Finding my Muse

To avoid any major confusion, the italicized sections are what the main character in the story is writing (i.e. she's writing about herself in third person).

There will -- hopefully -- be a second part that follows.

Feedback, comments and constructive criticisms are welcome.

"What's the project again?"

"I swear to god, Chris, you don't listen to a word I say."

"So what? Tell me again."

"I have to write a story about myself." Silence. "It can be anything. It can be about my life, it can be about my goals, it can be about my summer vacation. As long as it's nine thousand words."

Chris laughed, "What the hell are you going to write about?"

"I don't know..."

"I can tell you one thing. It's going to be boring as shit."

– She felt his presence behind her before she ever saw a glimpse of him. She sat in the music library, her forehead resting against the cool, laminate table in frustration. She hoped the music building would be the location to inspire her to write something great, something magnificent; so far, however, the faint serenade of soloists in practice rooms and the cadence from the drum line outside had become nothing more than a deafening cacophony hammering away in her head.

She saw his shadow reflecting on the surface of her laptop and she quickly turned in her seat to face the person who had invaded her personal space.

"Sounds depressing," the man said with a shrug.

"I'm sorry?" she replied incredulously. "Who gave you the right to read that?" She quickly snapped the laptop closed and silently hoped that she had remembered to save what she had just written. Not that it mattered anyhow.

"I'm sorry. I heard you say it aloud," he responded matter-of-factly. "Didn't realize that anyone ever came in here anymore."

"Oh, right," she said, her face reddening slightly. "Someone just told me..."

"Don't worry about it. Next time though, maybe let me know. Don't just sneak in here."

"I didn't sneak in; there was no one at the front."

"Nevertheless, I need to see your I.D.," he held out his hand expectantly.

She stammered and paused before muttering under her breath and diving into her book bag for her wallet.

"Who do you think you are, anyway?" she asked, fishing through her wallet for the I.D. she never used.

"Name's Michael. I work here. Make sure only the people who are supposed to come in here actually enter."

"Oh..."

"Juliet. Pretty name," he said, examining the card, "but you're not supposed to be in here. Music students only."

"Like you know everyone who comes in here." She started shuffling papers over the desktop, unplugged her laptop and was about to shove everything into her bag when his hand on her wrist stopped her completely.

"For one, Juliet, I do." She looked him squarely in the eyes and something about the way he'd said her name and looked back at her made her breath catch in her throat.

"I'm sorry, it won't happen again."

He placed her I.D. squarely on top of her closed laptop. "And two, I'll make an exception for you."

"It's really not necessary," she said with a resigned sigh as she turned back to the desk and shoved a notebook haphazardly into her bag.

"I insist," he said softly. "I know how important the 'right' location is for you writing students. Heaven help me if I shoo one of you away and prevent you from writing something great."

"How'd you..."

"Syllabus," he replied, pointing to the blue sheet of paper still on the desk.

She huffed and shook her head while shoving that into her bag with everything else.

"I'm here from two to six. Everyday," he said. "I have class at night. Sometimes I come back after nine and open it back up for procrastinators. Though, again, not like anyone ever comes."

"I..." she stopped in the middle of sliding the laptop off the table.

"No need to thank me."

–

"Chris and I; it just sort of happened. He invited me over one night to watch a movie and before I knew it, we were still awake and it was three in the morning. It was much too late – or early – for me to get home safely so I stayed there. We both fell asleep right there on his sofa. He wasn't my first choice, nor my last. He just was. He didn't inspire me, but he didn't discourage what I did or what I wanted to do."

– "So what project is this?"

"Are you familiar with Professor Kim's syllabi?"

"I've heard some students complain about his assignments," Michael replied. "I'm just wondering how long you're going to be nosing around all this sheet music."

Juliet rolled her eyes, "If you want me to go somewhere else, I'll go."

Michael laughed softly and shook his head, "Which is it?"

"The novella," she replied.

"All semester then." –

"Do you believe in the idea of a muse?" I asked Chris late one night as we were falling asleep.

"Like a little fairy that sits on your shoulder and tells you what to do?" he replied sarcastically.

