5. Art
ART
I spend the day struggling to concentrate on my work, finding my gaze constantly drawn to the ceiling and any movement going on up there.
When I told the others how we were going to be spending our evening, I was met with laughter and back slapping.
Kane snorted. “She’s only just got here and Art’s already under the thumb!”
Rocco joined in the ribbing. “You going to give her a foot rub when we’re done?”
“She is fit though,” Kane said. “I wouldn’t say no.”
For some reason, Kane’s words caused a rush of jealousy to surge up inside me.
With his long blond hair and flirty attitude, Kane is popular with the women who visit the shop.
I don’t want Kane to hit on Theresa while we’re all up there, sorting out the flat and drinking her beer and eating the pizza she’d bought.
She doesn’t seem like the type of woman who would fall for Kane’s obvious come-on tactics, but I don’t want to take that risk either.
I don’t need any more complications, and having one of my staff get involved with my landlady would only end in a mess.
Yet I find myself anticipating being in her company again. I’m certainly no domesticated god, but I can help her sort the place out, even though I’m only in it for the free beer and pizza.
The hours pass, and the three of us shut up shop and then prepare to head upstairs. Rocco and Kane are still ribbing me about being at her beck and call, but neither of them refuse to help with the clean up and head home either.
She must hear us coming up the stairs—which is hardly surprising considering the noise we’re making—as she opens the front door of the flat before we reach it.
She smiles sweetly as we approached, with me leading the way.
I don’t return the smile, and my scowl deepens when she holds out something rubbery and yellow to me. The smile doesn’t flinch from her face.
“I believe they’re called Marigolds,” she says.
I snatch the rubber gloves out of her grip.
Kane snickers behind me. “Do we hand in our balls as a deposit?”
Her expression doesn’t falter. “Only if you have a pair to leave.”
Despite my irritation, I bite back my smile at her retort.
“You can go without the gloves if you want,” she continues, “but we’re going to be using some industrial strength cleaning stuff for this place. If you like to bleach your skin off, go for it.”
“Fine,” Kane grumbles, taking a pair of the rubber gloves from her. “I don’t want to bleach my fucking tats off.”
Rocco just grins and accepts his without a grumble.
Looking around, I see she already made a start on the place.
She follows my gaze. “I didn’t want to touch anything that looked like it belonged to the shop.”
A few chairs are stacked on top of one another, and next to them a filing cabinet for the shop’s paperwork, and older folders of tattoo designs.
Cardboard boxes containing inks from when we changed suppliers a few years ago are sagged and splitting.
I spot some broken machines I’d thrown up here instead of trying to dispose of them.
I wish I’d had the opportunity to empty the place out before she arrived.
I should have done it as soon as I received the letter, but I’d truly believed I’d have more time.
Circumstances meant I’d been unable to. I hope she hasn’t come across anything I wouldn’t want her to see.
“Yeah, that’s fine,” I say, trying to figure out where I’m going to store all this stuff in the shop. I’ll probably have to get rid of it.
The other two have already got stuck in, picking up rubbish and shoving it into black bags.
Rocco turns on some music with his phone, the sound coming through the speakers, and they help themselves to the cans of lager Theresa provided as promised.
I try not to watch her as she works, the way her jeans mould to her hips and backside as she bends over to pick something up.
She must sense me watching, as she turns her head and catches my eye.
I force myself to hold her gaze. She doesn’t intimidate me—no woman intimidates me.
But then why does my heart rate step up when she looks at me?
Her lips tweak in a smile, her long dark lashes flicking down over her eyes.
My scowl deepens and I look away.
Someone rings the bell.
“Pizza!” she declares, and vanishes down the stairs, only to reappear a few minutes later balancing a stack of boxes on top of one another. The pile is so high, it’s impossible to see her around it, and I find myself smiling at the sight. I quickly snap off the expression before she sees.
Rocco and Kane whoop at the sight of the food, and before long we’re all chowing down on slices of meat feast and double pepperoni pizza. The girl has done good.
I notice she’s slipped away. I finish what I’m eating, take another swig from my drink, and get up to see what she’s up to. The couple of hours with the four of us working on the place has already made a massive difference.
I walk into the bedroom to find her standing beside the window, flicking through an A2 sized pad of sketching paper.
I stop short, frowning. Is she an artist, too?
Is that why she wanted to live above the studio, because she appreciates good art?
I take a step closer, something still not sitting right with me.
As she flips the page, it dawns on me that the paper is mine—a sketch pad I haven’t wanted to look at for the past ten years.
“Hey!” I snarl, storming across the room and snatching the item out of her hands. “You shouldn’t be looking at that.”
She doesn’t seem frightened by my aggression. “Is it yours? Those drawings are beautiful. Who is she?”
“None of your fucking business.”
She holds up her hands. “You’re right, it isn’t. The pad slid out onto the floor and it was open. I couldn’t help but see them. You’re really talented though.”
“Yeah, I know I am. I’m an artist for a living, remember?”
