Chapter 4
Ileave William outside our uncles’ apartment building. I have to lie down. That interview with Kimberly was a total fiasco. I can’t do this. My painting is gone. Will we ever find it? My stomach clenches like it’s been punched.
That brief rainstorm beat down the flowers in the planters on our block. The daffodils are bowed over, their yellow petals touching the ground as if in supplication. The sky darkens, warning that it’s about to rain again. The Payne’s grey-and-cobalt sky, with the sap-green haze surrounding the sepia tree branches, dark-violet buds in the foreground, are a potent color combination. I snap a photo for later. Large raindrops fall on my head. I pull up the hood of my sweatshirt.
The rain comes down even heavier. Some people wait under the awning of the apartment building across the way. I run and let myself into our apartment, relieved not to see Tessa in the living room. I remove my water-logged sneakers and slip into my slippers. After hanging my wet sweatshirt and yoga pants in the bathroom and drying my face, I sink into a chair at our dining room table.
There is an empty space where Going for It 10:50 and New York Friends used to hang on a row of nails. A huge hole gapes in the middle of the wall, dwarfing my paintings around it. The bricks are worn and not uniform, with cream-colored cement around them. My art career is like this brick wall. I can’t seem to get through to the next level. I can’t climb over. The bare nails in a row are like a small column of ants making their way across a vast, reddish-brown dessert intersected by cream rivers dipping down. I keep telling myself to push ahead, to keep going and eventually I will be successful, but here the nails just stop. Maybe this is it. Maybe this is as far as I can go.
Tessa is on the phone in her room. I sneak past her door into my bedroom in the back extension and pull the pocket door closed. I collapse onto the bed. The pocket door opens behind me, and Tessa enters. I should really get a lock. None of my friends understand privacy.
“I was finally going to be a successful artist, oxymoron though that may be,” I wail, turning my head to face her.
She sits on my bed and rubs my back. “Remember, you’re still a successful artist; you’re just an undiscovered one,” she says, using one of my jokes against me.
“But at what point do I become realistic, as my mom says, and realize I don’t have it?”
“Not at this point,” she says. “Your inclusion in this exhibit shows that you were about to make it. You just need another exhibit.”
“It took me years to get this exhibit. And now my mom is back to saying I should get a viable career.” My room is a testament to my current careers. Four guitars stand in a rack in the corner; my art and our band posters cover the walls. There’s even the slight whiff of old paint. I open the window.
“You have to remember that’s just her shtick. It’s more wrapped up in whatever went on in your parents’ marriage and less about you or actually being an artist,” Tessa says. “There are successful artists.”
“I just wish I didn’t have to show up at John’s fundraiser and take all her snide comments about getting a real job.” I sit at my desk. “I should do a search now and see what other art shows I can apply to. I’ve been focused on painting instead of applying lately since I had this show and needed artwork to sell.”
My desk is cluttered with plastic soup containers repurposed for holding paint, all stacked on top of each other, brushes standing upside down in an indigo, metal pot. Some artbooks hide my computer. I move the books and power up my laptop.
Tessa’s face falls. She’s suffered through the rejection process with me before. I’m prepared for this to be a marathon, but I wish the signs along the way were encouraging me rather than discouraging.
Tessa asks, “You’re still going to look for the paintings, right?”
“Yes, William and I interviewed the owner of the catering company already.”
“William—Takashi’s hot nephew?”
“If you like the I’m-so-superior type.”
“At last year’s party, I caught him looking at you a few times.”
“He saw me screaming at Rex. He was probably examining this new specimen of a person who screams on the street.”
Tessa tilts her head and makes an mmm sound. “I don’t think I’d describe it as that.”
“Whatever.” I flop back down on my bed and turn onto my side to face her. “He’s definitely not my type.”
“Pity.” Tessa pulls her blonde hair back into a ponytail. “Both Peter and Rex were artists—your type—and they didn’t work out. Maybe you should try a new type.”
I rub my forehead. “Oh shit. I have to tell Peter I’m not in the Vertex Art Exhibit before he flies in for it.” I groan. “Why do I have to be so competitive? He’s going to share all his successes, and I’m going to have to grin and say I’m happy for him. And I am happy for him. It’s just that watching him succeed while I stay stagnant is hard.” I can only acknowledge that to Tessa. It makes me look bitter, if human. But she is even more competitive than me. “Anyway, both of my relationships with Peter and Rex were not as big a disaster as my opposites-attract parents’ marriage. Opposites most definitely do not work.”
“Instead of worrying about some formula about what works or doesn’t work, I think you have to trust your feelings,” Tessa says.
“Trusting my feelings is what got me into the Rex relationship.”
“Not your feelings when a hot guy is playing a guitar and singing you a love ballad,” Tessa says.
