by P. J. Burgy
Tommy woke up around noon and fussed for lunch. He accepted leftover Chinese reheated in the microwave and ate at the futon as she rushed around the house.
“Wiener-man is out there. I hear his dogs. Fucking hate those dogs.” Tommy started a new game and turned up the volume on the TV.
“Tell me about it. He stopped me yesterday.” Lizzie slipped into the living room, looked for her display stands, grabbed them, and slipped back to the front door. She placed her things in a box by the umbrella stand.
“Creepy lonely weirdo.”
“Can you help me load the paintings into the trunk?”
“Uh, kinda in the middle of something…” He button-mashed the controller, focused on the TV, and shook his head in her direction.
“We’ve got time. We need to leave a little before two. What are you going to wear?”
“Oh, I’m not going.”
She nearly dropped the box of her business cards she’d carried out from her writing room. “What?”
“Not really my scene, but you have a good time.”
“You took off for today, didn’t you?”
“I did, but I’m still not feeling well. I want you to enjoy yourself though. I hope a bunch of people come and someone buys one or more of your paintings. You deserve it.” He glanced over at her cautiously, his tone flat.
Lizzie balked at him, and he remained facing away. Giving up, she shrugged and stalked off.
She heaved the box of paintings into the trunk of her car, panting from the exertion, and went back inside to get dressed and do her makeup.
Tommy paid her no mind until she appeared in the living room, flattening the front of her black dress. He looked at her once, did a double take, and smiled at her. “Looking good. New dress?”
“Yeah. Got it for tonight.”
“You should wear that for me then.”
“When? We don’t go anywhere.”
“We might one day. What time will you be home?”
“Not sure. Margo said it’d be open until ten.”
“I can’t imagine it’ll run that long.”
“We’ll see.”
“What about dinner?” He turned from her to pay attention to the TV.
“There’s stuff in the fridge.”
“I was thinking we could pick up burgers and fries from Biggles tonight.”
“I can’t.”
“It’s not like I can go anywhere, Lizzie. You have the fucking car. What am I supposed to eat?”
She fidgeted. “I said there was food in the fridge.”
“I don’t want that. I need starch. I’m hypoglycemic, remember? I need to eat specific things, or I get really sick, Lizzie. We don’t have anything here. Need fries.” He rolled his eyes and set his controller to the side, growing visibly agitated. “So, aim to be home by eight, okay? I can snack until then, but I’m going to need real food eventually.”
“The market is a ten minute walk if you-”
“In the snow? In the dark? In the cold? With my bad back and a migraine threatening?”
Her lips pulled back. “Please, Tommy.”
“Why do you hate me, Lizzie?”
“I don’t, it’s just-”
“You do!” He waved his controller around, ignoring the game for a few, tense seconds before turning back to play. “You resent me because I make you feel bad about your insufficiencies. I know that’s why. You feel bad for doing this shit to me, but you don’t stop to think about why you do it. I carry this household, you know. I vacuumed the house yesterday, Lizzie. The whole house. My back still hurts. I almost threw up.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll text you later, okay?”
“Eight, Lizzie. Be home by eight.” He scowled at the TV, hunching over on the futon.
“Eight.”
She swallowed thickly and finished loading the rest of the smaller boxes into her car. After she was done, she checked her purse on the porch. Not having pockets caused her a bit of anxiety and she made sure her wallet and phone had been packed away securely.
She, locked the front door, checked it a few times, and exhaled slowly, purposely. Her face felt warm, but her fingers tingled from the chill in the air. She zippered her jacket up as protection against the cold and walked to her car, her high black boots clacking on the sidewalk.
Margo Jenkins was about Lizzie’s age, but much tanner and blonder. She clapped her hands together, her long, red nails gleaming like talons above her head. She shuffled toward Lizzie’s car in her stiff high heels as soon as she’d parked in the lot next to the frame shop.
“Lizzieeeeeee!”
“Oh jeez, be careful!” Lizzie got out of her car and waved her hands at Margo, urging her to slow down. “Is there anyone else here?”