"Forget it."

I didn't tell him about Michael. I didn't tell him about the way he'd made my heart jump when I looked into his speckled green eyes or the way my skin tingled when his calloused fingers brushed over my wrist. How could two totally minuscule, innocent and otherwise utterly insignificant gestures light a fire inside of me? He'd just asked me for identification.

– Juliet closed her eyes and tilted her chair back into the wall of bookcases behind her. The soft, melancholy crescendoes of a cello wafted through the walls from a room nearby. Evening was her favorite time of the day to be entombed in the library. The chorus of voices from numerous instruments faded to one or two by nightfall and she was able to hone in on one melody that could urge her on and on for hours.

"Are you going to share your story with me?"

She opened her eyes and smiled, "Don't know yet."

"I think that's the least I should get in return, don't you?" He pulled up a seat next to her, folded his arms over the back of the chair and sat down.

"In return for what?"

"Letting you use the library," he replied with a smile.

"What am I using? Other than this desk, of course."

"And the power outlet your laptop is plugged into," he pointed out.

"Oh please, like you have anything better to be doing."

"Actually..."

Her face lit up and without thinking twice, she pressed the tips of her fingers against his lips and closed her eyes again. The notes of the cello on the other side of the wall lifted and began to quicken. She opened her eyes again, her smile broadened, she took a deep breath and held it until the instrument hit it's highest note and then exhaled silently.

Michael pushed her hand away from his mouth. She quickly turned to her computer and began to type furiously, trying desperately to get everything out of her head before he spoke again.

"I take it you like the cello," he said, watching her mouth twist back and forth with each word and sentence she typed.

Emphatically, she punched the 'period' key on the keyboard and breathed, "I love it."

"And to answer your earlier statement, I could go home and get some things done around the house. I stop getting paid at eight o'clock."

"Paid?"

He cocked his head to the side and couldn't help but smile at her question, "I teach here. You knew that, didn't you?"

"I..." she slowly closed her computer. "Sorry, no." –

"So how's that story going?" Chris asked me one night.

"I don't know. All right, I guess?"

"You going to let me read it?"

I finally replied, "Maybe."

Not likely. Certainly, in the past, I had let Chris proofread everything that I had written. It had started out with a story about my "best friend". Since, by that point, I had alienated almost all of my former "best friends" from high school, Chris was about the best and closest friend that I had. Naturally, I wrote the essay about him. It embellished his good qualities a little too much and I completely left out every bad thing I could think of. When he finally got around to reading it – the night before it was due, of course – his ego inflated to an extent even I couldn't have imagined.

After reading it, he had this ridiculous grin on his face. He told me how talented I was and how he couldn't believe that I felt that way about him. He continued on saying how lucky he was and how fortunate we both were to have found each other. Right then and there, he promised me that with his next paycheck, he'd buy me something nice and we'd go out for dinner somewhere fantastic. He kissed me softly, then pulled me away to his bedroom and we made love for the first time.

Two weeks later, as promised, he took me out to a Thai restaurant for dinner and afterwards we drove to the park. Under a large willow tree, he proposed to me in a rather matter-of-fact manner. I didn't accept or decline.

– "So this Chris..."

"What about him?" Juliet asked.

"Is he your boyfriend? Fiance? Husband?" Michael asked.

"At one point he was my fiance."

"And now?"

"I guess he's my boyfriend," she replied.

Michael chuckled, "You guess?"

"He doesn't much feel like it anymore. We live together and I share a bed with him when he's around but there's just nothing there anymore and he's gone on business trips nearly every week."

He nodded, "He support you?"

"As much as he can, I guess."

"He doesn't find it strange that you spend so much time in the music department when you're not even a musician?"

"He understands that I need to write wherever I can. Even if that's in the middle of a construction site."

"You ever think he just doesn't care?"

"Always." –

The first time I was alone – and knew I was alone – with Michael, I was nervous. It was nearly ten o'clock at night and for the first time in two hours, the lone cello on the other side of the wall had grown silent. Silence surrounded me, weighed down on me in every way imaginable. I sat at that table, encircled by ceiling-tall bookshelves cluttered with who knows what. Instead of using the silence to my advantage, my mind started to wander. I thought about Chris, I thought about myself but most of all, I thought about Michael.

