45. Della
DELLA
What a cluster. I can’t believe Tripp got arrested for domestic assault .
He’s going to be so mad. Part of me is scared he’s going to return, and part of me thinks he’s just going to want to get home so he can talk to his contact to scrub whatever evidence there is of the arrest. Regardless, Alan tells me he’ll spend the night in jail and appear before a judge tomorrow.
In an interesting turn of events, a few minutes after the police arrived, Everest burst into the apartment as if it were on fire.
I looked at Hazel, and she was just as confused as I was, but when he didn’t make eye contact with anyone, just went to stand next to Lanie and look nonchalant, I smirked amid the chaos.
I wonder what Cayson would say about the two of them…
if he’d accuse her of trying to take advantage, too.
After we give statements and all the activity dies down, I just want to retreat into the canvas I’m working on, so I make my way to my painting room.
It’s a minimalist landscape of the stream that cuts through the property, the day we had our picnic.
The surrounding wildflowers make me happy, and I love the way the colors are popping.
It’s turning out to be the second-favorite painting I’ve done here, even though it’s a very specific memory tied to Jaxon.
Besides wanting to lose myself in my painting, I also just want space to be sad.
It’s what the girls wanted me to avoid, and if Tripp hadn’t shown up at my apartment, that might have been the case, but now I’m turning everything over in my mind.
As if I haven’t done that enough in the past weeks, but seeing Tripp this morning, and then this evening again, got under my skin and jump-started a firestorm of thoughts that I wanted to process them by myself.
Molly and Hazel keep pleading, and I finally relent to have Hazel stay until after dinner, and Molly stay overnight. Both promise they have a ton to do, so I won’t even know they’re there. I don’t love it, but I’m done arguing.
True to their word, they leave me to get lost in my work the way I want to.
After seeing and hearing Jaxon with Tripp today, the brick wall I’ve constructed to keep him out took another hit.
Each day, my anger subsides just the tiniest bit.
When Tripp was banging on the glass, one of the first thoughts I defaulted to was, I wish Jaxon were here to help.
Because before all the shit, he had become my safe place.
As my brush moves across the canvas, I think about how much I’ve fundamentally changed since arriving in Amberheart Valley.
How much I’ve learned. How much I value and respect myself.
Every person I’ve met has had a hand in that, but no one is more responsible for that change than Jaxon Wills.
He reminded me how wonderful life could be, and my bottom lip wobbles with that realization.
I miss the way we laughed together and how his arms fit around me.
The way we could just be. And even though just hours ago I told him I was still angry with him, the reality is I miss most everything about him.
I don’t want to… God, I don’t want to. But I do.
He built me up and broke me in equal parts, no doubt, but the way he defended me today hits a spot in my heart I haven’t let myself feel since before that day.
But he called you a bonus. He said you were paying rent and putting out.
The brush strokes grow harder as the things he said fester in my brain.
He said Cayson could hate whoever he hooked up with after me.
While I was wondering how to bring up staying without sounding desperate and needy, he was already assuming we had an impending end.
I use my fingers to manipulate some of the textured paint to get things exactly where I want them.
He spoke that way about you. Even if he didn’t mean it, he still said it.
And that’s where I stop. It’s where I’ve stopped since I heard those words. That’s what I always come back to.
He said the things. Regardless if he meant them or not, he said them.
I take a breath and lean on the wall, taking in my progress. The painting is almost finished. I want to add a little more detail, but I fear that if I do that now, I’ll be too aggressive. Though some paintings need that, this one needs a steady and quiet hand.
“Knock knock,” Molly says, interrupting my thoughts. “What do you want on your pizza slices? I’m walking down to the tavern.”
“Oh, I’m not too hungry,” I say.
“My question was, what do you want on your pizza, not if you want it,” she says with a laugh.
I smile at her and tell her what I’d like, even if I don’t have much of an appetite.
“I’m going to take a break, too,” I laugh. “I’m almost done with this guy.”
“Can I peek?” she asks.
“Of course. Everyone will be peeking soon. I might as well start with my favorite people,” I respond.
