Текст книги "Painless"

Автор книги: Devon Hartford

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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 32 страниц)

Chapter 18

CHRISTOS

My ’68 Camaro dipped and bobbed over the picturesque rolling hills of Rancho Santa Fe as we neared my dad’s house. Rancho Santa Fe was an exclusive upscale community hidden a few miles inland from the coast. Suburban three bedroom houses on cookie cutter lots were replaced by lavish ranch style homes surrounded by oceans of acreage.

“There’s a lot of horses and mansions out here,” Samantha observed as she took in the countryside.

“Yeah,” I said.

“It sure is beautiful. How come you don’t go out to visit your Dad more often?”

I glanced at her briefly. It was the only answer I could give at the moment. The subject of my dad was guaranteed to piss me off or break my heart. I wasn’t in the mood to do either. I just wanted to get his advice and get through the visit as quickly as possible.

“Oh, uh, sorry,” Samantha said sheepishly.

“It’s okay, agápi mou,” I said softly. “Do me a favor, when we get to my dad’s place, don’t mention my drinking, okay?”

“All right,” she said uncertainly.

I wanted to tell Samantha that it would bother my dad if he found out I was drinking all the time. Sure, that was part of the truth. Who wanted to find out their kid was getting trashed on a daily basis instead of making something of themselves? But the rest of the truth was I felt like an idiot for drinking so much. After watching my dad destroy his marriage with his own drinking, I should’ve known better. Right?

Like father, like son.

Man, I had become a fucking cliché.

But it went deeper than that. My dad hadn’t really started drinking until he’d felt bound by his golden handcuffs.

My grandad had once told me that when my dad was young, he’d made a clear headed decision to paint abstract art because he knew it sold well. He had a family to support and he didn’t want to tough it out as a realist painter and hope that he’d make money someday. That’s what my grandad had done. Sure, now my grandad was successful, but in the beginning, he’d had plenty of lean years and my dad lived through most of them as a kid.

So my dad went for the sure thing. Not that Joe Anybody could make money as an abstract artist. Tons of artists tried the ‘easy’ route over the decades and failed miserably. But my dad knew exactly what he was doing. His career blew up from the start and it started raining money.

But it didn’t take long for him to feel bound tight by those golden cuffs. He got sick of abstract real quick. Maybe because it was so damn easy for him. He never did figure out a way to Houdini out of doing the abstract art and transform his career into doing the realistic stuff he really wanted to do. I guess it wasn’t in the cards for him.

Ironically, I’d already made a good chunk of change at my first solo show at Charboneau Gallery selling realistic art. I was living the dream my dad had hoped to live from the day he’d picked up a paintbrush. And here I was, drinking because things weren’t going perfectly.

The last thing I wanted to do was walk into my dad’s house and say to him, “Hey, Dad, I’m doing what you always dreamed of doing, but I can’t hack it because that fuck Stanford Wentworth said my paintings didn’t have any heart, and he was right. So instead of manning up and fighting through the pain, I’m crumbling like a sand castle in a slight breeze.”

Yeah, like I wanted to tell my dad I was pussing out on an opportunity he would’ve killed for twenty five years ago.

Hence, all my drinking of late and my reluctance to face my dad today.

I wheeled the Camaro onto a paved private road and drove until we came to the gates and stopped. The iron gate had a circle set in the center. The circle held a fancy polished gold letter M. I could never decide if it was cheesy or awesome. Mainly, I didn’t really care. My dad could spend his money on whatever he wanted. He’d paid for it the hard way when his drinking had chased off my mom. After she left, he’d painted like crazy and raked money in by the truckload, trying to fill the void. No matter how much he made, all the cash in the world couldn’t replace my mom. Not for me or my dad. Eventually, the drinking took over so bad, my dad stopped painting altogether and just drank.

I grimaced while punching a code into the little box bolted to a pole coming out of the ground in front of the gates.

A second later, the gates swung slowly open.

I’d only been here a few times in the last four years.

