The Iron Lady and the Emotional Vampire

The lone guitarist sits on stage in a worn wicker chair, his hair covering his eyes.

“Takes a lot of guts to get up there by yourself,” Ciaran Fox says to his friend, Phineas “Finn” Riley.

The guitarist sings in a whispery, melancholy tone, but it’s the opening bars of the song that capture Finn’s attention.

“That’s ‘By the Colour of Your Dreams,’” Finn says. “It was on everybody’s turntables in college.”

Finn recalls a time in Bristol, Rhode Island when he was a skinny, twenty-two-year-old long-haired hippie, a far cry from the close-cropped, business casual photographer he’s become.

Closing his eyes, Finn loses himself in the singer’s rich, haunting baritone.

“So now you’ve found a home,

After all you’ve been through.

A barren heart like yours,

Can never see the truth.

In the light, your life’s never like it seems.

But I’ll stand right by your side,

By the colour of your dreams.

I stood beside you then and now,

Through lies and false starts.

You always were the one I loved,

Even though you broke my heart.

Time has blurred your memory,

Left me bitter and mean.

But I’ll love you as you were,

In the colour of your dreams.”

Ciaran nudges Finn, giving him a broad smile that underscores the gap between his front teeth. “You seem a little lost. Are you thinking about Ramona again? You’re better off without her. I mean what sane person goes off to run a sweat lodge in Montana? You artsy types are just too flighty.”

“We specialize in meaningless relationships. I was thinking about Astrid.”

“Who’s that?”

“A girl I knew in college. Our group. Cerberus used to perform “By the Colour of Your Dreams.” It was her favorite song.”

Finn plucks Derry Dalrymple’s “By the Colour of Your Dreams” from his record collection. Placing it on the turntable, he realizes he hasn’t played the album since he’d graduated from college a dozen years ago.

He takes a sip from his fifth glass of Zinfandel, closing his eyes.

A heartrending ballad, the song is highlighted by Dalrymple’s fragile, plaintive vocal and thick, dreamy guitar chords that melt into soaring, frenzied solos.

Finn hears parts of the song he’d never noticed before. The studio recording is much richer than the acoustic version he’d performed, fleshed out with thudding drums, vibes, and a melancholy saxophone. Maybe it’s his faulty memory or the wine, but his ears detect the sound of a woman’s voice speaking in the background.

The woman repeats the phrase, “You know, you’re my only friend.”

As the song fades, Finn knows he has to find Astrid Gore.

Finn and Astrid Gore’s paths cross when her former boyfriend punts her across the hallway toward Finn’s room.

Astrid sits down on his bed as if she belongs there. Picking up Finn’s guitar, she asks, “Do You Know By the Color of Your Dreams?”

She looks like a young Ali McGraw, all raven hair, long eyelashes, and bright smiles. Devoid of an edit button, Astrid’s tendency to vacillate between being insecure or self-absorbed makes Finn wonder if her physical charms are worth taking an emotional roller coaster ride.

Caroline Watchung, a wholesome farm girl from Virginia who doesn’t spin gossip, is the first to approach Finn with disturbing tales about her ex-roommate. Nearly every girl in the dorm soon follows.  

Caroline claims Astrid sometimes sits in bed staring at nothing for hours. She dismissed it at first, thinking Astrid was meditating.

“I should have known better,” Caroline continues. “When I got to school, she’d already taken over the room. The place was a shrine to her mother. There must’ve been half a dozen pictures of her. She’d also decorated the walls with her horse competition ribbons. As luck would have it, we ended up taking the same equestrian course. Astrid and I were paired off to race against each other. I was winning until she rode up alongside me and kicked at my horse. When I confronted Astrid about it, she said I was lying. She told my friends that I’d kicked her horse.”

“Strange. Astrid doesn’t strike me as being competitive,” Finn says.

“Not competitive. Spoiled. She’s an emotional vampire. The Iron Lady doesn’t let her have her way, so Astrid makes sure everyone else lives for her.”