Walking over, she looks at it, then at me. “My God, Della, do you know how good you are? Seriously. Hazie!” she shouts to the other room. “Come look at the latest and freaking greatest.”
Hazel joins and praises me just the same.
“Look, I have no idea what careers there are in painting, but have you thought about pursuing them?” Hazel says without a hint of sarcasm.
“I don’t have an answer for that,” I reply. A career in painting is something I’ve never entertained.
“I mean, hear me out here,” Hazel says. “You know no part of me, no part of us,” she gestures between Molly and her, “wants you to leave. So what if you like… what if you paint weddings?”
“Paint weddings?” I question.
“Yeah, live wedding painting is a thing. Like a huge thing. A growing thing. I’ve been asked about it at least half a dozen times this year.”
“I don’t paint people, though. I’m more of a landscape painter,” I say. “I could never, like, capture the nuance of details on a face. That’s portrait painting.”
“What if you offer your services to paint the couple at their favorite place on the ranch? Obviously, there will be repeat spots, but you can paint them before or after the wedding. I’d have to get approval, but this has legs.
The focus of the painting can be the landscape, and then you can throw the couple in, making them blurry enough not to make out their features but clear enough to know it’s them. Is there a term for that?”
“Impressionistic,” I say.
“There you go,” Molly claps with an excitement I’ve yet to see from her. “Holy shit, you’re a freaking genius, Hazie! Can you do that, Del?”
“I’ve never once thought of it,” I say.
“But you can do anything, Della. Can’t you just see your little couple right here?” Hazel points to a spot on the painting.
My gears start turning. My paintings move between tonal, romantic, and impressionistic, so they would lend themselves well to that. With practice, I bet I could become proficient pretty quickly.
“Della, I’m not joking, not even a little.
A custom painting to commemorate a wedding or event here.
I mean, what?! My love and desire to keep you here is the driving force behind this idea, but from a business perspective, do you know how much that would set us apart?
Holy shit. It would be next-level. Legit, is this something that you could entertain? ”
My eyes move between my painting, Hazel, and Molly. “I mean, in theory, it could be doable.”
They rush over to hug me, and I feel every ounce of their love. “There is something for you here if you choose to stay. We’ll have to tease it out, of course, but you won’t even have to worry about working with Jax because you’ll be with me.”
The mention of his name brings me back to reality. I’d still be working at the ranch. I’d still run into him and Cayson. And yes, though I’d be working directly with Hazel, their entire family is so intertwined at Heart of Will.
“Think about it, okay?” Molly says.
“I will, I promise. Let’s see how my show does next week. Then we’ll see if people even like my work,” I say.
“Give me a break, Del. I can’t wait to tell you I told you so,” Hazel hugs me again.
“Anyway, I’m going to grab us dinner. Hazie, I’m making you come with me. Del, do you want to stay and think about your new career?” Molly asks.
There is a certain relief that comes with that statement.
The possibility of staying, and creating a life that's mine on my terms, is as thrilling as it is terrifying. I’ll research the commissions to see what that would pull in, but from a financial standpoint, it could work.
And I could expand it to all guests, not just those getting married.
“Yeah, I’m going to hang back. I might actually get started on another painting,” I say.
There was a scene I saw outside the barn when I snuck over this week that stuck with me.
I’d come back a number of times, making sure to avoid both Jax and Cayson at all costs.
But the scene was a plethora of items that screamed a moment in time.
Cayson hosted three of Mazie and Luke’s pre-school friends at the ranch, and this was their treasure pile.
It was a few cool rocks, a picked flower, two feathers, a piece of rope, and three pieces of wood.
The menial things against the ruby-red of this multi-million-dollar barn was such a juxtaposition that I snapped a photo because I knew I was going to paint it.
So while the girls leave to walk the strip to get dinner, I stay back, thinking about whether I can remain in the orbit of the Wills family as a resident painter.
To offer this service would be next-level for the ranch.
But in practice, could I really work in the same circle as someone I still dream about in the deepest corners of my mind, even when I don’t want to admit that I do?