Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Lawrence packed up his stool and supplies while we waited.
Worry creased Sylvie’s face. “Alice? We aren’t seriously going to a strange man’s studio, are we?”
Marge leaned in. “I’m with Brainy here. This is just asking to end up in some messed up documentary where they discover this guy is turning tourists into gumbo or dressing up their corpses as dolls and having tea parties with them.”
“I agree. This is reckless.” Doris nodded along, and all three of their heads looked like they were attached to one stick.
I turned to Marge. “Weren’t you the one who dragged us through the bayou behind some strange man in a camouflage truck out into the middle of nowhere?”
She stared straight back at me. “He had a legitimate business hat. He was the real deal. Does this dude have a legitimate business hat? No. I don’t think so.”
“Well, I asked him to go to his studio, and I don’t know how to explain it, but I trust him. None of you have to come, though.”
“Oh, we are not sending you alone to a stranger’s studio.” Sylvie crossed her arms.
Marge jutted a thumb at her. “I’m with Brainy again. No way you’re going alone. If he tries to chop you up into gumbo pieces, you’re gonna need me to fight.”
“Well, then I guess we’re all going together, because I’m getting this sketch done tonight. I need this.”
They exchanged a look. Then with one conjoined sigh of acceptance, they nodded.
“It is kind of special to have a drawing of you as you are. Oh, like Titanic!” Doris said.
“But hold on. If we’re doing this, we’re going to be safe.” Sylvie hurried over to Lawrence and asked for his driver’s license.
“Oh, smart!” Marge nodded.
He handed it to her, and she said, “I’m sending a photo of this to Tom, along with pinning our location, so if you try anything funny, my husband, a special forces operator, will be here with Marge’s daughter, who is in the FBI. Remember that before you try anything.”
She snapped a photo of the ID, then Lawrence took it back.
“You know, it’s you who asked to come to my studio.
Not the other way around. If we’re worrying about abductions or murders, it’s probably me who should be taking photos of your licenses and sending them to my father, a cop over in Pointe Coupee Parish. ”
We all exchanged a look.
“You’re not wrong, actually. Would you like to get photos of our licenses? We won’t be offended,” Sylvie said.
He just chuckled. “Nah, I don’t think you’re going to turn me into gumbo or dress me up as a doll and have tea parties with me.”
Marge pulled a face. “You heard that?”
He tucked his sketchbook under his arm. “Yep. But it’s good you ladies are smart. Lots of predators lurking around here.”
“Exactly!” Marge gave him a look of respect, then lifted a finger. “But just so you know, if you turn out to be one, I know sixteen ways to kill a man with a spoon. And I’ll show you at least one of them.”
Marge stared at Lawrence, who laughed and spun on his black combat boot. “Follow me.”
He walked through the fray of the celebration, cutting through the colorful costumes and the wild party happening all around us.
The widows shared a worried look.
“Ladies, we’re doing this. Come on.” I started after him, my desire to have his talent capture me exactly as I was overruling that tiny part of my brain wondering if he was in fact some serial killer who baited unsuspecting women by showing them his beautiful sketches and then assuming they’d ask to go back to his place for a nude.
Then I chuckled at the ridiculous thought.
Lawrence walked just far enough ahead that with the music drowning out everything around us, he couldn’t hear us talking.
“I’m telling you, maybe he’s not gonna chop us up and put us in gumbo, but we still haven’t ruled out vampire. New Orleans is teeming with them! He’s got that dark, moody thing going.”
“He’s an artist,” I said as I dodged a man in a hot dog costume. “He looks like a dark, moody artist.”
“Or a dark, moody vampire,” Marge argued back, stopping for a moment to look at the couple tongue kissing so intently he looked like he was going to swallow her head whole. His hands were up her shirt, feeling her breasts like there weren’t thousands of people surrounding them.
“Where are your mothers!” Doris shouted at them as we passed, but they didn’t hear her and never came up for air.
I wondered if I would still be able to feel Alejandro’s hands on my breasts when this was over. I loved every bit of his touch, so gentle. So passionate. I ached for it even now. Would I ache for it for the rest of my life if I lost all sensation?
“He did have a point that we are more likely the killers,” Sylvie argued. “But just in case he’s a serial killer—”
“Or a vampire,” Marge added.
“Yes, a serial killer or a vampire. I’m sending clips of everything to Tom. He’s staying up and is actually quite invested in our little escapade.”
