by Megan Chance
"Jonas."
He knew then that he was hallucinating. It sounded like her voice, soft and lilting, but it couldn't be her. Goddammit, it couldn't be her. She had left the exhibition and gone home. She was safe in bed. It was too damned late. Dawn was still hours away.
"Jonas."
The door closed. He heard her breathing. An illusion, he told himself, but even knowing that, he couldn't resist. Even knowing that, he welcomed it. Slowly, afraid it would vanish if he moved too quickly, he turned around. The studio was dark, but he saw her form against the door, saw the dim light from the streets glance across her face, whisper against her hair. She was holding something large and bulky, a bag of some kind, and when he turned to look at her she let it fall to the floor with a thud and moved toward him— so quickly, so gracefully, he was sure it was an illusion. It seemed her feet didn't even touch the floor.
Suddenly it was more than he could take. He backed against the wall, covering his eyes with his hand. His heart was racing. "Christ," he breathed. "Ah, Christ, don't torture me. Not this way. Please ... not this way."
It was quiet. He let his hand drop, expecting her to be gone, expecting to face the empty nothingness of his studio, afraid that he would. He looked up.
She was standing there, in front of him. A mere foot away.
She was no illusion.
He closed his eyes, feeling a surge of pain so raw and desperate it took his breath, and then opened them because not looking at her was more painful. He wanted to savor the sight of her, to burn this memory onto his brain, to not wonder why she was here or remember that he had to send her away. He just wanted to look at her, at the shadows of her eyes and the litheness of her body, at the strength in her face. And she let him look. Her breathing was her only movement, and he felt it pulsing in the air between them. Giving him life where he had none. Making him weak. Giving him strength.
He swallowed, forcing out words—God, such inadequate words. "You shouldn't be here."
"No?" She smiled, a tiny motion in the darkness. "Where should I be then?"
"Genie—"
She came toward him. The very surprise of her movement stopped his words in his throat. She stopped only an inch away, perhaps two. He felt the press of her warmth, caught her scent.
"I love you," she said.
The ache stabbed through him. He looked away. "Go home," he said, and his voice was harsh and raw. "I want you to go home."
She paused, an infinitesimal hesitation. Then, "This is my home."
The words sank into him—a promise, a curse. "No," he said, his voice hoarse, his heart hurting so badly he could barely breathe. "Genie, you don't understand. You can't understand. I . . . I don't know what's happening to me. I don't ... I don't know why. I've spent my life—Christ, my whole life—wondering if this . . . madness . . . will ever go away. And now . . ." He took a deep breath, trying to gather his thoughts, trying to harness the pain growing, spreading like a disease within him. "Ah, God, now I don't think it will. I don't think it ever will."
He heard her voice, a soft whisper in the darkness. "I don't care."
"But I care," he said. "I care. I would hurt you, Genie. You think I won't, but I will. Over and over again. I can't ask that of you. Don't make me ask it."
"Don't make you ask it," she murmured, repeating his words thoughtfully. "Does that mean you want to?"
The question speared him. He looked at her helplessly. "Genie—"
She stepped forward—a half step was all it took— and slid her arms around his waist, holding him captive, a sweet prison. Her body was cradled perfectly to his; he smelled the warm, sweet perfume of her hair. He tried to keep from touching her, but he could not. He wanted to touch her, he ached to. He laid his hand tentatively against her hair, felt its satiny softness, closed his eyes and breathed deeply of her, as deeply as he could, and for the first time in days he felt connected, he felt . . . alive. Since she'd gone, he had not felt this way. Not since she'd gone.
But still he fought it. Still, he tried to push her away, forced himself to say the words hovering in his mind. "You can't save me," he whispered. "No one can save me."
She pulled back only enough to look up at him. "Jonas," she said softly. "Jonas, I don't care about any of that. I don't care. I've spent my life making sacrifices for other people. I've spent my life hiding in corners. I don't want to do that anymore. Oh, Lord, I ... I never felt alive until I met you. I never felt . . . anything. Please don't ask me to give that up. I can't. I won't. I want to stay here . . . with you." She reached out, touching his face, cupping his cheek in her palm. "You made me beautiful," she whispered. "Now let me do something for you. Let me keep you safe."
"Let me keep you safe."
