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David and Friends

Sayuri Yamada

    Do you know what is really happening to paintings and sculptures? They aren’t non-living objects as you might think. They are very much alive and mostly aren’t happy. You might think pictures can’t be alive and unhappy. You are wrong. They have emotions and feelings just like you do. Have you ever sat for a painter? You have to be still for hours and hours. It’s a hard job, although it looks easy, you don’t have to do anything but stay still. That staying still is hard. You start feeling itchy on your legs or arms or nose or wherever when you aren’t allowed to scratch. Imagine you keeping your arms straight to the floor from your shoulders for years and years. Do you think you can do it? No, you can’t. But some sculptures have been doing it for centuries. They must be suffering a great deal if they are alive. And they are alive and suffering.
    Have you seen David? No, I don’t mean your friend David or your uncle David or your ex-boyfriend David. It is David created by Michelangelo in 1504. Have you seen him? The real one? No? But surely you know how he looks from photos. He is a young man standing naked. Good looking. A Good body.
    He has been standing on the plinth in the Accademia Galley in Florence since 1873. Before that, he was outside, in the public square by Palazzo della Signoria. He had to stand out there all day long for years and years. No rest. It is better now, since the Gallery closes every evening, he can relax when people have gone.
    But when he was in the square, he had no time to put his feet up. Imagine that. If you stood all day long, day after day, how would you feel? And stark naked. Your sexual organ was exposed to the public. You would start feeling that all the parts of your body are of the same value; your head, your chest, your shoulders, your arms, your legs, your penis, they are all equal. David doesn’t mind at all. Even when he was newly created, he was proud of his beautiful body, especially as the sculptor kept praising his beauty.
    Some people said in front of him that his penis was unusually small and it wouldn’t function for reproduction. Some said that if it were made the actual size, people’s attention would go there, not the other parts of his body, so it was made small. Some said that Michelangelo didn’t like sexual organs, especially males’. Some said that he liked David’s so much that he didn’t want to show the real one to the public. David heard all sorts of things about his penis. It was when he was still outside, so that he had to keep standing, had to stay still all day long. Because he hadn’t seen real people’s, (no men walked by showing their penises, at least while he was there) he couldn’t decide if his was really smaller. Besides, he couldn’t bend forwards to have a look at his, couldn’t he? He was in public all the time then.
    He also heard the man he was modelled on got laid a lot after he started standing out there, although some said there was no a real model, but Michelangelo created him from bits and pieces of his past creations. Anyway, many women and men, both young and old, wanted to see the model’s naked body and wanted to touch it and things went further. David wondered if the model could perform sexual intercourse well if his penis was as small as David’s. But he had never heard from those who had slept with him.
    When he was moved into Accademia Galley, he stopped thinking about it. He knew his body, most of his body anyway, was gorgeous. That was enough.
    You might think David is exceptionally easy-going. Most men, probably all of them, are concerned about the size of their penises. But he isn’t. Well, he might be really easy-going. But remember, he is a statue, even though he is alive just like you. How he regards things could be a bit different from how you do. Besides, he has been in the world a lot longer than any living human beings. It wouldn’t make him easy-going about his penis, you might think. You could be right. You could be wrong. I don’t know.
    While he was in the square, which was for more than three-hundred and fifty years, he had stood there in the same pose, even in middle of night and small hours of the morning. He was all right then. He didn’t know anything else, although he was a bit tired and bored. It was what he was supposed to do all the time, he believed. Pigeons’ droppings landed on his head and shoulders. Some kids threw stones at him. Cold rain splashed on his face, chest, arms and legs. Hot sun scorched his body. But nothing had bothered him really. He was proud to be standing in public.
    Things changed when he was moved into the Accademia Gallery in 1879.
    No more rain. He was under a round dome. No more hot sun. He was surrounded by white circular walls. No more pigeons. He was with other statues. No more bad kids, usually. In the evenings, people disappeared. No more hot or cold wind.
    In the evenings when the gallery was closed, it was gloomy without people, it was quiet without people. The absence of moving figures, the absence of sounds, were eerie.
