Michael walked down the corridor and before he turned into the bath, he heard Sumiko whisper to Harley, “They’ve split up.” He closed the door behind him and switched on the light, nearly collapsing as he did so: everything was so bright. The room was white everywhere, white fixtures, white walls, white tile, white bidet, white towels, and even the soap in the white dish was white. He wanted to pee just to create some contrast, some relief not merely for his bladder but for his suffering eyes. He was dizzied by the brutal starkness of it all and the headache that had been at work in the back of his brain rose another notch in intensity. He imagined walking into this room and switching on the light in the middle of the night, having just come out of a sound sleep. He might have to do just that. He shuddered as he approximated the magnitude of the headache that might be caused by such a visual concussion. He flushed, washed his hands, reluctantly dried them on a stiff white towel, and went back to Harley and Sumiko in the kitchen.
“Do you have another bathroom?” Michael asked.
“There’s one in our bedroom,” Harley said, his big smile filled with concern. “Something wrong with the other one?”
“No, nothing,” Michael said. “Just wondering. Your house is done very nicely.”
“Thanks,” Harley said.
“Taste this,” Sumiko said, coming to Harley with a spoon, her free hand cupped under it. “Be careful, now, this is hot. Blow on it first.” She blew on it for him.
Harley blew on it too, then sucked in the soup. “That’s great.”
“Want a taste, Michael?” Sumiko asked.
Michael sat down at the table again. “Thanks, but I think I’ll wait.” He squinted against the pain in his head.
“Something wrong?” Sumiko asked. “You’re squinting. Is the light hurting your eyes?”
“Nope.”
“Hey, man, you want to lie down before dinner?” Harley asked, sitting across the table, crossing his legs, and playing with the laces of one of his enormous boots.
Michael shook his head.
The doorbell rang. “That’ll be Eddie and Simon,” Harley said and left the room.
“You’ll love these people,” Sumiko said. “Eddie’s a writer and Simon, he’s a doctor and well, you’ll see.”
Harley came rolling into the kitchen with the guests who were laughing loudly with him. “Michael,” Harley said, “Edwina Johns and Simon Seys.”
Simon belched out an even louder laugh. “That’s really my name,” he said to Michael. “Can you believe my parents named me that? I’m just lucky they didn’t name me Yadont.”
Michael squeezed a smile into the chorus of guffaws. “I’m pleased to meet you,” he said.
“I like your paintings,” Eddie said abruptly, sitting in the chair that had been Harley’s. She looked at Michael’s eyes, seeming to get too close, yet they were separated by the table. “Your paintings remind me of my work.”
“Sumiko tells me you’re a writer,” Michael said.
“Yes.” She was not laughing now, but looking at Michael with a serious expression.
Michael looked to Simon. “What do you do, Simon?”
“I’m a physician,” Simon said. “A dermatologist. I just thought I’d squeeze that in.” He laughed again and the rest laughed with him.
“Are you two from Laramie?” Michael asked.
“No, we’re from Denver,” Eddie said, serious once more.
Michael’s heart sank at hearing the word Denver and the word dermatologist together. He figured that all skin doctors in Denver must know one another. Simon must know Bob and therefore, these two people, if not all four of them, were probably all too familiar with the details of Michael’s private life.
“Where do you live?” Eddie asked, accepting the glass of wine Harley handed her, but keeping her eyes on Michael.
“I’m kind of floating these days,” he said.
“Floating,” Simon said and he lifted his arms like a ballerina and pretended to float about the kitchen. “I’m floating. I’m a feather on the wind.”
Sumiko danced with him.
“I’m too big to float,” Harley said.
Eddie still studied Michael, sipped her wine. “That’s what I try to express in my writing. That floating.” She put down her glass and gestured, making circles with her limp hands.
Michael nodded to her as if he understood and that made her smile at him. He watched her trace the rim of her glass with her finger.
“You should have seen the rain we drove through on the way up here,” Eddie said, breaking away from Michael.
“Not just rain,” Simon said, starting to break into a chuckle again. “It was hail getting here.”
“Hail?” Sumiko said.
“Not bad,” Eddie said.
“The hail you say,” said Simon.
Harley’s and Sumiko’s laughter had wound down into smiles and Michael could sense that Eddie was irritated.
“Why is it,” Simon asked, “that hail is always the size of grapefruit or baseballs and never the size of hail?” He laughed more softly, his sounds twisting into the rather sad silence that had come over the room.
“Let’s eat,” Sumiko said.
“By all means,” Eddie said.
Harley and Sumiko expertly herded their guests into the dining room. A glass-topped table stood on an expanse of tan carpet, the wrought-iron legs curved down and back under, and pressed into the nap of the wool. Harley sat Michael beside Eddie with their backs to the wall farthest from the door to the kitchen. Simon sat opposite them. Harley and Sumiko sat at each end of the oval.
The soup was good, Michael thought, but then he was terribly hungry and the taste of anything would have served as a distraction from his headache. He could still see and feel the white light of the bathroom.
“So, how’s the skin trade?” Harley asked Simon.
“Very good,” Eddie said.
“Oh, he’s been waiting to use that all week,” Sumiko said. “So, it’s not as spontaneous as he would have you believe.”
“Put in my place again,” Harley said, sounding a little irritated.
Michael felt his mouth opening. He was talking only because, as a guest, he was supposed to say something at some point and he said, “I’d call that Dylan off the bottom.”
Eddie, Simon, Harley, and Sumiko looked at him without speaking. They seemed puzzled.
Michael felt compelled to explain. “Dylan Thomas wrote Adventures in the Skin Trade.”
“Oh, yes,” Eddie said.
Everyone laughed.
Eddie looked at Michael with her serious face again and held his eyes just a second too long.
“So how is business?” Harley put the question to Simon once more.
“Breaking out all over,” Simon said and laughed.
Harley chuckled politely. Eddie shifted in her chair. Sumiko sipped her wine.
“Business is good,” Simon said.
“How’s the writing?” Harley asked Eddie.
“I have a story coming out next month. A little journal out of Seattle.”
“Great.” Harley or Sumiko.
“What kind of things do you write?” Michael asked. “Or is that a stupid question to ask a writer?”
“I’m more interested in tonal columns and color than story,” Eddie said. “I’m into texture and contexture. I’m interested in the way opposites fit together, the way they interlock.” She took a sip of wine and licked the corners of her lips.
Michael nodded and looked at the others.
“I love your work,” Sumiko said to Eddie.
“How do you think of your art?” Eddie asked Michael. “What are you exploring these days?”
“Same as always,” Michael said. “I like colors. Sometimes I like yellows. Sometimes blues.”
They ate without speaking for a while. The only sounds were the soft dipping of spoons into puddles of cream of eggplant soup, the parting of soup-moistened lips, the clinking of spoon handles against the rims of bowls. The sounds grew louder and louder in Michael’s head, especially the smacking of Eddie’s lips as she sneaked glances at him.