“Does he think Lawrence is safe?” Doris asked, her face puckering with disgust as a man on his knees puked up something green and horrifying.
She instantly gagged.
Which made me gag.
Then Sylvie gagged.
The three of us hurried past the site, retching as we caught back up to Lawrence.
“None of you would have made it as nurses,” Marge sneered. “Pansies.”
I took several breaths, trying to quell the unease in my stomach from the horrifying sight.
Sylvie, now finished with her gagging as well, finally answered Doris. “Yes. He thinks we’re probably fine as long as we keep our wits and catalog what we’re doing with him.”
Lawrence walked up to a doorway of a tall building, then punched a code into the lock.
It swung open, and he gestured for us to follow him, the widows sharing a worried look.
Sylvie snapped a photo of the building number and sent it to Tom, but I marched right past inside the building that must have been a hundred years old. Maybe more.
We got to his apartment, and he wiggled the key in the old lock. The door creaked as he opened it. Sylvie took a photo of the number twelve on the door before following me inside.
“Make yourselves comfortable.” Lawrence flipped on a light, illuminating the simple but clean living space. “I usually do my painting and sketching over here in the spare bedroom. My roommate is in the military and deployed right now, so it’s empty.”
“That’s perfect.” I followed him toward the room.
The widows squished together right behind me, following so close I could practically feel their breaths on my neck.
I stopped, and they bumped into me. “I’ll be okay on my own in there,” I said, and their faces all bloomed with mirrored horror.
“Alone? No way!” Sylvie argued.
“You’ll be right out here if I need you, but this is a moment I want with just me and Lawrence.”
Marge scowled, and when Lawrence stopped at the old red door and propped it open, gesturing for me to head inside, she pointed her fingers at her eyes, then at him. Then she made a stabbing motion.
He just chuckled and went inside the room.
“I’ll be fine,” I said, and somehow I was certain I would be.
I left the widows outside the room in the small living area, where they huddled together like a tactical unit.
“One scream, Alice,” Marge called after me, loud enough I knew Lawrence heard her… and it was intentional. “One scream and we’ll be in there and we’ll tear his limbs and pecker off. Got it?”
I laughed. “Got it.”
I stepped in and closed the red door behind me, looking around the room that was set up like a small artist’s studio.
“I don’t have props or anything. I wasn’t exactly planning on this,” Lawrence said.
“I don’t need props. Just me.”
“Standing? Sitting? How do you want to do this?”
“I think standing. I want you to capture every inch of me exactly as I am. Maybe…” I looked around and noticed the full-length window with the beautiful sheer white curtains. “How about I pose here? In front of the window.”
“Love the light. Great choice. Now do you want me to sketch you like before or paint you? I can do either.”
“You paint too?”
He nodded.
“You good at it? As good as you are at sketching?”
He nodded again.
“Then paint me. Full color. I want to feel this moment every time I look at it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I arched an eyebrow. “I’m about to get naked in front of you. Don’t call me ma’am or I will feel old.”
He chuckled. “Don’t worry. You don’t look old.”
“I don’t feel old.”
“Then that’s why you don’t look old.”
I smiled at him, this simple-spoken artist.
He turned his easel and pointed it toward the window and set his paint beside him. “Whenever you’re ready.”
I took a breath. My fingers went to the zipper of my dress.
The fabric hit the floor, and as I stood there, fully exposed in the cool air, I should have felt vulnerable. Instead, I glanced at the door and knew with certainty the little widows, or perhaps more like little warriors, on the other side of it were looking out for me.
They were always looking out for me.
I stepped to the window, the muffled sound of New Orleans carrying up from the street below.
I positioned myself in front of it, reaching up to tangle my fingers in the curtains, bending my dancer’s body just slightly to give the arc of movement in my pose to capture me in these last moments of who I was.
“That’s perfect. Right there. The outside moonlight is really catching you beautifully. Highlighting every curve.”
Good, let it illuminate every incredible inch of me, I thought but didn’t say.
Instead, I stood silently as he started to paint.
In the silence, I thought about my breasts.
I thought about what this figure would look like if I came back a year later and asked him to do this again.
Would I still look like me? A lumpectomy and a scar but otherwise my figure the same?
Or would I look completely different? My breasts gone, perhaps rebuilt into something new?
Would I be looking at one percent or twenty-five percent?
