Evan's Life

I sat on a stool by the window watching the many people, tourists, bankers, old doves walking side by side with their hands folded behind their backs, and children desperate to run through the streets as cars became flashes of colors like a pollock painting spurts of yellow, blacks, reds, and silver ambitious as they were to prove superiority over the city. There were few artists downtown, fewer each month it seemed and the one’s that remained seemed to take on a disguise out of fear of some reprisal of fate they dressed conservatively, spent little time in the parlors or cafes and never spoke to anyone on the street. Mr. Mueller’s photo studio was a desperate holdout, what was once a ballet company that went under the patron Madame Piaf was sensitive to the fruitless causes and inspiration of artists and had an understanding relationship with the landlord agreed to put in a good word for Mr. Mueller. We split rent with Harry Mantas who ran Harry’s Deli and Shoeshine on the first floor, a little shop frequented by accountants and secretaries on their lunch breaks. I thought about all of this as I watched the little lifeless people and savored the pastrami and banana peppers and this good day-old bread and thought about Madame Piaf and what became of her and her children if they went back to Paris or on to San Fransisco as they said. I let the juice of this sandwich dribble down the side of my chin past hills of stubble and fresh razor cuts that stung for a moment. 

The sun was bright today, I knew it’d be busy. You could see Grant Park from here, few people walked the paths this year I spied a fountain where many evenings were spent with cheap wine and good bread from the farmers market split between myself, the birds, and the homeless. It was an August sun in mid-March and the floor to ceiling windows circling the studio allowed the peach-colored walls and hardwood floor to glow in unison. Mr. Mueller didn’t much like artificial light, today would be busy. First there was a large man with sunken droopy eyes and a daunting forehead who wore a great black coat and let himself in, rather obtusely. His face reminded me of a frog. He seemed to be a friend of Mr. Mueller, however, as he stood from the long desk opposite the door, and they exchanged hugs and kisses. I’d never seen a nastier looking man. Behind him two thin veiny boys in thick sheer coats looked about the ceiling and floors in a daze they had eyes like frightened deer. The taller one of the two, with shoulder length blonde hair twisted the length into a bun and smiled at Mr. Mueller before smiling at me alone across the empty floors. Fiddling with the Hasselblad in one hand and my sandwich in the other, this stained white shirt with small holes around the shoulder and navel tucked too tightly in my tan trousers. I didn’t meet his gaze but noticed the town car parked at the curb in front of Harry’s, the driver took a smoke break circling the length of the black sedan before leaning beside the trunk and watching. “This is my assistant Evan, out of Memphis he’s truly wonderful.” Mr. Mueller spoke his voice had a metalic quality and I was drawn to his sideburns before his eyes, the color of apple cider and finely tangled. Now they all looked at me and feeling the unsaid motivation I stood from the stool, with no hope of finishing this sandwich I'd leave it on the windowsill and approach the group. The man who I’d learn was named Ernest was a wealthy benefactor, or a lonely old man, and wished to have his “boys” photographed. We would shake hands as was customary, but I’d shrink my grasp as soon as those clammy hands grew tighter. Mr. Mueller had no prejudice against anyone it seemed, at least during my time with him, I envied him for his unblemishing ignorant kindness. Perhaps I misunderstood as he did have a habit of working with disgusting yet wealthy people. The boys were pretty though, I don’t think they spoke English though the taller one could make amble conversation well enough; it didn’t matter as talking during a portrait session seemed to be unproductive anyways. It’d been several months since I was sleeping on the doorstep of Harry’s, or under a tree in the park, or the grim hallway outside the studio. 

