Chapter 29
Twenty-Nine
The following morning, Whitney’s alarm went off early. It was Wednesday. Yoga morning. She grabbed her phone to find the schedule. It took some hunting to locate the schedule for this week online, but when she did… she was so relieved.
“Yes.” She kicked her foot in the air and sprang from her bed. Dreama’s class she could do. If it had been The Stretchinator again, she’d have rolled over and gone back to sleep.
She whirled up a smoothie and then texted Matthew. Weren’t artists into yoga and stuff like that? Maybe he’d like to join them.
WHITNEY: Good morning. Do you yoga?
MATTHEW: I’m not that artsy. More the boxing type.
WHITNEY: Thought I’d check.
MATTHEW: Pass, but how about coffee with me here afterward?
WHITNEY: Absolutely.
She put on her yoga pants and tank top, then tucked a dress and the essentials into a tote bag to take with her. She could even change at Matthew’s after coffee, before she went to work instead of in the locker room.
Two hours later, she walked into his building. She pulled out her phone and dialed his number. “I’m here, but I can’t get to your floor without a fob.”
“I’ll come get you. Hang tight.”
She waited, and it was a pleasant surprise when the doors opened and he was holding a mug of coffee in her direction, smiling at her.
“Join me?”
“I’d love to, sir.” She stepped into the elevator.
He handed her the coffee mug he’d been holding. “This is for you.”
“Thank you.”
“You could be one of those people who is cranky until you have coffee. I enjoy spending time with you, and I didn’t want to take a chance on that.”
“I’m not that bad.” She took a sip. “But I do like the way you think.”
The elevator doors opened, and they stepped out into his art studio. “Do you need some breakfast?”
“No. Coffee is fine.”
He shrugged it off. “Not even peanut butter toast? I make exceptional peanut butter toast.”
“I can even make that.”
“And you said you couldn’t cook. What else are you going to surprise me with?”
“I have a few tricks up my sleeve,” she said playfully.
“Me too. Come with me. I want to show you something.”
She followed him toward the far end of the room. He stopped right next to a large canvas propped on a wooden easel in front of the windows.
“What do you think?” He moved to the side, and she stepped around to see what he’d been working on.
“Matthew!” She set her coffee down on a stool nearby. “This is more beautiful than the little painting you already gave me. This is for Chloe’s room? You’ve changed it. Look what you did with the tree house.”
“The more I got to know you, the more personal that project became. Do you like the changes?”
“Yes. So much. Look at the fun details. It’s like an adventure. There’s so much to see.”
“I’ve got your assignment ready,” he said.
“Uh-oh.”
“You have to help me,” he said. “It’s part of the deal.”
Her shoulders drooped. “Why did I let you talk me into that? I’m terrible at art.”
“No one is terrible at art. And you’ll help, because this is important to you.”
“And you took advantage of that.”
“No, I used it to my advantage so the project will bring us both joy. That’s totally different.” He grabbed an apron from a hook on the wall and looped it over her neck. “This will protect your clothes.”
She tied the strings around her waist and posed. “How do I look?”
“Like an artist.” He lifted a palette and tapped the tips of several brushes before settling on one. “Okay, my little artist, today you paint.”
She let out a huff. “I’ll do my best, but I’m worried.”
“I’ll help. You’re going to fill in the sky.” He dabbed the brush in blue, then in white, and smeared it until it created a new color. He spread the pigment across the tray and then added a little yellow, and right before her eyes he had made five shades of blue for her. “See? Easy.”
“You’re amazing.”
“I’ve done it a time or two.” He handed her the brush. “Now look out the window, see how beautiful the sky is?”
She nodded. It was a perfect blue-sky day.
“Notice that it’s not all one color.”
She wasn’t sure she really saw that.
“I already put a base coat down when I prepped the board, so we’ll concentrate on the sky.” He crouched a little to get low enough to rest his head near her shoulder. “See how the sky is lighter along the top of the buildings, but as you move your eye up, the blue becomes stronger?”
“Yes. I do see that.”
“Good. Take this brush, and I want you to pick whichever of these colors feels right to you and put some paint on the brush. It doesn”t take much, then start up here and sort of roll and flip your brush as you go.” He demonstrated the movement in the air. She echoed the motion.
