said Carole. “Christian marriage, at least. Standing up before God and all the neighbors as you put it and saying, ‘This is my man till death do us part.’ It comes down to having witnesses to a contract. That’s what marriage is, really, a contract.”

“Sounds so cold,” said Brenda. “I guess that’s why a lot of people say true love is enough.”

“It is a contract,” said Carole. “It’s also a commitment, a covenant, an agreement, a vow, a bond, a whatever you want to call it. Because true love isn’t enough. That’s what Dr. Wallace says. And don’t tell anyone I said this, but I think our parents are right in saying it should be public.”

“Like the oath of fealty the knights took, like we were talking about before,” said Pat. “That was in front of the king and his court. The witnesses held the knight accountable and helped him keep his vow.”

“That's all true for marriage. But what about the work we’re going to do?” Sandy wondered. “It’s nice for us to sit here and talk about focus and purity and doing it all for Jesus, but with our work, is it just between ourselves and God? Do we have any witnesses keeping us accountable in that?”

“Well,” said Felicity, “there’s always our professors–”

“Of course we’ll all write to each other and– “” began Pat.

“Hey! Wait a minute!” gasped Elise, cutting across them both. They all turned to stare at her. “We all agree that it’s good to be held accountable. Like I said before, you guys keep me honest. Right?”

“Right,” they all agreed.

“Okay. So here’s my idea. Let’s form an order! We’ll pledge to be noble knights and true as we fight against disease and injustice and bad architecture and all the rest of it, and we’ll be each other’s witnesses! We can call ourselves the Lady Knights of the Single Eye!”

“And promise to stand for Pure Focus?” suggested Brenda.

“Certainly, that’d be it!” said Elise.

“Or Focussed Purity!” said Sandy.

“How about both?” said Pat.

“Sure, why not?” responded Elise.

“Can we drop the ‘Lady’ part?” asked Carole. “I’ll be a full knight or none at all!”

That sounded good to them all. Felicity asked, “So what will our pledge be?”

“Well,” said Elise, “we’re all Christians, right?”

“Yes.”

“All right, first of all we all dedicate our lives, our work, and our honor to our liege Lord Jesus Christ.”

“And how about this?” said Sandy. “Just to be clear, we should say that means that we will be virgin knights until our Lord sends us the Christian man He intends for us to marry. Speaking for myself, I mean . . . ” She looked around at the others. One by one they all nodded.

“And we pledge to focus on the work He has given us for His glory alone,” said Pat.

“Absolutely,” they all agreed.

“So are we all in?” said Elise. “Who will pledge her fealty as a charter member of the Knights of the Order of the Single Eye?”

A solemn hush went around the room. To Sandy, it was like being in church. Something momentous was about to happen, and they all knew it.

Then, “I’m in,” said Brenda.

“So am I,” said Pat.

“I am, too, all the way,” said Sandy.

“Me, too,” said Carole.

“Here’s my hand on it,” said Felicity.

“And mine,” said Elise.

And then and there, in the basement rec room of Sandy’s house, they swore their solemn oath to be faithful knights in Jesus’ service, dedicating their future work and their purity of mind, heart, and body to Christ alone. It was Sandy who suggested “Be Thou My Vision” as their anthem, and now, years later, it brought tears to her eyes to recall how earnestly they had sung it together, once she’d fetched the hymnal off the piano upstairs.

They had been so committed, so sincere! True, their baptismal and confirmation vows should have been enough to set and keep them on the path they swore to walk that night.  But there was nothing wrong in the vow they’d made, Sandy knew it, and nothing whatever wrong with the principles they’d dedicated themselves to. They were honest and worthy and noble and good.

“It was nothing to laugh at!” she shouted hotly at the grinning unseen skeptic who haunted the empty room. Nor did she care if the neighbors heard. “We were right to promise, right, right, right!”

Which made it all the more frightening how quickly she, at least, began to break the bond.

____________________________

by Catrin Lewis, 1983, revised 2013 & 2014.  All rights reserved

Free Souls, Chapter 10

Sandy climbed the stairs to her apartment in a distracted state of mind. She unlocked the door and routinely, almost mechanically, placed her hat on its hook and hung her coat and scarf in the minuscule coat closet. She hardly paid attention to what she was doing: something unsettled and sad had bedded down in the pit of her stomach and would not let her look back on the afternoon with any degree of contentment or rest.

“What do I want, anyway?” she demanded of the four walls. “I should be ecstatic!” 