Why did these gates make me think I was about to get swallowed? Maybe because the last time I’d been in my dad’s house, it had been a dark dungeon. You could feel the sadness seeping out of the walls in every room. All the curtains were closed, bottles of alcohol were scattered around on every flat surface in the place. Any sign that my dad was a painter was nonexistent. No art hung on the walls. There was no studio space set aside. As far as I knew, all of his painting supplies were stashed in a storage locker in Encinitas. That was thanks to Franco Viviano, the owner of Spada Gallery in L.A. Viviano was the guy who sold my dad’s work and had helped make my dad rich. My grandad had told me the whole story.

Apparently, when my dad had gotten the idea in his head to burn all his paintings and his art supplies in a drunken stupor a year ago, he called Franco and told him he was quitting. That was kind of funny because my dad didn’t work for anybody. Franco just represented him. But my dad told Franco he was quitting and burning all his art and supplies.

According to my grandad, Franco had jumped in a car and driven down from Beverly Hills the second he’d gotten off the phone with my dad. Franco had called my grandad while he was driving south and the two of them met up at my dad’s house. They didn’t want Dad doing something stupid. In the end, after calming my dad down, Franco had hired some guys to remove everything and put it safely in a storage unit in case my dad ever decided to paint again.

Sadly, before my dad had started going downhill, his house had been a painter’s paradise. Now it was a drunkard’s tomb. I hated it.

I pulled my Camaro to a stop in front of the house. It was still nice on the outside. It was only about eight years old. Give it another decade, and it would show signs of wear if he didn’t do any maintenance, which he probably wouldn’t. He couldn’t even keep himself showered and shaved, let alone take care of a huge mansion. Eventually the outside would catch up with the inside.

“Oh my gosh,” Samantha gasped, “is this your dad’s house? It’s huge.”

“Yeah.” Should I warn Samantha what awaited us inside? Or let it hit her like a hammer? I didn’t think it mattered.

“How long has it been since you were here?” she asked.

I squinted into the sunshine, “At least a year?”

“Are you nervous?”

“That’s an understatement,” I said sarcastically.

We walked up to the cut glass front doors. I rang the doorbell. It played a Bach piano sonata or some shit. The things people did with too much money.

I could see the silhouette of someone walking up to the front door.

Moment of truth.

The door opened smoothly and silently. None of that horror movie creaky hinges shit. Yet. Give it time for the rust to set in.

“Paidí mou!” my dad beamed, all smiles “So good to see you!” He attacked me with a bear hug and slapped my back. “It’s been a long time since you’ve been here! I’m so glad you’ve come.”

I hugged him back, but after a second, I said, “All right, Dad. I think you’re going to break something.” He seemed even stronger than when he’d hugged me in court at my trial. And he looked even healthier.

He released me, “Are you getting soft on me?”

“Yeah, as if,” I quipped. “But I think you’ve been hitting the weights again. Am I right?”

“I have,” he smiled.

Man, I don’t think I’d seen my dad this happy since before my mom left. But something told me this was all an act and the second we walked inside the dungeon, the truth would come out.

“Samantha!” my dad said. “So good to see you again!” My dad went in for a hug, but I think he saw that Samantha was a little overwhelmed, so he patted her gently on the shoulder. “Come inside, you two. Can I get you something to drink?”

I almost said, “Something without alcohol?” but I bit my tongue. Since I was old enough to know better, my dad’s drinking had driven me nuts. I’d always given him shit about it in the past. Who was the asshole now?

“Sure,” Samantha said. “I’m pretty thirsty.”

We walked into the huge entry hall with the big spiral staircase. The chandelier overhead was the size of the Eiffel Tower if it were made of crystal and hanging from my dad’s ceiling. Everything in the room was so damn bright and white.

What happened to the dungeon?

We walked down a marble hallway to the big kitchen. It was clean too. No booze bottles anywhere. My dad opened the Sub Zero. No bottles of vodka. Just bottled water, fruit juice, and milk.

