Some Girls Never Learn Ch. 01

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Rage against the machine. Create despite them.
8.5k words
4.66
14.2k
7

Part 1 of the 2 part series

Updated 10/09/2022
Created 04/08/2009
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brandy25
brandy25
14 Followers

Dedicated to a college swallowed alive and its abducted students. Rage against the machine. Create despite them.

Atlanta, Georgia. 1988.

Emma's foot shook impatiently inside the big black boots she wore in all her waking hours.

'If that woman says it one more time...' she gritted her teeth as the professor did indeed say it one more time.

She wanted nothing more than to jump up and shout, "Manet! It's Manet, not Mayonnaise, you big-haired, wanna-be Southern belle!"

She didn't do it. Munch's painting flashed in her mind as she mentally covered her ears and let out a silent scream. She smirked as the lecturer caught her eye, seeming to sense the energy that flowed from her corner of the room.

'Would you like fries with that?' she thought, reminding herself of her alternate destiny should she lose her scholarship to the College of Art.

Being a gathering of the almost purely artistic ilk, they were tolerant, but they wouldn't be that understanding. Candace Burnett had tenure; Emma Jones was a lowly second-semester freshman in the painting department.

Emma alternated her attention between the thick, heavy, picture-laden textbook and the small window to the world beside her. She'd made it 'her' desk early on just for that reason. She might have to pass the history classes, but she didn't have to be attentive to them. She'd always learned what she needed to know on her own. Even she knew it was the quality that made her the most talented student in her department and the worst of pupils.

Noah Garrity shook his head as Emma made it into his studio class just before he stood to make the announcements. The nineteen-year-old redhead gave him a variety of pains, in the head, the heart, the stomach, and, oh yes, the ass. He'd been at the school for eight years, teaching to support his lifelong art habit, and he'd never seen the kind of raw, unadulterated power her work displayed from any other student. She had more than potential.

Emma was a tightly bundled bright ball of creative energy just waiting to find its full release. It sat right there under her always paint-stained, always black t-shirt. It weaved its way out through the rips in her Levis. It curled and twined itself around each and every one of long, red, wild curls.

Ah, and her work, he'd catch a glimpse of it from the corner of a canvas, in the eye of a portrait, in the very visible brush stroke that strode straight from that canvas to his soul. He sighed. He knew that the big E that graced the lower right corner of each work would be famous someday.

At thirty-five, he was bordering on no longer being one of the young, cool teachers. He knew in another five years he'd be considered one of the out-of-touch, wacky coots whose studio classes were to be avoided by all but the most adventurous and the ones who enrolled so late that they couldn't get into the hip guy's class. He felt lucky now that the combination of his good-looks, a sprinkling of successful gallery showings and a prestigious award or two maintained his status in their eyes. Well, most of their eyes.

Emma could feel his eyes on her as she maneuvered quickly to an empty corner of a worktable. The metal stool squealed as she attempted to sit, and she cringed. "Noah" as he insisted the students call him, really hated her constant tardiness. What had he said to her in his office last week?

"Everyone knows your talented, Emma. I know it. You know it. You know it too well. You think sheer talent will carry you through life? It won't. Real art requires more...it requires discipline and commitment. Keep thumbing your nose at those things, and your talent will take you right back to the suburbs. Two kids and a Volvo...is that what you want?"

His tirade proved to her how little he knew about her life, but she knew a not-so-veiled threat when she heard it. If he flunked her for disregarding anymore of his dumb ass assignments, the ones meant to "expand her mind, test her abilities and train her eye," blah, blah, blah, she'd lose her place in the program. Understanding as much, she reached into her large, awkward-to-carry, paper portfolio and pulled out the piece of painted cardboard. She couldn't resist a furtive glance around the room at the work the other students had produced at the behest of Noah.

Two days earlier enough cardboard had been stacked at the corner of each table to accommodate the needs of each student. Cardboard. Pieces of old boxes. She'd hmphed at it. Six weeks into the class and they'd barely touched a real canvas.

"You may use this piece of cardboard and whatever type of paint you think best suits it. Add nothing to it but the paint. Create the sky."