    David stood on the tall plinth.
    He was alone.
    He was alone in the gloom.
    Then other statues and pictures started sliding down from their plinths, popped out from their frames, and walked around and talked to each other. Their footsteps echoed in the vast museum. Their soft murmurs wafted everywhere.
    David looked at them. He watched them. He stared at them.
    An old naked man with good muscles passed, whispering to a fully clothed older man with a beard. A thin naked man sauntered alone. A naked woman with floating long red hair ambled by. A clothed woman with white wings flew leisurely, perching here and there. A naked woman walked with a naked child in her arms.
    David gaped at them, his mind empty.
    He noticed they were all translucent. He could see walls, pillars, windows, other walking figures through them. He looked around. And stopped. He had moved his neck! He could move his neck. He tried his fingers. They moved as he commanded. Tried his toes. They did too. He didn’t know what to do about his moving body. He stayed with his neck turned to the right, his right-hand fingers open wide, his left-hand fingers clenched, all his toes clenched. With all the toes clenched, it was a little hard to keep a balance. He swayed. He swayed. He swayed. And then fell to the floor.
    ‘Ouch!’ he cried. At least he thought he had cried, but no sound had come out of his mouth. Then noticed he didn’t feel any pain. His body, also translucent, was lying lightly on the hard floor, with his right-hand fingers open wide, his left-hand fingers and all toes clenched.
    ‘You all right there?’ somebody asked him. It was a dark man with a hat on his head and a sword in his hand. His skin tone was brown against the grey darkness. A naked young white woman was standing beside him with concerned eyes. He could see the round white circular walls behind them. They were in the centre of a dome with a tall plinth with David standing on it.
    David was standing on the plinth! He looked up at David and looked at himself. The David was solid white marble with a gorgeous body. He was translucent white with a gorgeous body. His eyes got big. His mouth opened wide.
    The naked young woman said, ‘You must be new. When did you come here?’ Her firm white breasts lowered as the other parts of her body crouched by him. The dark man was still standing with his small penis between his well-toned legs.
    ‘Today,’ he thought he said, but what he actually did was hiss like an angry cat. He cleared his throat without a sound and tried again. He hissed. ‘My voice!’ That was what he wanted to say without success.
    ‘How long have you been silent?’ she asked him, lowering her face lower than her breasts.
    He opened his mouth, pushed the empty air out, closed his mouth, opened it again, pushed the air out again. No sound.
    ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, placing her white hand on his cheek. ‘You just take it easy. Breathe in deeply.’ He did. ‘Breathe out deeply.’ He did. ‘Now repeat it a few times. Don’t rush. Take your time. Do it slowly, slowly.’ He breathed in deeply, breathed out deeply, breathed in deeply, breathed out deeply. Then a voice came out, ‘Ahhhhh.’
    ‘My voice!’ This time it was out. The ‘VO’ sound was strangely high-pitched like a little girl shrieking. He cupped his mouth with both his hands. At least that was what he thought he had done. What he actually had done was lifted both his hands an inch and two, far from where his mouth was.
    You see, he had been standing without speaking or moving for 370 years or so. No wonder he had a hard time speaking or moving. It was a miracle he still remembered how to talk.
     ‘Don’t worry. You just do one step at a time. First, your voice. Forget about your body for the moment, all right? Say, “My voice” slowly,’ the woman said into his ear, touching his shoulder with her white breasts.
    ‘You’re doing a good job, David,’ the dark naked man said from above them, lifting the sword behind his neck. His small penis swayed for a second.
    David breathed in deeply and breathed out deeply, and then said, ‘My Voi-ce.’ It was out without ups and downs. ‘Today.... Yesterday.... I... don’t know when... I came here.... How do you... count days?’ he said to her white breasts.
    ‘What happened down there? Need some help?’ the clothed woman with wings flew by without a sound. Her long skirt floated around her legs. ‘Isn’t he the new one? Let me see him. I and all my friends have been waiting for him. Is he cute?’ She silently landed by him.
    ‘We’re all right. You can see him later. Bye.’ The dark naked man waved his dark hand to the woman with wings.
