Painting Naked (Macmillan New Writing)

by Maggie Dana

  My unexpected guest and his dog take it upon themselves to step onto my front porch and act like greeters at a carnival sideshow. “Howdy folks,” Dutch says, doffing his hat. “Step inside and join the fun.”

  I grasp a chair to steady myself. Is the room spinning, or is it me?

  Dutch kisses Lizzie hello, then guides my bewildered son into the kitchen.

  “Hi, honey. This is Dutch Van Horne,” I say, trying to keep Jordan in focus. “He just popped in for a quick visit.” I make it sound like he’s only staying five minutes. Then my legs give out and I sink to the floor and wrap my arms around Murdock.

  Scowling at Dutch like a belligerent teen, Jordan tosses his bag in the corner and leans against the counter.

  “I was on my way to a reunion in New Haven,” Dutch says, smiling at my son, “when I remembered how close your mother lives. I made a detour to come and say hello. I’ll be leavin’ tomorrow.”

  Lizzie whips up a sandwich for Jordan and tries to rescue us, but her efforts fall flat. The conversation stutters, then dies completely. Lizzie puts down her glass, stands up and says, “Well, it’s been a long day, so if you guys will excuse me, I’ll be off.” Then adds, on her way out the door, “Don’t forget about tomorrow, okay?”

  The way I feel right now, I seriously doubt I’ll be up for a picnic.

  Chapter 6

  Sands Point

  July 2010

  I wake up with a mouth like the bottom of a bird cage. My head’s on a turntable and my tongue is glued to my teeth. What the hell was I thinking? Falling into bed with Dutch isn’t the answer. He has the sexual attention span of a rabbit.

  There’s a knock at the door. “Are you decent?”

  My bathrobe’s nowhere in sight. I wriggle under the covers. “Come in.”

  Dutch, freshly showered and looking disgustingly cheerful, enters my room bearing a tray. Murdock, looking even more cheerful, trots beside him. Dutch places the tray on my bedside table.

  Sitting up, I make a clumsy attempt to wrap the sheet around my shoulders. I squint at the tray. Is that coffee and hot buttered toast? A pot of marmalade, a rose in a bud vase? Jeez, it’s kind of hard to stay pissed at a guy who delivers breakfast in bed. I give him a weak smile. It’s the best I can manage. “Thanks.”

  Dutch hands me a glass of orange juice. “Bad night, huh?”

  “Um, did we, I mean …” I feel a blush staining my cheeks.

  “You don’t remember?”

  “No.”

  “Then I’m devastated. But you were fabulous.”

  I groan and sink back into my pillows. The sheet slithers south, but at this point, it hardly matters. My first one-night stand, and I can’t remember it.

  Dutch grins. “Your couch is real comfortable.”

  I grab the sheets and cover myself again. “So we didn’t—?”

  “As tempted as I was, I didn’t take advantage.”

  My clothes are neatly folded on a chair. I don’t recall getting undressed. Hell, I don’t even remember climbing the stairs. Did Dutch have to carry me up? And where was Jordan while all this was going on? I blush even deeper.

  “How about some toast?” Dutch says.

  He really is rather sweet. Leaning forward, I kiss him on the cheek. “You’re a lifesaver.”

  “Aw, shucks.”

  I try to thank him for saving me from myself, but can’t seem to find the right words. So I pat Murdock’s whiskery nose instead.

  * * *

  Dutch stays until Jordan, who’s been out walking the beach, comes back. I’m embarrassed by my son’s surly behavior, but Dutch chooses to ignore it. He drives away just before noon in his elderly car with Murdock’s hairy face hanging out the passenger window. A sticker on the back bumper says Clinton and Gore for ’92.

  I confront Jordan the minute I return to my kitchen. “Why were you so infernally rude to him?”

  “Because he’s a jerk.”

  “For your information, Dutch Van Horne’s a decorated war hero, a Yale graduate, and—” I snatch up the kettle and pour cold water in the sugar bowl. “Oh, sod.”

  Jordan takes over making the tea.

  Gingerly, I lower myself in a chair. “Dutch is a good friend, that’s all.”

