hidden chamber of his own heart.
And if Rawlings were Judas and broke faith with Crosse, it would still be too late to stop Crosse’s greatest plan from unfolding.
Crosse had called the White House earlier and arranged to visit two days later to begin gathering as-built dimensions from the East Wing and to meet again with the president and first lady.
He heard music heralding the beginning of the Nightly News . The NBC logo appeared.
“In Chicago today,” the anchor’s voice began, over a photograph of the Chicago skyline, “a sixth gruesome slaying of a member of a prominent American family. ... This time, a twenty-two-year-old woman ...”
A photo of Chase Van Myer. “Her body left at an American landmark designed by renowned architect Frank Gehry.” A photo of the Jay Pritzker Pavilion.
Crosse felt a wave of disgust looking at the structure, a 120-foot stainless steel malignancy invading the earth, with unrestrained ribbonlike walls folding in on one another, the whole mess held up by an exposed skeleton of steel tubing. Like so many deconstructionist buildings, Gehry’s was based on twisted axes, disjointed forms, curved facades, flowing, melting volumes of space seemingly without boundaries. Cancer.
It was no wonder that Gehry’s work had come to symbolize the fragmentation of contemporary life, a social order without restraint. Anarchy.
Gehry’s architecture was all about the architect. About self-love. About the radical’s empty joy in roiling tradition.
Crosse loved structure, not tearing it down. His work served his clients” needs, not his own. He knew that freeing them to live more complete lives didn’t have a thing to do with bending the walls of their homes. It meant finding the structure that reflected their inner truths and then achieving it, at any cost. It meant going to war for an architecture that replicated the stunning marriage of form and function found in human anatomy.
Freedom was about drawing the right boundaries, not living without them.
Scout Van Myer appeared on the television, at a press conference outside the magnificent gates in front of his home, surrounded by his wife Carolyn, son Tristan, daughter Gabriela, and several uniformed officers.
“Whoever did this to my daughter will be brought to justice,” he said confidently. “Until that time, I want to thank you for being here today and keeping us in your prayers tomorrow.”
Crosse smiled. Van Myer looked strong and confident—at peace. And Crosse doubted it was an accident he had gathered his wife and children around him for the cameras. He was presenting the Van Myer family, newly constituted, liberated from the tyranny of his daughter’s sickness.
Crosse felt peaceful, too. When you do the right thing, even when it is hard to do, even when the cost is a human life, you can sleep well at night, a happy, tired soldier of the Lord.
He switched to ABC, then CBS, then CNN, all of them focused on Chase Van Myer, on the hand of God.
He turned off the television.
He did not want to die, but he sensed that his life was drawing to a close, that to ask for more time than he needed to complete his masterwork would be to ask too much. He thought of Martin Luther King’s speech foreshadowing his own demise. “I’ve been to the mountaintop,” he had said. “Like anybody, I want to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will.”
Crosse, too, had been to the mountaintop. He had seen God’s truth and carried it in his heart. And he was ready to die in service to it.
He walked into the bathroom, took a straight razor out of his shaving kit, flicked it open. He looked at himself in the mirror, letting his eyes move slowly across his wide shoulders, down his armor-like pectoralismuscles, his washboard abdomen. He held his arms out to his sides, spread his legs slightly, becoming da Vinci’s divine human form. Then he slowly cut himself, shoulder to
And if Rawlings were Judas and broke faith with Crosse, it would still be too late to stop Crosse’s greatest plan from unfolding.
Crosse had called the White House earlier and arranged to visit two days later to begin gathering as-built dimensions from the East Wing and to meet again with the president and first lady.
He heard music heralding the beginning of the Nightly News . The NBC logo appeared.
“In Chicago today,” the anchor’s voice began, over a photograph of the Chicago skyline, “a sixth gruesome slaying of a member of a prominent American family. ... This time, a twenty-two-year-old woman ...”
A photo of Chase Van Myer. “Her body left at an American landmark designed by renowned architect Frank Gehry.” A photo of the Jay Pritzker Pavilion.
Crosse felt a wave of disgust looking at the structure, a 120-foot stainless steel malignancy invading the earth, with unrestrained ribbonlike walls folding in on one another, the whole mess held up by an exposed skeleton of steel tubing. Like so many deconstructionist buildings, Gehry’s was based on twisted axes, disjointed forms, curved facades, flowing, melting volumes of space seemingly without boundaries. Cancer.
It was no wonder that Gehry’s work had come to symbolize the fragmentation of contemporary life, a social order without restraint. Anarchy.
Gehry’s architecture was all about the architect. About self-love. About the radical’s empty joy in roiling tradition.
Crosse loved structure, not tearing it down. His work served his clients” needs, not his own. He knew that freeing them to live more complete lives didn’t have a thing to do with bending the walls of their homes. It meant finding the structure that reflected their inner truths and then achieving it, at any cost. It meant going to war for an architecture that replicated the stunning marriage of form and function found in human anatomy.
Freedom was about drawing the right boundaries, not living without them.
Scout Van Myer appeared on the television, at a press conference outside the magnificent gates in front of his home, surrounded by his wife Carolyn, son Tristan, daughter Gabriela, and several uniformed officers.
“Whoever did this to my daughter will be brought to justice,” he said confidently. “Until that time, I want to thank you for being here today and keeping us in your prayers tomorrow.”
Crosse smiled. Van Myer looked strong and confident—at peace. And Crosse doubted it was an accident he had gathered his wife and children around him for the cameras. He was presenting the Van Myer family, newly constituted, liberated from the tyranny of his daughter’s sickness.
Crosse felt peaceful, too. When you do the right thing, even when it is hard to do, even when the cost is a human life, you can sleep well at night, a happy, tired soldier of the Lord.
He switched to ABC, then CBS, then CNN, all of them focused on Chase Van Myer, on the hand of God.
He turned off the television.
He did not want to die, but he sensed that his life was drawing to a close, that to ask for more time than he needed to complete his masterwork would be to ask too much. He thought of Martin Luther King’s speech foreshadowing his own demise. “I’ve been to the mountaintop,” he had said. “Like anybody, I want to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will.”
Crosse, too, had been to the mountaintop. He had seen God’s truth and carried it in his heart. And he was ready to die in service to it.
He walked into the bathroom, took a straight razor out of his shaving kit, flicked it open. He looked at himself in the mirror, letting his eyes move slowly across his wide shoulders, down his armor-like pectoralismuscles, his washboard abdomen. He held his arms out to his sides, spread his legs slightly, becoming da Vinci’s divine human form. Then he slowly cut himself, shoulder to
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