Cat's eye полностью

When they’ve had several beers they might talk about women. They refer to their girlfriends, some of whom live with them; these are called “my old lady.” Or they make jokes about the models in Life Drawing, who change from night to night. They speak of going to bed with them, as if this depends only on their inclination or lack of it. There are two possible attitudes to this: lip smacking or nauseated revulsion. “A cow,” they say. “A bag.” “What a discard.” Sometimes they do this with an eye toward me, looking to see how I will take it. When the descriptions of body parts get too detailed—“Cunt like an elephant’s arse,” “How would you know, eh, screw elephants much?”—they shush one another, as if in front of mothers; as if they haven’t decided who I am.

I don’t resent any of this. Instead I think I am privileged: I am an exception, to some rule I haven’t even identified.

I sit in the dankness and beer fug and cigarette smoke, getting a little dizzy, keeping my mouth shut, my eyes open. I think I can see them clearly because I expect nothing from them. In truth I expect a lot. I expect to be accepted.

There’s one thing they do that I don’t like: they make fun of Mr. Hrbik. His first name is Josef and they call him Uncle Joe, because he has a mustache and an Eastern European accent and is authoritarian in his opinions. This is unfair, since I know—all of us know by now—that he was shunted around in four different countries, because of the upheavals of the war, and got trapped behind the Iron Curtain and lived on garbage and almost starved, and escaped during the Hungarian Revolution, probably with danger to his life. He has never mentioned the exact circumstances. In fact he has mentioned none of this, in class. Nevertheless it is known.

But it cuts no ice with the boys. Drawing sucks and Mr. Hrbik is a throwback. They call him a D.P., which means displaced person, an old insult I remember from high school. It was what you called refugees from Europe, and those who were stupid and uncouth and did not fit in. They mimic his accent, and the way he talks about the body. They only take Life Drawing because it’s a requirement. Life Drawing is not what’s happening, Action Painting is, and for that you sure as hell don’t need to know how to draw. In particular you don’t need to know how to draw a cow with no clothes on. Nevertheless they sit in Life Drawing, scratching away with the charcoal and turning out rendering after rendering of breasts and buttocks, thighs and necks, and some nights nothing but feet, as I do, while Mr. Hrbik strides up and down, tugging at his hair and despairing.

The faces of the boys are impassive. To me their contempt is obvious, but Mr. Hrbik doesn’t notice. I feel sorry for him, and grateful to him, for letting me into the class. Also I admire him. The war is far enough away now to be romantic, and he has been through it. I wonder if he has any bullet holes in him, or other marks of grace.

Tonight, in the Ladies and Escorts of the Maple Leaf Tavern, it isn’t just the boys and me. Susie is here too.

Susie has yellow hair, which I can tell she rolls and sets and then dishevels, and tips ash-blond at the ends. She wears jeans and black turtlenecks too, but her jeans are skintight and she’s usually got something around her neck, a silver chain or a medallion. She does her eyes with a heavy black line over the lid like Cleopatra, and black mascara and smoky dark-blue eye shadow, so her eyes are blue-rimmed, bruise-colored, as if someone’s punched her; and she uses white face powder and pale pink lipstick, which makes her look ill, or as if she’s been up very late every night for weeks. She has full hips, and breasts that are too large for her height, like a rubber squeaky toy that’s been pushed down on the top of the head and has bulged out in these places. She has a little breathless voice and a startled little laugh; even her name is like a powder puff. I think of her as a silly girl who’s just fooling around at art school, too dumb to get into university, although I don’t make judgments like this about the boys.

“Uncle Joe was raving tonight,” says Jon. Jon is tall, with sideburns and big hands. He has a denim jacket with a lot of snap fasteners on it. Besides Colin the Englishman, he’s the most articulate one. He uses words like purity and the picture plane, but only among two or three, never with the whole group.

“Oh,” says Susie, with a tiny, gaspy laugh, as if the air is going into her instead of out, “that’s mean! You shouldn’t call him that!”

This irritates me: because she’s said something I should have said myself and didn’t have the guts to, but also because she’s made even this defense come out like a cat rubbing against a leg, an admiring hand on a bicep.

“Pompous old fart,” says Colin, to get some of her attention for himself. Susie turns her big blue-rimmed eyes on him. “He’s not old,” she says solemnly. “He’s only thirty-five.”

Everyone laughs.