  Why do I feel the need to justify myself? Jordan’s not a kid. He’s twenty-six, for God’s sake. Alistair would’ve said: “Go for it, Ma!” and I’m reminded of the night, shortly after my divorce, when I tried to tell the boys, then aged eight and ten, that it was okay for me to date other men. Jordan looked at me wide-eyed; Alistair grinned and said: “Does this mean you’re gonna fool around?”

  My anger, such as it is, fizzles out like day old soda. Jordan’s just doing what he always does—worrying about me. Seeing me drunk last night must’ve been a shock, especially when I was carried upstairs by a man he didn’t know from Adam.

  Jordan lets out a sigh. “I’m sorry, Mom. I was out of line.” He touches my forehead.

  I wince.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Not really. My hair hurts.” I take a sip of tea. “Right now I could swallow a bottle of Tylenol.”

  Jordan pulls an envelope from his pocket. “This isn’t a painkiller, but it might help.”

  I put down my cup. “What’s all this about?”

  “Go on,” Jordan says, handing it to me. “Open it.”

  I tear the envelope with clumsy fingers. It’s a slip of paper with numbers on it, I think. My eyes keep crossing.

  “It’s an airline voucher,” Jordan explains. “For a ticket to London.”

  I stare at him, mouth open, gaping like a goldfish.

  “It’s from Alistair and me.”

  “Are you serious?” My younger son’s in graduate school. He’s drowning in debt. He can barely afford to take the train home from Boston, let alone buy half an airline ticket to England.

  “Al’s promised to pay me back when he’s a world-famous paleontologist,” Jordan says. He pulls out a chair, turns it around, and sits down with his chin leaning on the back rail just like he used to when he was a teenager and in need of a good chat. “The voucher’s open ended. You can use it any time.”

  “No, it’s too much.” I push it toward him. “You’re sweet and wonderful, and I love you both for even thinking of it, but I can’t possibly accept it.”

  Jordan anchors the ticket to my table with a bottle of ketchup. “You’ve been wanting to visit Sophie for years and besides, the airline had a special offer, so …” He tries to look convincing. “No arguments, okay?”

  I study my son’s anxious, wide-open face and see the little boy who didn’t buy my first fumbling explanation about dating other men. I don’t think he bought the second one, either. I reach out and pat his thatch of streaky blond hair. “This is fabulous. You have no idea.”

  * * *

  With Jordan’s help I make the potato salad I promised Lizzie for her Fourth of July party. It’s in full swing by the time we pull into the McKennas’ driveway. Rock music pulses from an upstairs window and someone who can’t wait for it to get dark—probably Fergus—is already letting off fireworks. Smoke from a barbecue grill spirals lazily upward and I hear the shriek of small children, the low thrum of adult conversation. Discarded toys and a shocking pink tricycle litter the driveway. Jordan maneuvers past them to park beside Fergus’s motor home. He turns off the engine and pockets the keys. I guess he doesn’t trust me not to bugger off back home.

  “Go and join the others,” I tell him. “I’ll take the salad inside.”

  “Mom?”

  “Yes.”

  “I love you.”

  I brush his cheek with my hand. “I love you, too, and I’m sorry about last night.”

  “You’re entitled,” says my son. “It’s about time you had some fun.”

  “Getting drunk isn’t fun.”

  Jordan winks at me. Maybe there’s hope for this boy yet.

  * * *

  I find Lizzie in her kitchen abou
t to dismember a trio of chickens. The sight of all that naked poultry makes me feel sick.

  “You don’t look so hot,” Lizzie says. “You’d better sit down and tell me what happened after I left.” She waves toward a bottle of wine. “Want some?”

  “God, no.” I collapse into a chair and lay my head on Lizzie’s butcher block table. Execution. That’s what I need. Chop, chop. Head falls in basket. End of problem. “I got seriously drunk last night.”

  “You were pretty far gone by the time Jordan and I showed up.”

  “I had more after you went home.”

  Lizzie whacks the legs and wings off a chicken and tosses them into the blue and white striped bowl I gave her last Christmas. “That’s not like you,” she says, reaching for another carcass.

  “I was only following your advice.”