    ‘I just want to help you,’ she said.
    ‘Bye,’ he repeated.
    Their soft voices floated up to the round ceiling. She reluctantly flew up and followed their voices to the long corridor with statues lined up on both sides.
    ‘She’s always nosy. You should be careful about her. Can you stand up yourself?’ the naked woman with white breasts said to him.
    ‘I think so.’ He bent his left leg and then bent his right leg from the lying position and lifted his upper body. His whole body shot up to the domed ceiling then slowly floated down to the floor.
    A male statue with no head or arms peeked in. ‘Can you tell me what’s going in there?’ The voice came out of his neck.
    ‘We’ll tell you everything later, all right?’ she said.
    He sauntered away, ‘OK. OK,’ came from his neck.
    David looked up at the ceiling, which seemed so high. Then he looked his right. Her white breasts were right there. He couldn’t move. His eyes were riveted on them.
    ‘Sabines woman, your boobs are touching his nose. Look at his eyes. He isn’t used to women’s breasts,’ the dark naked man said above them.
    ‘Oh, sorry.’ She lifted her upper body a little.
    David looked at her breasts with longing.
    After trials and errors for some time, David could speak and walk relatively well.
    After walking around, stretching his arms, back, and legs, David came back to the naked woman and the dark naked man by the plinth with still-standing David on the top.
    ‘So, what is that?’ he asked the two figures, pointing at the unmoving statue.
    ‘That’s also you, but now it’s kind of your discarded clothes or a sheath or a husk or a cocoon,’ the dark man said, thrashing the sword in the air. ‘And I’m David as well.’
    He flinched a little to avoid the long sword. ‘Be careful. Don’t cut me.’
    ‘Oh, it can’t harm you,’ the dark man said and stabbed it into David’s chest.
    He shrieked, expecting agonising pain.
    Nothing.
    The dark man pulled the word from his chest with ease. ‘See. No harm done. We’re all like phantoms or ghosts or illusions or whatever you want to call us.’
    ‘Oh,’ he said, then remembered. ‘What did you say before the sword thing? You said you’re David as well, I guess. It must be just a coincidence I suppose,’ he said.
    ‘No, no. I’m the same David. I was just created by a different person.’
    ‘But we don’t look the same at all. You’re dark, I’m white. You’re more slender than me. You’ve got a hat on. I haven’t. You’ve got a sword. I haven’t. You’re a lot shorter than me. And, and...’
    ‘It’s just different people have different ideas,’ she broke in, ‘so the same person can be different. Do you know what I mean?’ She put her arm around his shoulders, her white breasts touching his arm.
    ‘I guess,’ he said, looking at her breasts.
    ‘Sabines woman, your breasts,’ the dark David said.
    ‘I know, but he should get used to them.’ She pressed her breasts into his arm.
    ‘You’ve been going to be raped, but never been raped. You must be frustrated. But don’t seduce a newcomer. He should learn things around him first,’ the dark David said, putting his hat on the tip of the sword.
    Echoing footsteps were coming closer.
    ‘Somebody’s coming. Hide!’ the white David whispered.
    ‘No need. It’s a security guard, who can’t see us. Don’t worry,’ the woman said.
    ‘Can’t he? Then... we could be out in the day time as well, I guess,’ he said without a confidence.
    ‘No, we can’t. Nobody knows why, but we can’t be out until all the people have left.’
    ‘Then,’ he thought, ‘I might’ve been able to be out and walk around at night when I was outside. I didn’t have to keep standing for that long, then.’
    ‘How many times do I have to tell you?’ she resumed as if nothing had happened. ‘I’m not frustrated. I’m not trying to seduce him. You fool. With your pathetic muscles among big guys, you can’t get laid much. You ARE frustrated.’
    ‘How many times do I have to tell you? I get laid as often as I want to.’
    ‘All right. When was the last time? And with who?’
    ‘With whom! Well, the last time was... I don’t remember it. It’s just I don’t pay much attention to that kind of thing. You know, it’s just a part of my daily life, like walking and talking.’
