Life Drawing for Beginners

  She lifted a hand in farewell as she propelled her crying daughter to the door, and Meg smiled briefly in return.

  “See you tomorrow, Emily,” she called.

  Emily made no response, which gave Irene some small satisfaction.

  —————

  The day was crawling by. Each time James looked at his watch he was frustrated all over again by how little time had passed since he’d last checked. Lunch had been hours ago surely, and yet here it was, not even three o’clock.

  By half past three he’d had enough. He locked the door of the house he’d been showing and phoned the receptionist to say he was going home with a headache. It was the first time off he’d taken since he’d started the job ten weeks ago, so his conscience didn’t prick him unduly.

  He drove to a shopping center on the outskirts of the town and whiled the time away getting a hot-towel shave and a haircut, which took all of half an hour, and buying what his grandmother would have called fripperies—biscotti in the little Italian delicatessen, a pair of sparkly green hair slides for Charlie, a milk jug with a row of fat smiling cats around the rim and a matching sugar bowl for Eunice, who refused to accept payment for her babysitting, and two pairs of black socks to add to the dozen he already had.

  He arrived at Little Rascals ten minutes early and waited for Charlie to finish the butterfly collage she was working on, aware of the appraising glance of the manager, who hadn’t ever asked him about Charlie’s mother.

  “Want to go for pizza?” he asked Charlie as they drove off.

  Her face broke into a delighted grin. “Pizza? But it’s not Friday.”

  “I know, but I thought we might have a special treat,” he told her, “just this once.”

  “Yaaay.”

  He couldn’t explain the restlessness he’d felt all day, the sense of impatience that had dogged him since he’d woken. He wanted to race through the day, he wanted the hours to flash by without taking a breath. By the time they finished their pizza it would be six, a quarter past when they got home.

  He’d get Charlie cleaned and settled into pajamas and dressing gown, and while she was sitting in front of the telly he’d shower and change, and then it would be close to seven, not long to wait at all until Eunice arrived to babysit. And after that he’d kiss Charlie good night and get into the car and drive to Carrickbawn Senior College.

  He enjoyed the drawing, that was it. He looked forward to the classes, he was glad he’d signed up for them. He found them relaxing, and a nice break from the weekly routine.

  That was all there was to it.

  —————

  From the minute they’d left the playschool Emily had been impossible. After lunch, which she’d refused to eat, Irene had dropped her into the shopping center crèche while she did her usual round of the boutiques and shoe shops. Within twenty minutes Irene’s name was being called over the center’s public address system.

  “Sorry,” the crèche supervisor said when Irene returned, fuming. “She’s being very aggressive and upsetting the other children. We’re not prepared to look after her if she can’t play nicely.”

  “What did she do?” Irene asked, regarding her daughter, who stood in the corner, red-faced and glowering.

  The supervisor indicated another little girl who was sniffling on the lap of a second adult. “She bit that child, and was physically aggressive with several of the others, pinching, pulling hair, and so on.”

  Irene approached Emily and crouched beside her. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing,” Emily mumbled. “I don’t like this place.”

  “Well, they don’t like you either.” Irene marched her outside. “You’ll have to come around the shops with me. Don’t touch anything.”

  “When is Pilar coming back?” Emily demanded.

  Irene gritted her teeth as she steered Emily through the doors of a shoe shop. “Pilar is never coming back—you can forget about her. How could she come back to such a wicked girl?”

  That evening Emily refused to eat dinner. She sat at the table regarding the mashed potato, sausage chunks, and little pool of baked beans Martin placed in front of her.

  “Don’t want it.”

  “You’re getting nothing else,” Irene warned, but Emily refused a single bite.

  “I want Pilar.”

  Irene threw an exasperated glance at Martin, but he was studying Emily thoughtfully, and Irene knew his sympathies lay wholly with his daughter.

  “Pilar had to leave,” he said. “I told you she was very sad, but she had to go.”