Her boss, whom she respected, esteemed, and yes, yes, yes, loved had just asked her to accept a promotion to associate architect in his firm! “He runs the best damn design practice in Wapatomekie, and I’m going to be his first associate! And I’m only twenty-eight!” It would bring amazing new opportunities, not to mention an increase in pay, all tied in with the fact that Eric Baumann thought she was worthy of the position. “Ecstacy” certainly should be the word.

But she was not ecstatic. She felt flat, empty, and painfully at odds with herself.

“What’s wrong with me?” she cried aloud as she kicked off her shoes and drew herself up on the sofa. “I was horrible to him! There at the exhibition, and later on in the car! Why can’t I take a compliment from a man I care about with any sort of grace? Would it have killed me simply to say ‘Thank you’ and get it over with? But no, I have to throw it back in his teeth and twist his words!”

But it wasn’t just that. Any other woman, loving a man and wanting to lead him on to love her, would have skilfully laid hold of that compliment (“You look like an Old Master,” he had said, and she had known exactly what he meant: the ensemble was one of her favorites; she knew it became her, though it was too good for office wear). Any woman would have made of his words a golden cord to bind him to her and make him her own. Any woman, that is, but herself.

She was sure Leah Matthews would have taken full advantage had Eric so complimented her. On the thought, she stopped. “He probably has said such things to her.”

But so what if he had? The point wasn’t what he had or hadn’t done, it was what she, Alexandra Marie Beichten, had done and had kept on doing to him.

Painfully, she recalled every word of their exchange over the El Greco. 

A self-justifying voice within her spoke up: “Well, there was no meaning in that, anyway. Totally silly for him to talk about giving you something neither he nor you could ever own. Talk is cheap. Easy enough for him to go on like that, when he’ll never be called on to back it up!”

But the contrary voice died away, suppressed by what she knew was the truth. For what Eric had offered her there in the Spanish gallery was not a priceless Old Master painting, but the assurance, much more valuable, that he could be aware of her wishes and desires, and in some way desired to fulfill them. No, he was not aware of everything she desired– not that, not the impossible That– but to the extent her wishes were right and fitting given their present relationship, that certainly was how he felt.

He’d shown it when he’d offered– no, given– her the position as associate architect. He had known that was something she wanted before she had been willing to see it for herself. The thought had crossed her mind over the past few months, but she had always repressed it as a dim, distant, impossible dream. But Eric had known she longed to handle projects on her own, to make a greater contribution to their mutual effort. And at some cost to himself he had given the opportunity to her.

And how had she reacted? 

"I practically turned my back on him in the car!  I acted like I had nothing to do with him, the office, or our work. Did I really have to make him spell it out for me as if I were a stubborn kid in the slow learners' class?"  But that's what he'd had to do before she would stop putting words in his mouth and consent to receive what he would give.

And then in her heart she had impugned his motives.

"'He's trying to see less of me', that's what you automatically thought.  All your life since you were a kid you've wanted to stretch your architectural wings and fly, and now you're saying 'Feed me, coddle me, don't make me leave the nest'?  He's going to give you more freedom, and you know how hard that must be for him, he's such a strong designer himself.  And your first thought is to think he's deliberately being cruel to you?  Where is your self-respect, Alexandra, your good sense, your-- your gratitude?"

She should have been happy about how things had turned out; happy, joyful, and relieved. But she wasn’t yet and as yet she couldn’t be. “What is wrong with me?” she demanded again. 

Then, “I should call him. He’ll be home by now. Things seemed better by the time he dropped me off, but I should apologize for being such a shrew before that.”

But she knew she wouldn’t even pick up the phone. She knew why she wouldn’t, and she knew what had driven her to act the way she had.

It was fear.

Fear crouched like a shrivelled loathsome gnome visible to her mind’s eye, grinning in her face, mocking her. She got off the sofa, put on the kettle, and made herself a cup of tea. Maybe that would break its grip on her and she could go on with her evening as she had planned. There was an orchestra concert on the radio she was looking forward to listening to. And maybe she would draw a little on the sketches for her dream house.

But twenty cups of tea would have been no charm against a demon so long in residence. And the question of how her prospective kitchen should relate to a possible family room was nothing compared to the problem of how she had gotten to this point in her life and what she should do about it. And she had to do something about it, or her career (she would not allow herself to say “more than her career”) might be in jeopardy.

She pushed back her hair from her face with both hands, as if trying to clear her sight. “Why,” she whispered into the silence, “why do I act like this? Especially towards him? Why am I so afraid?”

Especially when for so long in her life there had been no need to be?

_________________________________

by Catrin Lewis, 1983, revised 2013 & 2014, all rights reserved