Chapter 16
BARDY
It is a wise father that knows his own child.
Bardy turns and introduces Satya to the group. Their faces are a picture. Not at all sure they want a newcomer.
Except this is no Tash. No acid mustard.
He has known Satya’s husband, Jack, forever.
One of Tom’s best friends from school. And Satya nearly as long.
The couple met as lanky fourteen-year-olds in the school grounds.
He had to keep turfing them out of the cupboard in the sports hall for making out.
He stifles a laugh, thinking of what Jack had whispered to him. Well, begged him.
“Just keep her here. Had to get her out of the house. Think the boys were going to kill her.”
How old were they now? Three boys, somewhere between two and seven. Which probably means between seven and twelve. Always surprises him.
Jack had added, “And if they don’t kill her, I will.”
Satya is now smiling around at everyone. She has no idea they worry she is the new Tash. That the group is thinking they like it the way it is. Even Lou looks cautious. What you need in this situation—he has been here before when a latecomer arrives—what you really need is . . .
And there she is: the smiler.
Linda: “Can I pour you a glass of wine, Satya? And you’re going to have a go at photography, you say? How interesting.”
Satya smiles back gratefully, and Bardy sees the group relax. Not a lot. But a little. Enough room for Satya to wriggle in. Which he is sure she can do—she’s a nice woman, after all.
Who her boys want to kill. He allows himself a proper smile as he passes Satya the glass that Linda is holding out.
“Yes, I used to do quite a lot of photography, and then just kind of stopped. But a few years ago, I went to an evening class, but then didn’t really stick to it because of work and the kids. You know how it is.” She looks around, and Kate and Linda nod encouragingly.
Looks like Kate is coming round to Satya too.
“Jack bought me a new camera for my birthday and as you can see . . .” She laughs. “He thought it would be a good idea for me to come to this group, and maybe enter something for the competition.” She sips her wine. “I’m afraid I’m a bit of a workaholic and find it hard to stop.”
“What do you do?” Pia asks.
“I run an online beauty and wellness company, mainly makeup and skincare, but we’re expanding into supplements as well.” She then names a brand that even Bardy has heard of. And not just because he knows Satya and Jack.
“Your skin concentrate serum is very good,” Pia comments.
One more in.
“Can I pass you a pastry, Katya?” Leonard says.
Ah, well, Linda will sort that out later.
“Oh, these are delicious,” Satya exclaims, taking a bite. “Did you make them, Luigi?”
“Oh, please call me Lou,” says the woodturner and baker.
Bardy sits back. Full house.
Apart from Tay. But surely Tay is going to be interested in a woman who has built her own company from scratch.
“Have I missed much?” Satya asks.
The remaining time in the group is spent discussing what they are all going to have a go at for the competition. Satya asking interested questions.
It always frustrates Bardy how people relegate creative projects in their lives.
Satya is talking about never having the time.
She clearly loves the idea of getting back into photography, but confesses to Linda that it is always at the bottom of her list. Linda, who never seems to give anything the time it needs to improve.
Bardy hears her laughingly telling Satya, “The thing is, I really think I’m going to be good at them straightaway. It’s a bit of a shock.”
Pia and Leonard are talking about painting and music.
He has seen this before, too—how a family can influence what you do, or rather don’t do.
Pia is describing her super musical family, and confesses that she never feels quite good enough to play.
Leonard tells her about the brother who paints so much better than him, and his father who told him, You are the scientist, your brother’s the artist. It turns out Leonard plays the piano too.
He talks of the joy of a Bach fugue, the initial theme stated and then restated and entwined until it becomes a triumphant resolution. He’d like to play more but . . .
Lou is telling Kate more about Tina and asking about her own chemo.
Kate confesses how the stress of the past four years, and perhaps even earlier, has stopped her from going out and sketching.
Lou is talking about not having the space before.
He had always fancied working with wood.
Who knew. But didn’t really have the place for it.
He would really like to create something that is just a beautiful shape.
But this seems wasteful. So he’s going to have a go at making something useful, like bowls and platters.
Bardy has heard much of this before. How a comment as a child could stop a fledgling talent dead in its tracks. Or prohibit the simple enjoyment of something creative.
“Oh, you have to be really good at art to get anywhere.”
“Do you know how many books come out that only ever sell one copy?”
Hana told Bardy that husbands were often the worst for the women she taught.
A laugh and a throwaway—“Call that art!”—had stopped one woman picking up her brushes for ten years.
