“Trey and Stuart just pitched an idea they wanted me to run by you,” Josie says. She always cuts to the chase.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“They’d like to help you create a syndicated show, produced by WJKS.” She doesn’t sound either excited or skeptical. I think she’s letting me lead. I love that.
“A decorating/cooking/lifestyle show with me as the superstar?” I ask, just to clarify. Plus I wanted to say the words out loud.
“It’s only in the idea stage. I take it that you might be interested?”
“I might be,” I say, trying to sound cool and casual, while inside I’m shrieking: My own show? Is she kidding me?
“I’ll tell them it’s worth gathering specifics. Then we’ll all sit down and talk about it.”
“Do you think they’d let me use the Grand Dame?” I ask.
“I don’t know. Is it important to you?”
“Yes. I’d have to say it is.”
There are many catch-your-breath beautiful old places in Scenic, in varying degrees of falling apart and being put back together, but the Grand Dame called to me from the moment I first saw her. I loved her before I ever even walked inside. She had such a pretty face, with tall windows on either side of her front door. Luckily no one had fought her age every step of the way, like a panic-stricken former Hollywood starlet slowly maiming herself one surgery at a time. The Grand Dame is an example of how it’s not only possible to age well, but that aging can be a virtue. Every decision and change along the way has set her apart, and now she is unique in all the world.
“Would it be a deal breaker if you can’t use the house?” Josie asks.
“An actual deal breaker? Maybe not,” I say. It’s actually pretty scary to think how bad the terms would have to be for me to say no to stardom.
“I’ll give you a call when they have a proposal to review,” Josie says.
“Tell Trey no focus groups are allowed!” I call out.
“Okay, you’re the boss,” Josie says.
I love the sound of that.
Chapter Nineteen
Gwendolyn
I shut every blind to hide away, and switch on all the lights for company. Some rooms remain dark because they don’t have overhead fixtures. Caroline helped me order lamps which might already be in the garage, stacked within the myriad UPS and FedEx packages. I don’t have the mental energy to pull them inside and start assembling things, though. It takes a certain amount of optimism to open a box and I’m not quite there.
I put some pizza that I brought home from my dad’s place into the microwave for forty seconds. Armand claims to be allergic to microwaved leftovers. He has rules about everything. Basically they come down to one overarching principle: however I do things is wrong. I thought his nitpicking ways were sort of endearing, that we had a mutually-beneficial, symbiotic thing going on. He likes to be great at everything, and I didn’t mind letting him have his way. Maybe what he really enjoys about being around me is that my incompetence makes him feel awesome by contrast.
Cheese has melted onto the paper plate and I have to eat the droopy pizza with a fork because it flops when I try to pick it up. I miss Armand’s cooking so much I could cry. He elevated every meal into a little masterpiece. I loved his food, and when it quieted down in the evenings after everyone went home for the day, I loved his warm and cozy home that looked, smelled, and felt amazing.
My dad’s pasta lunch hadn’t worked out. I was eating it out of politeness, but after a few bites he took my plate away and dumped the contents into the garbage along with his own. It was an easy choice for us to order in; my dad doesn’t currently want to be seen in public any more than I do. It’s depressing enough that I’m a pariah, but it sucks a thousand times worse to know I’m bringing my family and friends down with me.
This floppy slice is pretty gross, but it’s better than starving. I haven’t filled my fridge or pantry yet and now I don’t know how I’ll be able to do it. I can’t simply go into the grocery store like a normal person. I’d probably be better off back in my lavender hotel room—and I do mean lavender. Walter had a lavender carpet put in while I still lived there, but at least he waited until I moved out to have the walls painted. He has doubled the rate for the room, which is now advertised as the Gwendolyn Golden Suite.
I throw away half my slice.
I can’t seem to stop thinking about Smith. It was so chivalrous of him to come over here last night, but I don’t know what possessed him to do it. How did he know I was in trouble and wanted help? It seems like there are always more questions between Smith and me than answers. The story his mom told me at the senior community clubhouse this morning was yet another example.
After mentioning that her boyfriend Caleb was taking her out to dinner at the Riveredge Country Club tonight, she said, “Smith still hates that place.”
“Still?” I asked. I never knew he hated it there.
“It just always intimidated him so. He felt like a fish out of water. And then there was that awful night.”
I suppose my expression told her that I didn’t understand.
“You probably don’t even remember that country club graduation dinner you invited him to. He was so nervous to spend time with your family.”
“Is that why he stood me up?” I asked.
“Stood you up? No, you must be thinking of another boy on another night. The night I’m thinking of, Smith had worked all day at the 7-11 and got home with barely enough time to shower before he had to leave. I remember him running out to his old Impala and it wouldn’t start. His dad was at the factory already and I didn’t have a car myself, so Smith went next door and asked if he could use Brenda Closs’s car to try and jump his.
“I remember hoping with all my might that the engine would catch, because I knew he thought the world of you. I was excited when the engine caught, and he left it running to make sure it wouldn’t go dead again while he returned Brenda’s car.
