She followed him through the house as he greeted several guests and said he’d be back in a minute. Outside, the front porch was crowded with more people who wanted to talk to him. He just kept saying the same thing, “I’ll be right back,” the smile on his face waning. They jogged toward his studio where he unlocked the door and slammed it behind them.
Once he caught his breath, he smiled at Alice, exhilarated. “We survived,” he said.
Alice reached for the tan book peeking out of her bag, but a voice inside pulled her back, telling her not yet.
As always, Joe’s easel was faced away from the door, the last layer of protection against curious eyes. He winked at Alice before venturing to the back of the garage, where he opened a chest Alice hadn’t noticed before.
The good stuff turned out to be a vodka that tasted as close to water as any vodka Alice had imbibed, not that she was much of a vodka drinker. They leaned against an unfinished wall, not talking, sipping their drinks, deciding whether to share their art. When Alice’s glass got low, Joe refilled it. On the second pour she tasted something earthy and nutty, not altogether unpleasant.
“If I’d kept this in the house, Hank would have used it for cocktails, which would be sacrilege.” He took a sip, contemplated the vodka, then swallowed. “I’ve been dreading this day for so long. Now that it’s here, I’m surprisingly Zen. Don’t get me wrong, tomorrow when I wake up alone, or the next day when I discover the last toothpaste Hank and I shared is gone, or a week from now when I finish this bottle—” he held it toward Alice “—I’m guaranteed to fall apart. For now, calm waters.”
Calm waters. It made her think of the story she’d written for him.
“Refill,” he asked. Alice was already more lightheaded than she liked and declined. He filled his glass again. The bottle was nearly empty. “So much for this lasting a week.”
He drained the glass in one long sip, then leaned back against the wall, in no rush to return to the party. They’d spent so much time together in this converted garage, but there had always been the portrait distracting them from the simple act of being together. Alice reached for the tan book again. It was now or never.
“This is something I wrote for you. At Hank’s request.” His eyes widened and she debated outlining how her gift worked. It was better if he figured it out on his own. Her job was to write the story and get him to read it. After that, the rest was up to him.
“Hank wrote a little letter to you in the front. It explains why—well, I’m not sure what it explains, really. I didn’t read it. It wasn’t for me.” This was half true. Rather, she hadn’t realized she was reading it until she got to the part about their inside jokes. Then, although she knew it was wrong, she kept reading. Maybe the same had been true for Duncan when he read her stories, that he couldn’t help himself.
Alice tapped the book for effect. “It was important to Hank that you read it.”
For the first time that afternoon Joe looked like he might cry. Instead he laughed. “Hank was always trying to get me to read more. He left copies ofLetters to a Young Poetunder our bed, on the driver’s seat of my car, on my easel, which really pissed me off because he wasn’t supposed to come in here without my permission. He must have bought fifteen copies of that book, all different editions. And you know what? I read it and loved it, but I pretended I hadn’t. Ever since Hank got sick, whenever I see a copy I buy it. Even if it’s an edition I already have.” He took the tan book from Alice. “You know, you were the last friend Hank made. He had no reason to let anyone new in. He chose you. He wanted you to be a part of our lives. I’m so glad he did.”
“Me too,” Alice said.
Joe kept staring at her until it made her uncomfortable. Even after she looked away, she could feel his gaze on her. It wasn’t the same as when he observed her to paint her portrait.
“I have something for you too,” he said. “I’ve been going back and forth, adding a little color to your cheeks, then removing it. Adding more blue to the background, then deciding it made you look washed out.”
“I am washed out,” Alice said, and Joe laughed.
“Well, you aren’t in my painting.” He studied her again, somberly. “To be honest, I wasn’t entirely sure I was going to show you the portrait until just now. I try not to control what I paint. The image comes to me, and I honor it. I don’t overanalyze it or try to understand why I see people the way I do. An artist’s job is to create, and an audience’s job is to interpret. God, if Hank were here, he’d tell me to stop being so pretentious.”
“Heishere.” It was very unlike Alice to say this. “He’ll always be here.”
Joe looked down at the floor. Exactly as Hank had predicted, he didn’t want to confront the idea of Hank being absent while still being present. That was the whole point of the story she’d written.
“People assume the brave part of making art is creating,” Joe finally said. “The bravery is in finishing. Saying nothing else I do will make this piece better and it’s time to send it into the world. Creating is a synonym for birth, but it’s as much a death. An ending. Because once it’s out there you can’t take it back. You have to let it be complete.”
Now it was Alice’s turn to stare at the cement floor. At a loss, she did what she imagined Hank would do in this situation. “Now, that really is pretentious,” she said even though it wasn’t.
Joe walked over to the canvas and looked between it and Alice. “You may hate it. It’s how I see you, and I think it’s beautiful.” He motioned her over. Alice’s heart raced. It wasn’t often you got to witness how other people saw you. She suspected that how Joe saw her was how she really was.
On the canvas an old woman stared back at Alice. The painting was a composite of different shades of blue, red, and yellow veering into purple and green. A long, jagged line traced the woman’s cheek, a scar or a shadow. Her wild blue-white hair was a halo of corkscrew curls around her head. A tingling crept up Alice’s arms. She felt like she’d seen this woman before, like she knew her, and she did. The tingling intensified into an electric shock, surging through her body. The woman in the painting was Alice. Not as Alice was but as she could be.
“You’re an old soul, Alice,” Joe said, studying her for a response. “You have so much more wisdom in you than you know. You need to let people see your wisdom. Don’t fear it. Let it define you.”
The woman in the painting was very old and very beautiful. She looked powerful. Confident. Wise. She could survive anything. Even love. The physical sensation coursing through Alice was the strongest yet, stronger even than when she’d needed to write a story for Joe. It wasn’t a dump truck of inspiration. It was an earthquake, a mudslide, a tectonic shift. Of course there was another story she needed to write, one that would force her to decide if she should continue to be a love scribe.
“I have to go,” Alice said as she raced out of the garage. “I love it, thank you. I’ll come by and get it tomorrow. Right now I really have to go.”
Alice ran toward home. Her shallow heels slowed her down, so she took them off, sprinting barefoot past dried tributaries, Victorian houses, palm trees, the physical world that had inspired so many of her stories. Like all her other stories, she had an image and a purpose. Only this time, the story was for her.
37
In Which Another Envelope Arrives
