She grinned at him but pointed sternly to the corner of the room, so he sighed and threw his head back, resuming his pose.
It should have felt ridiculous. It did, a little. But there was no real embarrassment. That was the wonderful thing. It was all so easy. This, the whole night they’d shared. It was that joy he remembered from his youth, the feeling he’d tried to explain to George.
“Stop grinning,” Lucy said, laughing as she drew. “And don’t look at me. Look at…hmm…that lamp over there. I’m trying to get your collarbone right.”
Jack obeyed, shifting his attention, though the lamp was a poor substitute for naked Lucy. “Whatisthis piece you’re working on? What’s it about?”
“Have you read Lord Byron’s poem?”
“Oh God, not thatChilde Haroldthing everyone keeps talking about? Please don’t tell me you’re yetanotherof his admirers?”
Lucy laughed. “You can’t deny he has a way with words, Jack. He is very talented.”
“Have you ever met the man? I didn’t like him. One of those fragile ego types.”
“Unlike you?” she asked innocently. “And I did meet him once. Caroline introduced me to him at the theatre.Sheknows him, of course she does.”
“Oh, she knows that whole set. And…what did you think of him?”
“Much the same as you.”
“But you’re basing a whole artwork on his poem?”
“On the poem. On the man. It’s very autobiographical,Childe Harold,though he protests it isn’t. But the central character, the poor little lordling, so very tired of his debauched life, going to seek pastures new on a tour of Europe…if that doesn’t sound like Lord Byron himself, I don’t know what does.”
“Him and a hundred others. There are forever ruined nobles fleeing to Europe. Most of them to escape their creditors. I hardly see what’s heroic about it.”
“Exactly!” she said, pointing her pencil at him. “Byron, Childe Harold, they are atype. They…the poem…it is designed to invoke our sympathy, with his‘sick, sore heart’and the teardrops in his eye, when really, he has brought it all upon himself. He is not a heroic figure at all, but flawed, even pathetic.”
“Andthatis what you are painting? A pathetic man? Why…er…why exactly am I the perfect model for it?”
“Hmm?” she said innocently. “What was that you said?”
“Lucy…”
She grinned at him, then became more serious. “I am not painting a flawed man, or not really. What I’m painting is arealman. Neither version of Childe Harold is correct. He is neither heroic nor pathetic. We are all of us made up of both. That is what I want to paint. It is this idea of…of painting a classically heroic young man—an Adonis type, like you—in a classically heroic pose, and yet…yet painting him as a real man. Flawed. Vulnerable.”
Jack took his foot from the chair, suddenly feeling exposed in a way he hadn’t until now. He went to the bed and sat on the edge where Lucy’s hip lay under the bunched coverlet.
“That’s what you see, isn’t it?” he asked quietly. “The truth of people.”
“I…I don’t know. I don’t think I see anything very different to what other people see.”
“You see the truth of me. That I’m all those flawed, pathetic things. And yet…you love me? How can that be?”
“Why wouldn’t I? It’s what makes you real. It is not as though you think I am perfect.”
He smiled. “But I do, Lucy. I really do.”
“Well I’mnot.”
“No. True. You’re stubborn, for one thing.” He touched her nose and she scowled. Then he leaned down to kiss her, and, after a moment, the sketchbook went sliding to the floor.
Jack woke with a start, wondering what was wrong before realising it was early morning, which explained it. He should still be asleep. Beside him, Lucy stirred, curls tickling his arm, and Jack froze once more.
It was morning. And he was still in Lucy’s bed. Ohdamnation.
He leapt up, hastily collecting his scattered clothes. They were creased, having been thrown unceremoniously to the floor last night. He’d had more important things on his mind.
