Chapter 40 Bardy
BARDY
We have seen better days.
“And I thought it was wood turning that would ruin your good looks.” Bardy helps settle his best friend in a chair in the corner of Lou’s sitting room.
“That bad?”
“He’s joking you,” Tay interjects, putting a cup of tea down within easy reach. She adds, “But I’m not goin’ to lie, you sure look like shit.”
Lou’s laugh is cut short. “Bugger, that hurts.”
“No bones broken though,” Linda says, settling a cushion behind his head. “There now.”
“Thanks, Linda.”
“Are you okay with that, or do you need a hand?” Bardy asks Pia and Satya, who are unrolling a large white screen from a shabby-looking box. “It’s a bit ancient, but I think it should be okay.”
“Oh, I think we’ve got it,” Satya responds dryly.
“Sorry,” Bardy murmurs. He guesses a top lawyer and an award-winning entrepreneur might just manage to put a screen up.
Kate glances up from where she is attaching her laptop to a projector and gives him an understanding grin. Silver-bright Kate. Those eyes. He’d never really looked into them until that time at Pia’s. Now he doesn’t want to stop.
As Lou was in no state for a day in London, Kate suggested they bring the art gallery to Lou.
On the group chat, the instructions were to choose one painting they loved.
Linda had added: And then we eat cake. She has done them proud, a coffee and walnut confection, an orange and lemon br?léed bundt, plus a white chocolate, cardamom, and damson cake.
She thought they might help Lou with his recovery.
And no one was arguing with Nurse Linda.
Surveying the cakes laid out on a low coffee table, Lou suggests that Bardy get some wine and glasses. “There’s a couple of nice bottles of Barolo I’ve been saving,” he adds, nodding toward the cupboard in the corner.
But Bardy is still looking at Kate.
And what is even better, silver-bright Kate is looking at him.
“Mate,” Lou interrupts, “wine?” Bardy knows from his expression that his best friend sees right through him.
“Where’s Leonard?” Bardy asks as he starts to sort out glasses and bottles.
“He’s got a meeting at the art gallery, something to do with the council, and possible funding. I think it was that,” Linda responds. “He should be here soon.”
Kate looks up. “That’s good, I know they are really worried, and when I bumped into Nate, the manager, he said he’d hit a problem with the Constable exhibition he was planning.”
“What exhibition is that?” Satya asks.
“He was hoping to get a small number of Constable paintings, ones he painted of Norfolk and Suffolk, to help publicize the fact that the gallery has lost funding and to put a bit of pressure on the owner not to sell the building,” Kate replies.
As if on cue, the doorbell rings. Lou automatically goes to rise, then, wincing, thinks better of it. “You stay where you are,” Nurse Linda tells him, “I’ll let him in.”
“Good meeting?” Kate asks as Leonard emerges into the room.
“I’m afraid not,” says the man with the discreet hearing aids.
“The council just doesn’t have the funds, and the owner still wants to sell the building.
Plus, Nathan thinks he will have to pull the plug on his exhibition.
Just too many problems.” He turns to Lou, “Now, how are you doing? You’re looking very well. ”
Even Lou joins in the laughter, whimpering, “Please don’t make me laugh.”
Bardy passes him a glass of wine. “That might ease the pain.”
They are now settled in chairs or on the floor, facing the white screen. Kate kneels by the projector, which she has placed at one end of the coffee table. Linda starts cutting cake and passes it around.
“Before we visit Kate’s art gallery, shall we have a quick catch-up? The MACKL competition is already open, but we’ve got another two weeks to get our entries in,” says the man who hasn’t written anything.
Bardy can tell by their faces that they have completely forgotten about the reason they get together. What is he going to do when it’s all over? He senses a looming loss.
And what about the rest of his life?
Plus, why is Hana being different with him?
Too many questions.
Satya is first. “I’m working on something new.”
“Great.”
“But I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Okay,” Bardy says slowly. Does this have anything to do with her and Jack? He hasn’t liked to ask how things are.
The next surprise is Tay. “I’m working on something too. But I don’t want to talk about it either.”
“Right. Anyone else?”
The others are more forthcoming: Leonard has a few good songs written, but he hasn’t worked out the ending for his musical; Kate is getting on much better with her painting; Pia is painting on fabric, but hasn’t added anything to her quilt yet, which she claims is now the size of Denmark.
