The Sculptor Series – Book Tour and Giveaway

I got that feeling again, the one where I felt that looking at this sculpted woman was too intimate. I didn’t want to be this close to her yet. It was like an invasion of personal space. Still, I couldn’t look away. Some of the limbs were yet to be formed, but it didn’t take away from the eerie realism and the mesmerizing beauty. It was as if the woman was always there, encased in the clay, and this man, Antoni Azarov, was simply freeing her from having been buried alive in it. I could swear she was moving. It was a statue, but the illusion of movement persisted.

I suddenly felt in way over my head. Who was I to work for such a gifted artist? I was an art-school dropout, a drug addict, a l-o-s-e-r with a capital L.

Oswald must have read the apprehension on my face. “Aw no, young lady!” he said. “Don’t you chicken out on me. You’re gonna do fine. You were the first person I interviewed, and I knew you were the right one on the spot. Don’t make Oz doubt his intuition, now.”

“I feel a little underqualified,” I said. “A lot, actually. Shouldn’t you hire some sort of agent or something?”

“No, we had some of those agents, and they’re nothing but a bunch of vampires. We need someone who loves art and respects an artist, and I could tell right away by the way you look at these pieces that you will know exactly what to do to protect Anton and his integrity.”

Protect the sculptor and his integrity? I applied to answer phones and sweep floors.

“Don’t worry, Miss Ona. You’re gonna like him. You’ll get along just fine. I know what I’m doing. We need a lady in here. Only women know how to do a hundred things at the same time. Now, when can you start?”

I shrugged. “Um, right away.”

He walked to the back studio where there was a little nook off to the side. “Your office is here.”

A makeshift table made of plywood was squeezed into what originally must have been a closet. Invoices, newspapers, and scribbled notes were scattered all over it. A cup of coffee of indeterminable age held down a stack of receipts. Everything was covered in a fine coating of powdered clay. It made the room look soft, as if the floor and all the objects within were covered in tawny felt. The only light in the studio entered through the cracks between the old canvas tarps that were hammered to the windows.

“It’s so dark in here,” I said. “How does he work like this?”

“Most of the time he uses those studio lights over there or candles or the fireplace,” Oz said. “He doesn’t like a lot of light, especially artificial light, and he don’t want no one peeking in neither. Now why don’t you clean up your little space over there. That way you won’t have to make a lot noise when Anton is here. He doesn’t like noise.”

“Of course,” I said.

“Now, I gotta go out for a second,” Oz said. “You’ll stay here and get settled.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Oz locked me in as he left, vaulting me in powdery silence with the sculpture. As drawn as I was, the woman gave me the creeps. I avoided her, feeling unworthy to look upon her. I went straight to the desk to make some order of the papers. Plumes of dust billowed up and covered me. I coughed and sneezed. The black suit was definitely a bad idea.

I rummaged around and found a bucket of cleaning supplies inside Oz’s office and managed to wipe down my new desk, phone, and chair. Then I surveyed the rest of the dust accumulation.

The room was trimmed with counter tops that were covered with strange tools resembling surgical instruments. Among the knives, sticks, paddles, and scalpels were sketches of human forms that looked like masterpieces in their own right. I thought I’d organize them and the tools, but I couldn’t resist the sculpture anymore.

The woman was frozen in mid-stride as if running as fast as she could. I could see the wind blow the delicate hair around the ears and the tension in her thigh as she pushed off her back foot. This woman was not running away from something, she was running toward something, and she was nude, like Gertrude in the display window, except for one sash of fabric. It spanned her body from her outstretched left arm and continued around her waist, down and around her leg until it fluttered from the back of her right ankle. I wanted to reach out and grab the cloth before the wind ripped it loose from her body. The woman was so strong and beautiful. Who could she be?

I jumped as I heard the door unlock and skipped over to the counter where I made a show of shuffling papers. Footsteps pounded down the hall. “Oz, I think we need a Shop-Vac in here,” I said. “Do you guys have a Shop-Vac?”

The footsteps stopped. Silence. More silence.

Then a man’s voice. “Who are you? What are you doing here?” Not Oz. A more resonant voice, weighted with some kind of accent.

Holy shit. Azarov.