Ivy Secrets, page 45
“One dollar.”
“What?” She laughed, caught by surprise.
“One dollar. A special for the woman who says there’s nothing she wants … because she doesn’t know what it is she needs.”
“Now wait just a minute—”
“Take them,” he interrupted imperiously, then bobbed his head up and down, becoming again just a smiling old man. “Take them. You’d be doing me a favor. Now they’re fresh and bright, but they’ll just sit here on the shelf and dry up, all their possibilities gone to waste. Certainly you can make better use of them than that.”
“Yes,” Jamie said softly, eager to hold them in her hands. “But can’t I pay you a fair price? I feel like I’m cheating you.”
“No, my dear, you are pleasing me. Think of them as being meant for you.”
He was working as he spoke, wrapping the box in brown paper, tying it with twine. He handed it to her, and again she caught that glint of mischief and mystery in his eyes.
Jamie felt her cheeks flush. Holding the package to her chest, she handed him the dollar, then hurried to the door. “Thank you,” she whispered with a quick glance back over her shoulder. “Thanks.” Then she stepped out into the rain.
One stop at the store on the corner for more candles and she was back at the loft.
Fitting the key into the lock, she pushed the door open into darkness.
“Let there be light!” she quipped, striking a match.
Around her, piles and stacks and walls full of canvases took shadowy form. She set a candle on the windowsill, one on the kitchen table, one on her night table. Then she sat down and unwrapped the package.
The box itself was old, the wood worn to a smooth, polished veneer; the painting on the lid was faded and dim. But inside, the twelve perfect tubes of paint lay fresh and shining, each wrapped in shiny white paper, foreign words labeling them in a tiny, perfect hand. She couldn’t read their message, but that didn’t matter. One twist of their tops and the paint would spill out: ocher, burnt umber, cerise, cadmium yellow, saffron, Prussian blue, lamp black, white … each one more beautiful than anything real. As beautiful as dreams and wishes.
Her heart pounding with anticipation, Jamie put a fresh canvas on the easel. She would start now, right now. She wouldn’t waste a moment, not a second. This time she’d get it right. She would.
As she opened the paints light and shadow flickered in her imagination; images she had never considered came together. Rather than planning a design, she could feel it emerging, gathering form and power, racing from her brain to her fingertips like some irrepressible impulse.
Brush in hand, she made one sure stroke. Another. Letting the paint take her, she seemed almost to dream the form, the images of the painting she’d make. It was like entering into a trance: letting go of reality and slipping into another state, another consciousness … moving deeper and deeper toward some mysterious destination. Her hand moved of its own will. Colors appeared. Shapes blurred and shifted. The paint flowed, caressing the rough texture of the canvas. The canvas warmed, coming to life beneath the kiss of brush and paint.
And then a yawn shook her, and another right behind it. Glancing at the clock, Jamie couldn’t believe what time it was! She’d been painting for hours without stopping, almost without breathing. Suddenly she couldn’t keep her eyes open. Her eyelids were heavy; even her eyelashes felt tired. She cleaned her brushes, blew out the candles, and fell into bed. And for the first time in longer than she could remember, her sleep was free of nightmares.
The next evening, far across town, Edward Rockford stood in his bedroom, staring at his reflection in the mirror. Something seemed to hold him there against his will. He knew it was crazy but he had the strangest feeling that a shadow, an image, had flickered there behind his own, within his own.
“Damn.” The muttered curse escaped through clenched teeth. His jaw ached with tension. Scowling, he shook his head to clear his thoughts, but they remained as dark and brooding as they had been for months, for years. It seemed like forever.
And tonight? He did not want to be going out tonight. He didn’t think he could endure another meaningless society event, another stifling room filled with chattering people. Just thinking of it made him tug at the knot of his tie, the top button of his starched shirt. His dark eyes flashed with anger and frustration. There would be no companionship there, nothing of any substance. It would merely be another evening spent among strangers, filled with hollow laughter and shallow talk. It was driving him crazy. Crazy! He could feel his passion, his true self, stretch and circle in its cage, pace the narrow limits, strain against its confines. He could feel its claws pierce his heart, his soul.