“The Iron Lady?”

“That’s what she calls her mother,” Caroline replies. “Did you know she drives three hours to here from Connecticut three times a week to do Astrid’s laundry and make her bed?”

“Sounds more like a maid than a mother.”

“Make no mistake, Astrid pays for her mother’s every little kindness. Her mother has total control of her, yet Astrid worships her. It’s like she tore Astrid apart and reshaped her to make her more dependent on her. I came back from class one day to find her in bed with Astrid. She was stroking Astrid’s hair and humming that Derry Dalrymple song.”

Finn lines up the trio of metal milk bottles in the rifle’s gunsight.

The nearby circus carousel spins to the cheerful music of “The Show Must Go On.”

Firing the rifle, Finn knocks over all three bottles.

“And the young man is a winner,” the barker declares.

Astrid eyes the stuffed animals.

“The frog.”

“Are you sure?” Finn asks. “There are bigger ones.”

“The frog. You know the story of Iron Henry, the Frog Prince?”

“Is that the one where the princess kisses a frog, and he becomes a prince?”

Astrid kisses the cloth frog, looking fondly at Finn.

“You’re my prince.”

Finn plays in Cerberus, a three-man acoustic band for fun, but to Dante Dacus, a local from Bristol who works at a lobster fishery, music means money. He forbids girlfriends from attending rehearsals but encourages them to attend their shows. Like Lance, their third member, Dante holds the opinion that Astrid’s attraction to Finn is an unhealthy distraction.

Lately, there’s another woman who’s caught Finn’s attention, a striking brunette who always seems to be sitting at the front table, her blinding blue eyes and perfect smile directed at him.

Tuning up for their first song, Dante asks Finn, “Where’s the clinging vine?”

Finn points to the corner of the bar where Astrid sits alone, smiling dreamily at him.

“Lovesick rich girls are trouble. Is it true does everything in even numbers?” Dante asked. “Does she brush her teeth twice, shut the door twice?”

“She does a few unusual things that by themselves don’t mean much. But together… Like when she sneezes, she has to hold her breath for ten seconds so the germs will float away. And she sleep talks…”

“She carries on a conversation with herself?” Dante asks.

“In Spanish. But she says she doesn’t know Spanish. And she carries around this frog…”

“A live frog?”

“No, a toy. I won it for her at a carnival. She calls it Phineas.”

“It’s a substitute for you, Finn, for when you’re not around.”

“Thank you, Dr. Freud.”

“There’s only one reason I’d be with a chick like her. Crazy in life, crazy in bed.”

“And Astrid is major league crazy,” Finn replies proudly.

Lance crisply strums the opening chords to “By the Colour of Your Dreams” as Finn and Dante join in. Finn’s eyes lock with the brunette at the front table, and the two of them undress each other with their languid stares.

When the show ends, the brunette swaggers toward Finn.

Finn glances at the bar. Astrid is gone.

“Name’s Vivian. So, yours or mine?”

“Yours.”

“Afraid of that groupie at the bar?”

“Definitely.”

“I can make you forget her.”

Finn forgets about Astrid, up to the moment he enters his dorm room and finds her sitting in a chair waiting for him, clutching Phineaus.

“How’d you get in?”

“I bribed the resident assistant.”

“Have you been sitting here all night?"

“Yep. Have fun?”

“We talked.”

“Sure, you did. I can smell the stink of her on you from here. You’re my only friend, Finn. How could you do this to me?”

Finn considers if it’s love, or pity that keeps him tied to Astrid. He wonders if there are more lust-driven women like Vivian in the world and decides he wants to find out.

“I don’t have any excuses,” he says boldly.

“I don’t need any. You can make it up to me by coming with me to visit mother.”

Finn senses by the look on Dagmar Gore’s face that he doesn’t measure up to her idea of what a companion for her daughter should be.