  Emily’s eyes filled with tears. “Was it because I was wicked?”

  Martin shook his head, frowning. “Of course not, darling. Why on earth would you think that?”

  Irene held her breath, but Emily didn’t mention their earlier conversation. “Can you ask her to come back?”

  “I don’t think we can do that—but we’ll get someone else, just as nice,” he promised, pulling a tissue from the box on the sideboard and dabbing at her eyes. “Now, why don’t you have a little bit of sausage, just for me?”

  And just for her father Emily began to eat her dinner, observed by her mother, who could do nothing right.

  At quarter past seven Irene left them to it—Emily taking longer than usual to go to sleep, demanding a second story from Martin—and made her way to Carrickbawn Senior College. She parked the car and pulled out her mobile phone and dialed the number her mother had given her. She hoped the Spanish woman’s English was better than Pilar’s.

  “Allo?”

  “Hello—is that”—she checked the page—“Katerina?”

  “Yes.” She pronounced it “jes.” “Who is this please?”

  “My name is Irene Dillon. I was given your name by, er”—what had her mother said?—“someone who knows you.”

  “Jes?”

  “I’m looking for an au pair, and I believe—”

  “Oh, sorry,” the voice said, “but I have new job, very sorry.”

  “Thank you,” Irene said crisply, and hung up.

  So much for that. Could immigrant workers really be that hard to come by? Irene seriously doubted it, but where were they all? Martin had made it clear that a new au pair wasn’t the route he wanted to take, so he was going to be no help at all. It was up to Irene to find one.

  Maybe she could put it to the class this evening, maybe one of them would have some kind of a lead. Maybe Zarek would know someone; he must have immigrant friends.

  So degrading, to have to rummage around like this for a maid. She slipped her phone back into her bag and opened the car door—and was startled to receive a broad smile from the antisocial Northern man, who’d just pulled up beside her.

  “Lovely day,” he said, “isn’t it?”

  —————

  The mechanic listened to the sound of his wife leaving for her art class. Her footsteps on the path, her car door opening and closing, the engine starting up, the car moving off. He waited until the sound had disappeared completely. Then he waited another five minutes before pulling out his phone.

  When can we do it again? he typed. Short and to the point, she wasn’t one for chitchat. She saw what she wanted and she went for it.

  She was dynamite. The thought of her made him hard. He pressed send and off it went.

  —————

  “I’m looking for an au pair,” Irene said. “Someone for a bit of housework and childminding. I was wondering if any of you know someone who might be interested.”

  “Yes,” Zarek said immediately, grasping at his escape from the possibility of having Pilar as a co-worker. “My flat mate is looking for new job,” he told Irene. “Very nice person, very friendly. Loves the little childrens. Very good worker.”

  “Sounds perfect. Would you happen to have her number?”

  Zarek tore a corner off his page and scribbled Pilar’s name on it, and copied her number from his phone. Maybe he should phone Pilar during the break, tell her to
expect a call. No—better not get her hopes up, just in case nothing came of it. Although Irene certainly sounded interested.

  He handed the piece of paper to her. She glanced at it before putting it into her handbag.

  “Thanks a lot,” she said. “Much obliged.”

  —————

  The door opened and Audrey hurried in, looking flustered.

  “So sorry,” she said, shrugging off her jacket. “I do hope I’m not late. My little dog escaped from the garden and I had to go looking for her.”

  “Relax; it’s only two minutes past,” Irene told her.

  “Oh, that’s a relief.” Audrey dumped her canvas bag on the table at the top of the room. “Anyone seen Jackie?”

  “She’s on the way,” Fiona said. “I met her in the corridor when I was coming in.”

  “Good.” Audrey pulled a cardboard tube from the bag. “While we’re waiting for her, I’ll show you what we’ll be doing tonight.”

  “Have you find your dog?” Zarek asked.

  Audrey smiled warmly at him as she eased the top off the tube. “Yes, I got her, she’d only gone as far as the next garden. She’s still a puppy, she’s very lively and curious.”

