Issue No. 4

Marvin

August 26, 2019

I go on vacations to relax, but relaxing too much gives me anxiety. I rarely sleep-in on vacations. My friends and I like to call this “nervously relaxing.” The next morning I woke up early as usual, dressed, and cooked eggs with spinach in the community kitchen. My posture tightened, standing before the stove, as Marvin walked through the swinging door. He looked better than I had seen him so far. His silky hair was loose around his shoulders and he wore a trendy denim jacket over a fitted white T shirt. He smiled at me and pulled two cups for coffee from the shelf. He prepared the Moka pot, which I’d been avoiding for a week, on the far counter. Sometimes I ask questions just to demonstrate to others that it's okay not to know something. I had met Marvin a few days earlier because I had asked him one morning, in the busy hours of breakfast, “how do you use that coffee maker?” Passing my litmus test for patient, generous souls, he kindly taught me. 

I turned off the stove. He poured the two cups of coffee and asked if I minded whether he joined me while I ate. Though I was halfway through my stay in Point Reyes National Park, I still hadn’t mentioned to a living soul that my heart was freshly crushed, or maybe suffocated, under the equivalent weight of a Pacific gray whale. I hadn’t mentioned that I was battling the unfiltered mania and rumination, which commonly stalks one in the slipstream of serious breakups. I was a human husk. Instead of iterating to him how the inside of my body felt vacant like the waxy innards of a crumpled paper cup, I said “sure,” arrested with hands full of plates and we walked toward the dining nook. 

He took a dish from my arms and helped me carry the plates into a petite, dim room that branched off of the kitchen. One long, wooden table was in the center of the space and wooden countertops ran along opposite walls on either side, above which were carved porthole windows. It felt like we were on a ship. I made for a seat at the countertop on the sidewall in front of a window. As early as thirteen I learned, like many others learn, that the tenderness in comfort from men, around my sorrow, is not always, but sometimes, threaded with romantic pursuit. And so it is difficult for me to soften while being “comforted,” depending on who the comforting is being done by. Light conversation felt impossible, but I was determined to utter nothing of the breakup during the meal, nothing that would render me in focus as a sexual being. I would allow the company of another person over breakfast to be comfortable enough. I hadn’t spoken at length, in-person, to much of anyone in many days.  We kept a distance of one stool between us and I nibbled at the runny eggs and a piece of provolone cheese from the small plate before me. 