I thought of his soft eyes and the way they lit up when I meekly walked into that library every single day. I still thought about his long fingers brushing against my wrist – I'm sure he meant nothing of it, but every single time his skin brushed against mine, I couldn't help but feel alive. That night, though, my mind started to wander further. I smiled at the thought of his messy, unkempt hair that made him look at least five years younger than he actually was. I imagined wrapping my hands around his waist and pulling his slender body against my own.

I couldn't remember the last time that I had wanted to touch someone that badly. I thought to myself, "If I can just touch that small pool of freckles below his ear – just once – I can stop coming here. I can go home and continue all of this there."

I glanced up after saving my work and found him standing in the doorway. His eyes were tired, his right cheek was red from propping it up against his hand for so long and he'd unbuttoned his dress shirt and I couldn't help but laugh when I saw the faded image of Darth Vader staring back at me from the t-shirt underneath.

"I need to go home, Juliet," he said sleepily, yawning for emphasis.

I loved the way he said my name – the way "jul" softly rolled off his tongue.

"One more minute?" I pleaded, though I knew perfectly well that I had nothing left to accomplish.

He sighed and nodded and as he turned, for the first time I noticed the shape of the large instrument that he carried around with him after his evening class. I quickly put away all of my things strewn over the surface of the table and joined him at the reference desk he always stationed himself at near the door.

"Ready my little Shakespeare?" he teased. He slung his bag over his shoulder as I leaned over the counter and watched him rifle through his sack for the keys. He hooked the key ring around his finger and turned to fully face me once more. Perhaps he wasn't expecting me to be leaning so far over the counter, but whatever it was, I could see the startled expression in his face when our eyes met again.

"You didn't tell me you played cello," I said, nodding towards the instrument propped up against the doorway.

"I do."

And I don't know why I did it, but as we stood there – rather dumbly – for what felt like forever, I did what I had wanted to do for weeks. I timidly reached out and softly pressed my fingertips against the smattering of freckles on the side of his neck. His skin was rough as if he hadn't shaven in a couple of days and I found him to be surprisingly warm.

I felt heat rushing from my feet to my face and smiled bashfully in spite of myself and quickly lowered my fingers but hesitated from pulling my arm away. He encircled my small wrist in his hand and we stood there, not moving for, again, what felt like forever. I was certain he was going to lean over that reference desk or pull me towards him and kiss me but he didn't; and I was too timid to make the move myself.

– Juliet walked into the small auditorium and took a seat near the back. She propped her feet up over the seat in front of her and pulled out her laptop. Lazily, she closed her eyes as she sensed him behind her. The fresh, soapy smell of his skin mingling with the musty smell from his favorite jacket robbed her of her train of thought and she slowly tilted her head back, opened her eyes and smiled as her gaze settled in on his warm smile.

"We'll be here for an hour," he said.

"You're not teaching tonight, right?" she asked.

"No. Why?"

She shrugged.

"I really can't stay late just to sit in the library. I figured this practice would suffice for today."

"Oh, no, it will. I just..." she smiled bashfully. "What are you doing after?"

He looked around to make sure none of his colleagues were nearby and lowered his voice, "What about Chris?"

She quickly shushed him, "He's out of town, but that doesn't matter. I'd be asking regardless."

"Yeah, okay," he stood as he watched the violinist of the quartet walk out onto the stage. "Just wait out here after." She smiled and nodded, turning her attention back to the front of the auditorium. As Michael walked away, he lightly brushed his fingers along the back of her neck and she felt as if an electric current had just been shot down her spine. The hair along her arms stood on end and she felt a nervous flutter in the pit of her stomach. As her eyes followed Michael while he took the stage, she had to fight the urge bubbling in her to compose a message to Chris in order to call off their three year relationship. –

"Can I join you?" Michael asked, walking into my little corner of the library.

His question startled me. He'd never requested to join me at my table when I was busy. He always stationed himself at the reference desk next to the door "just in case" someone actually showed up to use the library.

