But the truth was that not even Kendra knew what Henrietta Johannes’s new name was, that she knew nothing of “Jasmine” nor her whereabouts in Hawaii. There was plenty of speculation about where Henrietta lived, especially given the subject matter of her more recent paintings. But Jasmine had switched this up enough in her more recent paintings, producing works that evoked her modern-day life in Hawaii as well as her past in Colorado. It spun viewers’ heads around—in a good way.
A few minutes before Oriana and Reese left for the party, Oriana called Jasmine back home in Hawaii to check in. Jasmine answered right away, which was her custom now that she was so panicked about this new era of “fame” or whatever it was she was about to enjoy.
“How is everything?” Jasmine asked.
Oriana laughed gently. “I wanted to let you know I’m on my way to the party,” she said.
“Any sign they know about me?” Jasmine asked, as she had countless times over the past few weeks.
“No sign at all,” Oriana promised.
“But you’ll let me know if anyone says anything,” Jasmine said.
“Of course,” Oriana said.
“And if they figure out where I am…”
“We’ll do exactly what we said,” Oriana affirmed.
Jasmine had asked Oriana to help her with a specific plan to hide herself, her grandchildren, and her daughter in the event that her new identity was discovered. Oriana played along, although she knew that nobody in the world save for herself, Reese, Jenny, and her grandchildren knew that Jasmine and Henrietta were one and the same.
“I saw a thing on the news about Larry last night,” Jasmine said, her voice raspy. “It feels like they’re turning on him? The interview was rough. He floundered.” She paused for a long time before adding, “He looks old. Tired. I hope he can step away from all this. I don’t blame him anymore for any of it, you know? It’s been too long. And I can see the loneliness on his face. I can’t help but think that I won.”
Oriana sat at the edge of the bed and took her husband’s hand. Reese pressed a kiss onto hers.
“I think it sounds like you won,” Oriana agreed softly, her eyes filling with tears she couldn’t control.
A few minutes later, Oriana and Reese were on the hot sidewalk outside the hotel, ripping open a taxi door and hurrying off to the party. Like teenagers, they kissed in the back of the car until they burst into giggles, realizing how foolish they seemed. When the taxi driver dropped them off, he hollered out,“Take care, love birds.” Oriana guessed that they seemed like newlyweds or people in the midst of a wild affair.
At the restaurant, Henrietta Johannes’s brand-new paintings were hung across the far wall, ready to be auctioned off to the highest bidders. They were mesmerizing. They were also different from Henrietta’s work back in the seventies, but not so different that they felt crafted by a different hand. They spoke of an artist who’d lived numerous lives but still tapped into the same emotional center at the end of the day.
Oriana and Reese took their time with each painting, stopping to discuss quietly how each made them feel. It felt intimate to see them lined up like this—out of Jasmine’s little studio in Hawaii, ready to be auctioned off for millions of dollars.
Under his breath, Reese muttered, “Do you think she knows how different her life is about to be?”
Oriana shook her head. “How could she ever know?”
That night, Oriana and Reese stood in the back of the restaurant and watched as art buyers from all ranks and all levels of fame fought tooth and nail to buy Henrietta Johannes’s newest paintings. Several of the buyers also owned paintings sold under Larry Calvin Johannes’s name, and they saw owning Henrietta’s pieces as giving them ownership of the entire story. Oriana knew how the minds of art buyers worked. She also wasn’t sure if she fully agreed with that sentiment. How could you “own” someone’s story, even if you purchased something they’d made as a result of it for millions of dollars? This was the trouble with the ultra-rich, she knew. They didn’t know what they couldn’t own. They made it all up as they went.
That night, Henrietta Johannes’s new paintings raked in three hundred million dollars—some of which would be deposited into Jasmine’s account in the following three weeks. Kendra was floored and ran off to call Henrietta Johannes’sassistant, who, Oriana knew, was just Jenny, pretending to be someone else. It ran in their family: faking it in a world they didn’t understand.
When Kendra returned, her cheeks were red, and she threw her arms around Oriana and thanked her again. “Jasmine’s assistant started crying like crazy,” Kendra said. “It makes me wonder what she’s lived like all these years, you know? It makes me wonder what she’s seen and how old she is and what this means.”
Oriana glanced at Reese, who held their secrets tight.
“It’s impossible to know who’s behind any painting,” Oriana said. “We can feel something like the painter’s soul, I think. But that only reveals so much.”
Kendra nodded and squinted at the painting of the surfing Chase. “I feel her spirit,” she whispered. “It’s fascinating to me how much more I’ll never get to know.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
It was Christmas Eve on Oahu, and Jasmine was up far past her so-called bedtime, painting up a storm in the studio at the end of the hall. Now at seventy-nine years old, she ignored minor creaks in her knees and aches in her back, all in pursuit of finding the truth that lurked within the painting she wanted to finish by January. When inspiration struck, she couldn’t ignore it.
At one thirty that morning, Jasmine crept from the studio and padded downstairs, wrapping her old robe over her shoulders and tying it into place. There was a single light on in Alyssa’s room, but Jasmine didn’t want to disturb her. She’d learned recently that Alyssa had taken to writing poems late at night, and Jasmine never wanted to obstruct the creative process. Alyssa had even shared some of the poems with Jasmine. They weren’t bad. One of them had made Jasmine cry.
In the massive and tiled kitchen of the large house they’d moved into mid-October, Jasmine opened the fridge and retrieved a pitcher of filtered water, which she poured into a large glass. She took her water to the window, where she drank and watched the massive white moon resting like a ghost in the darkness. Sometimes Jasmine couldn’t believe how marvelousthe view the house had, not how many bedrooms they filled, nor how nutritious and tasty the food they ate was. She couldn’t believe that the beach was so great that Chase could surf right out in front of the house. He’d begun conducting his lessons right out on the water, where Jasmine could keep tabs on him from her easel. She was grateful that he’d decided to move in with her and the other girls for now, just until he figured out what he wanted his life to look like.
Jasmine knew that sleep wouldn’t find her quickly, not tonight. She made herself a mug of tea and sat on one of the extra-soft sofas in the living room. The lights on the Christmas tree glowed and filled her heart with song.
