CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Everything should be going perfectly. I have my easel and canvas all set up . . . my brushes, my paints . . . my palette is loaded . . . I even have the rubber gloves ready to go if I decide to do this thing without brushes. But that stupid, loud, intrusive racket from the other room is ruining everything. How in the hell am I supposed to be able to concentrate when it feels like a crappy high school metal band is practicing inside my ear canal?
Sighing, I put my palette down on the small table covered in plastic wrap and place the brush back in the cup I found under the bathroom sink. As I turn to face the hallway behind my bedroom, I glare. More horrible sounds are making their way under the space below the closed door.
Bwont, bwerp, bwap! Bop boop boop bwerpitty bwerp bweeeerrp!
I’m going to recommend to Amber that she get her hearing checked immediately, as soon as she returns from Japan, because if she thinks Sam’s music is anything other than total crap, she’s obviously tone-deaf at the very least.
Derw, derw, dow, dewp, boopa, derp, deeerrrp!
My bottom jaw shifts to the left; my teeth are officially set on edge by Sam’s so-called music. I turn and take a deep breath with my eyes closed. I can get through this. I can paint with him playing in the room across the hall. It’s mind over matter. It’s all about concentration and focus . . .
“Goddammit!” Sam yells, his voice coming through our two doors muffled but still very clear. Then something heavy hits the wall and something even heavier crashes to the floor. Several discordant twangs are involuntarily strummed on his electric guitar. I’m not sure, but it sounds like he might have used his instrument as a weapon to kill a television.
Smiling through the pain, I pick up my paintbrush and hold it poised over the blank canvas. I will paint something. I will create something beautiful. I will . . .
More crashing comes from the other room.
Then . . . Bwooowww wow wow wowwww, weir, weeeer!
I throw the paintbrush down on the plastic and stride over to the door. I’ve had just about enough of this nonsense. He knows very well I’m trying to work in here. It’s like he’s begging for me to come over there, so, fine! Here I go! I’m going right over there to have a word with him about his complete lack of courtesy for other people. And I’m not scared at all. My heart is hammering because I’m so angry.
“Hey!” I shout, banging on his door. “Do you mind?!”
Suddenly, his face is there, inches from mine. The breeze from his sudden opening of the door brushes loose hair against my cheeks, tickling my skin. My heart stops momentarily.
“What?!” he yells, his face red and sweaty.
I’m struck dumb. Seeing him there without a shirt on is enough to send my heart into overdrive. His chest is sweaty too. He has a tattoo over his heart that reads Sadie.
I say the first thing that pops into my head. “Who is Sadie?”
He stares at me for a few seconds, his nostrils flaring, his breathing reminding me of an angry bull. Time stands still, only starting again when he finally answers. “What do you want?”
His rudeness snaps me out of the little spell that had temporarily taken over my righteous indignation. “You know I’m trying to paint, right?”
He shrugs, his body stance relaxing a little bit. “No, actually, I didn’t know that.” He uses the back of his hand to wipe his forehead.
“Well, I am. And it’s pretty much impossible to do with you making such a ruckus over here.”
One of his eyebrows goes up. “A ruckus?” He strokes his beard a few times, moving his jaw around.
“Yes. A ruckus.” I ignore his sexy beard maneuvers and lean over, trying to see around him. “It sounds like you’re in the process of destroying this bedroom.” I can’t see anything but darkness; apparently, he plays with the lights off and his window blocked with a blanket. Weird. I feel bad for my sister, but I hope she’s not going to blame me for the expense he’s racking up by tearing holes in her walls or whatever I heard him doing in here.
He glances over her shoulder. “Not exactly. More like destroying my equipment.” He has the grace to sound a little chagrined.
“What equipment? You came here with a backpack and two guitars.”
“I rented a couple amps and some other stuff. It was delivered earlier.”
“Oh.” I somehow missed that. It must have happened while I was napping. I guess that explains the loud guitar I was hearing. “Well . . . I don’t think my sister or Ty would appreciate you bringing the house down around our ears while they’re gone.”
“Probably not.” He rests his arm on the doorjamb and sighs. “I’m just a little frustrated. I’m sorry if I was making too much noise. I’ll try to be quieter.”
I nod, feeling like a schoolmarm scolding a student. “Good. Thank you.” I turn to go, but then he speaks and I freeze in my footsteps.
“What are you painting?”
I force my legs to get moving again and continue into the bedroom without looking back. “Nothing, because you’re being too noisy!” I slam the door behind me, but not before I hear him laugh.
I walk over to my canvas and stare at it. It’s just as blank as it was an hour ago. The big white space is almost a threat, staring out at me, taunting me: Paint on me, chicken. Paint something . . . or are you too afraid? Make yourself useful around here, why don’t you . . .
I put on a pair of rubber gloves. I’ve never painted with my fingers before—well, not since I was a small child, anyway—but I might as well give this new technique a try, because this damn canvas ain’t gonna paint itself. It can’t hurt anything to try something different, right?
I pick up a tube of black paint and put a blob of the color on my fingertips. I use the first two fingers of my right hand to smear it around and then step back to look at it. My heart is still pounding. I don’t know if it’s from the painting craziness or that man across the hall.