“What can I get you two?” Dad asked.

“I’ll take a water,” Samantha smiled.

“What she’s having,” I said.

My dad uncapped the waters and poured them into clean glasses from the cupboard.

“Dad,” I asked, “what did you do, dip this place in a bottle of bleach?”

He chuckled as he poured the second water. “No, that much bleach would’ve burned a hole in the ozone layer,” he chuckled. “I’ve got a maid coming in five days a week. She’s got elbow grease to spare.”

“Five days a week?” Samantha marveled. “How much are you paying her?”

My dad frowned but smiled. “You really want to know?”

“Err, I mean,” Samantha stammered, “I need to find a job. I used to work at a convenience store but that didn’t work out.”

“A convenience store?” my dad gawked. “That sounds terrible.”

“It was,” Samantha groaned. “But maybe being a maid would be better. I wouldn’t have jerky customers coming in all day long. Anyway, I just wondered what a maid gets paid.”

“I pay the maid well. I hired her from an agency. I can give you their number and put in a good word for you. Maybe they can find you some work.”

“Really?”

“Sure. But I imagine most maids work during the day,” Dad said. “Don’t you have classes at SDU?”

“Yeah,” Samantha sighed.

“Well maybe the agency has some of those maids who clean office buildings at night. I’ll look into it.”

“Could you?” Samantha asked hopefully.

“Definitely,” he said. “Hey, I’ve got something I want you to see, son.”

“I’m all eyes,” I quipped.

My dad smirked at me and nodded. “Funny. You know, Samantha, this boy of mine is quite the character.”

“You’re telling me,” she smiled as we walked through the house.

He had so many rooms and hallways it was like walking through a museum. For the first time in years, there were paintings everywhere hanging from all the walls.

“Man,” I said, “there’s a shitload of paintings in here. It’s starting to look like the Sistine Chapel.”

“Is this all your art, Mr. Manos?” Samantha asked.

“Call me Nikolos,” Dad smiled. “Some of the paintings are mine, others are from fellow artists. I always like to trade paintings with artists I respect.”

Sam joked sarcastically, “Is that why I don’t see any of Christos’ paintings?”

“Whoa!” Dad laughed, “she has a tongue, doesn’t she!”

I sort of expected that to rub me the wrong way, but Samantha said it with such affection, it was obvious she didn’t mean it harshly. And my dad had no idea what I’d been going through lately. At least I hadn’t told him. Maybe my grandad had? It didn’t matter. I wasn’t going to bring it up.

“So what did you want to show us?” I asked.

“In here,” Dad said as we entered a huge room at the back of the house.

Light poured in from outside. The room was walled in by glass. It was white and clean and inviting. Things were organized, unlike the constant mess he’d worked in back in the day when he was doing abstract, even before the drinking had started. In those days, the studio had been messy but exciting and flamboyant. The perfect setting for an “Artiste’s Studio.”

This studio was calm and thoughtful. No raucous bullshit. All the painting supplies were racked and organized. Canvases were lined up in neat rows. Any supplies not in use were neatly arranged or put away in drawers. Yet it had this inviting feeling, like I wanted to dive in and start painting right here myself. It was the perfect balance halfway between a disaster area and an antiseptic surgical theater.

I noticed dozens of glass bottles containing dry pigment of every color in the rainbow resting along a counter top. “Are you mixing your own oils?” I marveled. Nobody mixed their own paint. It was such a pain in the ass. I ordered mine online.

“Yeah,” Dad answered. “I got tired of having to reorder everything. Besides, it connects me to the work more if I mix the paint from scratch myself. The old masters like Rembrandt had to make their own paint. Why shouldn’t I? Anyway, it’s my own personal protest against all the modernization in the world. Everything is too detached nowadays. I know a guy who gets his ultramarine pigment straight from the lapis lazuli mines in Afghanistan. That guy has some hair raising stories about buying pigment, let me tell you.”

“I can’t even imagine,” Samantha said. She looked like a kid at a campfire listening to mythical tales about gods and monsters.