Dagmar has the same flawless olive skin, aquiline nose, and silky raven hair as her daughter. While there is uncertainty and naivete in Astrid’s eyes, Dagmar’s glare is indomitable, even cruel. Undoubtedly it has to do with her husband, a college professor, running off with one of his students, as well as their offshore accounts. Although there was a silver lining in her husband’s deceitful departure (Dagmar’s subsequent highly sought-after paintings depict her inner turmoil over their acrimonious divorce), Dagmar has taken her hatred for men and used it to build a wall around her already vulnerable daughter.

“So, I hear you’re an amateur photographer.”

“And a musician. But I’m an experienced photographer. I’ve been doing it for ten years.”

“All photographers are amateurs,” Dagmar says snidely. “Artists take a concept, shape it, live it. You simply point and press a button.”

“He takes the pictures for the college newspaper, and some of his sports photos have been in the Providence Journal,” Astrid says with admiration.

“Did you bring any of your work?” Dagmar asks.

“I have an album of photos in my suitcase. I’ll get them.”

“Go get them, Astrid.”

Astrid gives her mother a sullen look as if begging for mercy.

“Don’t poison him against me too, Mother. He’s all I’ve got.”

“Nonsense. You’ve got me. Now scoot.”

Her head bowed, Astrid mutters “…It’s not fair…,” as she leaves the room.

Dagmar’s cold stare narrows. “I’ll give you thirty thousand dollars.”

“For what?”

“To break up with my daughter. Astrid is obviously attached to you. But obsession is not love. You’ve been around her long enough to know she’s more like a child than a woman, and after four years of therapy, her doctor has barely scratched the surface of what’s wrong with her.”

“Most of what Astrid does is harmless.”

“Wait until she turns the gas off, then turns it on again and forgets about it, or she takes her medication and then takes twice as much. Can you manage operating a revolving door to the emergency room?”

“She’s been fine at school.”

“And you deserve some credit for that. But what happens the next time a pretty fan winks at you and you wind up in bed with her? Astrid won’t forgive you a second time.”

“She told you?” Finn asks.

“In tears. I know she’s just another girl to you. They all are at your age. When she crumbles next time, will you stand tall to help her, or run? I say run. So, take the thirty thousand. I’ll also sponsor a show of your photos. And I know plenty of people in the art community who’ll buy them.”

Astrid sits on Finn’s bed, clutching at Phineaus.

“Where have you been lately?”

“Rehearsal.”

“Every night this week? Were you practicing in the dark? The lights at Dante’s were off.”

“We were at Lance’s place.”

Astrid’s insecurity and frustration bubble to the surface. “You took Mother’s money, didn’t you? That’s not something my prince would do.”

“It was never going to work out for us.”

Astrid rises from the bed, smashing her fist against his cheek. She quickly becomes a fusillade of punches and kicks. Dante barely avoids being bitten by pushing Astrid back onto the bed.

Snatching up Phineas, Finn rips the stuffed frog apart. Opening a window, he throws Phineaus’ remains outside.

Astrid runs out of Finn’s room. Her piercing scream follows her down the hallway.

Finn tries to bask in having washed his hands of Astrid’s toxic behavior. The next day he notices his guitar is missing but he considers it collateral damage. But after two days of not seeing or hearing about Astrid, guilt points him toward her room.

He finds her sitting alone in the lounge, staring at nothing. A trio of girls muttering on the opposite side of the room occasionally take side glances at Astrid.

“A doll… She’s upset because she lost her dolly!” one girl says, sending the trio into a frenzy of laughter.

Finn’s presence snaps Astrid from her trance, turning her into a frightened little girl. She’s so broken she can’t look Finn in the eye. Finn tries to apologize, but Astrid covers her ears, shutting her eyes tight.

“NO, NO, NO!” she screams, her voice as loud as a three-alarm siren.

She runs off to her room, screaming and crying so loudly that everyone in the dorm ends up covering their ears.

Astrid stays in her room for two more days, then goes home - back to the arms of the Iron Lady.

Finn gazes around the foyer of the Dagmar Gore Gallery, walking up to the front desk.