“You’re a tattoo artist,” she says.
“What the fuck do you think tattoo artists create if they’re not artists? The clue is in the name.” My voice comes out sharper than I intend, and she shrinks back.
“Sorry.” She glances away. “Of course, you’re completely right. I’ve just never had any experience with tattoos.”
I look at her in disbelief. “You don’t have any tattoos? Not even one, like the lower back or foot one all girls seem to get.”
Slowly, she shakes her head. “Nope, none. It’s never been my thing.”
“And yet here you are living above a tattoo studio.”
She gives a tight smile. “Yeah, go figure.”
“Why?” The beer has loosened my tongue. Where normally I’d have just left it, and not bothered getting into a conversation with some chick I didn’t even like, I find myself wanting to know.
She lifts her dark eyes to mine. “What?”
“Why have you come all the way from America to live in this dump? Why didn’t you just put the place on the market and take the cash?”
She shrugs. “It was the right time for me to make a change.”
“You could have made a damned big change with the amount of money this place would have brought in.”
Her face grows pinched, and I suddenly notice the dark smudges beneath her eyes.
“Money wasn’t enough,” she says. “I needed a change, and this place kind of landed in my lap. I didn’t have time to start putting a property on the market. I had to get away.”
I feel myself soften at her words. I wonder what made her up and leave everything to come to a strange city alone, to live in this shithole, with the three of us working beneath her.
“Sorry. I didn’t realise it was a touchy subject.”
Her gaze flicks to the sketch pad I’m still holding. “Just like I didn’t realise that was a touchy subject either.”
I press my lips together. “Yeah, sorry about that. It’s not touchy—at least it shouldn’t be. It was a long time ago.”
She nods. “I understand. Time isn’t always a healer, huh? Sometimes it only makes the pain worse.”
We stand, staring at each other.
“Theresa,” I start.
“Tess,” she replies, interrupting me and giving a little lop-sided shrug. “Everyone calls me Tess... or at least, they did.”
“Tess,” I repeat. “I just wanted to say sorry for the way?—”
Rocco and Kane bowl into the bedroom, their big, tattooed, now fairly drunk selves barrelling into the middle of our conversation.
“Hey, boss,” Rocco says. “I think we’re pretty much done.”
I turn to face my employee. “Yeah, all right, Rocco. You can get going.”
Rocco laughs. “I wasn’t talking to you, Art. I was addressing the lady. She’s the boss now.” He throws her a wink.
Tess presses a smile between her lips. “No problem, Rocco. Thanks for your help. You, too, Kane.”
Kane nods. “You coming, Art?”
I turn back to her. “You sure we’ve done enough?”
“Yes thanks. The apartment is looking a million times better.” She raises her voice, aiming it at the men already heading out the door. “Just remember to take the empty cans and pizza boxes with you.”
Rocco is already halfway out the flat, and calls back to her, “Will do!”
The moment I shared with Theresa has thrown me. There had been some kind of connection I haven’t felt in a long time. I look at her, standing beside the bedroom window, the light from the streetlamp filtering through the old net curtain. She appears small, but brave and determined as well.
“You sure you’re all right?” I ask. It feels weird leaving her here alone.
“I’m a big girl, Art,” she says. “I can look after myself.”
I’m tempted to point out that she isn’t so big, but decide against it. It seems we could go from everything being okay, to being at each other’s throats in nought to sixty.
She lifts her fine, dark eyebrows at me. “Don’t you have a home to go to?”
I try not to let her words sting as I turn and leave.
Truth is, I don’t have a home to go to.
I wasn’t supposed to be staying at the flat—that hadn’t been part of the lease I signed—but the old lady never visited the place, or made any attempt to rent it out separately, and the keys were on the same bunch as the master key I’d been given for the shop.
I poured everything into getting my business up and running, and I pay a decent salary to Rocco and Kane.
The work I do pro-bono means I’m losing hours from my own salary, but I don’t care.
As long as I have what I need—a roof over my head, food in my stomach, and to be my own boss in the shop—I don’t want for anything more.
Material possessions have never been important to me, and while others I’d been at school with had gone on to earn crazy money doing the London finance thing, I’d joined another tattoo studio as an apprentice, learning my craft.
So when the flat share I’d been in previously had fallen through, I’d just stayed at the shop.
I hadn’t told the rest of the guys. In their eyes, nothing had changed and they hadn’t noticed the couple of extra bags lying around.
I’d lost money on the previous place, and hadn’t had enough stashed away to get myself started somewhere new.
I’d told myself it was temporary and that I’d move out again as soon as somewhere else came up, but that never happened.
That had been six months ago now. When I received the letter saying the new owner of the property would be residing upstairs, I knew I was going to have to move out, but I thought I had at least another month or so.
I certainly hadn’t expected her to show up a few days later and start throwing out my stuff.
Perhaps I should have just owned up to the fact I’ve been living there, but my pride had prevented me.
So now I have a new landlady, not only here, but sleeping in my bed.