Steeplechase Read Free Page B

and under this she will not be wearing underwear. Lately they have all been beautiful. This one has a glow of bright red hair and perfect cheekbones. Her eyes are wide and intelligent.
    He is talking with her. He is always talking with someone when I arrive. He is the only person in the room with no self-awareness. This is how he disarms me. His shoes are old and there is tape on one, holding the sole on. His jumper is faded, but not in that funky op-shop old-made-new way. It is just an old jumper with a stain over his heart where a pen has leaked. His hair is a sweaty mess. He is plumper than the other boys and his skin has a sheen to it that makes me think he was out last night, drinking.
    The model grins at him, her face lighting up with pleasure. She laughs. He likes to make girls laugh. Sometimes he makes me laugh too.
    I ease my satchel down and stand at the front of the room. There is a desk here, and a whiteboard that is never used. I perch on the desk and slowly, one by one, the pretty, bored faces turn in my direction. There is a dull ache in my stomach. It feels like I have been hollowed out, which is fair enough. I suppose I have been.
    â€˜So we meet again.’ There are some nods, a few grins. John whispers something to the model and she giggles prettily before standing, tugging her clothes tighter around her as if she is reluctant to shed them at all.
    She smiles at me. Very attractive. I may have seen her before. Or not, six hundred models a year and all the drawings the same. The pose with the head bent forward, the one leaning back like a dancer, the lying on the floor as if dead or sleeping. There are only so many poses a body can adopt. She unties her dress and unwraps herself. Some of them like to do this in another room. Either way, they end up naked. The students are used to this now but there is still a certain awkwardness. There is never any interaction between student and model, except John of course. I watch him lowering his easel to chair height, the canvas is unbalanced and he grabs at it noisily. The girl closest to him smiles and they exchange raised eyebrows. John holds his finger to his lips and her smile becomes a wide grin. He is charming in his awkwardness.
    â€˜So,’ I tell them. ‘You know the drill, five-second poses, then thirty-second poses, then some longer ones. You okay with that?’ This to the model. She has a name. It is on the job sheet that I have buried somewhere in my notes. When I started working here I used to make a point of remembering their names. Now I just stand and take my watch off my wrist and hold it, mostly for show. ‘Start,’ I say, and then, ‘Change.
    â€˜Change.
    â€˜Change.’
    The model lunges into impossible shapes. Perhaps she is a dancer or a gymnast, her breasts never seem to sag. She is gorgeous. ‘Change, change, change.’
    Little stick drawings, lines really, just the general shape and movement. They are no better or worse than any other students I have had. I walk slowly around the circle of easels and the works are interchangeable. Sharp quick lines of varying thickness. Some more interested in the curve of the back, some of them breast-men and women, drawing the pretty pert hang, the ever-changing direction of the nipple. Some of them concentrate on the hair.
    John has never been good at the quick drawing. I walk behind him and notice that today he has decided not to draw the model at all. Instead he has begun to sketch my desk, the model’s dress hanging from it like a dead pelt, the puddle of skirt lapping at the ground beneath. Nothing quick about this drawing, he has started with shadow and is drawing back to the highlights. This is something my sister used to do. I recognise the intensity of the strokes.
    â€˜Okay. A longer one now. Say, twenty minutes?’ The model nods. I walk, slowly, glancing. I do not interfere. I am here if they want me but they never do, these bright young things with