To understand the sexual artistry of Edward Grable’s life is to understand his fitting and timely death, and this begins in his youth.
His first lover was a woman almost twice his age. She lived next door to him in a split-level house, the kind that dotted every suburb in the fifties. Her husband paid Eddie – he was called Eddie back then – to take care of the yard, to trim the shrubs and mow the lawn and generally keep the estate ahead of the rest of the neighbourhood in that unspoken-of contest for suburban domination. Eddie had just finished mowing the lawn and was about to start trimming the shrubs when Mrs Carlson appeared in the door, her capri pants and tight pink sweater leaving no curve to the imagination. She leaned against the doorjamb and called Eddie’s name.
“How about a glass of lemonade? You must be parched.”
Eddie thought that sounded nice. He followed her into her kitchen, admiring the decor on the way – he had never been this deep into the Carlsons’ home before – and graciously accepted the cool glass, the condensation dripping over his fingers in tiny rivers. At his last gulp, Mrs Carlson reached for the glass and set it with fluid grace on the counter, then settled a perfectly polished and manicured red nail on his shoulder. She traced the outline of his oxford button placket down the front of his chest. “Eddie,” she whispered, “would you like to see the bedroom?”
Eddie gulped.
She led him by the hand to the master bedroom, her swaying hips enticing the young Edward Grable forward the way a snake charmer seduces the cobra out of its basket. In the bedroom, she turned to him and pulled him closer.
“Mr Carlson is away on business,” she whispered in his ear as she began unbuttoning Eddie’s shirt. She noticed his nervousness in the uneven rise and fall of his chest and said, “Don’t be nervous, honey. This is perfectly natural.”
They eased onto the bed, Mrs Carlson guiding Eddie’s hands to her nipples, Eddie nuzzling the warmth between her neck and shoulder. There was something innate that told him what to do even though he’d had no such experience before. Amidst the sighs and moans of Mrs Carlson, Eddie worked the magic he didn’t know he had.
It is said that prodigies are infused with an old spirit that guides them through their art, giving them knowledge that would take them years to learn in school. It is said that Mozart began composing at the age of five.
If Eddie could be said to be a prodigy, then this was his composition.
Mrs Carlson’s surprise at Eddie’s experience was clear. Watching Eddie through the years next door, she had seen him buffeted by the turbulence of puberty. She had watched him grow up from a shy, awkward, and gawky teenager into a shy, awkward, and gawky young man. She could not recall ever seeing a young woman on his arm.
She watched the blond bristles of his buzz cut as they moved ever so slightly up and down between her legs. “Oh, Eddie,” she moaned. “You’re absolutely incredible!” And with her back arched and her head thrashing from side to side, she came for the first time in years without the aid of her hand.
And so it began. Composition No. 1: Mrs Carlson.
Though Eddie visited Mrs Carlson as often as time and Mr Carlson’s busy travel schedule allowed, he was suddenly beginning to notice just how many women there were out there. Women he had never met began striking up conversations with him on the street. Waiting for the bus downtown, he would be surprised to find himself in the middle of a pheromonally induced circle of femininity, soft hands accidentally brushing against his thigh accompanied by the sounds of, “Oh my, excuse me…” He would find himself making apologetic faces to the men who were left standing alone at the other end of the bus stop, scowling at him. He would later learn never to apologize for his gift.
His next composition was a young woman by the name of Marilyn Cullers. Only a year older than he, she’d found a way to sit next to him on the bus downtown every day for the past week. Eddie was oblivious to the wordless catfight that ensued every afternoon between the five or so women who rode the same route home that he did. Marilyn had schemed to be the first on the bus when it came to her stop so that she’d have first choice among available seats. Now as she sat down next to Eddie and smoothed her skirt, she shot a smug smile back at the women who gave her dirty looks as they passed by.
“Hi, I’m Marilyn.” She demurely offered her hand to Eddie, who was staring out the window.
“Oh,” he said, taking her hand awkwardly. “I’m Eddie Grable.”
“Eddie…” She said the name as if it was a holy password into some unknown vault of treasures. “Would you like to come home with me?” Her wild whisper sounded almost like a plea for help.
She nearly tore her own clothes off as she dragged him to the bedroom, pulling at him wildly as she fell onto the bed. Eddie’s artistry took over and soon he was creating art on the canvas that was Marilyn. His fingers and body moved over her as he watched her face carefully, controlling the moment so as to elicit just the right facial expressions, the right twist of the head and the right parting of the lips. As she moaned, writhed, contorted under him, he waited for the perfect moment and then released the power of his genius.
Her face was a study in angelic, epiphanic beauty.
Composition No. 2: Marilyn Cullers.
At a time when most men of his generation were looking for a woman to marry and settle down with, Edward Grable never even flirted with monogamy. The fifties gave way to the sexually liberated sixties, and though Edward never gravitated toward the hippie lifestyle, his sex life certainly espoused the free love sentiment that surrounded him. Still somewhat shy and socially inept, he didn’t have to worry himself with the awkward task of meeting women; they flocked to him. And it was around this period that he learned the technique of slowing time.
He was in the bedroom of his small apartment with a tall, sleek redhead, her form stretched languidly beneath him. As his body slowly brought forth the art that was in her, he studied her carefully. Her eyes were shut, her mouth open in what was about to be a cry out. He realized that the moment was slowed so that he could work the canvas until it was perfect. It was as if he could get inside the moment, crawl around in this little bubble of time and stretch it, compress it, tinker with it until it was absolutely right.
He took advantage of it. He moved his fingers and his body, watching her expression change. There – her mouth was set so perfectly, almost but not quite an O. Now the eyes – he moved and played until they were open ever so slightly, just the way he liked it. She was ready. He let time expand back into regularity and watched as his work of art blossomed like a flower beneath him; he admired the delicate arch of her back as she came, the sound of her cries resounding against the walls of the small room. When the moment had passed, she smiled lazily up at Edward.
Edward Grable developed a photographic memory out of necessity. Where most artists had a gallery in which to display their work, Edward had only his memory and a sole audience of one – himself. Even his lovers, his compositions, could not see the genius in their own faces, being wrapped up in the moment as they were.
Awkwardness and social ineptitude eventually left Edward Grable as he matured through the sixties and into the seventies. In the early part of the decade, he moved to the west coast in a fit of artistic ennui. Word of his arrival had somehow spread prior to his coming, and women of the rich and famous elite were already banging down his door before he’d unpacked the boxes. He realized he had a new challenge: take the faces and the bodies that had been seen all over the world and transform them in his own vision.
He was invited to all the important social gatherings; he was often the only one who was introduced without a title. A simple, “This is Edward Grable” often made the new acquaintance’s eyes open wide with recognition. If he was a man, he shook Edward’s hand and for the next hour tried to pry Edward’s secrets from him. If she was a woman, she used every ounce of her charm to get into his bed before the night was over. “Please,” she would often say. “Let me be your next composition, your new canvas. I won’t disappoint you.”