Masking

Daedalia: Chapter 7

Daedalia is a serialized novel, with a new chapter released every Monday morning. The story is designed to unfold slowly, the days in between, a space for it to settle into your imagination. Each chapter is a 15–20 minute read/listen. Check out the Table of Contents if you want to jump to a specific chapter. Want something to binge while you wait? Three novels, complete with audio narration are ready for you to dive in.

Previously…

Lefty pushed Kelly to make a plan for her life, and the conversation exposed how frightened and stuck they both were. When he came home expecting her to be gone, he instead saw her work assembled for the first time and finally understood its power. A single sale at a Venice art festival sealed an unspoken pact between them.

The following transcript is an excerpt from an interview with Kelly Mudd, recorded on January 8, 2033, at her home in Black Mountain, North Carolina, six months prior to her death.

MM: Do you ever wish people knew the truth, that you were the actual artist behind the work?

KM: I’m not sure anymore. Ask me again tomorrow.

MM: So you’re saying you don’t regret it today.

KM: No. I’m saying I’m not sure. I never really wanted to be famous or to be recognized. Not really.

MM: Why not?

KM: People are a lot of work. Even if you’re not famous, you still have to interact with your family or friends or co-workers. That’s a lot. I can’t imagine having to be responsible for maintaining some kind of relationship with thousands of strangers. Leave me be and let me do my thing. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.

MM: But you may feel differently tomorrow?

KM: Possibly. Who knows? I’ve always felt differently.

MM: How do you mean?

KM: I don’t feel things the way other people do. I never have. My feelings change abruptly, unpredictably. I don’t think it’s that way for most people. At least it doesn’t seem that way to me.

MM: Can you give me an example?

KM: Mmm. I’m not sure if I can just conjure one up. Ask me about a specific time in my life and maybe I can think of one.

MM: Okay. How about when you were young, when you were just starting out in California?

KM: Oh, I was all feelings back then. I miss having feelings that big, that all-consuming. That’s the thing about getting older. It’s quieter. Less to get upset about. But I kind of miss getting upset in the way I did when I was twenty.

MM: Can you tell me a story from that time?

KM: Let’s see… Well, in the beginning I struggled with knowing how to be in the world because my world was so different. I didn’t understand that people couldn’t see and experience what I did, so I came off crazy much of the time.

MM: You mean mentally ill, like sick or do you mean eccentric?

KM: In those days, there wasn’t much of a distinction between the two. I acted out, I ran away. I was trying to figure out my own operating system. You see, my connection to my art, the way I’ve always made it… it’s not me exactly. It’s a force, an energy that works through me, that I follow. I know, I know, that sounds really woo-woo or whatever, especially these days. But I don’t know another way to say it and, frankly, I’m old and at a point where I don’t care anymore what other people think so much.

MM: I can’t tell if you’re being literal or not about this force you’re referring to.

KM: Oh yes. Very literal. She had a name — Ona.

MM: Okay, that’s… weird. You said she had a name. Is she no longer there?

KM: She’s here, I guess, and her name is just my label for her. She’s not even a she. Why do you suppose us humans are so fucking beholden to naming and categorizing every single thing? Why must we pin everything down?

MM: I don’t know. It makes it easier to talk about, maybe?

KM: I suppose that’s true. Sorry, I got sidetracked. What was I saying?

MM: You were going to tell a story about your big feelings in your twenties.

KM: Yes. It’s hard to remember just one. (laughs) I had a lot of big feelings about selling those first few pieces. They were part of me, like my children. They were evidence that I was good at something. But they were also a connection to something deeper. Call it wisdom or magic or whatever you like but I was being shown things– Ona was opening doors for me to worlds a twenty-year-old girl had no business knowing. It was a gift in the truest sense of the word.

So when Lefty came along and saw these drawings as something else, as a means — well, I didn’t know what to do with that. I needed money. God knows he had been taking care of me for almost a year because I didn’t know how to do anything. I just wanted to draw. Once the pieces were done, they were like my children in a way. How could I just give them up or, worse, take money for them? But that’s what Lefty wanted me to do. He said I had to if I was going to survive.

MM: So you never thought about how you might sell your art, use it to make a living, before Lefty came along?

KM: Oh sure, I did. I saved up for a whole year to print this dumb little zine. I took my box of them to California. I was going to be a star. At the time I thought I was so original. That was the one time I tried. I knew I didn’t have that muscle or gear or whatever it is that Lefty has.