  “Since when did you start doing that?” She gives me a lopsided grin. “And exactly which piece of advice were you following?”

  “About having an affair with Dutch.”

  “What does that have to do with getting drunk?” Lizzie takes a sip of her wine. Her fingers leave smeary prints on the glass.

  I attempt a weak smile. “Dutch courage.”

  Lizzie spits Chardonnay all over the table. Wiping it up, she says, “Well, did you or didn’t you?”

  “What?”

  “Sleep with him.”

  I shake my head. The room swims. I close my eyes and wonder if hangovers are terminal.

  “Why the hell not?” Lizzie says.

  “He didn’t want to take advantage of me.”

  “Well, that’s gotta be a first,” she says. “So, tell me, Jill. When was the last time you got laid?”

  I shrug. “I honestly don’t remember.”

  * * *

  Early the next morning, I pull out my passport to make sure it hasn’t expired, then phone Sophie to invite myself over.

  “Come in September,” she says, “and for God’s sake bring decent weather.”

  After promising to do my best, I take a cup of coffee and my sketch pad outside. I’m negotiating with Zachary for my share of the chaise when I hear a familiar screech. Two iridescent green parrots fly overhead, trailing twigs and grass from their claws.

  The first time I saw them, digging for seeds in my lawn, I could barely believe my eyes, so I phoned our local pet shop and was told these birds are considered pests because they’re not indigenous, that they’re encroaching on the local bird population. Rumor has it they’re descended from a shipment of parrots that escaped at Kennedy Airport twenty-odd years ago, or perhaps it was from an overturned tractor-trailer on Interstate 95. Nobody really seems to know.

  Pests or not, I adore these crazy birds. I love it that they’re ballsy enough to live here, and I make angry phone calls to power company officials when they remove parrot nests from the tops of utility poles. I pick up my sketch pad and flip through page after page of parrots—in trees, building nests, and flying in formation. Strains of Turandot waft through the back window. Jordan must be up.

  Turning to a fresh page, I sketch a parrot with a puffed-up chest, outstretched wings, and a wide-open beak. I draw notes floating out. He’s singing. He’s taking a bow. The audience is clapping.

  Jill, get a grip. Parrots don’t love opera, they love sea shanties and pirates. They sit on their shoulders and say things like “Ahoy there, matey!”

  Skull and crossbones. Buried treasure.

  Walking the plank.

  * * *

  The boys outgrew the fort the year I turned eighteen—the same year Colin’s family disappeared and my father got sick.

  Bone cancer.

  He died the following February, two weeks before my nineteenth birthday. My mother presided over the post-funeral gathering like a dowager queen. Stiff and dry-eyed, she handed out cups of weak tea, plates of crustless cucumber sandwiches, and slices of fruitcake as if she were hosting a lunch for the Women’s Institute. Sophie stayed glued to my side as friends hugged me and neighbors murmured words of sympathy, but I was numb. I kept looking for Colin. Somehow, I expected him to show up and put his arms around me and tell me everything was going to be all right.

  But he didn’t.

  And it wasn’t all right.

  My dad was gone and I was alone with my mother. A year later, she married again and I became a stranger in my own home. So I moved to London with Sophie, threw myself into art school, and met a handsome, fair-haired American exchange student from Boston.

  Chapter 7

  London

  September 2010

  A light rain is falling when my Virgin Atlantic flight touches down at Heathrow the Friday after Labor Day. I’d forgotten how furiously green England is. After a summer of drought and bleached grass in Connecticut, my old home looks lush and verdant and I feel a bit strange, seeing it through the eyes of a visitor. This is the first time I’ve been back in almost ten years.

  Sophie’s waiting at the barrier, impossibly elegant in a simple linen dress with a scarf knotted around her neck that would’ve taken me half an hour to tie. Her blue eyes sparkle and her hair, still thick and still golden and as unmanageable as ever, is piled on top of her head and held in place with two tortoiseshell combs. Tendrils curl at the nape of her neck. People glance at her and smile. She doesn’t seem to notice.

