Canvas for Love

by Charlotte Greene

  “Is there any doubt you’ll get it?”

  I paused before responding. In truth, I didn’t think there was. Unless I completely screwed up tomorrow or botched my teaching demonstration, I was pretty sure the job was mine. This caused another pang of guilt, as I realized that I really should tell Amelia, and soon. While I wouldn’t start until summer at the earliest, more likely autumn, she would need some time to find my replacement.

  As if reading my mind, Meghan asked, “So what’s Amelia think about it?”

  “I-I haven’t told her about it.”

  “Why not?”

  I had no response for her straightforward question. “I guess I wanted to make sure I got it first. I don’t want to bother her about it unless it’s real.”

  Meghan blew out a low whistle. “She’s going to be pissed off if you hide it from her, Chloé. I would be if I was her. You really should tell her now.”

  “You think?”

  “I do. But that’s just my opinion. You don’t have to listen to me.”

  I knew she was right. My guilt the last hour was entirely derived from my instinct to hide this opportunity from her. It didn’t make any sense to hide my news. She should have been the first person I called. As usual with Amelia, pure cowardice had led me to cover it up. It would be much worse to tell her after I’d been offered the job, and I knew it. Still, it was my decision to wait or tell her, and I needed to think about it a while longer. I changed the subject.

  “Anyway, Aunt Kate wanted to know if you and Zach could come to dinner this weekend.”

  Meghan sighed. “I don’t think so. I just got back a couple of days ago, so I can’t take another night off so soon.”

  I remembered then that she’d been gone for the last month. Meghan is in a jazz-and-bluegrass band, and she and her band had been on their first tour together. I could have smacked myself for being so self-centered. “Jeez. That’s right. You just got back from your tour. How was it?”

  “It was great, Chloé. We went all over the South. We were in a different place every night, just about. Nashville was our last stop, and it was fantastic. We got to play in this cute little honkytonk on Broadway—Robert’s—and the crowd was great.”

  “That’s so awesome. Are you sure you can’t come to Kate’s? What about tomorrow? I want to hear all the details, and I’m sure Kate would, too.”

  “I guess I could if we had an early dinner—like four o’clock. I have to be at the bar by seven.”

  “Four should be perfect. My interview is in the morning, and I can fill you and Kate in about it and my trip, and I’m sure she wants to hear about your tour, too.”

  “All right. I’ll tell Zach about it now. I think he has to work, but I’ll ask him.”

  “Great. I’ll see you then.”

  “Oh, and Chloé?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Good luck tomorrow. At the interview, I mean. You deserve it.”

  “Thanks, Meghan. That means a lot.”

  We hung up, and I called my Aunt Kate, letting her know about my interview and Meghan’s packed schedule. Luckily tomorrow worked well for dinner for her and Jim, too, and she promised to have it on the table when we arrived so we’d have plenty of time to talk about everything that had happened.

  “Should I expect Amelia, too?” she asked.

  “I don’t think so, Kate. She has to work all day tomorrow, and I doubt she’ll agree to leave the office so early just after our trip.”

  Kate clicked her tongue. “She works too hard, that one. She’s going to work herself into an early grave if she isn’t careful.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  She wished me luck, and then we finalized plans and hung up. I paced around the house for a while afterward, too anxious to settle down. I needed to call Amelia, if, at the very least, to invite her to dinner tomorrow, whether she would come or not. I also needed to tell her about my interview. I knew it would seem like I was sneaking around behind her back if I didn’t.

  Squaring my shoulders, I finally picked up my phone and dialed her number. It rang long enough for her message service to pick up—not a surprise when I knew she was working on something.

  “Hey, Amelia. Aunt Kate wanted me to see if you might come to dinner tomorrow at four. I know you’re busy, but I’d love it if you could try. Also, I have some big news. Call me back when you get a chance. Love you.”

