When The Bough Breaks

7

I drove out to Robin's studio at half-past seven. It had been several days since I'd seen her and I missed her. When she opened the door she was wearing a gauzy white dress that accentuated the olive tint of her skin. Her hair hung loose and she wore gold hoops in her ears.

She held out her arms to me and we embraced for a long while. We walked inside, still clinging together.

Her place is an old store on Pacific Avenue in Venice. Like lots of other studios nearby, it's unmarked, the windows painted over in opaque white.

She led me past the front part, the work area full of power tools — table saw, band saw, drill press — piles of wood, instrument molds, chisels, gauges and templates. As usual the room smelled of sawdust and glue. The floor was covered with shavings.

She pushed open swinging double doors and we were in her living quarters: sitting room, kitchen, sleeping loft with bath, small office. Unlike the shop, her personal space was uncluttered. She had made most of the furniture herself, and it was solid hardwood, simple and elegant.

She sat me down on a soft cotton couch. There was coffee and pie set out on a ceramic tray, napkins, plates and forks.

She sidled next to me. I took her face in my hands and kissed her.

"Hello, darling." She put her arms around me. I could feel the firmness of her back through the thin fabric, firmness couched in yielding, curving softness. She worked with her hands and it always amazed me to find in her that special combination of muscles and distinctly female lushness. When she moved, whether manipulating a hunk of rosewood around the rapacious jaws of a band saw or simply walking, it was with confidence and grace. Meeting her was the best thing that had ever happened to me. It alone had been worth dropping out for.

I'd been browsing at McCabe's, the guitar shop in Santa Monica, looking through the old sheet music, trying out the instruments that hung on the walls. I'd spied one particularly attractive guitar, like my Martin but even better made. I admired the craftsmanship — it was a handmade instrument — and ran my fingers over the strings, which vibrated with perfect balance and sustain. Taking it off the wall I played it and it sounded as good as it looked, ringing like a bell.

"Like it?"

The voice was feminine and belonged to a gorgeous creature in her mid-twenties. She stood close to me — how long she'd been there I wasn't sure; I'd been lost in the music. She had a heart-shaped face topped by a luxuriant mop of auburn curls. Her eyes were almond-shaped, wide-set, the color of antique mahogany. She was small, not more than five-two, with slender wrists leading to delicate hands and long, tapering fingers. When she smiled, her upper two incisors, larger than the rest of her teeth, flashed ivory.

"Yes. I think it's terrific."

"It's not that good." She put her hands on her hips — very definite hips. She had the kind of figure, small-wasted, busty and gently concave, that couldn't be camouflaged by the overalls she'd thrown on over her turtleneck.

"Oh, really?"

"Oh, really." She took the guitar from me. "There's a spot right here—" she tapped the soundboard " — where it's been sanded too thin. And the balance between headstock and box could be better." She strummed a few chords. "All in all I'd give it an eight on a scale of one to ten."

"You seem to be quite an expert on it."

"I should be. I made it."

She took me to her shop that afternoon and showed me the instrument she was working on. "This one's going to be a ten. The other was one of my first. You learn as you go along."

Some weeks later she admitted it had been her way of picking me up, her version of come up and see my etchings.

"I liked the way you played. Such sensitivity."

We saw each other regularly after that. I learned that she had been an only child, the special daughter of a skilled cabinetmaker who had taught her everything he knew about how to transform raw wood into objects of beauty. She had tried college, majoring in design, but the regimentation had angered her, as had the fact that her dad had known more about form and function intuitively than all the teachers and books combined. After he died, she dropped out, took the money he left her and invested in a shop in San Luis Obispo. She got to know some local musicians, who brought her their instruments to fix. At first it was a sideline, for she was trying to make a living designing and manufacturing custom furniture. Then she began to take a greater interest in the guitars, banjos and mandolins that found their way to her workbench. She read a few books on instrument making, found she had all the requisite skills and made her first guitar. It sounded great and she sold it for five hundred dollars. She was hooked. Two weeks later she moved to L.A., where the musicians were, and set up shop.

When I met her she was making two instruments a month as well as handling repairs. She'd been written up in trade magazines and was back-ordered for four months. She was starting to make a living.

I probably loved her the first day I met her but it took me a couple of weeks to realize it.

After three months we started to talk about living together, but it didn't happen. There was no philosophical objection on either side, but her place was too small for two people and my house couldn't accommodate her shop. It sounds unromantic, letting mundane matters like space and comfort get in the way, but we were having such a good time with each other while maintaining our privacy, that the incentive to make a change wasn't there. Often she would spend the night with me, other times I'd collapse in her loft. Some evenings we'd go our separate ways.

It wasn't a bad arrangement.

I sipped coffee and eyed the pie.

"Have some, babe."

"I don't want to pork out before dinner."

"Maybe we won't go out for dinner." She stroked the back of my neck. "Ooh, such tension." She began to knead the muscles of my upper back. "You haven't felt this way in a long time."

"There's a good reason for it." And I told her about Milo's morning visit, the murder, Melody, Towle.

When I was through she placed her hands on my shoulders.

"Alex, do you really want to get into something like this?"

"Do I have a choice? I see that kid's eyes in my sleep. I was a fool for getting sucked in, but now I'm stuck."

She looked at me. The corners of her mouth lifted in a smile.

"You are such a pushover. And so sweet."

She nuzzled me under my chin. I held her to me and buried my face in her hair. It smelled of lemon and honey and rosewood.

"I really love you."

"I love you, too, Alex."

We undressed each other and when we were totally naked, I lifted her in my arms and carried her up the stairs to the loft. Not wanting to be apart from her for one second I kept my mouth fastened upon hers while I maneuvered myself on top of her. She clung to me, her arms and legs like tendrils. We connected, and I was home.