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Kell

Six days after our dinner in Springfield, the blue is still wet. I can tell by the sheen across the surface, which means what I want to do next will have to wait.

Four canvases are in various stages around the studio now. One is dry enough to work on again, a second needs at least another day, and the smallest is mostly green and black because I wanted to know how many different greens I could make before they began looking the same. More than I expected, but fewer than I wanted.

A larger canvas stays turned toward the wall. I started it after the morning I woke beside Laura, trying to recreate the light coming through her bedroom window and the way her hair looked before she fixed it. I don’t know how to paint a face yet. Every time I turn the canvas around, she doesn’t look like my Laura, so I work on it for a while and turn it back again. I haven’t shown her or even mentioned it.

Yesterday I worked two colors together until both disappeared into brown. Today I scrape away a section of another canvas because I don’t like what happened to it, then spend twenty minutes making the replacement worse.

I finally put down the knife. “Fine. You win.”

The painting remains unreasonable. Canvases line one wall, jars of brushes cover part of the worktable, and a stack of boards waits near the sink because I wanted to know whether paint behaves differently on wood. Most of my supplies stay here now instead of spreading across Laura’s dining room, although I still bring home an occasional small canvas when I’m not finished thinking about it.

I’ve been thinking about this one long enough. The diner two blocks away has a red EAT sign in the window. I know all three letters without having to sound them out, which makes me like the place before I even open the door.

Carl is sitting near the back with two men I’ve seen around town but haven’t met. He waves me over before I choose a table.

“Kell. Sit down. These two have been telling lies about me for twenty years.”

The older man beside him shakes his head. “Thirty.”

“See?”

I pull out the empty chair while Carl introduces Frank and Roy. The waitress brings me water and tells me to holler if I want anything.

Frank wants to know whether I’m really going to make money painting. Roy tells him I already have, which starts an argument over whether selling one painting makes someone a professional artist.

“What do you think?” Frank asks me.

“I think I got paid.”

Roy laughs. “That settles it.”

“It settles nothing,” Frank says.

Carl points toward him. “Frank’s been retired eleven years and still tells everybody he’s in construction.”

“I could go back tomorrow.”

“You complain when you have to stand up to get more coffee.”

They tell me Carl charges too much rent. Carl tells me none of them has rented anything from him in twenty years. Roy asks whether I paint people, and when I say not yet, he volunteers Frank as a model.

“Why me?” Frank demands.

“You’ve got character.”

“I’ve got clothes too, and they’re staying on.”

I laugh with them. Nobody stops the conversation to make sure I understand everything. If I miss something, I ask. Sometimes they explain. Sometimes the explanation starts another argument.

It is easy. I hadn’t expected that to matter, but it does.

When I finally stand to leave, Carl tells me he’ll bring the rest of the paperwork to the studio tomorrow. Frank tells me to come back when I get tired of painting.

“I don’t get tired of painting.”

“You will.”