  Too distracted to read, but too anxious to watch television, I decided that painting would be the best way to relax. I went upstairs to my bedroom, dragging my suitcase, then changed quickly into my painting clothes—a pair of old gym shorts and a ratty T-shirt so splattered with paint and turpentine, I wouldn’t be caught dead in them outside. My new painting quickly absorbed me, and several hours passed without my realizing it. Only when my bladder started to actually hurt did I think to check the clock. It was after ten.

  Confused, I looked at my phone, wondering why Amelia hadn’t called. I realized I’d left it on silent and missed her twice. She left two messages.

  “Hey, Chloé. Just calling you back. I can’t make dinner tomorrow, but I promise I’ll come to the next one. What’s your big news?”

  In her second message, she sounded tired. “Hey, hon. I just got home and I’m headed to bed. I can barely see straight. Sorry I missed you tonight. I bet you’re in your studio right now with your head in the clouds, knee-deep in paint. Wish I were there to kiss you good night. I have an early morning conference, so catch me at lunch, okay? I want to hear your big news.”

  The second call had been an hour ago, which let me off the hook for responding. I relaxed. Telling her about the interview before it actually happened was now a moot point. She would be busy all morning, which wouldn’t give me an opportunity. Part of me knew I was being a coward—after all, I could text or email her the news—but mostly I was so relieved that I was finally calm enough to head to bed. I stripped down and was asleep in seconds.

  Chapter Eight

  My interview went fantastically well. It helped that I went into it believing that I would be hired, and it also helped that everyone I met that morning seemed to think so as well. Christophe Montmartre, who’d arranged everything, managed to get just about every current faculty member from art history to show up. It wasn’t a large department, and most of them had planned to come in to catch up on paperwork, so no one seemed to resent having to be there during a holiday week. The new chair of art history, Heidi Maslov, was so excited to have me as a candidate, she was actually trying to woo and flatter me. I might have told her that she needn’t have bothered—I wanted the job so desperately I found it hard not to fawn all over everyone.

  I was shown my potential office, given a quick tour, and then we all had a formal, sit-down conversation about my credentials and the job’s responsibilities. Everyone was impressed with me, and I with them and the job. Christophe dropped by briefly to say hello at the end, and when we started chattering away in French like old friends, I was pretty sure I’d just nailed it. I walked back to my car certain they would call me to arrange the next step.

  I’d texted Amelia just before going into the interview to let her know I was turning my phone off. This was a code between us that generally meant I was painting. This arrangement had been a hard-won battle, as Amelia thought it should always be possible to contact me. I didn’t think there was a single emergency that warranted being in constant contact. We went back and forth about it so often I’d simply had to put my foot down—I could turn my damn phone off when I felt like it.

  When I turned my phone on in the car, I found only a single response from her—a texted picture of some white roses from her garden last summer. The image brought tears to my eyes, as it spoke of all the progress we’d made since we started dating. The photo meant, simply, that she loved me and thought I was beautiful. As I drove back to my place, I tried to call her, but, as my interview had lasted into the early afternoon, I’d missed her mini lunch break.

  Back at
home, I took off my beautiful gray skirt suit, grinning at the memory of the interview I’d had last September. I’d shown up for my appointment with the notorious Amelia Winters wearing some of my Aunt Kate’s old work clothes. They’d looked terrible and were ill-fitting, but as I didn’t own anything suited for business, they’d been better than nothing. Now I had a whole wardrobe of fine clothes, many of them tailored, all thanks to Amelia. This thought gave me pause again. Amelia had bought all of these clothes for me, ostensibly so I could look the part as her assistant at work. She’d spent lavishly on them, and looking at them now, I realized once again the significant investment she’d made in me. If I left her employment, all of this would go to waste.

  I shook my head, angry with my self-doubt. Yes, she’d bought me these clothes, and yes, they were for work, but I’d already made her company hundreds of thousands of dollars. As far as I was concerned, I’d earned them already. And anyway, when I’d brought up paying her back for the clothes out of my wages, she’d dismissed the idea, laughing. As far as she was concerned, the clothes were a gift.