    ‘Then, did you get laid last night? You should remember that at least.’ She left the white David and advanced to the dark David. The arm of the white David longed for her breasts.
    ‘I don’t remember it. Can you remember exactly what you said last night? All of it? I don’t think so. It’s the same thing.’ He pointed at her with the sword.
    ‘You liar!’
    ‘I am not!’
    ‘Liar!’
    ‘No!’
    ‘What’s going on?’ The woman with wings flew in, her bare feet flipping up and down beneath the long skirt.
    ‘Go away!’ the dark David and the white woman said in unison.
    ‘Easy, easy.’ The woman with wings glided away.
    ‘Why don’t you like her?’ white David asked.
    ‘It’s not that we don’t like her. She is just a big mouth,’ she said.
    ‘A huge mouth,’ dark David corrected.
    ‘Yeah, a huge mouth, all right. She can’t think without saying it out loud. She’s got a diarrhoea mouth.’
    ‘I like that. A diarrhoea mouth!’ He clapped his hand, throwing the sword and the hat away into the corner of the dome. Both the sword and the hat hit the circular walls and bounced to the floor without a sound. The smooth brown floor was visible through them.
    ‘Hiya. I see the newcomer’s finally down. See you later.’ A middle-aged man with a red flat hat and red clothes sauntered by and sauntered away.
    ‘See you later,’ she said to the departing figure and then to the white David, ‘he’s always decent.’
    ‘I just want to say this, but... if you don’t mind, if you don’t take it personally, if you . .’ the new David faltered.
    ‘Spit it out,’ the dark David said.
    ‘All right. I just noticed that... you are...’
    ‘Just say it.’
    ‘David. Keeping things inside is bad for you,’ she said.
    He had been alone so long that he didn’t know how to interact with others and was afraid of offending them and as a result losing the new friends. Imagine, you’ve been on a desert island for 370 years or so, you might have lost the ability of interfacing with others.
    ‘All right. I think, I’m sorry if I’m wrong, but you look thin. You see, you and I are supposed to be a biblical hero. So, so, you should have a good body like I do. Sorry, sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you. Sorry, sorry.’
    ‘Don’t worry. You haven’t offended me. No at all. I know I’m thin. But my bronze body is standing a bit away from here and I’m on loan. I won’t be here for long. Anyway, my other body still has muscles, although they’re thinner than yours. But me, here, I’ve been getting thinner and thinner year after year. I don’t know why. This Sabines woman hasn’t changed an iota. Most of the others change, thinner or thicker. Nobody knows how it works or doesn’t work. Anyway, here I am, a lot thinner than before, so even when I’m in the other body, I can move around a bit, well, not much, I’m not that much thinner, but I can move my arms and legs a bit. If you get thinner, you’ll be able to do it in front of the walking and watching people without letting them know it. Phew! I haven’t made a speech this long for donkeys’ years.’ He sat down as if he had run ten miles.
    ‘But it takes time to change, like fifty years or a hundred years. I might change later, I hope. I’m a bit tired of being the same,’ the white naked woman said.
    ‘You might change. You might not. Who knows?’ the dark David said, shrugging his shoulders.
    The woman with wings peeked in in mid-air. ‘What’s going on?’
    ‘Go away,’ both the dark man and the white woman shouted.
    Do you think David, I mean white David, changes like some of the others after for a while? Yes he does. He has got fatter. He cheeks are rounder. His arms are thicker. His stomach is bulging. His bottom gets big. His legs become beefy.
    Now, he is no longer a young man with a gorgeous body. He looks like a middle-aged man who has been drinking beer every day, doing no exercise, with watching TV as his favourite activity. Still in the day time, when the museum is open and people are around to admire his youthful figure, he is his usual well-toned body on the plinth.
    You might wonder how fat bodies can get into slim ones. Well, this is how it happens, eventually.
    The Tannoy announces the museum is closing in five minutes both in Italian and English. People are sauntering to the front door. Security guards give a sigh of relief that they can go to bars soon, hoping the night shift will come on time.