Emma had watched as those around her stared in wonder. They loved the great Noah. Create the sky? She was certain he'd seen her roll her eyes, but he didn't acknowledge it. They'd jostled around her, opening the tool boxes that each lugged through the hallways of the school containing the supplies they might need that day. She'd eyed the cardboard suspiciously, grabbed a piece and then left. He didn't seem to acknowledge that either.

Noah smiled to see her pull the assignment from her case. She'd left early, as she often did, but he took note that she took the cardboard with her. He pulled an easel to the front of the room and was momentarily tempted to call on her to present first. But, he didn't.

He did as he always did, offering up the floor to volunteers. There was never a pause, never a need to call on anyone. Each was still young and arrogant enough to believe they'd created something genuine and new and, in that same arrogant, young spirit, wanted to present it to the world for their awe and envy.

Four had been cut into the shape of a puffy childhood cloud and painted white. Two mimicked Van Gogh's Starry Night. One was awash with planets and moons and what he guessed to be far off galaxies. He had to bite his tongue at the one that appeared just as blank and brown as it had when he'd passed out the assignment.

The longhaired boy, the one who bedded the girls quickly and easily, announced, "The sky does not reflect in the cardboard," and sat down.

Several of the girls gasped and one guy said, "Wow, man, I never thought of that."

Emma bit her tongue. 'That wasn't the assignment, idiot.'

Every encounter with Vaughn had left her wondering how he ever got accepted into the program at all. She was certain that his family must have helped finance the museum's overhaul. It was the only thing that made sense. She was busy contemplating this when she felt eyes on her again, but many eyes this time.

'Damn,' she stood quickly.

She hated to seem like she was hesitant to present. It would only bring out the sharks and their inevitable, envious criticism. At least she told herself it was envy. That made it sting less.

She cleared her throat as she sat the thick work on the easel and readied herself to explain her thoughts, to defend her work, to not die because she had to stand in front of so many people yet again.

It was Noah who bit his tongue when she sat the work before the class.

"Um, it's looking up at the sky while lying under a tree."

It was that. It was more than that. The cardboard had been sawn neatly in two, leaving a rippled background. Onto it she placed branches of a tree with the textured side up, painted to a give the illusion of curves and knots. Small green shoots of leaves appeared at intervals. Placed on a branch was an almost three-dimensional Robin, orange breasted. And, the sky itself. She manipulated the ripples into a combination of smoothness and lines to create clouds. Shadows were cast. It was a study in perspective and color. Looking at it, he could see the sky.

Noah made no comment, and there was a long pause as he examined the work. It took him a moment to realize she'd said nothing beyond the one sentence. She shuffled her feet, appearing unbearably uncomfortable.

Before she could grab her project and retreat to her seat or out the door, he asked, "Any thoughts?"

A student near the back mumbled. He could see that a couple were as fascinated as he was at the intricate detail. As he scanned the eyes in front of them many looked away, unwilling to praise or put down. And, then, what always happened, happened. The most envious found their voices.

"Is it okay that she put that tree in there? I thought this was supposed to be just the sky." The question was directed at him, not her.

Noah frowned, "No other materials. The branches are fine."

He wanted to add that everything about the simple work exceeded his expectations, but he did not. Lavishing praise on her again would only make it worse. She had no friends. She had those who tried to ignore her, those who feared her and those who blatantly hated her. She wasn't a girl who evoked mediocre responses from people and that included both her fellow students and the college's staff.

Emma swallowed hard and returned to her seat, trying to will her cheeks not to turn redder. No one had said a word after the tree comment, save Noah. Their coldness seemed to seep into her very bones at times. She'd done nothing to bring the ire, but she supposed she'd done nothing to prevent it. She had chosen to live in a world apart from them from the beginning. She was used to keeping to herself. She'd never fit in back home; she saw art school as no time to start.

She left as soon as he announced that he'd decided to have mercy and give them no assignment for the weekend. He rarely did that, but he was feeling generous. Carol was coming down from New York to slum with him for a couple of days; he was sure he was getting laid. It had been a while. Yep, he was feeling generous.

When he pulled from the parking garage less than an hour later, he never expected to see her standing in the street beating an old, yellow Datsun with her fists.

'Drive by; go home. She's fine,' his rational mind tried to assert.

