No complicated menu here. Just hard work and simple food that comes with something that looks suspiciously like happiness.
And as a hearty laugh spills from my dad’s throat at a story Quinton is animatedly telling with exaggerated hand gestures, I hug my arms around my body.
Why has this felt so hard? Until now.
I decide I’ve done enough for one day and mosey on over to where they sit. “How’s the frame coming along?”
I slide my hands in the back pockets of my jeans, tugging my bottom lip through my teeth. All three look up, and Maisey jumps up, grabbing my hand. She maneuvers me between her and her dad and insists I sit.
I do, and my own father greets me like it’s the first time we’ve met.
Quinton tilts his head toward me. “Hungry?”
“Starving, actually. I was going to go and grab something soon.”
“We made enough for everyone, CC.” Maisey hands me a wrapped-up sandwich.
“Oh, thank you. That’s so sweet.”
“Making progress with the backdrop?” Dad asks.
“Yes, the background elements are done. I’ll work on the foreground tomorrow.”
“Your art is important to you, isn’t it?” my father asks, like he doesn’t know me from the next stranger on the street.
“It is. Very much.”
“How long you been painting?” Quinton asks.
I blow out a puffy breath. “A while.”
“Is that what you were doing in the city?” Maisey asks.
I smile at her. “Yeah. At least, I was trying to.”
Her brows fall. “What do you mean?”
“My work never really took off, not like my mother’s did.”
“She was an artist, too?” my father asks.
A pregnant pause passes, causing something in my chest to rise and burst. “She was.”
My father stares at me, something like understanding passing through his gaze before he returns to his sandwich, washing it down with a sip from the bottle of water I assume Quinton supplied him with also.
“Well, I have actual work to get to. You good here?” Quinton says.
We all finish up and pack away the impromptu picnic.
“Great. Guess I’ll see you tomorrow,” I utter.
He closes in as I make to leave to follow my father who has wandered off. “Just one more thing.”
I look into his eyes, lost as to what he could want.
His hand rises, sweeping past my ear, brushing my hair as his hand drops...
The stolen carpenter’s pencil between his fingers.