“Girl, Brad was helping me move furniture upstairs earlier. And he’s also gonna help us with the event, hah!” Margo clapped her hands again, grinning with red painted lips. “Where’s Tommy? Pussed out?”
“Ah…”
“Figured. That’s why I asked Brad to help.” Margo fixed her low-cut blouse, pursing her lips. “He’ll be down in a sec.”
“You want to get the smaller boxes upstairs then?” Lizzie popped the trunk and grabbed a box.
“Yeah, sure.”
They spent the next few hours bringing boxes up and setting the second floor for the gallery. Margo already had her paintings – pleasant scenic landscapes – hung up in the first big room. Brad had hung them carefully, his broad shoulders carrying the brunt of the weight when it came to the prep work.
Margo flirted with him frequently as they worked together on placing tables. Lizzie ignored their playful banter, well aware that it meant nothing. Brad wasn’t Margo’s boyfriend, nor was he in the running for the position. In the town, Margo was notorious for her free spirit and propensity to chase down the single gentlemen for a good time. She was the opposite of Lizzie, and yet they had something in common; they didn’t quite fit into the small-town atmosphere. They were both aliens.
She’d been a childhood friend. Always fancy. Always loud. Always the one to grab Lizzie’s arm and drag her around to places she didn’t want to go. And yet, here she remained. Lizzie had been surprised to see Margo still there, still in her childhood home – her parents had moved to Florida years back – and still making a name for herself by living the life she wanted to live in Puhtipstie.
It didn’t hurt that her parents had been wealthy. Margo had a large house close by. She lived there all alone, hosting little parties with out-of-town friends sometimes. The frame shop had been her mother’s and Margo had happily inherited it when her parents retired and moved down south. It was an avenue to her real goal: becoming a model. She had framed portraits of herself all over the walls in the downstairs shop. One day, she said, one day a talent agent would visit her shop and whisk her away to fame and fortune.
Margo Jenkins, super star.
At thirty years of age, it didn’t seem to be a dream coming true anytime soon. But that didn’t stop Margo. Nothing stopped Margo. She was a force of nature.
“Girrllllll!” Margo cried, waving her hands at the table. They’d just finished setting it and the cooler on the floor crackled with ice, the cans of soda settling. “I’ve got the wine in the fridge downstairs! I say we dump the sodas and put the bottles in the ice instead.”
Lizzie faltered, wiping her brow. “But, uh…”
“This is an art gallery, not a cookout. We need the wine. I have white and red. And glasses!”
“I don’t want to drink tonight. Can we keep the soda?”
“Oof, sure. Ugh.” Margo yielded to the request with a pained grimace. She stomped off in her heels, walking downstairs to the shop as Brad trailed after her, waiting in the wings to assist in any way he could.
Lizzie smiled and took a walk around the two rooms on the second floor. It had come together nicely. The long, red throw rugs looked pretty dang sharp on the dark linoleum floor and the black tablecloth meshed well with the gray
walls. Margo had her scenery paintings – fifteen total, mostly 24x×36 in light wooden frames – hung all around the first room. They’d placed the table with the covered plates of food against the flat wall at the right corner. The second room was hers, complete with another smaller table, her books displayed there, and her cards stood proudly beside them. Some 4×4 plaques adorned the table as well, set to the side and laid out in an uneven grid.
She stopped to admire one of her paintings, her hands clasped behind her back. A stormy evening, the clouds rippling and ominous, lay before her. Below those clouds stood a sinewy figure clad in shadow, arms out and expectant. She’d labeled this one ‘Storm Crow’.
Her other paintings had a similar aesthetic; they were grim with contrasting light and shadow. Murky. Unsettling. Helena had made a valid point about Lizzie’s untapped horror market, even if it wasn’t a genre she wanted to write in. It was visual to her. It came out in the paint, not words.
Margo came back upstairs with two wine bottles, Brad carrying four behind her. She heard the ice crackling again as Margo stuffed the white wine into the cooler, moving the sodas to the side and grumbling.