And so many people felt they could only do something if they were good at it—not thinking that it might just be enjoyable or therapeutic.
Or that with time, they would get better.
Hana changed how he thought, and he is grateful for that. She once told him, “I used to feel like I had to justify why I painted. Now I just paint. It is who I am. It makes me happy.”
Simple really.
Does his writing still make him happy? Yes, mainly.
But he gets where Kate is coming from. Stress can be a killer.
Not being in the right frame of mind. Still, he does always write his phone poems on color.
His version of temazepam. Or beer. Today’s was called “Dutch Corner,” based on the bank of orange created by Netherlands supporters who gather on a particular section of the Tour de France.
He had seen it once, and as orange smoke from flares had drifted across a sea of orange, he had experienced the pure rush of joyous color.
“We’re doing life drawing next week,” he hears Linda tell Satya. It brings him back from his detour into his hobbyhorse. Maybe he could write a poem called “Hobbyhorse Gray?”
“Is that just for the artists?” Satya asks.
“No, we all do it,” Bardy assures her. “I think it’s good to try different things. It can end up influencing what you do. Even if it’s about form and shape and the whole process of really looking.”
Leonard now looks uncomfortable. “Will it be a female or a male model?”
“Oh, I think male, don’t you, Bardy?” Linda is smiling at him. So is Kate.
Quite frankly, he has no idea. He knows his friend Colin, an ex–art teacher, will help him with the class, but he has no idea where he will find a model. One thing he is sure of, though, is that he won’t be volunteering.
Bardy decides to walk the long way home, past the fishing quay.
The tide is in and the water is flat calm.
Lights reflected from the buildings form luminous drips running into the inky depths.
The town is quiet, despite it being the Easter school holidays.
The air is cold, and it is late on a Monday night.
The only human sound coming from a few couples hurrying past and the occasional opening and shutting of the fish-and-chip shop door, the volume of conversation from within ebbing and flowing on the ring of a bell.
Bardy sits on the harbor wall next to a Tetris of lobster pots and pulls his jacket closer around him.
Out in the channel, an iron sculpture of a man stands, arms outstretched like a wind turbine.
Only arms and a head are currently visible, dark outlines against the water.
Perhaps he could get their model to stand like that?
That would freak out Leonard. And Lou. Bardy smiles.
Closer in, a tall ship, painted black and white, creaks on its moorings, as the smaller workaday fishing boats beside it shift in the wash from some movement unseen in the channel beyond.
Bardy reviews this evening’s session. It was good to see Jack.
Even briefly. There were times when it seemed like Jack had taken root in their house.
His parents hadn’t seemed to mind. Well, they wouldn’t.
He was using Bardy and Hana’s fridge like his personal larder.
Probably saved them enough to send him to college.
He knew Jack and Tom still stayed in touch.
He really should get his shit together and visit.
Not live. Not a kookaburra. Bardy digs his hands deeper into his pockets.
He must set up a video call. The time difference was tough.
The boys are always ahead of him. Nothing new there then.
He had long ago given up trying to keep up with everything his boys were into: the manga .
. . the sci-fi . . . the bands. Now, Tom’s job is in interconnected tech environments and Ned is into designing low-emission coworking pods.
Yep, beyond him. But boy, he misses them.
Still, good to see Jack. A blast from the past. And it was fun having Satya in the group. Maybe she would talk to Tay? Or is that interfering? But is all well with Satya and Jack? Bardy doesn’t know what to do with this thought. Relationships? He was the man who had no idea his wife was so unhappy.
Blue and green should never be seen.
One of his mom’s sayings.
Satya: lapis lazuli blue. A blue you can’t ignore.
A hard stone? No. Something comes back. Ned studied geology before he got into the pod start-up.
Diamond was the toughest, talc the softest. Wasn’t lapis somewhere in the middle?
He’s overthinking it. It is just about the color that shines from the woman. The most beautiful, iridescent blue.
And Jack was the green of toy soldiers. Is that because he still sees the boy in him? Always easy company was Jack. No trouble, despite the gargantuan appetite. Why does he think now of toy soldiers and a flat, matte green? Difficult to see what is going on under the surface.
Bardy gets up, easing shoulder blades cramped from the cold, and heads for home. He is taking this too literally—his weird color thing. Just because blue and green aren’t complementary colors. It doesn’t mean anything. The color wheel doesn’t hold all the answers.
Invented by Sir Isaac Newton.
And what did he know?