Mr. Mueller gradually grew less weary of my presence, becoming more accustomed to the fact I wasn’t going to ransack his business without a note. This was the fifth shoot I’d done alone in the sense that Mr. Mueller still stood over my shoulder and studied me breathe regularly but I had creative control. It was business as usual; two glasses of sherry and lead around by his velvet wrapped words fleeting like breadcrumbs as the payer of bills would end up in his office at the far end of the studio and sit and ramble on for as long as I needed. I could hear the sliding door close. It was a trick I became accustomed to rather quickly, The boys were loose in the way they moved like deer in a open meadow. I spoke in hand signals mostly with the occasional mummering of what way one should turn their head. They didn’t seem to understand that the photos had to be developed and begged me to see the results. After explaining the process, they just giggled to themselves, and one gave me a kiss on the cheek before they knocked on Mr. Mueller’s door. 

After work on days like this I’d often end up at Vanwurst a cheap little corner café down the street from the Art Institute with a sunroom of sliding glass windows that on a warm winter day the waiters would leave open, and I’d sit and read the paper and study people. I’d done portraits of Mr. Vanwurst wife which hung about the interior of the place, so he let me eat reduced and take home any expired pastries that hadn’t sold. Mr. Vanwurst didn’t like artists, he found their attitudes like that of cheap vagrants but envied their wealth all the same. I’d invited Mr. Mueller to join me several times but he didn’t come, even though I'd consider him more of a landlord than a photographer anymore. I took the models sometimes as an illusion of my success. The décor and cuisine were reminiscent of fine dining along the gold coast, yet the clientele consisted mostly of construction workers or students. There always seemed to be some sort of roadwork or half-finished apartment at least a couple blocks in any direction. Then there were the variety of art schools and preparatory academies intermingled. Mr. Vanwurst kept the coffee and wine cheap. After the boys and their patron left Mr. Mueller called the next appointment in. 

By this time on good sunny days, still in the dreary season, but tiptoeing to spring lines would form with ease in the hallway. There was no waiting room, but Mr. Mueller took care to provide chairs and cups of water. He had a secretary at one point but she left shortly after I arrived. Luckily, we had the whole second floor aside from a janitor’s closet beside the stairs for Harry’s. A younger woman with great puffy hair and broad shoulders was next she came alone and wore a long flowy blue dress complimented by blue earrings shaped like birds. She spoke in a slow uniform manner like how one would address their hard of hearing grandfather. I feared this was her first time and Mr. Mueller gave me a side eye with that charmed smile and I resigned myself to fiddling with the white tarp backdrop as they exchanged pleasantries. Her hands were visibly trembling as she approached, blue high heels singing against the wood floor. “Just have a seat on the stool” I spoke nodding and pointing indefinitely as I pulled another from beside the window. We seemed to have far too many plain wood stools to spare. This time Mr. Mueller, either bored or curious, leaned against a shelf of film boxes and watched, lighting a cigarette and puffing some smoke. I glared at him for a moment then resumed my narrow stare towards the model, her bright hazel eyes and skin painted a soft bronze by the glare of the sun. I took a heavy breath then told her to relax and began. 

Occasionally Mr. Mueller’s brother will come by, I never learned his name. He was a music professor at the University of Chicago. He was tall and gaunt with thick black rimmed glasses he couldn’t live without and a face like that of an overdriven mule. The suits that he wore always seemed to be a size too big. An amusing man to look at though Mr. Mueller informs me he’s quite well. He’s played the piano since they were children. I often frequented a jazz hall in the city on weekends, another prowling ground besides the park where I can pick up unsuspecting faces, photos of strangers were becoming a fetish rather gradually. I didn’t know how to dance so I’d linger in the corners or at the bar with the lonely old men divorced and living in a dream through watching their younger selves. The older people danced solemnly with strange and complicated steps while the younger swayed their hips and let their heads hang loose eyes closed tilted towards the chandelier ceilings. Some do not dance at all but merely lean on each other with hauntingly calm smiles and disappear into the maze of swaying-colored fabrics. You weren’t supposed to smoke in the club, but some invisible figures lingered in the corners, their faces oily when the light shined and the cigarette smoke black and dense. A vague disturbance like the mummering voices that was as much music as the piano and saxophone.