Dad continued, “I’m thinking about flying over with him to Afghanistan the next time he goes, just to see the mines and thank the guys who are breaking their backs digging up rocks so I can paint in a cush studio.”

“Warn me in advance if you do,” I said. “I’ll come with you.”

“You’d go to Afghanistan?” Samantha asked in disbelief. “Isn’t that super dangerous?”

“Imagine the stories you’d bring back,” I said.

My dad said, “Samantha, you should come with us.”

“Oh, I couldn’t afford it,” Samantha said, “Besides, I’ve never done anything like that. I don’t know if I could, even if I had the money.”

“Sure you could,” my dad said.

I winked at Samantha, “Now you know where I get my sense of adventure, agápi mou.”

“That’s an understatement,” she chuckled.

I glanced around the studio, feeling like a kid in a candy store. That was when I noticed the paintings on all the easels were portraits. My dad hadn’t painted portraits since before I was born.

I walked over to one of the easels. “Holy shit. This is grandad.”

“Yeah,” my dad said. “He’s been sitting for me the last several weekends.”

“This is where grandad has been coming?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

The painting was amazing.

Samantha walked over to look at it. “Oh my god, that’s Spiridon!” She reached out to touch the painting. “I mean, that’s him! It looks like he’s standing behind the picture frame.”

She wasn’t kidding. I’d always known my dad was fucking unreal when it came to painting realism. I got all choked up. Who had stolen my alcoholic dad and replaced him with the heroic guy standing beside me?

If my mom could only see him now. She’d flip. This version of my dad was the man she’d married, not the one she’d left.

I asked, “Do you guys mind if I use the bathroom?”

“You remember where it is?” my dad said.

“Considering there’s like, what eight?” I said.

“Ten,” dad chuckled.

“Ten,” I nodded, “I’m sure I’ll find one or two before I piss myself.”

Samantha and my dad laughed and continued talking as I walked out of the room. The second I turned the corner, tears were dripping down my face.

Mom.

I missed my mom like fucking crazy.

She never would’ve left the man standing twenty feet behind me and split our family apart.

I wept silently as I made my way to the closest guest bathroom. I locked the door behind me, put the lid down on the toilet seat, and dropped on top so I could bawl silent tears as I clenched the sides of my head in agony.

Sadness tore me apart.

Mom.

I missed her so much.

Why couldn’t she have stayed?

I hitched and sobbed in silence for another twenty minutes.

* * *

“Did you fall in?” my dad asked me as I returned from the bathroom.

“Almost,” I joked liked I was kick back happy. “If it wasn’t for the rescue crew that lowered the rope ladder down from the helicopter, I would’ve been a goner.”

My dad chuckled.

“I thought maybe you were constipated,” Samantha blurted, then clapped a hand over her mouth.

“I like this girl,” Nikolos grinned.

“Me too,” I said to him. “She cuts straight to the point. But yeah,” I said sarcastically, “after the rescue crew pulled me out, they got the guys with the oil drilling rig to bore down into my ass until the turd came out. I had my butt cheeks up in the air when the thing blew. You should’ve seen it. Brown rain.”

“That is foul,” Samantha grimaced and stuck her tongue out.

“Hey,” I chuckled, “you brought up the constipation.”

“And you ran with it across the finish line,” she smiled.

“If these jokes get any dirtier,” my dad laughed, “I’m going to have to go get my hip waders. I’m already up to my knees in shit jokes.”

Samantha cackled with laughter.

We spent the next two hours in the studio trading jokes like old pals and talking art. I could tell Samantha was having a blast.

“Anybody want dinner?” my dad suggested as the sun was going down for its nightly nap.

“What’s on the menu at Chateaux Manos?” Samantha joked, making the S in Manos silent, like it was French.

“We’re going out,” Dad said.

“What, is it the chef’s night off?” Samantha said sarcastically. She was totally comfortable with my Dad after only a few hours.