He really did try, but the part of his brain that was still preoccupied by the painted wings of her robin and how the orange breast matched the highlights the sun brought when it sifted through her hair, well, that part of him pulled up beside her.

He hit the button and rolled down the window, calling out to her, "Hey, Emma, are you okay?"

Emma jumped at hearing her name. She was very focused on how to best crush the most unreliable car in the world, the one she'd been so proud to buy only two short years earlier. Granted, there was a hole in the passenger floorboard, the rear view mirror was cracked and rust had begun to cover a generous amount of the crevices in the car's hull, but she only needed the damn thing to run, not to look pretty. And, now it was refusing to do even that.

It took her a moment to take in the man calling her name.

"My fucking car won't start. Other than that, I'm grand," she said with more than a hint of teenage sarcasm in her voice.

Noah smiled and answered, "Well, if I were mechanical at all, I'd help you, but..."

Reason tried to intervene again, 'Don't do it. Don't. You have an hour to pick up your shit before Carol gets here.'

It failed again, and he offered, "I could give you a ride home...if you want one?"

As Emma made her way around the car, he watched the way she moved. He'd watched her before then, although he barely admitted it to himself. While she wore a uniform of t-shirts, ripped blue jeans and an old leather jacket, it didn't stop his body from taking notice of hers. The denim covered long legs. She stood almost his height. And, in the rare moments when she took off that jacket, the curve and bounce in her breasts was enough to make him hard.

He caught himself inadvertently licking his lower lip, and his mind stepped in again, 'Would you like a ride, little girl? You pervert. She's your student. She's a teenager. You have a grown woman coming to visit you. Quit looking at this girl that way!'

He quickly rebuked the accusation. He swore to himself that he was fascinated only by her talent, not her other attributes. He knew it wasn't entirely true, but it had to be the truth he lived with in that moment.

Emma stopped in front of the driver's side window, leaning back against her car, "Wow, you drive a Mercedes?"

She laughed.

He knew it wasn't a comment of admiration.

"I had no idea they paid you guys so well," she was still laughing as she added, "How very bourgeois."

He felt a muscle in his jaw flinch as he forced a smile, "Bourgeois? Interesting thought from a suburban girl like you."

He grinned at seeing her nostrils flare just a little bit. He knew it was a biting insult to one who viewed herself as far too sophisticated to be associated with something as mundane as a subdivision.

He met her eye again, "Would you like a ride in my bourgeois vehicle? Or, are you going to walk? Either way, I need to get going."

He really wasn't sure if he wanted her to accept or decline, although some part of him was infinitely curious about her destination. His mind begged answers to lots of questions. Where does she live? How does she live? Does she live with anyone? What would she do if I took her to my studio? He quickly struck that last one from the mental list he'd conjured.

Emma put aside her attitude and her pride. She wasn't relishing the idea of the walk to Little Five Points, and she was going to be late to work. Miriam would be pissed if she was late again; her band was playing at a new club tonight. The currently cool independent newspaper, ART, aka, Art Related Trash, had called her the hottest drummer in town. If Miriam was nothing else, she was hot.

In weak moments, Emma envied her mini-skirted, big-haired, foul-mouthed sluttiness. Everyone swore she'd fucked both Axl Rose and one of the guys from Suicidal Tendencies, and that she'd done it before anyone else even knew their names. She was fairly certain she didn't envy those experiences, but there was an unashamed quality she desperately wished she possessed. With Miriam being her first cousin, Emma felt cheated of the unashamed gene.

While she appreciated the mastery of an Eddie Van Halen as much as the next gal, she hid her real taste in music from public consumption. She pretended to enjoy Megadeth and Metallica with as much enthusiasm as everyone around her. She went to the Drivin' N Cryin'concert. She tucked her Mozart, Beethoven, Straus and Vivaldi cassettes in shoe boxes under her twin bed. Mahler was in the walkman stuffed into her backpack. She couldn't paint to metal or punk or pop or any other variation of modern music for the masses. She just couldn't.

She was staring intently out the window as he leaned down and turned on the radio. He started to apologize as the emotion of Tosca flooded the car.

He was shocked when she interrupted to say, "It's okay. I like Puccini."

He looked over at her a moment and back to the street, having hit the brakes a little too hard at a red light.