I laugh and punch her lightly. “C’mon, you’ve got to admit that’s hard to resist.”
“I could resist,” she says. “I’m a logical lawyer.” She’s half kidding, but she is more likely to weigh the pros and cons before acting than me.
“Those are fighting words, my friend,” I say. “If you’re just a logical lawyer, you’re even more likely to fail. You’re more likely to short-circuit.”
“Whatever. You should concentrate on finding your painting, not proving me wrong.”
“I’m very good at multitasking.” That’s one skill I have in spades as a struggling artist.
“My bet is on Vinnie,” she says. “He’s so slimy. Unless Rex flirted with the waitstaff and got them to carry it out.”
I snort. “Rex is charismatic and a flirt, but he’s not that persuasive.”
“Yes, plus he doesn’t have any motive,” Tessa says. “Rex wants you to succeed. It’s more publicity for the band.”
Tessa says she has to get back to work and leaves. I do a quick search of art show applications and make a list.
Who would steal the paintings?Still, the small circle of suspects gives me hope. And then because I’m feeling so unsettled, I wander into our living room and set up a canvas on an easel. But how can I even convey the emotion I’m feeling now? I won’t allow myself to feel completely destroyed. I need that hope that we’re going to find the paintings.
It doesn’t make sense to destroy the paintings. Black would convey my despair, but an all-black painting with a small, unpainted circle of hope on the side is not my style at all. I need to cheer myself up by painting something the opposite of what I feel. I make some pink by mixing titanium white with alizarin red. And then add cadmium yellow, violet, turquoise, Prussian blue to my palette—my happy colors.
Back staring at the blank canvas. That feeling of bubbly joy is gone. Now it is like a heavy weight is compressing me. I force myself to take a dab of paint and spread it on the canvas. A long brushstroke of pink. I paint a line of yellow next to it. It’s like a fricking carnival tent.
I sit on my stool. Pink and cadmium-yellow lines. Nothing inspires me further. I distract myself with other thoughts, and Tessa’s words come back to mind. There must be a good guy in my circle of musicians who could be a match for Tessa. It’s not like I haven’t flipped through my mental Rolodex of prospects before. Most are taken, and few are Tessa’s type, which is less scruffy musician and more cultured European. There’s Thijs, the singer for Bad Credit. He just moved here from Holland. He’s totally Tessa’s type—and he plays the guitar. I snicker. Tessa, you are so doomed.
I add another stroke of yellow. A strand of the brush gets stuck in the cadmium-yellow line. Apt. It’s my favorite brush, but it’s falling apart.
My uncle’s party felt like the other parties. No vibe of calamity. So much for a woman’s—or an artist’s—intuition.
My phone immediately rings.
“What?” he asks. His expression is so clear in my mind—his brow furrowed, his brown eyes a little quizzical, and he’s probably running his hand through his blond hair.
I curl up on our couch and tell him everything that has happened. A pigeon alights on the windowsill and struts back and forth, making a deep, cooing noise.
“I wasn’t coming for the art exhibit alone,” he says. “I was coming to see you. I think we should try again. We know our issues. We can work them out.”
Last time I couldn’t. We would each withdraw from the other when we conflicted, like icebergs drifting farther and farther apart in the Arctic. But even knowing that, we still couldn’t fix it. I tried, but it was too much to always have to be the one to reach out. But he was reaching out now.
“Maybe,” I say. “But right now, I just feel wrecked.”
He continues, “I might move back.” Peter lives in California. He wanted me to move with him, but I couldn’t leave New York. It’s not that California wasn’t seductive, with its warm breezes and beach life. But I couldn’t give up New York. I can’t explain my love affair with New York City. Living here is vital to my existence. It’s the energy, the gallows humor, the people—not only my friends but random exchanges with strangers.
“I can recommend you to some art dealers,” he says. “I’ve got a whole list I’m going to meet in New York. But we should probably wait until I solidify my contacts and this blows over for you. You only get one shot, and you don’t want to blow it. Further.”
He’s not coming just to see me. I swallow. Relief. And that alone tells me that my heart is no longer in it for him.
I say, “Peter—”
He cuts me off. “I know that last time you said you just wanted to be friends, but let’s see each other again in person and take it from there. No pressure, no commitments. Don’t say no. I’ve gotta go, but I’ll see you in New York.” He hangs up.
I hate it when he does that to me.
Right.Time to paint. I sit back on my stool again, staring at the canvas. That whole interview with Kimberly was a total disaster. I’m too scattered right now—too upset about my painting being stolen. I close my eyes and take a deep breath in, sitting up straight on my artist’s stool. I’m letting my emotions take over. Another deep breath. Focus. I can figure this out.
My phone buzzes. The police want to talk to me.