“That’ll form soft color, but not in a line. It’s not about staying between the lines with a crayon. There will be white spaces between and that’s good. As we continue, you’ll see how the different colors will open up or deepen the sky. Going lighter as you get down to the bottom will give the image the illusion of distance.”
She sucked in a breath and tried it on the canvas, gently dabbing and rolling the wide brush like he’d shown her. “It doesn’t look like anything.”
“Keep going. Trust the process. Now, I’ll share a little insider tip. Sometimes, when I’m working on a sky like this, I’ll kind of squint as I do it.”
“Are you kidding me?” She flashed him some stink eye.
“No. I really do.” He took the brush, dabbed it into a more lavender blue, and then squinted and rolled the color up into the corner. “See?”
She mimicked his squint, giggling the whole time, then picked up a shade lighter and worked it into the board. “It’s actually kind of fun to do. Might not be good, but it’s fun. And you know, I thought you were kidding about the squinting, but it is helping. I guess it’s like when you do Christmas tree lights. I always have to squint to get the lights just right.”
“Exactly like that,” he said. “It allows the mind to see the open spaces.” He put two more brushes on the stand next to her. “You can use one of these for the lighter colors if that makes it easier to kind of get what you want.”
She worked for about ten minutes, moving the paint, adding some dark, changing to something a little lighter, squinting the whole time.
He refreshed her coffee and sipped from his travel mug while he watched. “You’re doing great.”
“I hate to admit this, but it’s really relaxing.” She stood back and adjusted the colors again, getting bold and dipping into the pinkish tone a little. It had seemed an odd shade to be used in a sky, but now she could see where it would open up the sky a bit.
“Nicely done,” he said.
“I’m getting the hang of it.”
“You are. Bravo.” He stepped in close behind her. “Here. Take this in your hand. It’s a dry brush, and we’re going to crisscross through everything you’ve done to blend it.”
She held the brush in her hand and made a broad stroke across the sky.
He placed his hand over hers, still standing behind her, and pulled in close to her body. Together they made small x’s across the canvas.
His shampoo, or maybe it was aftershave, wrapped around her. The closeness. The creativity. She didn’t want this moment to end.
“It’s beautiful.” He kissed her cheek. “Thank you.”
She turned into his arms, the paintbrush still in her hand. “Thank you.” She looked up into his face. “I never knew I wanted to do that.”
“I hope we experience a lot of firsts together.”
“Me too.” She had to pull herself together. Things were already moving super-fast, and today her heart soared. “What’s next?”
“I’ll work in the other stuff and show you when it’s done. Did you get the measurements?”
“Yes. I have them on my phone. Let me get them.” She walked into the other room and grabbed her phone from her purse. “Here you go.” Turning the phone toward him, he jotted the dimensions on the palette with paint.
“Got it. Let me know when we need to install so I can clear my calendar. It’ll come in a roll, and we’ll put it up sort of like wallpaper. Won’t take but a couple of hours.”
“That’s incredible.”
“Glad you thought of it, and thanks for letting me be a part of something so special.”
She nodded, wanting to tell him how special he was to her, but not knowing how to put it into the right words. “Thank you. You are so easy to be with. All this stuff over the past couple of weeks—my life is not usually full of drama.”
“You made it through without a scar.”
“I did, but you helped. This. You and me. It’s so good, and I’m anxious, incredibly excited about it all, but I want to be sure we take our own advice. Take our time, build a foundation.”
“I’m in no hurry. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Good. Yeah. I’m not always super easy to hang out with, especially when I’m tired after putting in too many hours. I”m working on it, though. If that happens, I invite you to kindly remind me to balance it with these kinds of times when we aren’t looking at the clock. Like the day we picnicked at Maymont. Just enjoying each other.”
“I ask the same of you. I can get caught up in my work too. The murals, they’re huge. They take time. I put everything else on hold when I’m creating them. I could see you thinking that I’m overlooking you, and I’d never want you to feel that way.”
“We’re the same way that way. Our passion for our work. I went into law because, well, it’s what my family does, but I’ve looked at my practice as something more. A way to help someone through something that is hard. Something no one ever plans for. It’s not world change, but it is important to that person at that point in their life.”
“At the core, we’re the same.” His brow lifted. “At some point, maybe we can work on that goal together.”
She could see that in her heart, even if her mind was still catching up. “I really hope so.”