I still didn’t know which path I would choose. But what I did know was despite the fact they were trying to kill me now, I was grateful for these breasts and all we had been through together.
They were part of a body that had carried me through a wild, beautiful life. They had changed over the years—softened, shifted—just like me.
But I loved every version of them from the first moments of their arrival—my excitement at fourteen after my wishes had been answered and I could stop shoving socks in a training bra.
How they’d looked in that first showgirl costume I’d worn. Not large—they were never large—but they’d been beautiful. Perky and glittering with the sparkles dusted across them.
How they’d fed my daughter. Given her nourishment and life as I struggled to find my path into motherhood. How natural it had felt the first time she latched on.
How Alejandro would look at me in that red dress he loved so much, his gaze always drifting to them with the low-cut neckline that hit them just right.
How they’d looked in that madam’s costume, pushed tight together and begging for their own applause.
Thank you, I thought as I glanced down at them. Thank you for being such an incredible part of my life.
Lawrence’s hand moved effortlessly across the small canvas. I stood in that moonlight, exposed and raw, feeling every bit of the fear and grief and hope surging through me so he could capture me exactly as I felt in the moment the way he’d done with me dancing.
Emotions I didn’t even know I had hidden surfaced as I stood there, tears pricking my eyes. But this time I didn’t force them back. This time, I let my vulnerability break through.
Open.
Honest.
Me.
A girl with cancer.
Terrified. Devastated.
But also loved and supported and protected so well that I knew we couldn’t fail.
When he finished, he set down his brush and stepped back and said nothing. Just turned the canvas slightly so I could see it.
I looked at the painting.
The woman in it was beautiful.
He had done exactly what I’d hoped. Captured every curve, every hint of light on my skin, but also somehow, most importantly, he’d captured what I was feeling. Froze me in this moment of my journey through life, beautiful and strong and terrified.
“It’s incredible. Thank you,” I said simply, more profound words struggling to form.
He just nodded. “I’ll let you get dressed.”
He turned around, and I gathered up my clothes and dressed. When I was done, he pulled the painting off the easel.
“It’s wet, so I’ll get a box you can carry back to your room.”
He scrounged around, then procured a box just big enough to slide the canvas into, leaving the top open so it could breathe. I pulled out a thousand dollars and offered it to him. He declined. I set it on the easel, giving him a look that meant I wouldn’t take no for an answer.
He looked at it for a moment, then at me, and gave a soft nod before walking to the door and opening it.
Three sets of wary eyes blinked back at me, the widows all checking me over to make sure I was safe.
“All clear?” Marge barked. “He try anything funny?”
“All clear,” I said. “Lawrence was a perfect gentleman and did an incredible job.”
“Can we… can we see it? Or maybe not because you’re, you know… naked.” Doris whispered the last word.
“Of course you can see it.” I walked forward and tipped the box enough to give them a view. They pressed their heads together, all gazing at the masterpiece that was me.
The room went quiet.
Doris pressed both hands to her mouth.
Sylvie said very softly, “Oh, Alice.”
Marge looked at it for a long time without speaking, her jaw working slightly, and then she looked at me, giving a slight nod. “Incredible.”
“You’re so beautiful,” Doris whispered.
“We need to get that back to Bertha safely,” Sylvie said after she stared at it for a few more long moments. “That’s too beautiful to risk getting damaged.”
Marge snapped into military mode. “Alright. It’s a mad house out there. Threats in every direction. Drunk people stumbling. Drinks everywhere. Thieves hiding in the shadows. I’ll carry it. No one is getting this masterpiece from me.”
I chuckled but didn’t argue, handing her the box. “Thank you, Marge.”
She marched toward the door, the widows following behind her. I turned to Lawrence.
“Thank you. Truly. You are an incredible artist, and if you ever decide you want to make some money sketching and painting, I have very rich friends who will pay a lot of money for your work.”
He considered my words, then shrugged. “You know where to find me if you want another portrait after your battle.”
I breathed in, then out.
After my battle.
And there would be an after. There had to be.
I glanced at the widows waiting at the door.
I had too much to live for.
“Thank you, Lawrence. I’ll be back.”
“I know you will. And good luck, Alice. You’re very brave.”
“No,” I whispered, looking at the girls waving at me to follow. “I’m just very well-defended.”
He nodded, and I followed my widows back out onto the wild streets of New Orleans, the painting of me protected until we made it safely back to Bertha for a night of rest before the big finale tomorrow.