Jackie

Leo was kissing me—messy, passionate kisses with his tongue deep into my mouth. Then he stopped and began kissing me all over my face, licking my cheeks, and licking my... hair?

Someone was licking my hair.

“What are you doing?” I sat up in bed. Minx was sitting on my pillow. “Were you licking me? That is so weird.”

She meowed loudly, and I looked at the time. Sunday morning and I had slept in until after eight o’clock. Her breakfast time was an hour ago. I never slept in. In fact, I hadn’t slept through the night since... well, since Brent left.

But I had slept well at Leo’s place on Friday night, and now again at mine.

Crapola. Was I turning into some kind of stereotype? Dried-up single mom who finally gets some and comes to life. I got out of bed and fed Minx on autopilot. There was no question, I felt fantastic. A good night’s sleep and orgasms were a cure-all.

Since nobody was around, I skipped my morning shower, pulled on old jeans and a button-down shirt, and began painting. The large vase of bright red tulips that I was painting yesterday were sitting on the buffet, but after a few frustrated moments, I dropped my brushes into a jar of water. There was too much energy in me to paint something small and fidgety.

I grabbed my mug of coffee, went out on the deck, and looked out at my garden. The dappled morning sunshine spotlighted all the spring bulbs pushing their heads up: the lavender croci, the white and yellow narcissi, and a tide of dark purple grape hyacinths. And all the flowers were set off by that bright green that signalled the early spring. Our cherry blossom tree was beginning to bud. The tree had been here when we moved in, but every flower was from a bulb I’d planted. They had naturalized and spread everywhere. A shadow of sadness loomed, but I didn’t want to dwell on how much I was going to miss my garden. I needed to memorialize this sight. I pulled out my phone and took a few photos, then went back inside and grabbed my sketchbook and some markers. I did a pencil outline, and then sketched in some colours and played around with the composition. If I moved the cherry tree to the foreground, made the wave of purple hyacinths move towards the centre, and then added some pink tulips—not yet in bloom, but I was taking artistic license—then this would make an incredible painting. And I had the big stack of blank canvases that I had bought for that restaurant show.

I set up my easel on the deck. First a charcoal sketch on the big canvas and then I blocked in some big squares of colour. Freeing myself from replicating exactly what was in a photograph or still life was incredibly freeing. I was painting my vision of life—an enhanced reality where the colours were more vivid and elements were freely added and subtracted.

The glorious flow state emerged where I was losing all sense of time. Yet this flow state was different. Now, I wasn’t escaping from my problems, I was painting for the sheer pleasure of painting. It was sensual, tactile, relaxing. At times my mind drifted back to Friday night. Was that what post-divorce sex was going to be like? Because pre-marriage sex had been wracked with worries: Am I going to get pregnant? Is he going to think I’m a slut? Are my breasts too small? Is he the one? Am I doing this right?

But Friday night had only been about sex. I wanted it as much as Leo did, and he had been incredible. Whenever I shifted, the soreness between my legs reminded me of every naughty thing we had done. It was ridiculous, but I felt like a pirate—lawless, swashbuckling, daring. Not the boring hockey mom anymore.

Finally the loud gurgling of my stomach signalled how much time had passed. I checked my watch and found I had an hour until the kids were home. Exactly the right time to clean up my painting stuff, eat, shower, and be ready for their return.

I stood back and looked at the painting. It wasn’t done yet, but it was going to be good. The bright colours gave it an energy and movement that drew you inside. I exhaled happily. I had stumbled into my theme for the show: painting all the scenes I’d miss when I left my home.

Brent and the kids exploded into the house and for once I was exactly where I wanted to be: on the living room couch, reading a book with a cup of tea beside me.

“Mom!” Tristan threw himself into my lap. “I missed you.”

I kissed the top of his head. He had the sharp scent of ripe boy. Brent was pretty lax about showers after hockey. But I didn’t care, I hugged him tightly. “Missed you so much. Did you have a good weekend?”

“Yup. We ate at Boston Pizza tonight.” No matter how many incredible things he did since I last saw him, Tristan would only remember the last one. He stayed perched on my lap and peered at the crumbs on my empty plate. “Are there chocolate chip cookies?” Tristan could have worked on a C.S.I. team, as long as the C stood for cookie.