“You shouldn’t become overtly fixated on the subject.” Mr. Mueller would say for the hundredth time his voice was like a dull bell ringing out my ears. I had a poor habit for portrait makers in developing an attraction to the subjects I intended to capture. It’s a longstanding argument among photographers if you’re to remain objective in capturing life or seek to influence it for the perverse narrative of the photo. The photo itself is an emotional truth that neither I nor the subject would hope to understand until resigned to the isolating nature of that comforting red hue seeking gratification as life develops before my eyes, my life. It creates a perverse sense of how to view the world. It goes to your head and becomes an obsession in short order.

I had a little place in Chinatown, a studio with a bed next to the kitchen sink and a curtain separating my stovetop from the toilet. Still, it was such a nice place once I got in such sorry states of pity over work or the clubs or whoever’s face, I’d seen in the studio or the street that struck me in such a way. I could smother myself in a pile of collected quilts along this yellow mattress and watch the sunset from a window along the length of the bed and listen to the train that became a constant. I paid rent to a small Cambodian woman who lived the floor below, her English was strung together, and I think she found my presence an irritant, but I truly loved the way she spoke so joyfully words had such life to them in the way she exchanged meanings and spoke in and out of Khmer when there was a phrase she didn’t know. She had two daughters I knew of, both college age their English was much better, and we played cards on the porch with tea and crackers, sometimes I’d sneak hotdogs and chili fries from food trucks along S Michigan, and other things their mother forbade them to eat. However sometimes when in my lack of better interest in late nights or early mornings I’d overhear mention of the family “left behind” by the mother and her friends from the laundromat often followed by a deep solemnity carried over into the next day and I’d do well to remain hidden in my room. 

“Why don’t we go to Pearls? You know people.” Mickey spoke shyly as he flicked a bronze lighter letting the fire dance in those almond eyes swaying side to side, he was a child. I was a child, but Mickey was grown with yellow jagged baby teeth that you’d spot in-between the giggles of his laugh. We pitied each other, it's how we showed care. “I can’t sit here all day.” he moaned with a greasy hand run through dry curls of red hair that covered his eyes he sunk back against my mattress while I leaned against the window admiring polaroid prints Chantou had made for her aunt’s birthday last week. The family intended to frame most of them, but she snuck a few to my room and I found a small stack at my feet this morning. I didn’t know any of the people though she figured I was a photographer and so must get a thrill out of staring at any picture, it was a nice gesture.

Pearls was a gentle little two-story orange stucco building with white trim and a lingering scent of vinegar. It’s a nice little space in Pilsen with cheap lemon and peach flavored beer and handmade tortillas. My Spanish is passable but I’m friends with the bartender Montoya a smaller man with hunched shoulders and a protruding forehead he always keeps an orange comb in his shirt pocket though he went bald a decade ago a salt and pepper moustache flourishes concealing his long lips. It was quiet for a Friday afternoon, and we found seats easily in a back corner beside the window with papel picado in red and green strung about from end to end of the bar and shelfs of marigolds that an old woman who looked much like Montoya watered, gently caressing the stems. “How is the weather?” was Montoya’s greeting as he brought two coronas and looked at Mickey with a questionable but affectionate inspection, he looked at all my friends in such a way. “The weather’s fine” was Mickey’s response before I could stir my thoughts and a small smile crept along Montoya’s face as he looked at me for approval and I shrugged my shoulders, “It’s fine”. Of course, Montoya wasn’t referring to the actual weather, he could just as easily look out the veranda that wrapped the corners of the café. It was a secret we shared that signified our friendship I suppose, “the weather” was life itself, long rainy afternoons and golden shafts of light then all is still, and he could gauge my drink by my response. Life was simply fine today though and I suppose Montoya knew as soon as I walked through the door. Corona was such an average drink though, he never gave me corona then again, I'd never brought Mickey here before.