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Authors: Sara Susannah Katz
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“Should I be jealous?”
He smiles. “Absolutely. How could you possibly compete with a woman of her beauty and grace?” He takes a sip of my Coke. “So
how did I sound up there?”
He sounded like a goose struggling to free itself from an oil spill.
“Fantastic, honey,” I tell him. “Amazing.”
“You really think so?”
“Yes, I really do.” Michael is beaming now and except for the bald spot he looks exactly like the boy I fell in love with.
Priapus, the son of Aphrodite, has an erection the size of a baseball bat. I am looking at a photograph of a fresco fragment
from the House of Vettii in Pompeii. Obviously I can’t get the fresco for the exhibit, but I can probably get a good reproduction,
printed onto a slab of stone. I make a note to call Jodi Mattson at the Field Museum.
I’m in the Whole Beanery trying to get a head start on the ancient sex exhibit, a collection of art and writing from the Greco-Roman
period slated as the centerpiece of the Bentley’s seventy-fifth anniversary celebration. It will be a sweeping exhibition
with depictions of the promiscuous Zeus, who routinely transformed himself into a swan or bull or eagle to gain sexual advantage
over women and boys; the
hetaerae
of Greece, the elite among prostitutes known as much for their intelligence as their sexual expertise; Aphrodite, the patron
goddess of the
hetaerae,
ruler over lust, capable of sending victims into destructive sexual frenzies; and Bacchus, the famed god of ecstasy and wine
who inspired drunken orgies so wild and lawless that authorities found it necessary to arrest participants by the thousands.
“You work at the
Bentley
Institute?”
I turn to find a man at the table beside mine smiling as if he knows me. It is the man from the parking lot, the professor
with the pink shell and three pennies and bedroom eyes. Evan Something.
“Yes,” I say, aware of a warm flush that has something to do with my pride in the Bentley and something to do with this man’s
lips. “I’m the assistant director.”
“Julia Flanagan. I remember. I’m Evan Delaney. I’m, uh, the guy who was in desperate need of change. For the meter, I mean.”
“Yes.” I am abruptly aware I’ve got pictures of naked Greeks and Romans scattered about the table. I sweep everything into
my briefcase.
“You don’t have to stop on my account.”
There is the beginning of a sly grin and I know what he is thinking. Everyone assumes that if you work at the Bentley Institute
you must have an Olympian sex life.
“That’s okay. I was just finishing up anyway. There’s only so much of this I can take in one sitting.”
Why did I say that? It wasn’t true. I have been known to sit in one place for six hours consecutively until my work is completed.
Leslie hired me because I’m a work-horse and we both know it.
Evan asks about my job and I hear about his frustrations teaching medieval literature to nineteen-year-old students who would
rather be back in their dorm rooms, sleeping or getting stoned or playing with their pet ferrets.
I notice the book on his table. “Ovid?”
He doesn’t say anything for a moment, just gazes at me in a way that makes me feel vulnerable and shy. “Publius Ovidius Naso.
One of the greatest writers of classical antiquity. Exiled to the shores of the Black Sea. A poet. A lover. A soul in pain.”
He opens the book and turns to a page somewhere toward the end. “This is one of my favorites. From ‘The Art of Love.’ ”
Evan reads aloud, unself-consciously, in a mild and matter-of-fact way. Occasionally he lifts his eyes to meet mine, not salaciously,
but engagingly, and every time he looks at me I can feel my heart clench.
“In Cupid’s school, whoe’er would take degree
Must learn his rudiments by reading me,
Seamen with sailing art their vessels move;
Art guides the chariot: art instructs to love.
Of ships and chariots others know the rule;
But I am master in
He smiles. “Absolutely. How could you possibly compete with a woman of her beauty and grace?” He takes a sip of my Coke. “So
how did I sound up there?”
He sounded like a goose struggling to free itself from an oil spill.
“Fantastic, honey,” I tell him. “Amazing.”
“You really think so?”
“Yes, I really do.” Michael is beaming now and except for the bald spot he looks exactly like the boy I fell in love with.
Priapus, the son of Aphrodite, has an erection the size of a baseball bat. I am looking at a photograph of a fresco fragment
from the House of Vettii in Pompeii. Obviously I can’t get the fresco for the exhibit, but I can probably get a good reproduction,
printed onto a slab of stone. I make a note to call Jodi Mattson at the Field Museum.
I’m in the Whole Beanery trying to get a head start on the ancient sex exhibit, a collection of art and writing from the Greco-Roman
period slated as the centerpiece of the Bentley’s seventy-fifth anniversary celebration. It will be a sweeping exhibition
with depictions of the promiscuous Zeus, who routinely transformed himself into a swan or bull or eagle to gain sexual advantage
over women and boys; the
hetaerae
of Greece, the elite among prostitutes known as much for their intelligence as their sexual expertise; Aphrodite, the patron
goddess of the
hetaerae,
ruler over lust, capable of sending victims into destructive sexual frenzies; and Bacchus, the famed god of ecstasy and wine
who inspired drunken orgies so wild and lawless that authorities found it necessary to arrest participants by the thousands.
“You work at the
Bentley
Institute?”
I turn to find a man at the table beside mine smiling as if he knows me. It is the man from the parking lot, the professor
with the pink shell and three pennies and bedroom eyes. Evan Something.
“Yes,” I say, aware of a warm flush that has something to do with my pride in the Bentley and something to do with this man’s
lips. “I’m the assistant director.”
“Julia Flanagan. I remember. I’m Evan Delaney. I’m, uh, the guy who was in desperate need of change. For the meter, I mean.”
“Yes.” I am abruptly aware I’ve got pictures of naked Greeks and Romans scattered about the table. I sweep everything into
my briefcase.
“You don’t have to stop on my account.”
There is the beginning of a sly grin and I know what he is thinking. Everyone assumes that if you work at the Bentley Institute
you must have an Olympian sex life.
“That’s okay. I was just finishing up anyway. There’s only so much of this I can take in one sitting.”
Why did I say that? It wasn’t true. I have been known to sit in one place for six hours consecutively until my work is completed.
Leslie hired me because I’m a work-horse and we both know it.
Evan asks about my job and I hear about his frustrations teaching medieval literature to nineteen-year-old students who would
rather be back in their dorm rooms, sleeping or getting stoned or playing with their pet ferrets.
I notice the book on his table. “Ovid?”
He doesn’t say anything for a moment, just gazes at me in a way that makes me feel vulnerable and shy. “Publius Ovidius Naso.
One of the greatest writers of classical antiquity. Exiled to the shores of the Black Sea. A poet. A lover. A soul in pain.”
He opens the book and turns to a page somewhere toward the end. “This is one of my favorites. From ‘The Art of Love.’ ”
Evan reads aloud, unself-consciously, in a mild and matter-of-fact way. Occasionally he lifts his eyes to meet mine, not salaciously,
but engagingly, and every time he looks at me I can feel my heart clench.
“In Cupid’s school, whoe’er would take degree
Must learn his rudiments by reading me,
Seamen with sailing art their vessels move;
Art guides the chariot: art instructs to love.
Of ships and chariots others know the rule;
But I am master in
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