"I..." I quickly scrambled, shuffling together pieces of paper all around me. "Sure."

He dropped a large folder on the table in front of me and took the seat there. "Need to grade papers."

"Don't you usually do that up front?"

"Usually."

His gaze met my own and I felt my heart stop right then and there. With the way he looked at me with his piercing green eyes, I'll never know how I managed to keep myself composed around him. He smiled and I immediately turned my attention to the computer screen in front of me. I fixed my gaze on the words I'd typed but that image of him smiling at me was burned in my mind's eye. All I could see were his full lips and the slight turn of his canine and the very small gap in his two front bottom teeth.

I typed a few sentences and forced myself to look up when he – very obviously – cleared his throat for the third time.

"Yes?" I teased. He replied by silently nodding to my left and sitting just out of my computer tunnel-vision was a flier for a concert to be held the following week. A string quartet – his string quartet. I'd seen the fliers before but for whatever reason, I had never expected him to personally invite me.

"We practice every Thursday evening," he said. My heart jumped. I bit my lower lip and allowed my eyes to meet his again. "You can bring your laptop."

– "Is he gone a lot?" Michael asked as he waved off a waitress with a pitcher of water.

"Lately, yes," Juliet replied, shoving an unwanted pile of mashed potatoes around her plate.

"Are you ever suspicious?" he asked.

"Honestly?" she looked down into her plate and slowly cradled her head in her hands. She sat silently for a moment while she imperceptibly shook her head back and forth.

"I'm sorry," he said quickly. "It's out of line."

"No, no," she reassured, "I am. I do. I just..." she sighed. "I don't care." –

Chris came home late one night after I'd spent hours in the music library. I, myself, hadn't gotten home until nearly 11:30. It was unusual for him to be so late getting home. As I was washing my face, I heard the front door open and that was followed by loud stomping and stumbling. He was drunk. I didn't need to smell him or hear him speak or even see him. I knew just by the way he walked in through the front door.

"Jules! JULES!"

I turned off the sink and quickly rushed into bed. Maybe if he saw me in bed, he would feel guilty for having woken me up.

"Oh shit, oh Jules," he mumbled as he stumbled in through the bedroom door. I rolled over and feigned grogginess.

"What time is it?"

"Oh fuck," he moaned as he clumsily pulled at his t-shirt. "I'm so sorry baby."

"Just get in bed."

"Right there, babe. I need to wash the hooker stink off me."

He stumbled out the door and into the bathroom. I jumped out of bed as soon as I heard the shower start. I pulled on my clothes when I heard the curtain shift and by the time he started drunkenly humming, I had my laptop and book bag and hurried out the door.

– "So what do you want to do?"

"What do you mean?"

"With writing, with your degree."

"Oh," she said, thoughtfully tapping a pen at her bottom teeth. "I guess I want to be a novelist."

"You guess?" he asked with a smile.

She laughed out loud, "Well, what else would I want to be? I've just been taking all these creative writing classes for nothing."

"Novels, eh?"

"Why not?" she asked. "And you? What do you want to be?"

This time he laughed, "I think you know the answer to that question."

"A cellist? A teacher? A composer?"

"I always wanted to be a pianist, actually," he replied.

"Why cello, then?"

"I'm better at that. I didn't study piano. I studied cello."

"Do you like teaching?"

"I like parts of it," he replied, the red marker in his hand quickly making dashes and marks across the front page of a test.

"That part?" she asked, nodding towards the – evidently poor – test he was grading.

"This is the worst," he replied, writing an 'F' at the top of the paper.

"You like the people?" she asked. He stilled his hand and raised his head.

"Which people?"

She was about to point to herself, but she didn't move. The way he looked at her made the answer completely obvious.

"Michael..."

"You didn't come to the concert on Sunday."

"I... Sorry?"

"Make it up to me." –

"You've been spending a lot of time at school."

"So?"

"Why haven't you been spending any time with me?"

"You've been gone a lot, too, Chris."

"Yeah, but I've been gone on business."

"And I've been at school taking care of business."

"Does this have something to do with that 'fairy' shit?"