At four, when the gallery opened, Kate Grimes was the first person to arrive – dressed in a long, green shirt and black leggings, her white hair tied back in a long braid. She stopped at the cooler, cracked open a diet cola, and sipped on it while Margo prattled at her about the bookstore and selling her art there as well. Kate said there wasn’t much room, but would consider it, edging away from the bubbly blonde inch by inch.
Lizzie smiled as Kate peeled away, another guest entering: a Margo fanboy named Herbert who had brought her flowers and demanded her immediate attention. Brad broadcasted his displeasure before storming out of the gallery. An argument ignited, over within minutes, replaced by new voices and loud greetings from the first room.
Kate and Lizzie stood in the second room, eavesdropping on the conversations emanating from Margo’s side of the floor. More people had arrived after all. A few locals, but mostly Margo’s friends from online and school. A couple tan, hip looking strangers poked their heads into the second room, caught sight of the walls within, and ducked back out.
“This is nice,” Kate said, gesturing to one of the paintings. “But she has prices on hers. Why don’t you?”
“I didn’t know how to, honestly.” Lizzie shrugged. “And I doubt anyone will ask.”
“I asked.”
“Other than you, I mean…”
“Think about it then. I have a marker and sticky notes. You need to price them, Lizzie.”
“Sure…”
“No Tommy?”
Lizzie shrugged again.
Kate rolled her eyes and sipped at her cola. “Surprise surprise. I’m sorry. That was rude. But then again, so is he.”
“I won’t defend him. I’m mad too.”
“As you should be.”
Lizzie exhaled. “He wants me home at eight.”
“Eight? This thing runs from four to question mark! That could be nine. That could be ten.”
“I’ll text him around seventy-thirty in any case…”
Kate lifted her top lip. “To. The. Wolves.”
Feigning a grin, Lizzie shook her head. “Not sure they’d even want to eat him.”
Kate snorted and sipped her cola again. “Worth a try.”
Margo floated in with a glass of white wine, a couple of her friends at her side. Idle banter ensued as she introduced Lizzie, and Kate stepped back to escape the huddle.
“Everyone, this is Lizzie Clay, my best friend!” Margo stated, lifting her wine glass.
Lizzie waved, swaying on her feet, and found herself barraged by a litany of questions about her paintings. None of the questions were especially flattering.
After ten minutes, Margo drifted out and her friends followed, leaving Lizzie alone with Kate once more.
“That was exciting,” Kate said. “I’ll stick around another hour or so, but then I’m heading out, Lizzie. I can’t take much more of her.”
“I appreciate that you even came.”
“I had to. You’re my best employee.”
“I’m your only employee.”
“True. I’m getting another soda.” Kate wandered off into the first room, dodging the other guests as soon as she walked in.
Lizzie grabbed her purse under the table and checked her phone, relieved to see she hadn’t gotten any messages.
When Teddy and Helena Miller arrived, Lizzie was in the middle of making a plate of crackers, pepperoni slices, and cheese. Kate had slipped off to the bathroom downstairs – the two colas had done her in – leaving Lizzie by herself to mingle awkwardly with Margo’s friends.
“Oh no, you two!” Margo pointed at Teddy before he could reach the table. “One plate, Theodore Miller! I’m watching you!”
Lizzie turned, already amused, and ate as the siblings stalked over to her, bypassing Margo entirely. “You came.”
Teddy wore something a bit nicer than his hoodie, though it appeared he’d had help with the tie. He looked like he had come in for an interview, his jacket tweed with leather elbows and his button up shirt a pale green. The teen had even combed his wild hair back and put on some slick brown slacks. “Free food. Never say no to free food.”
“This room smells like pretentiousness and unwashed yoga pants,” Helena hissed, head low and eyes narrowed. She hadn’t dressed up at all, wearing that same big, puffy coat with the fur trimmed hood.
“Where’s your art, Lizzie?” the brother asked, clumsily piling food onto a plate with tongs. He loaded up on the pepperoni.
