Beneath The Skin(20)

My face hides all emotion—except for my eyes, perhaps, which feel like they’re glowing with green fire. I merely stand there, my stomach tight and my breath held, and let him observe. It’s like I’m in class all over again, awaiting my stupid peers’ criticism.

“Her hands and ankles are handcuffed to the pedestal,” he notices. “Sorry, but uh … seeing as she’s papier-mâché … or clay, or something … I don’t think she’s going anywhere.” He laughs again.

His laughs ring across the gallery, ring into my ears, into my heart.

“You don’t think there’s a point to the cuffs? That a woman can be objectified … without her consent?” I ask, my voice soft and low.

“Okay, is that what this is? Sorry, but no.” He shakes his head, leans back against the glass wall as he smirks. “Welcome to the new age, my friend. Men are just as objectified. You see ads nowadays? Men with sculpted abs and big, fat biceps and no fuckin’ waist to speak of?”

“It’s not the same.” Now I’m crossing my arms, my words growing more clipped by the syllable. “Women are treated like objects beyond that. Tools only meant to advance men. A pretty, opinionless wife on the arm of a CEO. The First Lady. The slut in a movie. A billboard of—”

“I live in an apartment with two gay men,” Brant cuts me off, and his voice is neither mad nor argumentative; in fact, the asshole sounds downright amused. “Between them and the carousel of pretty boys who slip through my pad on a nightly basis, they have so much damn body dysmorphia and body image issues and objectification between them that even I catch myself counting calories. Hey, did you know that I’m ‘straight skinny’ … but ‘gay fat’? Me. Fat.”

I feel so many thoughts bubbling up my throat and so much anger stewing around inside me that I suddenly—and uncharacteristically—find myself completely devoid of words. I simply stand there and stare at him stupidly, my eyes cold and my lips locked.

Didn’t I say I wouldn’t let him get to me? Didn’t I just say I knew exactly what kind of boy I was getting to know?

Why do I insist on engaging with him?

“And why’s the censor bar over just her mouth?” he asks, giving the work another quick, haphazard inspection. “I mean, you can clearly see her nipples. And her pink taco. I can see her cute little pink taco.” He points at it demonstratively and whispers, “It’s right there. Her a-cooter-mah-twat-a. Right there.”

Maybe I should start offering spoons with my work. “I guess that’s all I’ve brought you here to show you,” I say, giving up. “Y’know. Artist to artist.”

He looks at me suddenly. “Who’s the artist of this work?”

I narrow my eyes. “Some bitch named Nell.”

He nods thoughtfully, then seems to appraise me with his eyes. “So are you done showing me all this art stuff? You ready to … show me a little something not currently on display?” He does a little cheesy dance as he circles the naked sculpture, growing closer to me, his balled up fists in the air bouncing to some beat that only he hears.

My cold stare stops him short. “Let’s be real for a second,” I suggest to Brant—ignoring his soft, inviting eyes and his ridiculously terrible-yet-oddly-sexy dance moves. “The only thing you and I will ever be … is friends. You got it? I brought you here to show you art. That’s it.”

He smirks cockily. “Why? You afraid I’m too much for you?”

“I’m not afraid of anything.”

“Sure you are,” he retorts. “We’re all afraid of something. I, for one, am kinda afraid of leaving this art gallery without at least a kiss.” He bats his eyes dumbly, smiling with that crooked, dimpled smile.

My fists tighten. What a tool. “And where does that kiss lead? To me becoming just another dent in your headboard?” I lean into him. “Let’s be clear. You’re not an artist. You’re just in my school to score.”

He laughs at that. “Why would you think that about me? I’m not some … weird kind of art school man-whore.”

“No, you’re just the normal kind. Another guy who thinks he can get inside any woman he bats his eyes at. You already had your way with some girl behind that folding partition earlier this week in my studio class. Probably had one or two others that same night. And maybe two the weekend before. And how many have you had since?”

“Wait, wait, wait …”

“Hey, I don’t care,” I tell him, raising my hands up innocently. “I’m not here to judge you. I don’t know you and you owe me nothing. If you want to be a player, go ahead, play. But I’m not part of your game. I make art. I push at the world. I—”