Love Creeps by Amanda Filipacchi Read Free Book Online

to Roland that Alan was so blind to Roland’s more obvious attributes, but Roland didn’t see how he could inform him of them without being offensive or sounding monstrously conceited.
    Lynn came back to her gallery after having spent hours stalking. Exhausted and achy, she lay down on the floor.
    Patricia stood over her without pity.
    â€œStalking makes me feel humiliated,” groaned Lynn.
    â€œGood,” Patricia said. “As you said yourself, you’ve been on top of the world for too long. A little humiliation once in a while is healthy, it’s part of the human experience. It’s like gravity. If you don’t have it, you’re like those astronauts who’ve been in space for ages. Your muscles get weak. You start having problems, unless you’re on a special exercise program. Your exercise program is stalking.”
    Charlie Santi entered the gallery. Lynn promptly picked herself off the floor.
    He wanted to show her some of his new paintings. Lynn had been representing Charlie for five years and had always been his staunchest supporter until the sudden disappearance of her desire. She took him to the dreaded light box, remembering when she used to call Charlie up almost every day, begging to know what he was up to.
    Charlie began laying out transparencies of paintings. They were in his usual style. Charlie’s canvases were always fairly large, covered in textured white paint. In a corner, or at least off center, was always a tiny shape, which looked vaguely like a person, but that was never certain. In Lynn’s all-time favorite painting of Charlie’s, the little shape looked as though it might be lying on its side, sleeping, possibly with its hands under its cheek. It was a very peaceful painting, which, along with all the other paintings in the world, she no longer liked.
    Lynn stood rigidly over the light box, making polite but reserved sounds.
    Her stalker, whom she hadn’t yet noticed, was standing outside the gallery window, staring at Lynn through the glass fondly. He was wearing red pants, a green shirt, a blue tie, a yellow jacket, orange shoes, and a purple hat with a white feather sticking out of the top. He looked like an elf. Or a parrot.
    When Charlie was done showing Lynn the transparencies, he said, “So, what do you think?”
    She glanced at him almost pleadingly. “Oh, Charlie. I think you should trust your instinct. I’m not the right person to ask right now.”
    â€œI want an answer. An honest answer. Yes or no. Do you like them?”
    â€œCharlie, I’m not …”
    â€œYes or no, Lynn! Yes or no, goddammit!”
    The cuckoo clock Patricia had recently bought for Lynn did its hourly thing. Its doors flew open, the yellow bird came out, but instead of saying “Cuckoo!” it said, in Patricia’s voice, “Stalk! Stalk! It’s four o’clock! Do you know where Mr. Dupont is?”
    Unwilling to be distracted, Charlie said, “Just answer me, Lynn, do you like them?”
    â€œNo,” she said gently. “But it doesn’t mean anything.”
    â€œShh! I brought two canvases with me.” He quickly unwrapped them. “This work is phenomenal,” he said. “I’m no longer asking you, I’m telling you. Because I don’t have the slightest doubt.”
    â€œThat’s great,” she said.
    â€œReally? You like them?”
    â€œWell … I meant it’s great that you feel so strongly about them.”
    â€œBut do you like them?”
    Lynn scrutinized the paintings, searching for the faintest speck that might thrill her. In one painting, Charlie had, for the first time ever, painted not one, but two tiny shapes. One appeared to be strangling or hugging the other. In the second painting, the single tiny shape was in a fetal position, or possibly just thinking in a position like The Thinker , by Rodin.
    The little shapes became blurry through Lynn’s