  “I can’t believe you’re finally here!” Sophie’s hug takes my breath away. “You look absolutely fabulous. You’re thinner and”—she holds me at arm’s length—“you’ve still got a complexion to die for.”

  I hug her back. “Liar.”

  “Come on,” she says. “Let’s get you home. You must be knackered. If I can keep those bloody dogs quiet, you can have a nap.”

  * * *

  Sophie’s house is an unexpected treasure, a small brick oasis with a walled garden barely a stone’s throw from the King’s Road. The rumble of traffic, several streets away, isn’t loud enough to keep me awake. I fall into Sophie’s spare bed and doze off.

  The light is fading when I wake up. Sophie comes in with a mug of tea. “You still take sugar, I hope.”

  “What time is it?” I sit up and rub my eyes.

  “Seven.”

  “Oh, hell. I won’t be able to sleep tonight.”

  “That’s probably a blessing,” Sophie says. “Ian’s making another of those spy movies. He’s invited us to stop by later and watch them filming. Do you feel up to it?”

  “Sure, why not?” I’m curious about Sophie’s latest boyfriend. A movie producer, this time. Probably bald, short, and aggressive, but that’s just a guess.

  Sophie sets my tea on the night table. “Come downstairs when you’re ready. Leftovers for dinner. Nothing fancy.”

  But it is, and we dine by candlelight on chicken curry with strawberries and cream to follow. And when I’m feeling too full to stand up, Sophie hands me a towel. “I’ll wash and you dry,” she says, glaring at the dishwasher. “Bloody thing’s terminal.” She puts on a long, white apron that makes her look like a tall Mrs Tiggy-Winkle or perhaps a slender Jemima Puddle-Duck.

  “How’s your mother?” I say.

  “Independent, impossible, and driving.”

  I almost drop a plate. “Driving?”

  “Mum finally got her license.”

  “You’re kidding.” Last I knew, Claudia had failed her driver’s test so many times, they told her not to bother again. No point, the authorities said. You’ll never pass.

  “I wish I was,” Sophie mutters. “She must’ve bribed someone.”

  Images of Claudia careering along narrow country lanes, scattering cows and tractors like confetti, flash through my mind. “Does she like living in Cornwall?”

  “Loves it. Why don’t you go down and see her?”

  “We could both go.”

  “Maybe next week,” Sophie says. “Now, it’ll be cold by the river. Wear something warm.”

  * * *

  It’s a ten-minute walk to the embankment. The Thame
s, thick and silent beneath a duvet of mist, reminds me of all the spy movies I’ve ever seen—suspicious figures in trench coats and trilbies leaning against lamp posts smoking cigarettes.

  The movie set—cameras, lights, and clapperboards—fulfills most of my expectations. Ian Remmington does not. He’s tall and slender with long hair and soulful brown eyes—a nineteenth-century poet masquerading as a twenty-first-century film mogul.

  He asks Sophie to join him on location in Sardinia the following week.

  “Not this time, Ian. Jill and I have other plans.”

  He bends to kiss Sophie’s cheek. “Okay, how about Fiji, in November? We’ll call it a honeymoon.” He winks at me and goes back to work.

  “Are you guys serious?” I ask.

  Sophie laughs. “Ian’s the ideal boyfriend, but he’d make a perfectly dreadful husband.”

  “How would you know? You’ve never had one.”

  “I think of Ian as dessert,” Sophie says, “rather than the main meal. He asks me to marry him at least once a month and I always refuse. It works both ways. I feel desirable and he gets to indulge his romantic fantasy as the spurned lover.”

  “Didn’t you ever want kids? A family?”

  “Once, maybe. But I got over it. Now I have dogs”—she grins—“dogs and lovers.”

  * * *

  “What are you going to do about Colin?” Sophie asks the next morning. We’re having coffee at her kitchen table. On the tiles beneath our feet, the puppies scarf down what’s left of our scrambled eggs. Sophie’s kitchen is comfortingly shabby, with mismatched chairs and faded chintz curtains. Along one wall lies an enormous Welsh dresser filled with Portuguese pottery, baskets of tarnished silverware, and a collection of Toby jugs I remember from Claudia’s old dining room.

  “Nothing. Everything. I don’t know.”