“It is,” he said. “I could stir something up in the kitchen, but I was thinking of going out.”

“I hope you have someplace fancy in mind,” Samantha said.

“I was thinking ‘berto’s,” Dad said.

“As in Roberto’s?” Samantha said.

“Of course as in Roberto’s,” he laughed. “What other ‘berto’s could I mean?”

“I don’t know,” she said, “Alberto’s or maybe Rigoberto’s, or Tio Alberto’s or Filiburto’s?”

“Wow,” I chuckled, “you’re really turning into a local San Diegan, agápi mou.”

She nodded proudly.

“That’s all well and good,” Dad said, “but we all know Roberto’s is still the best.”

We climbed into my Camaro and I drove the three of us to the Roberto’s in Encinitas.

My dad ordered for everyone while Samantha and I grabbed the salsa bottles and napkins and found a table outside.

“Okay,” Samantha said, “your dad is like totally awesome.” She was grinning from ear to ear. “Why have you been hiding him from me all this time?”

After spending several hours with my dad, seeing the studio, and touring his house, it had become clear it wasn’t an act. He’d literally transformed himself since my last visit. “This is the new and improved Nikolos Manos. Remember I told you about his drinking?”

“Yeah?”

“He is a changed man. I haven’t seen him like this since years ago.”

“Well, he’s awesome now, that’s for sure.”

“True that,” I smiled.

“How awesome is it that he’s like a billionaire, and he wants to have cheap Mexican food for dinner?”

“He’s not a billionaire, but he is epic awesome,” I grinned.

My dad carried two trays with carne asada burritos outside a few minutes later. “I got chips and extra guac for everyone,” he smiled as he set the trays down on the colorful mosaic table top.

We chowed down on our grub.

“So,” Dad glanced at me and said, “your grandad tells me you’ve been having a little trouble with your new paintings?”

With my mouth still full of delicious carne asada, I mumbled, “Fucking kill me now.” It came out like I thought it was funny, and my dad chuckled. But inside, everything tightened up. Now that my dad had thrown away the booze and turned into a tea totaling ass kicking painter, I couldn’t tell him about my downhill slide. It would kill him.

Sam flashed me a quick look. She knew the score, but I knew she wouldn’t talk.

“What’s been giving you grief?” my dad asked.

In the past, I would’ve dodged the question. My dad had had so many problems of his own, we never had time to talk about mine. But he had opened the door. By the look in his eyes, he wanted to know. Where to begin? Fuck it. I was going balls deep on the ass fucking that my painting had been giving me lately. “Did you hear that Stanford Wentworth came by the studio?”

“The Stanford Wentworth?” Dad marveled. “I didn’t realize you’d gotten famous so quick.”

“More like infamous. Wentworth hated my new shit.”

“Bullshit,” my dad spat. “I saw your work at the solo show. It was beautiful.”

“Wait till you see my new stuff,” I grinned cockily. I knew I’d made substantial progress since doing those old paintings. “Technically, my new shit’s way better. Anyway, Wentworth hated them.”

“Then he’s an idiot,” my dad chuckled around the food in his mouth.

Talking about Wentworth should’ve sent me searching for a fifth of bourbon. It would have yesterday. But the stress I had around the topic of Wentworth had up and vanished.

As lame as it sounded, I think it was because of the simple fact I was sitting across from my dad like not a day had gone by since things were still good with him and Mom, when we were still a happy family. The happiest ever. I’d felt those good feelings coming back throughout the day today. Well, half back, which was fucking awesome because half of the greatest family unit on the planet seemed pretty incredible to me. Plus, I had Samantha.

What more could a guy ask for?

(mom)

“Two things,” Dad said. “One, we’re hopping on a plane to wherever the fuck Wentworth is at the moment so I can break his jaw.”

I grinned, “I hear he’s in St. Petersburg looking at some Russian painter’s new work. Cold as shit that far north of the equator. Wait until Wentworth heads down to Italy. I hear that’s where he spends Spring. Then I’ll join you.”

