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“Why didn’t you say anything?” I’m just so absolutely floored by his talent, and the fact that he didn’t tell me right away, that I’m beside myself over it.
“Well, I don’t really like people to know. I mean, it’s not a humble thing, per se.” He laughs. “It’s just that painting is very personal to me. I don’t do it much anymore. Not like I used to. But this here”—he waves a hand about the room, palm up—“being on display like this, it makes me uncomfortable.”
“But why?” My fingers are still on his wrist. “These are … I can’t even … Seriously, Luke, you have a gift.”
Suddenly his hand turns over and his fingers lock around mine tightly. I can’t breathe all of a sudden.
“Why, thank you,” he says and raises his chin, grinning, trying to inject a little humor in the moment. “But really it’s just a hobby.”
My chin draws back, and I shake my head at the absurdness of his comment. “Oh, this is more than a hobby, Luke. You don’t just wake up and paint something like this with this much detail and passion. No, this”—I point at the painting of the woman in the field and then at the one of the bottom of the world—“this is a part of you, like an arm or a leg, and you can’t convince me otherwise. How long have you been doing this?”
“Since I was nine,” he says, and instantly I begin to make the connection, but I let him explain it anyway. “Shortly after my brother got lost on that camping trip, somehow I picked up painting and it became my escape when I was afraid of everything else.”
I squeeze his hand this time, feeling awful for what he must’ve gone through even though it was so long ago. I have a personal relationship with fear and I can relate and understand what he went through. But hearing it come from someone else—especially from Luke—makes me wonder if sometimes I use photography to escape my own fears.
“So then what are these paintings doing here if it makes you uncomfortable?” Something dawns on me as I ask that question and then I glance up at the price tag dangling from a little piece of string taped to the canvas. Subconsciously my mouth falls open when I see $1,500 scribbled in blue ink on the little white tag.
“I sell them every now and then,” he says, and then nods in the direction of the platform floor where we stood earlier talking to Melinda. “Not usually this large, and just a few here and there. When I—well, we actually; Alicia’s helping too—agreed to organize the event, Alicia thought I should sell the larger ones, too.” He shrugs. “I thought, why not?”
My eyes grow wider as I look up at his paintings again.
“But why didn’t you want me to know?”
His smile fades a little. “Well, it’s not really that I didn’t want to show you, but—” He stops abruptly and instantly I get the feeling he’s going over in his mind what kind of answer he wants to give, even if it’s not the truth.
I step around in front of him and look at him with all the interest and curiosity and consideration that I can manage because it feels exactly like a moment in which it’s needed.
“Well,” he says, burying both of his hands deep in the pockets of his khakis, “if you knew they were mine you probably wouldn’t tell me if you thought they sucked.”
I throw my head back and laugh lightly.
“You’re kidding, right?” My hand shoots out and I press it gently to the center of his chest and give him a playful shove. He teeters a little on the heels of his loafers and cracks a smile.
“Pu-lease!” I roll my eyes for added effect. “You know as well as anybody that these paintings are far from ‘sucking.’ ” I laugh again, and my purse strap begins to fall off my shoulder, bringing my dress strap down with it. Luke reaches out and catches the strap of my dress with his finger and slowly slides it back into place. The touch, although light, sends shivers up my arm. I swallow anxiously and my eyes begin to wander. Toward the floor, to his feet, then to his shirt and his tanned, muscled arms pressed against the rolled-up blue sleeves, and then to his neck and ultimately back into his eyes again.
With my camera still in hand, I step over to Luke’s side and say with a really bad English accent, “Mind if I photograph you with your masterpiece?”
Immediately he begins to shake his head. “Oh no,” he says, waving a hand at me. “I really don’t think I—”
“Come on, just a few quick shots,” I urge him.
Still he doesn’t look convinced.
“Pleeease?” I say with all the sweetness I can muster and top it off with a smile. It must be infectious because now he’s smiling back at me and I find a heat in it this time that I’ve never felt before.
“All right.” He gives in, and I feel my face light up like a Christmas tree.
Luke steps up to the painting of the Bottom of the World and stands in front of it with a shy awkwardness, his hands buried in his pockets again, his shoulders stiff with uncertainty. Dropping my purse on the floor beside my sandaled feet, I shake my head at him and wave my free hand.
“No—crouch down in front of it”—I step up and point out the perfect spot with the tips of my toes—“right about here.”
When I step out of the way, Luke does as I instruct and crouches, the top of his shoulder overlapping the base of the painting.
“Just look natural,” I go on, “and don’t look at me, but off in the distance. And don’t smile.”
Luke sits crouched on the pads of his feet, his heels raised from the floor, with his elbows resting on the tops of his thighs, his hands dangling stiffly between them. I move several feet away and stand at an angle so that I’m not directly in line with him and the painting and I start snapping shots. Six, twelve, eighteen, as many as I can and all in different angles.
Finally I put the camera away and Luke pushes himself up on his toes.