He stuttered, "You like Puccini?"

She turned to stare at him, "Yeah, I do. So, sue me."

He glanced in her direction, then forward again and laughed.

She gritted her teeth, "What's so damned funny? Think a suburban girl is too stupid to know who Puccini is?"

He shook his head. "No, just thought a girl who probably sleeps in her leather jacket would listen to something...louder...and more abrasive."

"Turn here," she said frantically.

She pointed to her right and directed him to turn at the corner where a guy with an impressively long, spiked, bright blue Mohawk stood smoking a Marlboro Light. Emma threw up her hand and waved.

She rolled down the window to yell, "Look at my ride, Stew!"

She slapped the side of the car as Stew gave her a thumbs-up and laughed.

Noah nodded his head in the guy's direction when she hit the button to roll up the window.

He asked, "A friend of yours?"

She sank back for a moment, then pointed and yelled, "Here! Pull over!"

Noah pulled in front of a little store with an odd window display of assorted bongs and books.

As she opened the door and gathered her plethora of items, she answered, "Stew's a throw back to glory days of Syd and Nancy, but he's a good guy. He writes poetry."

She started to shut the door, and then remembering stopped and said, "Thanks for the ride, Professor."

He watched her open the door and walk inside.

"Nice ass," he said it aloud and didn't reprimand himself. She had a nice ass. The faded shade of her tight Levis was rubbed particularly white just beneath her shapely buns. What man wouldn't notice?

He was shocked when she turned briefly, bit her lip and smiled in his direction. Had she really done that? She had. Internally, he groaned. He was certain his cock was reading far too much into it.

"What the hell, Emmaline?" Miriam was waiting behind the glass display cases filled with handmade book jackets, bookmarks and a variety of smoking and reading related paraphernalia.

The girl with the bright red lipstick and black nail polish continued, "I can't fucking believe you're late again."

She muttered, "Sorry," as she laid her stuff on the ground beneath the cash register.

But, Miriam was caught up now in playing the role of her boss and wasn't done, "Look, this is getting old. Do you want this job or not? If you don't, you can just pay the rent and work somewhere..."

Emma's mind flashed to her small studio apartment above the shop and shook her head.

She cut her off, "No, I want the job. My god damn car died. I had to ride here with Noah, okay? I'm sorry."

Inside, she huffed a little. Family and boss didn't mix well at times.

Miriam raised an eyebrow, "Noah? That hot professor you hate so much?"

"I never called him hot, and I never said I hated him, not exactly," Emma responded, glaring at her.

"Oh yes, you did call him hot!" she laughed, "You just don't remember because of the Jagermeister."

'Quit drinking,' she added it to her mental list of things to remember right after, 'Trust no one.'

Noah cursed when he heard the message. Carol wasn't coming; she'd been called back into work because of some unspecified emergency. The long and short of it, she wasn't coming; he wasn't cumming.

"Dammit," he said aloud as he plopped onto the sofa.

He took a deep breath and then sighed. He hadn't been laid in weeks, so many weeks that it had turned into months, but he refused to count them in that increment. It was too depressing. His mind immediately drifted to Emma. Had she really given him the look he was certain he'd seen?

He sank back and closed his eyes. Emma. She had great, full lips; he wondered what it would be like to have that mouth wrapped around his cock. Emma. Her breasts would bounce when she rode him. He could see her redheaded temper turning easily to a fiery passion.

Three hours later, he knew, even as he did it, that it was a moment of sheer insanity that had him back his car and making the drive to the little, hole-in-the-wall store where he left her. She might not even be there. She might be there. He wasn't certain which would have the better outcome. His mind tried to jumble together an excuse for his return as he searched for a parking space along the street.

Emma sat down her copy of The Feminine Mystique and tried to imagine how it must have been before feminism. Would she be married? Would she be dreaming about being a mother rather than an artist? The once radical ideas seemed so tame, even outdated.

She was staring a display rack of Marxist writings when the little bell above the door jingled. Being the worst store clerk in the world, she generally ignored customers as they came through the door. But, this being the first in more than an hour and so close to closing time that it pissed her off a little, she glanced over towards him. Tall, dark hair, older.

brandy25
brandy25
14 Followers