But no!
Staring straight ahead, holding his own dark gaze, he fought the passion down. Stilled it. Lashed it tight to the bars of his muscle and bone, the cage he had forged out of will and despair.
Why go? Why bother? I’ll stay here. Pour a drink. Read. I won’t go.
But something drove him on, restless, seeking. And tonight that feeling was stronger than ever, fierce and compelling. But to what? What hope? What dream?
Fool!
He smiled a cold, bitter smile, a mocking smile so chilling it would have raised goose bumps on the arms of the women waiting for him in the car downstairs. If they had seen. Which they never would.
“Never,” he whispered, erasing all emotion from his face, all feeling from his dark, dark eyes.
And, looking as cool and soulless as a painting, he shrugged into his jacket and left.
At that same moment the phone rang in Jamie’s silent loft. It made her jump. Brush still in hand, she walked over to where the phone lay on the floor next to the bed. “Hello?”
“Jamie? Hello, this is Kent. From next door?”
“Yes, hi. How are you?” She shifted from one foot to the other, impatient already.
“I’m great. And I’m about to make you an offer you can’t refuse. My friend’s got three tickets to the opening tonight at Lupercine. It’s their photography show. Great stuff! So you’re coming with us. Be ready in an hour.”
Jamie shook her head. “I can’t. Thank you but—”
“No ifs, ands, or buts. You’ll love it, and you can’t play the hermit forever. Say yes.”
“No, I really can’t. I’m in the middle of painting and I don’t want to stop. But it was very nice of you to think of me. I appreciate it.”
“Sure. You know what? I’ll just slip the extra ticket under your door. Use it if you can. Bye.”
“Good-bye.”
Jamie stared at the receiver for a moment, then set it down, frowning. She had been painting all morning and afternoon, caught in the same trancelike state as the night before, and this interruption annoyed her. The last thing she needed was some enamored neighbor lurking at her door. As if she was anticipating his unwelcome appearance in that very spot, her gaze swept the room.
She gasped, her eyes flying wide.
Across the room, her canvas looked gorgeous, vibrant, alive with a shimmering light that seemed to come from within it, from the paint itself. She stood dumbfounded, transfixed. That was the light she’d imagined, the light she’d seen before only in her dreams. There … there in her painting!
Unaware of her own movement, she took one step closer. Maybe it was only a trick of light coming in through the windows, some crazy mix of smog and sun. Maybe she was dreaming it now. She rubbed her eyes, getting paint in her hair and on her forehead, but she didn’t feel a thing. The light remained. A beautiful light, a perfect light …
But a landscape.
On the canvas, unforeseen and unplanned, a scene was taking shape: a sweep of hills, trees, a building of some kind hinted at by sharp, dark strokes of umber. It seemed barely hidden beneath her usual abstract style. The brush strokes were hers, as familiar as her own signature. The colors were hers, her characteristic overlay of thin layers of bright hues. But … a landscape?
She hadn’t painted a landscape since her first formal art class when her father had walked into the studio, glanced over her shoulder, and passed judgment: “Well, you don’t have much of an aptitude for that technique, do you?”
That had hurt. It still did. So she certainly had no intention of painting a landscape now … or ever.
But is it possible to paint something you don’t even know you’re painting? she wondered. Goose bumps rose on her arms.
She approached the easel warily. She drew a deep breath.
Biting nervously at her lower lip, she reached for the brush. But suddenly it felt cold and dead in her hand and her hand was shaking. It took all her energy just to screw the caps on the tubes of paint and to clean her brushes. And soon the loft would be dark.
Maybe she should go out for a little while. A bath first, a bite to eat, and then the opening. Suddenly it seemed like exactly the right thing to do. Hurrying into the bathroom, she ran the water good and hot, added some bath salts, and then sank through the cool bubbles into the heat and comfort with a sigh. Closing her eyes, she kept her mind carefully empty. No thoughts. No fears. No dreams. Nothing.
So she was completely unaware of what was about to begin … or had already begun.
Jean Stone, Ivy Secrets
