The kitten scampered toward her, mewing plaintively. Kari picked her up and started back. As soon as she entered the atelier, however, Sienna began squirming. Kari let her down, and the kitten ran to the chamber’s far corner and slipped beneath a canvas drop cloth.
Indrid said, “Many young animals grow out of shyness as they become aware of their own strength.” Indrid had brought in a second chair, which, like hers, faced the new work. “Come sit down.”
Kari sat and accepted a plate holding buttered bread topped with chunks of crumbly cheese and sliced tomato. “I’m starving.”
“I’m not surprised.” Indrid filled a mug and set it on the floor between them. She sipped from her own mug and studied the painting. The colors gleamed wet and alive in the afternoon light. “This is extraordinary.”
Kari ate and drank and watched her oldest friend approach the canvas. The man’s boundaries swam in and out of focus as clouds passed over the sun. One moment he was almost lost to the gloom; the next, his defiance seemed ready to push him from the canvas.
When her plate was empty, Kari set it on the floor and said, “I make such a total mess of my relationships. It’s only in those first moments of coming together that I realize . . .”
Indrid stepped back two paces, still facing the canvas. “What?”
“How lonely I am.”
Indrid nodded slowly. Her gaze still elsewhere.
“So I grow frantic. Desperate. Clingy. I want so much. And then . . .”
Indrid spoke to the gray-shrouded man. “You run.”
“It doesn’t matter what they do. How nice they are. How right it feels. I don’t . . . I can’t . . .”
Indrid walked back. Seated herself. Assumed a position so as to face Kari directly. “The relationship’s intensity threatens your world. It isn’t the man at all. Your enclosed space, your creative drive, becomes endangered by what they represent.”
Kari wiped her face. “How do you do that?”
“My dear young friend, has it occurred to you that you are facing your own wall?”
When Kari did not respond, Indrid went on, “You came here to Miramar expecting one thing. But your current state, your immediate needs, won’t be satisfied by more of the same. The solitude you needed to protect yourself in Los Angeles, it has no place here.”
Indrid’s words pressed against Kari from every side. Just the same, she could not deny the truth. Or deflect.
Indrid reached over, gripped Kari’s hand, and said, “Just know you don’t walk this road alone.”
* * *
Kari waved Indrid off, then stood and watched the silent valley road, so tired her thoughts felt congealed. When her phone rang, it required genuine effort to pull it from her pocket, find the proper function, make the connection, lift the device, speak the word hello.
“Hi, Kari. It’s Aldana, your neighbor.”
Only then did Kari notice the woman standing a half dozen homes away, waving in her direction. Kari waved back. “Yes?”
“You remember at dinner, we mentioned the young artist who’s the son of our friend?”
Kari searched her memory. “Liam, is that right?”
“He’s coming over this evening. We’re grilling burgers in the backyard. I was wondering . . .”
“Just a moment.” First things first. A nap before anything. Kari checked the time, decided. “Would six be okay?”
“Perfect!” Aldana waved once again. “See you then.”