I frown at the result of my first finger-painting attempt. Humph. I’m not impressed so far, but I might as well keep trying. At least I’m getting somewhere.
I pick up a dark-blue shade and repeat the process, covering up more of the white gesso that serves as the foundation for what my sister has deemed to be the next masterpiece for her apartment. Pfff. Even finger-painting, I can’t do any worse than that fake Jackson Pollock out in her foyer. My energy picks up just a tad.
I select a deep-green shade next and smooth it into the blue and black. The effect isn’t completely terrible. I’ll probably never show this to anyone, though. I wonder if there’s a place in New York City where I can safely and legally burn a canvas.
I grab another couple of colors and play around with them, warming to the idea of finger painting as an adult. What’s happening on the canvas right now is nothing like my old style—it’s more abstract and amorphous—but it’s keeping me busy, at least. I feel the stress created by Sam’s discordant destruction across the hall start to ease out of my body. I think I read somewhere that therapists use finger painting with the mentally ill. I’m not sure I want to examine too closely what this is saying about me right now.
The next color has to be exactly right. Purple maybe? I’m not sure. I select a tube and hold the color up to my fingertips. Maybe. This could be the one I need to use next.
I put a giant helping of it in my palm and place the tube down on the table. Smearing my gloved hands together, I prepare myself for this daring move that’s already feeling really good in the deepest part of my creative self. I’m just reaching out to touch the canvas, fingers loaded with glorious violet paint, when a horrible noise comes from out in the hallway again.
Bana, bamp, bamp, bowowowowww, derrrr, neerrrrr neeerrr!
I flinch but move my fingers closer to the canvas anyway. This is really going to be the beginning of something special, I can feel it. I just need to get past the noise and . . .
Louda dout dout dow, de deeer deeer de deeer deeerr woww!
I cringe. Whatever creativity I was feeling bubbling up in me is now simmering down to nothing again. I cannot believe this. What is his damn, freaking, fracking, frucking problem?!
“Goddammit!” he shouts. I hear what sounds like furniture moving, wooden legs scraping across floors. But I don’t remember his bedroom even having wooden floors. What in the Sam Hill is going on in there?
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, in and out. I am locked and loaded with my purple paint, ready to dive into the creative process. This painting session need not end here. I can live my life while he is living his. His problems are not my problems, and my problems are not his. This is my world, and I’m the only one in it. Peace and serenity exist inside my bubble. Serenity now . . . serenity now . . . I can do this . . .
I reach out with my eyes closed and make contact with the canvas. Down and to the right. A sweeping motion, that’s it, yessss . . . This is going to be so beautiful . . .
“That’s it! Fuck this shit!” Sam shouts.
My eyes fly open as his reality comes crashing into mine. I grab the bottoms of my gloves and snap them off my hands, sending purple paint across the tarped area to land on the formerly pristine wall. Jesus H. Christ on a Popsicle stick! What the hell!
I’m across the room in two seconds, running full out. Sam is so going to get a piece of my mind. I fling my door open in time to see his back disappearing down the hall.
“Where are you going?!” I shout, outraged at the idea of him missing out on the dressing down I was about to give him.
“Out.”
I leave my room to follow him. “Where?” I know what my sister would say about all this: He can’t leave angry! Who knows what trouble he’ll get into? Maybe he’s going to the airport to take off for LA. Maybe that girl Sadie is waiting for him. He avoided my question about who she was. She’s probably the reason he left early, and now he’s regretting that decision.
“What do you care?” He stops at the end of the hall and spins around to face me, waiting for my answer.
I slow down as I approach him, shrugging. I need to be cool. Amber needs my help. I can’t tell him what a shitty shithead he is for being so loud and inconsiderate . . .
“I don’t know. I was just thinking . . .” Panic level ten! Quick! Say something that makes sense! “If you’re going out, maybe I can hitch a ride with you?” I have no idea where this is coming from. I don’t want to go anywhere with him! What the heck? I think Amber brainwashed me with all that finding-his-buttons stuff in the cab.
He jabs his thumb over his shoulder. “I was just going to get some air.”
I smile brilliantly. Hallelujah. This is so much better than hearing he’s leaving for California or that he’s going out to score some drugs or climb up onto the roof of the building.
Words tumble out of me. “That sounds great. Really great. Phew. I could really use some fresh air myself. Do they have that here?” I’m getting a cramp in my face from smiling so hard.
He walks toward me and stops a foot away. I don’t know what to say, but my smile slips away out of nervousness. What is he going to do? Why is he so close?
He reaches up and gently swipes his thumb across my cheek. “If you’re going to go outside, you’re probably going to want to clean your face off first.”
My hand slowly rises to my cheek. “Oh, no. How bad is it?” I have been known to paint almost as much of myself as I have my canvases.
His smile is almost sad, which is weird. “It’s not bad,” he says. “Just a couple specks here and there. I may have smeared some, though.”
I hold up my finger. “Don’t leave without me. I’m just going to go wash my face, and I’ll be right back.”
“I’m not going anywhere special,” he warns as I hustle back to my room.
“Perfect. I don’t like going to special places.”
His chuckle follows me down the hall.