The words sank inside him, a benediction, a prayer, a wish, and it struck him suddenly that if anyone could do that, if anyone could keep him safe, it was Genie. Christ, she already had. She kept away the darkness, she made him feel whole the way he'd never felt before. "Let me keep you safe," and he realized it was what he wanted more than anything in the world. To be safe, yes. To be loved. She had seen him at his worst, and she had stayed. She had looked into his eyes and seen his hell and she had touched him and smiled at him. She had loved him. Despite everything, she had loved him.
Had he ever been loved like that before? Had he ever thought he could be?
He felt her touch against his cheek and it warmed him. Clear into his soul, it warmed him. The cold in his heart eased, dissolved, and through the bleak darkness inside him, he felt a light—the hope she'd given him. The hope he thought he'd lost forever. It shone before him, weak at first, then growing stronger and stronger. A lone star in the night, a beacon he turned to, one he needed. Because he knew suddenly that without her he would disappear. Without her, he would give in to the darkness forever. And he was so afraid of it. Christ, he was so afraid.
He was trembling, and he grabbed her wrist, holding her hand tightly to his face, afraid she would stop touching him, that she would back away. He thought he would die if she did. "Ah, Genie," he murmured. "You don't know what you're getting into."
"Don't I?" she asked in a whisper. "Maybe you're right. Maybe I can't save you. But I can love you. I can love you, Jonas. Isn't that enough?"
The words were haunting, so soft and tender they took his fear and his pain—and brought him something else instead. Something he'd always wanted, something he never thought to have.
A future.
It shivered tremulously before him, weak and wavering, but it was a future nonetheless. A future where before he'd never had one, where before there had been nothing but . . . nothing.
Jonas swallowed. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her more tightly to him, burying his face in her hair, needing to feel her solidness and her strength, wanting to hold her so tightly that everything she was became part of him. He wanted her compassion and hope and tranquility. Her beauty and her strength. Her love.
God, he wanted her love most of all.
And it was that, finally, that he surrendered to. There was no denying it, not anymore. He loved her. He wanted her. Forever, if she would have him. He wanted to feel her beside him all through the night, wanted her calming presence during the day. She'd said he made her feel alive, but the truth was just the opposite. The truth was that without her he had no life at all. Without her, there was no peace and no future and no happiness. Only loneliness and pain. Only that.
He tightened his hold, clutching her with desperate strength. "I love you," he whispered against her hair. "Christ, Genie, I love you so much. Don't ever believe anything else. Please, no matter what happens, believe that one thing. Believe I love you, and—please—don't ever stop loving me."
She looked up at him.
"I won't stop," she said. "I love you."
"1 hope it's enough," he said quietly.
She smiled then—that soft, wonderful smile—and pulled him closer, and he saw the conviction burning fiercely, beautifully, i
n her eyes. "It will be," she promised. "It will be."
And for the first—the only—time in his life, he believed maybe it would.
Author’s Note
In the mid- to late-nineteenth century, New York City was the American artists' mecca. The areas along lower Broadway and Greenwich Village were filled with art dealers and studios, and the affluent sponsored and patronized artists as much to prove the measure of their taste and success as for investment purposes.
The National Academy of Design was the preeminent art school and gallery in New York at this time, and every year it held a very popular exhibition for local artists. Though the exhibition was always in the late spring, readers will note I have changed it to the autumn in my story. Because of the nature of Jonas's illness, and several other factors, it served my purposes better to take some creative license with the timing.
Jonas's sufferings from bipolar illness (commonly called manic-depressive illness) are not atypical. Those diagnosed with bipolar illness experience mood swings that range from mild euphoria and depression to extreme life-threatening and psychotic episodes. Though lithium and other medications can sometimes be used with great effectiveness in controlling the cycle, there are those who are not treatable—or who refuse treatment.
In the nineteenth century, there was no choice. The only "treatments" for bipolar illness were alcohol or drug abuse, confinement to asylums, or suicide. In spite of that, many of those who suffered did survive to contribute lasting and beautiful works of art— among them are thought to be Lord Byron, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Schumann, Robert Lowell, and Vincent van Gogh.
Though a small number creative artists are actually bipolar, studies have shown that artists as a group have a higher percentage of bipolar illness than the general population, and recent studies have explored this link. For those wishing to read further, I recommend Kay Redfield Jamison's excellent book on creativity and manic-depression, Touched with Fire.
Megan Chance is the critically acclaimed author of several novels. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and two daughters. The Portrait was originally published in 1995.