“I’m looking for Dagmar,” he says to the male receptionist with the pencil-thin mustache.

“It’s been a while since you’ve been here, hasn’t it?”

“I’ve been living in Connecticut for the last twelve years. I had my first exhibition of photos here. It helped launch my career. How about Astrid Gore, is she here?”

The receptionist gives him a wry smile. “Strike two. Poor Astrid. I remember her from when I was an intern. She worked here when she dropped out of college. College really messed her up. She said the man she loved beat her up, can you imagine that?”

“I did not!” Finn says indignantly.

“So, you’re Phineas. She said you looked like a rock star.”

“She had blinders when it came to me.”

“I’ll say! Astrid had this job for a while, but she just couldn't face people. She tried. But it was like she was a kindergartner trying to do calculus. She was an emotional cripple. Everything was over Astrid’s head. She got into substance abuse. She’d sit here and carry on conversations with Phineas.”

“That was her doll’s name. They call me Finn.”

“That explains it. One day Astrid was really out of it. She kept saying Finn killed Phineas. Her mother ended up sending her to rehab a few times. I think the strain of looking out for Astrid finally took its toll on Misses Gore. The Iron Lady had a stroke. The irony was Astrid took good care of her mother but couldn’t care for herself. A couple of friends who visited their house said Astrid was clear-eyed, lucid, and that she was a first-class nurse. Then Misses Gore had another stroke and was gone. Apparently, that rekindled Astrid’s old habits. Astrid ended up marrying some lush she met in rehab. Last I heard, she lived in Cranston, Rhode Island.”

“That’s hardly a tawny town,” Finn noted.

“You got that right. Astrid went from the penthouse to the outhouse.”

Finn pulls up to what used to be a white ranch-style home. The sidewalk is cracked, and the lawn resembles a cornfield. The shutters on the house are askew, the paint is smudged, and several cracked windows are reinforced by newspaper.

The screen door creaks when Finn opens it, nearly coming off its hinges.

A gaunt, unshaven man in a bathrobe with nicotine-stained teeth answers the door.

“Look. If you’re here about back taxes, I ain’t got the bread.”

“Stan Lumpkin? I’m here to see Astrid. I’m Finn Riley.”

The man let out a ravaged cough. “So, you’re Finn. I spent our four years together trying to live up to your reputation.”

“I thought our relationship was more like two siblings than two lovers. I was wrong.”

“She called you her soulmate. So, you’re here to apologize?”

“I realized it wasn’t her taking advantage of me. It was me taking advantage of her.”

“She said what you did was the most horrible thing anyone ever did to her. And that includes our screwed-up marriage and her drug life.”

“Did the two of you at least have some happiness together?" Finn asks.

“Sure. While I was on vacation in Paris with her and the Iron Lady, or at one of those high artsy fartsy openings. But when we were alone together, you were always in the room with us.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Eh. If I really loved her, I’d be punching you out. I thought I loved her, but I was wrong. I loved her lifestyle. But champagne, drugs, and money couldn’t hold us together. I got sick of her, especially after the third overdose, so I left her. Astrid said you’d come back for her someday. It was the only thing she was ever sure about. Hold on…I’ve got something she wanted to give to you.”

Lumpkin exits the living room, returning with Finn’s guitar.

“Where is she? I’d like to see her and tell her how sorry I am for abandoning her.”

Lumpkin walks toward a bookshelf. He picks up a vase, handing it to Finn.

“She’s in there,” he says.

“She’s dead?”

“She got sick two years ago. Hepatitis from the drugs. She went back to Bristol, back to where you two went to school. Astrid was still chasing your ghost. She was alone when she died. That guitar was next to her.” 

The guitarist sings in a whispery, melancholy tone.

“Is that Finn Riley up there?” a man asks Ciran.

“Yep. Recognize the tune?”

“Sure. That’s ‘By the Colour of Your Dreams.’ But what’s with the urn? Is that for tips?” the patron asks.

“Nope. Finn promised Astrid that no matter where he goes, he’ll never leave her again.”