  She reached into the tube and eased out a rolled-up sheet. “Now, I want you to look at this drawing and see what you notice.”

  She unrolled the sheet and stuck a blob of Blu-Tack to each corner and attached it to the blackboard. Her students regarded the charcoal image in silence.

  The female subject was nude and seated on a stool with her back to the artist, but she was turning from the waist to look over her shoulder. Her arms were raised, piling her hair onto her head, the curve and nipple of the near-side breast just visible. A towel was draped loosely at her hips, her buttocks rising from its folds. Her face was in three-quarter profile, her lips slightly parted in a half smile.

  The rolled edge and claw feet of a bath were visible to the right of the figure. The impression was given of someone just about to step in—or maybe just out.

  The proportions and perspective were perfect, the lines gracefully and confidently executed. There was a wonderfully sensual feel to the image.

  “Tell me what you notice,” Audrey repeated when nobody spoke.

  “It’s like a negative,” Meg said. “Like it’s reversed, or something.”

  Audrey nodded. “Exactly right—”

  Jackie entered just then, wearing her usual dressing gown and carrying her rucksack. Sorry, she mouthed at Audrey as she dropped the rucksack and began taking off her shoes. Audrey smiled at her briefly before turning back to the class.

  “That’s exactly what it is, a drawing in reverse. It’s called a tonal study. What we do is cover the whole section first with pencil or charcoal”—she indicated the sheet—“and then we pick out the figure using our putty rubbers. It’s like you’re doing the opposite of what you normally do. You’re rubbing out the figure instead of drawing it.”

  They were silent, their eyes still on the drawing. Jackie tucked her rucksack under a chair and undid the belt of her dressing gown.

  “It’s a useful exercise,” Audrey went on. “The object is to pay attention to the tones and planes of the figure, to see where the light hits, and what shapes are created by it. Once Jackie is in position I’ll go through it in more detail.”

  “Who did it?” Irene asked.

  Audrey blushed a little. “I did, actually, at a life drawing course I attended last summer. In Tuscany,” she added.

  “It’s great,” Fiona murmured, and the others chimed their agreement.

  “You are very good artist,” Zarek said.

  Audrey’s cheeks grew pinker. “Oh, well, thank you…anyway, that’s what we’ll be trying out tonight. I think you’ll enjoy it.”

  Jackie came to the center of the room and stood by the chair, looking questioningly at Audrey.

  And the fourth life drawing class began.

  —————

  Michael sat in the gathering dusk and remembered his wife laboring over the flower beds, easing up weeds or thinning seedlings or dead-heading flowers. Ruth had loved the garden; she was happiest when she was making things grow, or simply sitting on summer evenings where Michael sat now, surrounded by the scents and colors that she’d created.

  He’d let the place go after she died. He’d never been any good in a garden anyway, better at admiring flowers than growing them. Everything had faded away without Ruth to water and weed and nurture, and he hadn’t cared. What good were flowers to him, what did he want with scents and humming bees and flapping butterflies, when she was gone?

  He’d like it now, he’d like to have something to look at when he sat out here. Maybe he should employ a gardener, couple of hours a week, put a bit of a shape on it. The girl had started things off, with her weeding. Maybe she—

  He shut the thought off and turned his face to the sky, ribboned with grey and orange and purple. Wouldn’t mind being able to paint, like to try and capture that. Maybe he could do a class. He watched a bird flitting across the lawn, home to bed. He turned to glance up behind him and saw the curtains drawn in Valerie’s room.

  After another few minutes, when the darkness began to draw in, he rose and went indoors, and locked the door for the night.

  —————

  “I didn’t see you at the pool on Thursday.”

  “Yes, I must work. One of the other worker on holiday, so I work for her.”

  “Oh.” Meg sipped her tea.

  “How was birthday party?” Zarek asked.