  Calmer now and more at ease with my decision to work for the university if they wanted me, I went back to my painting, becoming lost in it. By the time I snapped out of my dream world, I was running late for dinner and had to drive to my aunt’s place to make it on time.

  When I got there, at exactly four, I walked inside without knocking. I’d grown up here, for the most part, and Kate and I didn’t stand on ceremony. The house was incredibly warm, and the scent of peppers and onions made my eyes sting the moment I walked in. Kate came bustling out of the kitchen in her usual cooking disarray, her graying hair wild and her apron splattered with sauces and flour. Neither of us paid attention to this kind of thing and hugged anyway, the tomato sauce on her hands smearing into my shirt.

  “Oh my goodness! You’re a sight for sore eyes,” she said. “You look so healthy and tan!”

  “All we did was eat seafood and drink piña coladas and margaritas.” Among other things, I thought.

  “Well, you needed it. You work much too hard, sweetie. You’re going to burn out if you’re not careful.”

  I let her little jibe slide, used to it at this point. She took every opportunity to criticize my work with Amelia, and Amelia’s business in general. Despite my excellent salary, she thought it beneath me.

  I didn’t want to get into it, so I changed the subject. “Where are the others?”

  “Meghan just popped out for some wine, and Zach and Jim aren’t coming. Zach has to work, and Jim was just called out of state on some granite-countertop emergency or something with his company. It’s just going to be us ladies tonight.” Her eyebrows shot up. “Oh! Where’s Amelia?”

  “She couldn’t come,” I said, trying to sound casual. I hated the cracks about Amelia’s company, but I especially hated it when Kate criticized Amelia for missing things like this. It wasn’t as if she did it on purpose.

  Luckily Aunt Kate seemed to know when to let it go, as all she did was shake her head. “Well, that’s too bad. Maybe she’ll make it next time. And anyway, it does seem like an age since it was just the three of us.”

  It did. Meghan and I became friends right before I moved in with Aunt Kate. We were both in middle school, and my parents had just died in a car accident. Meghan’s dad had abandoned them when she was a kid, and her mom, a musician, was frequently MIA, so Meghan stayed at our place at least a couple of nights a week through high school. To some extent, she’d been like a second surrogate daughter to Kate, and lately it was rare that the three of us had a night together without someone’s boyfriend or, more recently, girlfriend in the mix. Tonight was a good opportunity to catch up as a family again.

  Meghan came in a moment later, and she and I greeted each other with a long, solid hug. I realized then that it had been almost six weeks since I’d seen her—a length of time that would previously have been unheard of. In high school and college, she and I had basically been attached at the hip, either seeing or calling each other every day. We’d gone to different colleges, but that didn’t stop us from hanging out every weekend into our early twenties. When I’d moved to France for my graduate studies, we still had weekly phone calls and long visits during my holiday breaks. Things had changed lately with the introduction of Amelia into my life, and that change was rarely clearer than when I realized how distant Meghan and I had become. She’d cut her hair recently, and her clothes looked a little smarter than usual. It seemed like she was a different woman almost every time I saw her.

  “You look great, Chloé. You really do. I haven’t seen you this tan since the Jazz Fest disaster of 2010.”

  I laughed. We’d both been twenty-one, and both of us had gotten ridiculously drunk at Jazz Fest. We’d been too far gone to think about the fact that we were outside in the sun all day, and both of us had been sunburnt to hell, wincing and pussyfooting around in pain for days after.

  “God, don’t remind me,” I said. “I still can’t listen to Elvis Costello without wanting to smear aloe all over my body.” We both laughed.

  “What kind of wine did you get?” Aunt Kate asked, interrupting us.

  “All of them,” Meghan replied, holding up her bag. It held at least four bottles. “I thought we could take this opportunity to celebrate, just the three of us, since I know you both have some good news.”

  This was the first time I’d heard about Kate’s news, but when I looked at her, she was glaring at Meghan as if to silence her.

  “You’re right, Meghan,” she said, “but we have to eat something, too, and the food is almost ready. You should always have a wine cushion.”

