NOTE: If you haven’t been following this from the beginning, and if you want to know the full sequence of events, start with the introduction. Click on Archives on the right.
Bel Vionnet lets the leash sag, as the sour smell of fresh spread mulch doesn’t distract Ossian from the subtleties, he finds on a dead poke weed stalk.
“I always let him get a thorough sniff.”
“Good idea, enrich his mind!”
A lawn service truck and trailer rattles past.
Ossian pulls on his leash veering into the street, leaving his fascination with the pokeweed for the adventure of the chase.
“He always attacks those trailers.”
“Imagine the scent trail streaming behind!”
“Yes, all the grass cuttings stuck in the machinery and whatever else was chopped up.”
We walk on, along Wicket Street, and left up Oval Street hill.
Tall Maynard Keyes stands by his long pink station wagon, parked at the top, outside Diddlie’s house.
Occasional gusts carry late pink cherry blossom into his graying windblown hair. Moving the leash to her left hand, Bel points up the hill.
“Look at that huge pink Buick!”
“It must be Maynard’s.”
“Isn’t he Boyd’s friend?”
“Yes, I wonder what he is doing here. I don’t think he knows Diddlie.”
We walk up to the driveway. Lark comes out of the carport chatting with Diddlie, who is carrying Mr. Liddell. Diddlie beckons to us, in front of a deep purple azalea set off by the white dogwood above.
Maynard strolls over to them as we get to the car, to look at the rabbit.
“Fine looking specimen of Oryctolagus cuniculus.”
Diddlie, turns to Maynard. “What? Did you say cunnilingus?”
“No, I was referring to Leporidae, the family of rabbits and hares.”
“We don’t speak Latin here.”
Lark grabs her arm. “Oh! stop, Did!”
Maynard is smiling and reaches out to pet the rabbit with his broad palm.
“This is Mr. Liddell.”
“Delighted! I’m Maynard.”
Mr. Liddell keeps his ears flat against his back.
“Remember me telling you what a huge help Maynard has been to Boyd and me, Did?”
“Where is Boyd?”
Diddlie has her back to the house as Maynard waves.
“He just came out of your front door.” Maynard steps away to answer his phone.
Boyd now has strawberry blond hair, worn down to his neck, with a little eyeliner.
Diddlie turns to see him. “Boyd, where have you been?”
“I was talking to the Red Queen in the living room.”
Diddlie presents the rabbit to Boyd. “Must have been a long conversation.”
“Well, that parrot has a big vocabulary and I went to the powder room. Want to be ready to meet everyone.”
Boyd ignores Mr. Liddell as Ossian jumps up with his forepaws on Boyd’s left knee.
“What a cute dog!”
Bel tightens her grip on the leash. “You look great, Boyd. This is Ossian.”
“Oh! Bel thank you! I haven’t seen you for, I don’t know how long!”
“It has been a couple of years, I think.”
Diddlie walks back to the carport, still chatting with Lark, and puts Mr. Liddell back in his hutch.
“How is your husband, Steve, isn’t it?”
“He is fine, studying Frans Hals.”
“On yeah, what a lively painter! I mean those banquet paintings are so animated!”
”I wouldn’t know, you and Steve should talk.”
“Oh sure, I don’t know when I last saw Steve either.”
“Where are you living now, Boyd?”
Another gust blows his hair over his forehead, and he moves it with a feminine toss of his head.
“Thanks to Maynard I have been staying with the Sorrell sisters over in DC.”
“Okay, that explains the long hiatus.”
“Yeah, I am like their maid, bel, doing the housework.”
“Well, how good of you!”
“Got to earn my keep.”
Lark is calling Boyd from the carport.
“Excuse me bel, I owe Mom more attention than she gets from me.”
Boyd turns back towards the carport pushing back his hair with both hands against the wind.
Maynard offers his hand to bel, after putting his phone back in his pocket.