“That sounds like a fun trip,” Samantha smiled after wiping salsa from her lips. “Do we go to the ultramarine mines in Afghanistan afterward?”

“Totally!” I joked.

“Perfect,” she said before biting delicately on more burrito.

“What was the other thing?” I asked my dad.

“The other thing is, I need to see your new work so I can figure out what made Wentworth say that. As much as I’ve always disliked the guy, he knows what he’s talking about. I want to figure out why he said what he did. But I can’t make any comments until I see your new paintings in person. Otherwise, I’ll be blowing smoke up your ass, and you know how much I hate to get my lips close to your puckered butthole.” He leaned over toward Samantha and whispered conspiratorially, “This kid was a fart factory when I used to change his diapers.”

Samantha blurted laughter.

“Puckered butthole?” I asked doubtfully.

“I hear how the kids talk. No reason why I have to sound like an antique.”

“No kids talk like that,” I laughed.

“So I’m a fucking trend setter,” Dad smiled.

He was that. You didn’t make millions by being an also-ran copycat or an idiot.

* * *

“I think I see what Wentworth was talking about,” my Dad said thoughtfully as we stood in front of my painting of Sophia in the studio at my grandfather’s house.

Samantha stood next to me. My grandfather was right behind us.

“Technically,” Dad continued, “it’s incredible. But it’s stale.” He said it with no judgment. It was an observation, like he was thinking things through out loud. I knew my dad well enough to know he would say more when he had a clear concept in mind.

My grandfather chuckled, “You should’ve heard the way Wentworth was telling Christos to change things on the now-defunct painting of Isabella. If I hadn’t walked out of the room, I would’ve thrown Wentworth out of the house.”

I rubbed my grandad affectionately on the shoulder, “Thanks, Pappoús.”

“I really wish you hadn’t trashed that painting,” my grandad said. “It was excellent.”

Boom. Silence.

My grandad had accidentally let the cat out of the bag.

My dad knew exactly what caused an artist to trash a painting. He’d had plenty of personal experience.

“I’m sorry,” my grandad said. “I shouldn’t have—” he stopped short. “I’m going to go make some lemonade. Anyone want a glass?”

“Uhh…” Samantha stammered, “I’ll help? Don’t we need to pick some fresh lemons first? I think I saw a lemon tree down the block.”

“It’s spring,” I said sarcastically. “The lemons don’t come in for another couple months.”

“We’ll wait?” Samantha said. “Let’s go, Spiridon, before we miss the lemons ripening?”

The two of them walked out of the room.

My dad raised his eyebrows at me. “When did you start trashing paintings?”

“It was just one,” I said with a combination of guilt and defensiveness. “The one Wentworth didn’t like. I had to agree with him.”

My dad pulled a couple of chairs in front of my painting of Sophia and sat us both down.

“Was it like this one?” he motioned to the painting of Sophia.

“Better.”

“So why’d you trash it? And what did your grandad mean by trash? You weren’t drinking, were you?”

I could’ve blown a smokescreen and denied it, but come on, he would know. He’d been through it all himself. “Yeah,” I sighed.

“How bad is it?”

“The drinking or the painting?” I joked.

“I’m sure your painting was terrific.”

I clamped my hand around my jaw and rubbed the stubble nervously, “Like you said, technically, it kicked ass.”

“And the drinking? Is it kicking your ass?”

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

My dad shook his head. “That’s what I told myself. Remember where that put me?”

My stomach suddenly felt like someone had run a sewer line right down my throat and it was pumping toxic waste into me by the gallon. I needed a tub to vomit in.

“That good, huh?” Dad said.

I hung my head and shrugged my shoulders.

“You’ve gotta make a choice, paidí mou. The longer you slide down hill, the harder it gets to stop yourself from crashing into the bottom. You’ve got to take the reins or the drinking will.”