She nodded toward the wide entrance into the second room, the divider standing partly in the way. “There.”
Helena grabbed eight slices of cheese, counting them as she went, clutched them to her chest, and stormed into the second room. “I’ve seen enough flowers. Now it’s time for the good stuff!”
Kate came back to see Helena and Teddy eating and staring at the walls, admiring Lizzie’s paintings while mumbling back and forth in their usual fashion. She cracked open yet another diet cola. “Oh boy. Look who showed up.”
Helena whirled. “Hullo, Kate!”
Teddy stared at a painting of a nude woman wearing a deer skull as a mask, her form obscured by red mist and thin branches. The title card read ‘The Visitor’. “It’s beautiful.”
“Cause it’s boobies,” Helena said.
“Did you kids check out Margo’s paintings when you were raiding her snacks?” Kate asked, taking her spot next to Lizzie’s table.
“Not a fan of fields of flowers and happy little trees,” Helena answered, shoving a piece of cheese in her mouth after. “Wanha shee grimnesh.”
“Grimness?” Kate raised an eyebrow.
“That’sh whash Mom call’d it.” Helena swallowed and licked her lips after. “Grimness. Like Edgar Allan Poe. Lizzie is like him. But with paint.”
Lizzie chuckled. “Your mom was into horror too?”
Helena and Teddy nodded at the same time.
“Explains a lot,” Kate mused.
“She used to let us watch whatever we wanted.” The girl pursed her lips. “Unlike Dad, who has channels blocked. Not that it stops us. His passwords are embarrassingly easy to guess.”
Lizzie smiled, eating her food, and watched as the siblings made their rounds and discussed her paintings in low, secretive tones.
After thirty minutes had gone by, they announced their departure because ‘their show would be on soon’ and slipped away like ghosts.
A little over an hour later, Margo rushed in, clearly beyond excited, and flitted over to Lizzie with her hands balled before her. “Lizzie! Lizzieeeee!”
“Hm?”
Margo bit her bottom lip. “There is… this super hot… super suave piece of man meat out there.”
“Who?”
“No idea. Never seen him before. But he’s looking at my paintings right now. You have to come get your peepers on him,
stat!” She did a little dance, grinning widely.
Kate sighed with audible frustration, twisting her wrist to look at her watch. “Lord…”
“Um, okay?” Lizzie blinked at Margo and strolled over to the divider between the two rooms. Margo stood beside her, nudging her elbow to hurry her along.
Leaning out a little into the first room, she scanned over the faces and counted eight people – only two she recognized as locals. Most were unknown to her. A woman, tan and blonde, dressed to the nines. Another woman, tan and brunette in flamboyant matching sweater and tights. A thin punk-haired fellow with a crazy jacket. A tall, dark stranger in a slate gray jacket idly gazing at a painting of sunflowers, his hands in his pockets. He could have been Lizzie’s age, or he could have been older – it was hard to tell. Classically handsome, like a male lead from the black and white Hollywood films. He stood out like a sore thumb.
“That’s him. Isn’t he adorbs?” Margo hissed into Lizzie’s ear, grasping her arm tightly.
As if he’d heard, he tilted his head and glanced over at the divider, gaze curious but distant.
Lizzie ducked back into the second room, rolling her shoulders dismissively. “Sure. Go hit on him, Margo.”
“I was going to, but I wanted you to see him first. What a hottie. Phew! Wonder what he’s doing in Puhtipstie…”
Kate muttered to herself. “Probably lost and looking for a bathroom.”
Lizzie gently pulled away from Margo and made her way to the table, standing beside Kate again. “Or he’s that new guy in town. I heard the Hildemann place was sold, and someone moved in recently.”
“Oh, so he’s wealthy too!” Margo said.
Lizzie smirked. “If it’s him, sure.”
Two of Margo’s friends wandered in and eyed up Lizzie’s artwork. They seemed unsure of what to say at first and offered big smiles to her as Margo introduced them.