“Excuse me, I am Maynard, I don’t think we have met.”
“Bel Vionnet, glad to meet a friend of Boyd’s.”
“The Sorrels are old friends of mine, by the way.”
“From student days, perhaps?”
“Well, just after, when I was peripherally involved in a scandalous affair.”
“How interesting!”
“Young Lucinda Sorrel was found out in an affair with her sixty-three-year-old high school drama teacher.”
“Sounds like an enriching experience for them both!”
“I am sure it was, but legally it was statutory rape.”
“What a nightmare!”
“Yes, it was that too, until a legal acquaintance of mine took the case and managed to minimize the damage to both.”
“Maynard! You were a friend indeed!”
“Honestly, I found Lucinda interesting, and her delightful sisters became dear friends, too.”
Boyd is running back to us.
“Sorry, bel, what did you ask?”
“The Sorrells, Boyd, do you know them all?”
“Oh, sure, Lidia, Lucinda, and Ottoline, we all share a huge house in DC”.
Lark and Diddlie catch up from the carport. Diddlie looks up at Maynard.
“You are a high-altitude individual.”
“Sadly, I am earthbound.”
Diddlie steps closer to Boyd, looking into face. “What are you guys talking about so intensely?”
“I am about to explain a scandal. Well, my life’s story, I guess!”
Lark puts her arm across Boyd’s shoulders.
“It is okay, Boyd.”
“So, Diddlie, I’ll tell you that Ottoline Sorrel is the artist who painted Adonis and the three Graces. I mean it is just beautifully done.”
“Like, what style?”
“Adonis is offering himself, fully extended, to them in old master style!”
“How big is it? I mean the painting.”
“It fills a wall upstairs in their house. Maybe four by six feet.”
“My God! Is it an oil painting?”
“Yes, kind of traditional except The Three Graces have blueish cartoon bubbles rising from the cigarettes in their lips.”
Lark claps her hands, laughing. “Cigarettes! No one smoked in those days!”
“That’s the point, Mom. They are making fun of Adonis too.”
“What are they saying?”
“Oh, I forget.”
Diddlie has folded her arms across her chest. “Oh no, are you telling me they are Lesbians?”
“Maybe, or maybe they just think he is a jerk.”
“What about the artist?”
“Ah, what about her, Diddlie?”
“I mean is she, like what gender? You know.”
“Ottoline is nonbinary, honey.”
“Oh, right, the pronoun thing.”
“Gender categories are kind of breaking up.”
“Yeah, I am confused by all the talk.”
“Like global warming, you know, more fluid.”
“I presume the Graces are nudes, right?”
“Just as curvy as Rubens’s or Botticelli’s.”
More cherry petals fill the air around us.
“You sure have learned a lot about art!”
“Of course, Diddlie, hanging out with those three. It’s like a perpetual life class.”
“So, you are their student.”
“Oh, among other things.”
“What things?”
“Like, loving.”
“Are you talking about sex?”
“Ah, I could be.”
“Well, make up your mind.”
“No, sweety, I am asking you to make up yours.”
“Boyd, in my experience love and sex merge and diverge.”
“Inevitably?”
“No!”
“Well, you can have love without sex and you can sex without love.”
“Love can wear off though.”
Bel watches a helicopter overhead while restraining Ossian as he barks at a hysterically high pitch.
Boyd watches Ossian’s strenuous barking. “Your dog objects to helicopters!”
“No, Boyd, there must be a fox! Anyone see it?”
“Bel, I am sure he saw it run off when that thing went over.”
“Right, I wanted to point out before we were deafened, that love doesn’t wear off.”
Diddlie ignores the dog. “Okay bel, passion, attraction, interest, all that does.”
Bel looks up from Ossian who has bumped her leg to get her attention back.
“I agree with you there, Diddlie.”
Lark is shivering. “This wind is cold. Let’s go in the carport.”
“Oh Mom, you are such a delicate flower!”