“Smith was dressed up so nicely and he’d bought you flowers that I’d seen him put carefully on the passenger seat. I remember thinking, ‘he’s going to be glad to leave us behind, and enjoy his scholarship down in North Carolina beside that Golden girl.’”
She looked around the clubhouse this morning when she paused in her story, like she was surprised to see it there because she’d been carried back in time by her memory. She took a sip of her coffee and asked me again if I wanted any. They always have fresh coffee and cookies at the clubhouse. I declined. Then she leaned in confidentially.
“Well, Smith was going to be a few minutes late to your dinner, but he was going to make it. As he was backing out of the driveway, though, a friend of his dad’s was waiting to pull in. Smith saw before I did that something was wrong and he came back and parked the car.
“Smith’s dad had collapsed at work. The friend had come to deliver the news in person. They’d called in an ambulance and he’d been rushed to the hospital. Siler, next in line after Smith, fed the other boys their dinner while Smith took me on to Riveredge Memorial. I hope you don’t mind, but Smith gave his dad your flowers.”
She had smiled weakly at me. I put my hand over hers and patted it gently. “I’m glad he did, Mrs. Walker. I would have wanted him to, had I known.”
“I’m glad. Well, it was morning before we were back at home again. For a while there it looked like Smith’s dad was going to rally. But it wasn’t to be,” she said, shaking her head.
“He sort of dwindled for a while before he died, like he was giving us all time to get reconciled to the idea. That was the kind of man he was. He didn’t just act rashly, he took his time and made sure what he was going to do was the thing that needed to be done. I suppose death wasn’t much different.”
I patted her hand again, though I was confused by her story and couldn’t quite reconcile it in my mind. She shook her head solemnly. “It’s one thing to make your own sacrifices, but another thing a
ltogether to have your own child making sacrifices for you. I think the weight of that is heavier when I see you, Gwendolyn. I know Smith wanted to follow you, honey. I’m sorry it didn’t work out that way.”
“I never knew about your husband,” I said quietly.
“You didn’t?” She seemed to wake totally from her memory at this.
“No. I left for a long trip the day after the dinner Smith missed at the club, the night your husband collapsed. I thought Smith had just stood me up.” I sighed at the tragic absurdity of it. “I was gone for six weeks, so I didn’t know your husband had died either.”
“Smith must have mentioned it when he told you about the change in his college plans?”
“I didn’t give him the chance. I was hurt he wasn’t coming. I didn’t know why, but I thought it was because he simply changed his mind. I always worried he didn’t care for me as much as I cared for him.”
“Well, I’m sorry you two didn’t talk to each other honestly. Smith always thought very highly of you, Gwendolyn. Very highly.”
I wish that I could be as certain of Smith’s feelings as his mom seemed to be.
I’m a grown woman, Smith is a grown man. I don’t have to pretend I’m married to Armand anymore, and I certainly don’t have to hide him from my family. I could simply call him up.
He doesn’t know the truth about next week’s interview, though. I don’t want him to find out that he’s the main reason I agreed to do it. Armand’s attorney advised me to take Trey’s offer, and I’ve got it in writing that immediately following the interview, any lawsuits against Smith and his brother Taylor will be dropped. My lawsuit will be dropped too, and I’ll be entitled to $100,000 in stock options that I’ll cash out immediately. I’m afraid Smith might try to talk me out of it; he might try to play the hero again, no matter what it costs him.
I climb the stairs to the small bedroom where I moved all my art supplies. It doesn’t have its own bathroom, an enormous stainless steel sink, or beautiful mullioned windows like the attic studio in Scenic. This is a simple, plain room, with only an easel, and me.
The associate professor I had loved for a year in college used to say that the most important first step in any artistic endeavor is framing your scene well. First you have to decide what you’re trying to capture. Even with something as seemingly simple and obvious as a portrait, there are limitless options. You could choose to go in very, very close, and perhaps just frame a single eye. Or you could do a full body portrait that also captures the context of the room where the person stands. Or anything in between.
Since college I haven’t been very cerebral about art. I try to tune out and let my hands do the thinking. I don’t like to discuss it much, because like love, trying to articulate beauty only seems to water it down and make it flimsy. That was the philosophy of another art professor of mine. When anyone would start an existential conversation about the act of creation, he’d say, “For God’s sake, just shut up and work!”
I look skeptically at my canvas and draw a meandering footpath.
By the time it registers that someone is pounding on my door, I get the impression it may have been going on a while. I haven’t given any thought to household safety matters for four years. We had live-in help at the show house, the property was fenced, and there was an alarm system. My suite in Walter’s hotel was located on the restricted top floor, well away from the comings and goings of the lobby. I feel vulnerable suddenly, realizing that Alejandra and Miguel aren’t here, nor Armand, nor the hotel staff. It’s down to me.
I see that it has grown dark outside as I set my palette on the floor. I take off my smock and hang it on edge of the open door, paint side out. I look at my jeans, which appear to be paint free. I try to see the seat of my pants to be certain, but after a few dog-chasing-her-tail rotations I decide I’m surely clean enough to peek out the window and see who’s there.