    The last footsteps have died away. It is finally quiet. The air is recovering more oxygen as tons of carbon dioxide from people’s noses and mouths disperse.
    The windows show a black night with a few stars. A dot of red on an aeroplane moves from left to right
    The head of White David blurs and a translucent white head emerges. It has plump cheeks and a round nose. The chubby shoulders follow. Then meaty arms pop out. The chest with almost women’s breasts and bulging stomach come after. Then the thick legs bring up the rear. He stomps down to the floor and stretches his arms into the air, bends forwards and backwards, and twists his substantial middle to the left and the right a couple of times. His bulky body seems happy to be free from the tight corset of the slender body.
    Other translucent figures are also moving here and there. The closed museum is crowded with ghost-like beings None of them move fast. The fastest one is a white man in a flowing toga leisurely jogging.
    The floor has crisp packets and chocolate bar wrappers here and there, left from the people in the day time.
    Several cleaners come in, blue uniforms. They hoover the floor, picking up big rubbish with their hands. The translucent figures move through them. It seems the walking statues and pictures know the cleaners are there, but can’t be bothered to care. The material world is overlapping the translucent world.
    A security guard in a dark blue uniform walks in and says, ‘Evening ladies.’
    ‘We’ve got two gentlemen today,’ one of them says, giggling.
    He looks around and spots two men mopping the floor and says, ‘Hi.’
    They wave their hands to him. One of their legs goes through a hopping bust.
    David saunters by. His big stomach wobbles. He sees a white woman in a long robe and asks her, ‘Do you want to sex with me?’
    ‘No. You almost squashed me yesterday,’ she answers.
    ‘But I don’t weigh anything. How I look means nothing.’
    ‘It’s my feeling. I almost suffocated under your bulky body. Sorry.’ She walks away.
    ‘All right.’ He isn’t disappointed. There are many naked women around and he has almost infinite time, he believes.
     The cleaners have finished their job and leave, pushing carts full of chemical bottles and cloths. The security guard has long gone back to his office.
    The lights are switched off.
    It is now dark with some vague light from the windows.
    The strolling translucent figures are distinguishable in the dark.
    A thin woman in a red dress is talking to a small child. The dark David, who is thinner than before, is swinging his sword half-heartedly. The white naked woman, who still hasn’t changed, is trying to do the splits over and over again. The woman with wings walks by and asks her, ‘Do you want a hand?’ The white woman says, ‘It’s all right. I can manage somehow.’
    Out of the windows, the vague moon moves behind thin clouds. Some stars blink. Others stay still. An insomniac crows flies, cawing.
    The white fat David’s translucent body stands out in the dim. It is as if a negative shadow is moving without an object.
    When the opening time is near, all the moving figures go back to where their original forms are.
    He struggles to get back into the slender David. He manages to put his lower body in. When his whole body is almost in, the whole marble statue pops. The small bits and pieces of marble are all over the plinth and the floor around it.
    Where is David? Nobody knows. There is no translucent David there or anywhere else.
    You might assume that when the original statue has gone, the translucent one will go as well. You might be wrong. He might breeze in one day. Who knows?
    Dark David goes into the bronze statue. Because he is much thinner than the original one, the statue shrivels as if it were a deflated balloon. The sword and the hat haven’t changed much, but they have flattened as well. The whole thing on the plinth is a brown blob. Where is David? He wasn’t that small. And where are the unchanged sword and hat? Beats me.
    A middle-aged man, who hasn’t changed much in the body size-wise, gets into the old man picture and the entire figure becomes blurred and disappears. There is a dirty white space where the old man used to be.
    An old woman, who has a hunch back, struggles into the picture of a middle-aged woman without a hunch. The picture whirls a little, starts melting, and dribbles down to the bottom. Some goes onto the frame.
    A sad facial expression of a head pops in to a smiling head, which gets on fire and then leaves pale-white ashes on the plinth.
    All the exhibits in the museum are gone, except for the white naked woman, who argued with Brown David. She is still standing with her arm high in the air, trying to escape from the man who tried to rape her, who isn’t there anymore.
    ‘Jesus Christ! I’m the only one left.’

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