“It’s really hot in the laundry room, eh?” Gail sat in front of her work at the table.
“Pretty warm.”
“You looked sick out there. I’m glad you showered. You look a lot better now.”
Michael nodded. “Wouldn’t want to look sick.”
There was a knock at the door and Michael got up and looked through the door window. It was the man from yesterday, with his lawn mower. “You’re not going to believe this,” he said to Gail.
“What?” Gail got up, came to the door, and looked out. “Didn’t he finish the job?”
“I thought he had.” Michael opened the door and stepped out into the heat.
The man pointed at the yard and held up five fingers again. Michael looked at the grass. Gail came out, too.
“You just mowed it all yesterday,” Michael said.
The man flashed five fingers again.
“Thank you,” Gail said, “but we don’t need you today.”
“I tried to give you ten dollars yesterday,” Michael said. “Listen, I’ll give you another five because you earned it, but we don’t need our grass cut again.” He turned to Gail. “Would you grab a five for me?”
Gail went back into the house.
“Can you talk?” Michael could smell the man, recognized the smell from when he had carried the wool shirt before. “Can you hear me or are you reading my lips?”
The man nodded and smiled.
Gail returned with the money. Michael took it from her and handed it to the man.
The man turned away and, somewhat relieved, Michael and Gail turned back into the house. Michael had just closed the door when the sound of the lawn mower split the air. He looked at Gail.
“That guy scares me,” Gail said.
“He’s harmless,” Michael said.
“He’s a nut.”
Michael looked out the window at him, wearing the wool shirt, struggling to push his mower with the wobbly wheel. “He’s pretty weird, all right. We’ll let him do this today.”
The man mowed the already mowed lawn and was gone without a knock at the door. Michael suddenly noticed the silence. He got up from his desk and walked from window to window, looking out.
“He’s gone,” he said to Gail.
“Good.”
“Boy, that machine of his makes a lot of noise,” Michael said. “Listen to how quiet it is now.”
“Yep.” Gail yawned and rubbed her eyes. “I hate work. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it.”
“How old do you think that guy is?” Michael asked.
“If he comes back he won’t get any older; that’s all I know.” Gail sharpened a pencil. “I don’t know. Sixty?”
“I’d bet he’s our age.”
“Looks sixty.”
“He does; you’re right.” Michael rubbed the back of his neck. “Of course, I feel sixty.”
The following morning was overcast and Michael had trouble pulling himself out of bed for his run. Lately he’d had to force himself. He’d had to force work as well; the paintings were staring back at him, mocking him, scaring him. He tied the laces of his shoes and grabbed the nearest shirt, which happened to be the light blue UNC T-shirt. Gail stirred when he opened the door of the bedroom.
“Michael?”
“I’m going running,” he said.
“Is it still dark?” she asked sleepily.
“No, just cloudy.”
Her head fell back onto the pillow.
Michael walked down the stairs, pulling on the shirt. The morning was a bit cooler than it had been and Michael felt it helped him start at a better pace. He ran toward the avenue, crossed it, and turned up a street parallel to it. His strides felt good and long. Then he saw it. At the mouth of an alley, between a house and an old hardware store, was the wobbly wheeled lawn mower. It was parked next to the wall of the store. The store was dark and there was no one around. Michael slowed and then ran in place, staring at the mower. He looked at the house and wondered if the man lived there. He looked down the alley and saw that it opened onto the avenue. He ran that way and glanced around, not really knowing what he expected to see.
He arrived at home to find Gail collecting her papers at the table. “How was your run?”
Michael nodded and went to the cabinet for a glass and filled it with water from the bubbler.
“I’m going to make some breakfast,” Gail said. “Would you like some?”
Michael shook his head.
“Are you okay?”
Michael blew out a breath and raised his water glass to her. Gail studied him for a second, then went back to her papers.
Michael set his glass on the counter and walked upstairs, pulling off his shirt on the way. He called back down to Gail, “Hey, I changed my mind.”
“What do you want?”
“Pancakes?”
“Okay,” she called.
Michael got cleaned up and collected clothes from the hamper to throw into the washing machine. He made a point of finding and including the UNC T-shirt with the load. He held the shirt for a second over the filling drum of the washer, then dropped it in.
“What’s wrong?” Gail asked at the table, pancake on her fork.
Michael unscrewed the cap on the tin of syrup. “Nothing’s wrong.”
“Something’s wrong. Is it the painting you’re working on?”
“Nah.” Michael took a bite. “These aren’t bad.” He paused. “Actually, work is going along pretty well.”
“Good.”
“I saw that guy’s lawn mower this morning.”
“Excuse me?”
“That beat-up mower he used on our yard. I saw it when I was running. I didn’t see him, just the mower.”
“Oh,” Gail said. “And?”
“I saw it. That’s it.”
“Was it everything you expected?”
“Very funny,” Michael said.
They were silent for a bit, then Michael said, “People used to believe that forces and spirits could enter into sculptures.”
“I believe that. I believe that about your paintings,” Gail said.
“They thought that the spirit the thing represented would enter it.” Michael rubbed his temples. “I think I try to find spirits when I work. I think I’m looking for them.”
“There’s a lot of power in your work.”
“I’m not talking about power.” He didn’t exactly snap, but he regretted the way he’d said his last words.
“I’m going to be late for class.” She stood and grabbed her satchel from the counter, kissed Michael on the forehead.
“See you later,” Michael said.
“I love you,” Gail said.
“I love you, too.”
Michael cleaned the kitchen and then went out to his studio. He turned on the standing fan and stood in front of it for a few seconds. He didn’t work on the painting he had going, but took it from his easel and replaced it with a blank six-by-eight-foot canvas. He began to cry as he put blues on his palette: cerulean, cobalt — hue and color, pthalo, and indigo. He stared at the blank canvas, but was able to apply only one shade, cerulean. He started at the lower lefthand corner and moved slowly, with short strokes from a small brush, diagonally toward the upper righthand corner.
He went into the house to cool off and have a yogurt for lunch. He put the load of clothes into the dryer.
Back in his studio, Michael slowly pushed the cerulean into the canvas, scratching it in since there was so little paint on his brush. He’d always prided himself on the fact that, although he painted abstracts, he never began a canvas without a vision. That vision was subject to change, sometimes great change, but he usually knew what he wanted, what he was trying to express. This time was different. He pushed in more blue. Hours passed and the whole field was covered at last, blue and flat. He wanted to get far away from the canvas, far, far away, and try to see it like a piece of fallen sky. He recalled a Chinese thinker named Chhiao who claimed that from a certain distance a mirror could see a person, but that person would be unable to see the mirror. So, in fact, one could be someplace and not know it.