  We followed Kate into the kitchen, and Meghan and I immediately started setting the table—our old chore as adolescents and young adults. I brought out wineglasses, and Meghan poured very liberal glasses of pinot grigio for all of us.

  “I thought you had to work tonight,” I said.

  She shrugged. “I do, but I can always head in a little late—my coworker won’t mind. It’s the Friday after Mardi Gras. People are worn out. It’s always a dead zone in there this weekend.”

  When Kate served the shrimp-and-crawfish étouffée, I began salivating before I even tasted it. Kate knew this was my favorite dish and served it only on special occasions. The rice was fluffy and spiced, the bread fresh and hot, and she’d whipped up her own homemade butter. It was, as usual, enough food for twice as many people, but the three of us did a fair job of decimating the spread. After we finished, the table looked something like a natural disaster. We kept the dinner conversation light, by house rules. Important or bad news had to wait until after the meal to avoid detracting from the food. Food in a Creole home should, according to Aunt Kate, be the center of attention at a meal.

  We left the mess and headed into the living room with our second bottle of wine—this time a sparkling rosé. Meghan brought out champagne flutes, and she and I sat close to each other on the love seat. Aunt Kate sat in the nearby armchair, all of us close enough to brush legs.

  “Okay,” Kate said. “I want to hear about the interview. I can hardly stand the suspense.”

  I looked at the two of them with a serious expression, letting the tension build, and then broke into a wide smile. “It went great. More than great. I think I’ll get the job.”

  Meghan and Aunt Kate were tremendously happy for me, both of them rocketing out of their seats and pulling me into a three-way hug. We danced around a little, and when we sat back down I told them all about the school and the department.

  “I told you that you’d like it there,” Meghan said. “I think I even took an art-history course when I went there. Well, maybe—I never went to class. But I signed up for it, anyway.”

  “Did they tell you what kind of classes you’d be teaching?” Kate asked.

  “Mostly freshman- and sophomore-level courses for now. Introduction one and two, that kind of thing. But I’ll get more advanced courses in time, once they can work me into the
rotation.”

  Meghan squeezed my shoulders. “I’m so damn happy for you, Chloé. You’ve worked so hard for this—harder than anyone I know.”

  Aunt Kate touched my knee. “Me too, honey. I can’t wait to tell everyone that my niece is a professor.”

  I held up my hands. “Let’s not get too hasty. I haven’t been offered the job yet.”

  “But you will,” Kate said, nodding with certainty. “I know it.”

  Her confidence brought tears to my eyes, and soon all us were blinking and wiping our eyes. I had worked very hard at my various degrees and internships, and these women had been with me through all of it. They knew as well as I did that I wouldn’t have made it without them. Their encouragement and devotion had made it possible for me to get where I was today.

  I cleared my throat. “Okay. Enough tears. This is a happy occasion, and Meghan said you have some news, too, Aunt Kate. What is it?”

  Meghan and Kate shared a worried glance, and my heart rate picked up. What were they hiding from me?

  I must have looked apprehensive, as Kate laughed and patted my hand reassuringly. “Don’t be worried, Chloé. It’s good news. I’m just sorry I didn’t tell you first. It happened when you were in Mexico.”

  “I just happened to drop by the next day, and she told me everything,” Meghan explained.

  “Just know I would have told you right away if you were here,” Kate said.

  “What? What would you have told me?”

  Kate took a deep breath and let it out. “Jim and I are getting married.”

  The news was so surprising, I didn’t know how to react. Before my parents died, my aunt had been married to a drunk who’d deserted her. They’d had a nasty divorce some years after he left. She’d spent most of my adolescence and early twenties telling me to avoid marriage at all costs. While I knew she and Jim had become serious—he’d recently moved into her place part-time—I’d never expected them to get married.

  “Wow!” I finally said. “I never—”

  “Right? Who would have thought? I know I told you for years how stupid marriage is. But I’ll admit it—I was wrong. When he asked me last Saturday, I didn’t even hesitate. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world.” She paused. “I hope you’ll be my maid of honor, Chloé.”