38. Riley
It only takesa couple of days for Archie to recover from his bug, and things quickly go back to normal. Forty-eight hours after he first threw up, he’s back in the living room, feeding Swimmy his fish flakes and laughing brightly.
Cole is visibly relieved to see Archie back in his regular spirits, and I feel comforted both by his happiness, and by Archie’s. The little boy is back to his usual energetic self, and only needed to miss one day of pre-K, much to his consternation.
“School is important,” Cole reminds him as we’re about to head out the door on Tuesday. Archie is a little dejected, having enjoyed his day off yesterday. “If you don’t go, you’ll fall behind the other kids. You don’t want that, do you?”
By the end of the day, Archie seems to have forgotten all about his desire to stay home. He’s talking at a mile a minute when I go to pick him up—he told all of his classmates, and the teacher’s goldfish, about Swimmy.
When the weekend rolls around, I volunteer at the community center again. I couldn’t make it last week because of Archie’s illness, but I explained everything to the director of the center, who was very understanding.
Unfortunately, I had to push off the art class I’ve been teaching there on Saturday afternoons. The kids are excited to see me back. One girl even shows me a painting she made on her own last weekend.
I guide the class in their experiments with a new medium: oil paints, which I almost never use. They’re messier than acrylics, requiring oils to clean the brushes rather than water.
The community center has a big jug of turpentine to use with the oil paints. As I portion it out, my students wrinkle their noses at the stench, laughing. Then they go to work, practicing with dabs of paint.
“Remember,” I tell them, “oil paint takes a long, long time to dry. If there’s anything you want to fix or blend, you can keep adding paint, and keep on mixing!”
As the students figure things out for themselves, I decide to mess with the oils on my own canvas at the front of the room.
I start painting a close-up of Archie’s new betta fish from memory. In the days since we brought Swimmy home, he’s really come into his own. The withered fins are growing back like flowing lace, and his scales are much brighter than they were before.
I don’t manage to finish my painting by the time our class is over, but I leave it on an easel in the back of the art studio, promising myself that I’ll finish it next week and bring it back to hang in Archie’s room.
I leave the class feeling happy. It takes a while to rinse all of the oil paint from my hands, but I hum as I scrub them clean, lighter than air.
I take the subway back to Cole’s neighborhood, then walk the last stretch to his house. When I step through the door, I hear Archie giggling from the other room.
“Hello?” I call. “Anyone home?”
Archie appears in the foyer, followed closely by Cole. To my surprise, there are wide grins on both of their faces, not just Archie’s. I glance up at Cole.
“Welcome back,” he says. “How was your class?”
“It was good,” I say warily. “What’s going on here?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Something’s definitely up.” I gesture to him, my eyes narrowed in suspicion. “You’ve got this look on your face.” I point down at Archie. “And so do you!”
Archie laughs again, unable to keep a straight face. “It’s nothing!”
“It doesn’t seem like nothing.” I size both of them up, trying to figure out what could possibly be going through their heads. “It’s not my birthday, or I’d think you guys planned me a surprise party.”
“No idea why you would think that,” Cole says, clearly feigning nonchalance. “Nothing’s out of the ordinary. Come sit down in the living room.”
“Okay.” I take a guarded step forward. “But if a clown jumps out from behind the couch, I’m gonna punch him, no questions asked.”
Cole chuckles. “Got it. No clowns. I promise.”
I follow Cole and Archie into the living room, and immediately, I notice what’s up. It’s hard to miss, hanging on the formerly bare wall opposite the couch.
“Oh!” My mouth drops open, and my hand rises to cover it.
The painting is every bit as gorgeous as it was when I first saw it at the silent auction. It draws the eye, and to my surprise, the blues and whites match the upholstery in Cole’s living room.
I look up at Cole, flabbergasted. “You bought that painting? Are you serious?”
“Well, you told me you liked it.”
“But—but it went to someone else on the night of the auction,” I protest, still in disbelief. “How on earth did you get it?”
“I tracked down the original buyer,” Cole explains. “I made him a good offer, and he accepted.” He shrugs. “Apparently, private sales like this are decently common in the art world.”
“I can’t believe it.” I feel as though all of the air has left the room. I think of how much the painting went for originally at the auction, and my stomach dips. Cole spent a lot of money on this piece. I clear my throat, then say, “I… wow. It’s gorgeous. And it really suits the room. You made a good choice.”
“I didn’t buy it for the house.” Cole smiles down at me. “I bought it for you.”
My heart skips a beat. “For… for me?”
“Yes.”
“It’s your favorite painting,” Archie says happily. “Right?”
“Yeah, buddy.” I reach down to ruffle his hair, unable to take my eyes off of the painting. “It sure is.”
“Why?”
“Well…” I drop down on one knee next to Archie, seeing the painting from his eye level. I point up at the canvas, and his eyes follow. “Do you see how bright this blue is? And how the lines are very smooth at the top?”
He nods, wide-eyed.
“But when they get down to the bottom, they start to blur together,” I say. “There are a lot of things that the artist might have meant when they painted this. Paintings can say a lot. You ever heard the saying, ‘a picture’s worth a thousand words?’”
Archie shakes his head, still staring at the painting.
“Well, you have now,” I say with a laugh. If I felt giddy before, it was nothing compared to this.
I straighten, turning to Cole. There are no words to describe how I’m feeling right now, nothing I can say to adequately thank him. Not only is this the most extravagant gift I’ve ever received, it’s also the most deeply personal.
“I… I don’t know what to say.”
Cole shrugs. “You don’t have to say anything.”
I shake my head. “Thank you. Thank you, thank you. This is the most beautiful thing anyone’s ever done for me.”
I follow up my thanks with a long look, one that, I hope, gets the rest of my message across. I wish I could kiss him in front of Archie. I wish I could show him how I feel without words, the same way this painting does for its artist.
He smiles in a way that makes me think he understands.
Later, I think. I’ll show him later.
I sink down onto the couch, my gaze fixed on the wall opposite, now adorned with the stunning work of art.
When I saw it at the auction, it made me think of Cole, of the depths in his eyes and the blurring lines of our set of rules. It made me think of the closeness between us as we settled into each other, our lives mixing together like the vibrant paint, colors combining to create something entirely new.
I take a deep breath, tears pricking at the corners of my eyes.
Everything he does, every single day, I fall a little harder for him.