Unsurprisingly, Linda has had enough of bird painting, but she does have another idea.
But like Satya and Tay, she doesn’t want to talk about it.
Although she does say cryptically to Kate, “I could do with a bit of help from you.” Kate looks puzzled, but nods.
He just thinks he is going to be put on the spot when Pia saves him.
“While we haven’t been able to meet . . .” She glances at Lou and smiles softly at him. What a woman of contrasts she is. “I have spent a little time with Brenda. I think I was rather rude to her. For which I have apologized.”
She glances at Tay. Tay barely moves, but it is enough. Pia smiles. She is forgiven.
“We have come to a compromise. I will choose the wool, and together we will think about the designs. Brenda is a very fast knitter, and Noy is a superstar model.”
She glances at Tay again, who nods. “Real.”
Satya pipes up, “You could start an online business. Beautiful Scandinavian designs in neutral, natural fibers.”
Ever the entrepreneur.
Pia continues, “Brenda also asked me to join her book club. I found the meeting I attended very interesting. I had been thinking of our group and missing you all. And I ended up asking if anyone in the book group was creative. Apart from a woman named Amanda, who did many different things and felt that we were all creative in some way, everyone else said no. Even Brenda.”
Pia looks around earnestly. “And this is what I found so interesting. When I asked some more, pushed them”—she half smiles at Bardy—“not like a lawyer, but because I really wanted to know, I discovered so much.”
They all wait expectantly.
“One woman wrote poems on her phone . . .”
Bardy looks up from pouring wine.
“She had a difficult relationship with her daughter, I think. I didn’t pry, but she said this poetry helped her.
Another woman then admitted that at family gatherings, she was always asked to do the speech, and so she wrote a poem for that person.
And then the woman next to her said she had written a poem about each book that the book club had chosen to read.
So there you had it, three poets on one sofa. ”
But Pia hasn’t finished. “Then Sunita, a scientist, admitted that she painted. And when she showed us the images on her phone, they were just beautiful. Well, this reminded a woman called Vix of how much she loved making her Christmas door wreath.”
Satya lets out a small sound between a sigh and a cry.
“What is it?” Linda asks in concern.
“Oh, nothing.”
After a pause, Pia continues, “One woman, I forget her name, once won a competition for a short story about an ancient tree in the Highlands, which locals know is a wishing tree . . .”
He wishes he’d thought of that one.
“. . . and another said she designed gingerbread houses. Then they told me about Brenda.”
“Her knitting?” Kate asks.
Bardy is thinking of her flower paintings. And a man called Brian.
“No, they didn’t even know about that. Although at the end of the evening, I did suggest that Brenda show them all of Noy’s outfits.” She winces like Lou had when he laughed.
“Anyway, the women in the group told me that two of them had lost their husbands, and what Brenda did was to take one of their husbands’ shirts and make a teddy bear from it.
” Pia cannot help adding, “It is perhaps not something I would have liked, but for these women it gave them something to hold at night that brought great comfort.”
Pia looks at Tay now. “I think, perhaps, I did not take the trouble to get to know Brenda. She is a very kind woman, and I do not think she has a very easy life with this Brian.” She adds reflectively, “It also occurred to me, talking to her friends, that perhaps sometimes we also underestimate ourselves. All that creativity and everyone saying they weren’t really good enough, or only doing something for a special family party or for Christmas. ”
She looks at them all now, tentative, hesitant. “I was wondering if, for our next group outing, perhaps we could have an evening of music at my house? Leonard could play us some of his songs. I have a piano. And I could cook a Danish meal for you all.”
She is met with noises of full approval. Especially from Leonard the composer.
“And I wondered if it would be alright with the group if I were to invite Brenda.”
More noises of agreement.
“We could dance. Your sitting room would be a great spot for a party,” Linda exclaims.
“Do you like to dance?” Kate asks, and it’s a while before he realizes she is talking to him.
“You askin’?”
She grins. “You dancin’?”
He has a sudden image of Lou and Tina dancing.
Lou is surprisingly light on his feet, swinging Tina around.
And there was no doubt, Jon and Lou always had the best moves at the school dance.
One of the very few things that won admiration from their peers.
He glances at Lou, thinking of the painting he has chosen for Kate’s gallery.
“That’s a date,” he says to Pia. But all he is thinking of is dancing with silver-bright Kate.
He turns to her now.
“Right, over to you . . . Kate’s gallery is now open.”