If it wasn’t for the fact that my dad obviously knew what he was talking about, I would’ve written off everything he’d just said as a bunch of empty platitudes. But he’d lived at rock bottom for years. I’d seen it myself. It was sort of hard to believe he’d turned himself into the clean and sober man sitting next to me in a year’s time. But he had.

I needed to take what he said seriously.

In that moment it hit me that I’d been trying so hard to convince everyone for the last couple years that I had my shit together, I’d started believing my own bullshit. Deep down, that same old self doubt still ate away at me. Time to change that. My dad’s successes, both as an artist and a human being, gave me the confidence to finally speak with total honestly. “I don’t know what I’m doing, Bampás,” I said softly. Saying that out loud was the hardest thing I’d done in a long time.

I noticed my father’s eyes moisten when I called him Bampás.

His voice caught when he said, “None of us ever does, paidí mou. All any of us can do is keep moving forward and hope for the best. Sometimes things work out, sometimes they don’t. But you have to keep trying until you run out of try. That’s all there is to it.”

“That sounds fucking stupid,” I chuckled as silent tears dripped down my face.

My father laughed softly. “I know, but it doesn’t make it any less true.” He placed a comforting hand on my shoulder.

The next thing I knew, I was opening up about everything to my father. “I’m running out of money, Bampás. I’m burning through cash paying Russell to work on my defense against that guy Hunter Blakeley. My paintings are shit, and Brandon is barking up my ass about having everything ready for my next solo show yesterday. At the rate I’m ruining paintings, I’m never going to finish them. Everything is spinning out of control and I can’t stop it.”

My father looked at me thoughtfully for a long time. Eventually, his eyes lit up and he nodded. “I think I figured out why.”

This was the point where my father always dropped some big piece of wisdom that made me think about what he’d said for weeks if not months afterward. He was good at that sort of thing.

“Why?” I asked.

He tapped two fingers lightly against my chest. “Your heart.”

“My heart?”

“You left your heart out of every one of these paintings.” He motioned at the canvases surrounding us in my grandfather’s studio. “These are Brandon’s paintings, not yours. Did you pick any of these models?”

“I approved them. I mean, I picked them out of a bunch of headshots Brandon sent me.”

“But you don’t care about any of them. It’s obvious. I can see it. I’m sure they’re all nice women. But you don’t care about painting beautiful young women like you used to.”

“Nope,” I grinned. He was right.

“You’ve changed. You know why, don’t you?”

I did, but he was going to tell me like he was reading my mind.

“When you were younger, all you did was chase skirt. You were obsessed. You were in love with the idea of beautiful young women and the thrill of the hunt. That’s why the nudes you painted in the past are still good. You put your youth into them. Being a horny young man is a fine thing any man can appreciate.”

I chuckled. He knew what he was talking about. He had a thousand stories about chasing girls before he met my mom.

He continued, “But at some point, that started to change when you started growing up, didn’t it?” My dad stood up and walked over to the painting of Tiffany that hung on the back wall. “When did you paint this nude of Tiffany? I haven’t seen it before.”

I stood and walked over next to him. “That? Probably six months ago?”

“Uh huh,” he nodded thoughtfully while looking up at it. “It’s not like the nudes you painted a few years back. You’ve grown as an artist. Tell me, why do you think this portrait of Tiffany is different?”

“The main thing is, I’ve been friends with Tiff forever. She’s not some girl I was chasing,” I chuckled.

“That is a substantial difference,” Dad said. “And let me guess, you painted Tiffany before you met Samantha, didn’t you?”

“Yeah. How can you tell?”

“Well, your painting of Tiffany has a clear, singular message. Despite Tiffany’s obvious beauty, the message that comes through the painting loud and clear to me is respect and caring. And love.”

I huffed a chuckle.

My dad smiled, “I don’t mean romantic love. I mean the love of genuine friendship. I know Tiffany has turned into a spoiled princess since she was a little kid. But she wasn’t that way when the two of you met in grade school. She was an innocent little girl with a big heart. You two were fast friends for years. And you put the purity of that friendship into your portrait of her. It’s unmistakable.”