Megan never visited me at the hotel. We have spent as little time together as possible since I’ve been in town. I open the door for her warily. She rushes in and slams, then locks it, as if all the runners in the New York City marathon are chasing her up the street and my doorway is the finish line.
As I look closely at my sister, I notice a few very odd things. First, she’s not wearing a business suit, she’s in what might be yoga wear. This is strange indeed. Second, she looks like she’s been crying. That would mean she had feelings, so I’m justifiably skeptical.
I stare at her a minute before I have a sudden and terrifying thought.
“Dad?” I ask.
Megan shakes her head. Then she does something horrific.
I can’t remember ever seeing her do anything like this, not at our mom’s funeral, not when a boy broke up with her in high school or college, not when she fractured her arm attempting a new landing from the high bars.
Megan bursts into tears.
It’s terrible to see a very mean person cry. It looks like anger. Normally when people cry in my presence, my instinct is to hug them, to pat them on the back, to softly say soothing things. Megan looks like she’s viciously chewing air. I tell myself to go to her, but myself won’t budge. I compromise by leaning in a bit and saying, “What the hell is wrong with you?”
Good. It made her stop.
“This place is hideous,” she says.
I look around and sigh. “I know. But it was really cute when Caroline lived here. It’s like she took all the personality with her when she left.”
Somehow this exchange causes the horrible thing to happen again. This time, thank God, Megan hides her face in her hands. While I wait for her to stop, I survey the house some more. It’s true that it looks like a pit now.
Megan resurfaces and I think of her children and her husband and become scared again. “Is anyone hurt?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “Caroline Penny,” she says.
“What about her?” I ask, now worried for Caroline and her children. “Do you know her? Is she okay?”
“Kyle is having an affair with her,” Megan says. She appears calmer and more lucid now, though I would have thought that if she’d have trouble saying anything, then that would be it.
“Your happy homemaker friend and my husband…” Megan dissolves into tears again.
I don’t want it to be true. It makes my stomach hurt. I remember that Kyle mentioned this house to me the day I came back to town and Megan had sounded jealous when he did.
“Caroline is only the latest. Kyle has had three affairs in seven years.”
“And you just found out about all of them?” I sit on the cold wooden floor and motion for Megan to take a chair, a painted wooden one that Caroline left. She just stares at it.
“No. I find out about one every few years. When it ends, he tells me all about it. It makes him feel better to get it off his chest.”
“What an ass!” I feel sorry for Megan. No wonder she’s such a bitch.
“He’s really an amazing father. He really is. He takes care of the kids and I get to work whatever hours I want and know they’re fine…I’m about as maternal as our mother was, which we both know isn’t exactly the best way to raise kids. Kyle makes up for me. He’s worth it.”
“What’s the problem then? Sounds like it’s all going really well.” I shake my head in horror, empathy, and sadness.
“Kyle says he’s in love with her.” Megan stares down at the floor a few feet in front of where I sit.
“He’s not usually in love with them?”
“No!” she says, as if I’ve just insulted her.
Or him. I honestly have no idea what logic she’s using, but she seems put out by the suggestion. There’s a lot I could say here, but I’ll only fight with my sister when she’s a worthy opponent. Not now. Looking at Megan, I feel sort of nauseous, sort of curious, and suddenly very tired. I must’ve been painting for a long time because my arms feel heavy.
“Can you talk to her?” my sister asks, loo
king directly at me for the first time since she arrived.
“No!”
“Please, Gwen?”
“And what would I say?” I demand, with the whine Megan always seems to bring to my voice.
“Maybe tell her that I know about the affair, and that I don’t want to lose my husband. And find out if she’s in love with him. Okay?” Megan makes this pathetic request with what I can only guess is supposed to be an imploring smile. I turn away quickly.
“I suppose I can try,” I say, though my heart sinks at the thought.
“I just can’t lose him…”
I don’t want to think about Megan and Kyle’s home life. It sounds like they do more acting than Armand and I ever did.
When a painting fog comes over me, I tune out and lose track of time. I can’t plan it or will it, I can only succumb to it if it happens. It’s when I produce my best work. It’s when I feel like a real artist.
It’s nine o’clock and I’m ready to shower and sleep after I clean out my brushes. Megan thankfully left as soon as I agreed to speak with Caroline. I couldn’t offer my sister a drink or a comfortable place to sit, though I doubt she would have taken either anyway.
I stop in the doorway of my makeshift studio and glimpse the side of the canvas that consumed the past five hours. It’s turned away so that all I see are the colors: saffron, dandelion, verdigris, copper, vermillion, and chestnut. Cornflower, cyan, and azure at the top. Sky.
I walk around to see the entire canvas, a very large one. I cross my arms in front of me and narrow my eyes.
It’s a strange process of discovery I sometimes experience, to see a painting that logic tells me I made with my own hands, but it feels somehow beyond me, too. Like how a writer in his eighties might feel perusing a manuscript he wrote in his twenties. For artists, moments of objectivity are as rare as they are essential. Sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes heart lifting, such an instance might test an artist’s will, providing proof that critics are right, the work isn’t special. Or it might be a godsend, giving a pivotal boost of confidence that is to an artist more important than bread or breath.
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