“Yup. I baked some yesterday. They’re in the cookie jar.”

Hannah leaned for a hug too. “Hi Mom.”

“Welcome back, darling. Minx is in the laundry basket in your room,” I said before she could ask. “I think she’s hinting that you should put away your clothes.”

“That’s silly. She’s hinting that I should leave my clothes in there because it makes a comfy bed.”

I laughed. “You’re too quick for me. Do you have homework?”

“Nope. I did it all during Tristan’s game. Dad let me stay home alone.”

What? That was a first, and I had a brief panic attack imagining all the things that could have gone wrong. At least Brent had the decency to look embarrassed. He explained, “She’s twelve now. Hannah told me she’s taking the babysitting course, so I’m pretty sure she can stay home by herself.”

The initial flare of anger died down as quickly as it came. “You’re probably right, Brent. But this is the kind of thing that we should discuss first.”

Hannah tried not to smile. She had been bugging me to leave her and Tristan home alone, but I’d been resisting. She was exactly the type of smart kid to take advantage of different standards in different households. She told me a little more about their weekend, including a mention of dinner at Margaret’s place, and then drifted off to her room.

Brent sat in the armchair across from me. “Now, I know you’re going to chew me out, so can I just say that it was Hannah’s idea.”

“Oh, you’re throwing your daughter under the bus?” I laughed, and he visibly relaxed.

He laughed. “You sound like a hockey player or something. So you’re not mad?”

No, I was too busy blushing. Who knew that semen contained vocabulary boosters? I blew out my breath and tried to act like a grown-ass woman.

“All I’m saying is we still need to agree on these things, just like when we were together. If you’re letting her stay by herself and I’m saying she’s too young, that will end up confusing Hannah. This isn’t a huge deal; we could clear it up with a quick phone call. But something big, like dating, we’d need to talk about.”

Damn. Back on that subject and I was blushing. I reached for my tea and hoped that Brent wouldn’t notice. But even if he did, it wasn’t like he could tell I’d had sex.

Luckily, the idea of a teenaged boy getting near his precious daughter completely distracted him. “Dating? She’s not talking about dating yet, is she?”

“Shhh. She’ll hear you.” I shook my head. “No, not yet. I only mentioned it as the example of something important.” Or possibly because I was dating. Woo hoo.

“Phew. Thanks. I thought I was going to get roasted here.” Brent leaned back in his chair and peered at me. “There’s something different about you. Did you cut your hair or something?”

“No. I’m the same.” Don’t blush, don’t blush, don’t blush. This was ridiculous. But obviously relying on Mr. Vibrator was not the same was having actual sex.

“The place looks great. You’ve done a good job here.”

“Yeah, it was surprising how much useless stuff was lying around.”

I’d been in a very unsentimental mood while I decluttered and gotten rid of many things that reminded me of Brent and our happier times. “There are four boxes of yours in the basement. Maybe you could take them with you now?”

“Sure, I’ll get to them.” He wandered around the house, doing the “inspection” he’d promised, but there wasn’t a word of criticism. My hard work was paying off.

He stopped in the middle of the living room.

“Hey, Jakes—” Whatever was coming was going to be big because he had used his pet name for me. “I’m sorry but I don’t think your paintings are really, uh, enhancing, the value of the house.”

That felt like a slap across the face. “What? I thought you liked my art.” He always told me how cheerful my art was and how he could never do anything like that.

“Look, they’re great, like funky or whatever the word is, but when we’re selling a multi-million dollar home, the art should be classic, refined, and more, uh, neutral.”

Sometimes it was hard to imagine that Brent could still find new ways to hurt me, but obviously he could. My mouth pinched in a straight line, which had the advantage of keeping me quiet. Undoubtedly Margaret’s home was full of classic, refined art. I picked up my plate and cup and headed to the kitchen so he couldn’t see my face.

“Fine. I’ll have everything ready by the end of the week. Have your realtor contact me, and we’ll set up a time.” Maybe I could rent art or something. Because when I had my own place, all the art was going to be vibrant, alive, and “funky.”

“And Brent, since staging the place costs money, I assume we’ll be splitting the bill.”

“Yeah, that sounds fair. I know you’ll keep things reasonable.”

“Of course.” I’d give him refined and neutral up the wazoo.