MM: Do you regret that? Sometimes when you talk about him, you sound… well, like maybe you resent him.

KM: No. Never. At least not then. Don’t ever let him hear me say this, but he saved me. He did. He was no saint, Lord knows, but he saw something in me before anyone else did. That first time he sold all those pieces…

MM: Which ones do you mean?

KM: It was the Echo Lake series. There must have been thirty or so. I was just beginning to understand what I was doing.

MM: Oh, right. I came across an article the other day about those. They’re in Saudi Arabia now. All but two. Did they sell at a small gallery or something?

KM: Oh hell no. It was one of those little street festivals. I think it was Venice or maybe Santa Monica. I can’t remember exactly, but I do remember sitting there with Lefty in that cramped little tent with all those pieces staring at me and strangers walking by like they didn’t even see them.

I’m not sure if I was more upset about them being ignored or at the prospect of someone taking them away from me. Either way, Lefty was oblivious. He just kept pushing. I tried to cancel, to tell him I was sick that morning, but he wouldn’t give in. He’d already paid for the space. He paid for everything in those days with money he didn’t have.

So I went, and we sat there for hours, not talking, as people walked by. I remember a girl stopping in front of one of the frames and just staring at it for the longest time. It’s like I could see her, like I was inside the drawing with Ona and I could see her looking in. I could feel what she was feeling — her fear, her shame, her self-hatred. Her yearning was so strong. It brought tears to my eyes.

I remember clenching my fists so tight. I wanted to get up and give the piece to her, to just shove it in her hands and tell her to take it. Meanwhile, I could feel Lefty’s eyes boring into me, imploring me to be the show pony, to hop up and dance, to try to get this girl who couldn’t afford to buy a damned hotdog to buy this piece of art for three hundred bucks.

MM: So what did you do? Did you give it to her?

KM: No. I ran away. I just ran.

MM: Where did you go?

KM: I walked until I got lost. I ended up in this not-great part of town. It wasn’t like under a bridge or anything like that, but I did get mixed up with some people I shouldn’t have. I was so young, really just a country mouse. I’d never done drugs or really drank much. But I wanted to escape that feeling I had that I didn’t know how to deal with.

I’m not even sure what it was those guys gave me. Looking back, it was probably ecstasy. But I floated for a while. It’s hard to explain what drugs do to someone with a brain like mine. I think most people use them to get to a place where I live most of the time.

MM: So what happened?

KM: I ended up without my shirt in some nice old lady’s front yard.

MM: Was Lefty mad?

KM: I suppose he was, but he was also pretty damned proud of himself. He had sold almost all of that series in my absence and we finally had a little bit of money, which we badly needed.

MM: Did you ever tell him why you ran away, why it hurt you to sell your work?

KM: Not for many years. He would never have understood back then.

MM: While we were talking, I looked up the value of those pieces from that series. The Saudi guy’s collection is estimated at thirty million dollars. How does that make you feel?

KM: Tired. Sad. Proud, a little too, I guess. But mostly tired.

MM: I’m sorry. You need to rest.

KM: It’s okay. I like talking with you this way.

MM: Can I ask one more question?

KM: Sure.

MM: Do you ever think about those pieces, or really any of your work that’s been sold over the years?

KM: I do think of them sometimes. If I close my eyes, I can see them all. I know where they are and what they’ve seen. You don’t believe me. That’s okay.

MM: No, no, just trying to understand. So you’re saying however many pieces you’ve created over the last forty years, you can see them all — or like see through them, like they’re windows or something?

KM: That’s a great way to put it. It’s just like that and nothing like that at all.

MM: I want to understand.

KM: I want you to understand.

MM: I’ll let you rest now.

KM: Okay. But would you stay with me for a while until I fall asleep?

MM: Yes, of course. Can I get you some more water or anything?

KM: You think I’m a crazy old woman, don’t you?

MM: Why would you say that?

KM: Because it’s true, mostly. But I’ve been crazy most of my life.

MM: Or maybe it’s the rest of the world that’s crazy. Can I share a theory?

KM: Okay.

MM: You never really were the artist. I mean, you made the art, but you never really saw yourself as the owner of it, and that’s why it wasn’t hard for you to just let someone else take the credit.

KM: I was rewarded handsomely. I’ve had a good life. A better life than I could have ever imagined for myself when I started out.

MM: I’ll get your water. Can we talk again tomorrow?

KM: Yes. I’d like that, I think.

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