Marvin occupied the dialogue with a problem he was having. Gesticulating animatedly, the jean jacket slunk down his forearms. He sought my help choosing between two options for his future plans. The first option, he said, would be to sell his truck tomorrow and use the money to buy a one-way ticket to Bali for next week. Once he got to Bali, he could work for a surf camp for a few months. He said he had previously worked at the camp and that he made good money doing it. I was confused. “Do you have to call ahead?” I asked. “How does that work? Can you just show up and they’ll give you a job? What if they already have enough instructors?” He seemed unfettered by these details. The second option was to wait to sell the truck and stay at the hostel for a few more nights. I waited for him to offer a reason as to why this was on the table but there wasn’t one. He simply stopped talking. His eyes flickered up at me and I suddenly realised he may have wanted me to offer a reason. My posture tightened again as if my body was laced with a drawstring secured at my navel. “You should go,” I blurted, gnashing a piece of buttered toast. “Bali sounds awesome. Why not?!” Crumbs fell out of my mouth and onto my shirt. I felt proud of my veritable breeziness. “I guess,” he mumbled. He glanced at my breasts, covered in burnt crumbs, and then the table. He ran a tanned hand through his hair. I looked out the window. He changed the subject. “I’m an artist,” he said. I could drive back to Laguna Beach where my dad lives and finish up this mural I’m working on.” “Oh yeah?” I asked, my interest suddenly piqued. “I’m an artist too,” I offered. We discussed what mediums we prefer and he asked me what I do for money. “I work at National Geographic as a designer during the day,” I explained,  “but I make art and I like to write when I’m not working.” This should have been obvious from the moleskins stacked at my elbows everywhere I went. His eyes widened, “Oh my God” he breathed, “have you ever been on one of those National Geographic cruises?” My mind’s eye procured visions of all the National Geographic emails I'd inherited in my work inbox for the last three years and the destinations and prices of the cruises he was referring to. The cruises weren’t just expensive. They weren’t just thousands of dollars. Sometimes they were tens of thousands of dollars. Sometimes they were priced at seventy-thousand dollars a head, often more than not. At this point in my vacation I was so broke that I had struggled to keep my grocery bill for the week just under thirty dollars. After briefly vacationing from our conversation to  run the mental math on my destitution, I did a quick check to make sure my eyeballs were positioned tightly in their sockets and hadn’t rolled so far back in my head that they’d traveled down my esophagus and into my intestines. They were securely in place. “No I haven’t,” I replied. “I have,” he said brightly. “I went with my grandma when I was a kid. It was amazing. We went to South America and swam with the puffins.” His expression was alarmingly childlike, as if the vibrancy of his inner colors had been carefully and dependably preserved since adolescence via scientific methods. “Wow that’s so cool. You’re lucky,” I said. I meant it. He continued about Laguna Beach. “Yeah, if I go home I’ll probably try to stay with my dad again. But last time I showed up there he kicked me out because I didn’t have a job. He came home and when he saw me there with all my shit he was so pissed.” At the word pissed, he slapped his hand on the table and bent forward laughing hard. I wasn’t sure how this scenario was funny, but I tried to imagine how it could be. “Then I went to stay with my grandma.” The more Marvin spoke, the more I was able to assemble and compartmentalize a profile of his personal history and economical makeup, but he was beginning to feel more like a cartoon than a real person. “I have my paintings on Instagram. Can I show you?” He tried to pull up the app but there was no cell signal. “Ah it won’t load,” he said. “I have lots of my art in my truck, actually. Can I show you later?” “Sure,” I said. “I have to get going soon, but maybe when I get back later.”  The thought of going anywhere near Marvin’s truck alone with him made me uncomfortable. We tapered off our conversation about art and the murals. He mentioned that the city of Laguna Beach often puts out calls for artists to decorate the city for various holidays and not many people apply for the competitions. He said “I apply to all of them and I’ve won at least once every year since 2016. My art is on all the banners that hang from lamp posts all the way down Main Street. And I have a mural in City Hall that’s been there for years.” 

Later, I walked out to my car and when I passed his truck I squinted my eyes to peer through the back windows to see if I could make out any art materials. There was a jumble of objects and shadows. I really was curious if his art was good or not. 

About a month after my return to Washington, D.C., I sat at my desk staring at the glare on my computer screen, reminiscing on my travels. Marvin came to mind. I pictured the angularity of his cheekbones. That bloodshot eye. I tried to imagine the type of art he would make, if he did. What it would look like. I opened up a Chrome browser window, typed in “Goo..,” and Google populated. In the search bar I entered the keywords “Laguna Beach Marvin artist mural.” A long list of articles appeared on my screen. I combed the entire page, even clicked on some, but none were relevant to my search, or were for the wrong Marvin, or were unrelated entirely. I tried again. “Laguna Beach City Hall mural Marvin.” This query rendered similar results to the first. I paused. I google searched Laguna Beach City Hall and found a phone number. I flipped through the offering of images of the outer perimeter of the building and didn’t see any murals. I did the Google street-view tour.

I picked up my cell phone and thumbed the City Hall phone number from Google into the dial pad. I abandoned my cubicle and walked around the corner of my office to a phone booth, shutting the glass door behind me. A receptionist answered the call. I asked if she knew of anyone named Marvin who had won some competitions for the city to create art for banners on Main Street and about any murals on location at City Hall. She asked for his last name. “I don’t have one,” I said. “I met this person while traveling and unfortunately I lost their phone number. I’d like to hire him to do some work.” She transferred me to the department of recreation, pleasantly asserting they could answer my question. I was giddy. The voice of a woman came over the receiver sounding irritable. I politely repeated my initial question. “You don’t have a last name?” she prodded. “No, I’m so sorry, I don’t,” I apologized. “Well it doesn’t matter anyway,” she said, “there are no murals here.” “Oh.. really?,” I asked. “Are you sure? This person said they painted a huge mural right in the center of City Hall. And all the banners down Main Street.” Sounding even more irritable, she spat “I've worked here for ten years and there are no murals anywhere in any of the buildings. I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Reaching an impasse, I thanked her and we hung up the phone.