  She rolled her eyes, pushing her glasses up in a gesture that was becoming familiar to him. “Well, busy, of course, and noisy. She invited all the girls from her class—she wanted all the boys to come too, but I had to put a limit on it. I think thirteen came.”

  Zarek imagined thirteen little girls full of sugar, leaping and shrieking around the house. “Lot of fun,” he said, thanking the gods that he’d escaped.

  Meg made another face. “Fun for the kids, sure—but I was exhausted at the end of it. Of course,” she added, “my darling husband wasn’t there—he said he had a meeting at work that he couldn’t get out of, very convenient. So I had to do the whole thing myself.”

  Zarek laid down his cup. “Please excuse,” he said. “I need toilet.”

  —————

  “So this is your first year of the playschool,” Irene said.

  “That’s right. I was a teacher before I went on maternity leave with my daughter, and basically I never went back. She’s just started school, so I thought I’d try this.”

  “And how do you like it?”

  “Well, it’s hectic, but I love working with children, especially really young ones. They’re a joy—most of the time.”

  Irene laid down her half-full cup. “Frankly, I don’t know how you do it. No offense, but I have to say it would be my idea of hell.”

  “None taken; each to his own,” Meg replied lightly. “What is it you do again?”

  “My husband and I own Fitness Unlimited, next to the library.”

  “I know it.” Meg ran a finger around the rim of her cup. “And I have to say that going to a gym would be my idea of hell.”

  Irene grinned. “Touché. By the way,” she went on, “what do you think of Zarek? He’s gorgeous, isn’t he?”

  “Zarek?” Meg’s hand drifted to her braid. “To be honest, I hadn’t really noticed.”

  Pathetic; what a bad liar she was. Couldn’t she see how everyone knew she was mad for him? Irene debated telling her that she was wasting her time, but then decided not to. Let Meg find out all by herself.

  —————

  “Would you mind if I told you something?”

  “Not at all,” Audrey replied. She never minded being taken into someone’s confidence. The very question, cloaked in a vague secrecy, usually suggested that the something in question was fairly interesting.

  “It’s just that…I’m pregnant.”


  Audrey’s face broke into a wide smile. “Oh Fiona, good for you. Your first?”

  “Yes, and I’m dying to tell everyone.”

  “Of course you—”

  “But my husband says we should wait, you know, until it’s safe.”

  “How far gone are you?” Audrey’s knowledge of pregnancy and all it entailed was limited to staff room chat among the teachers who found themselves in that condition. Nevertheless, she’d picked up a respectable amount of information over the years.

  “Only a few weeks; I suppose he’s right.” She glanced at the hand Audrey was using to hold her cup. “You don’t have children yourself?”

  “Not yet,” Audrey told her cheerfully, “but I live in hope.”

  “I think,” Fiona said, her blush deepening again, “you’d make a very good mother”—and it was with the greatest difficulty that Audrey resisted the impulse to hug her.

  —————

  “So how are you feeling?” Irene asked—compelled to show interest, since Fiona had shared her big secret the week before.

  “Fine—no morning sickness at all so far.” She crunched into a custard cream. “If I hadn’t done a test, I’d wonder if I was imagining things.”

  Irene remembered the awful queasiness that had begun barely three weeks into her pregnancy and lasted right through, making breakfast, and often lunch too, an impossibility. Her stomach churning, as if her body were rejecting the fetus as much as Irene’s mind had been.

  “You’re lucky,” she told Fiona. “Not everyone sails through. And you’re tiny, so you’ll probably get your figure back in no time.”

  “Maybe,” Fiona said, smiling brightly, “you should give it another go. I mean, I know you said you had a tough time before, but you never know, a second pregnancy might be a lot easier.”

  Irene wanted to slap the smile off her face. A few weeks’ pregnant and already an expert. Assuming that everyone was just dying to go through the horror of bringing another screaming baby into the world.

  “I have no intention of having another child,” she said. “I’m having far too much fun having sex with whomever I please. Why would I want to stop that?”