“Oh, Oliver.” I suddenly thought I was going to cry. God, I was tired! “He’s so lucky to have you as his dad,” I said. “You’re so … tolerant and forgiving.”
He gave me a rueful smile, barely visible in the dark. “Well, I don’t know about that,” he said. “I told him next year it’s Smith Mountain Lake with his old man, or I’ll disinherit him.”
I smiled as he pulled the van into Lisa’s driveway.
“Get a good night’s sleep,” he said, putting the van in park. “I’ll see you bright and early in the morning.”
“Okay.” I leaned across the console to kiss him on the cheek. I felt his hand on my bare shoulder. Felt his fingers trail down my arm until they tightened—it was not my imagination—around my elbow. There was something more than friendship in that touch, and when I drew away, I didn’t reach for the door handle, hoping against hope that he’d kiss me and feeling too uncertain to take the lead myself. But he only smiled, touching my cheek with the back of his fingers. I wondered if he knew he was driving me crazy or if I was reading him all wrong and he wasn’t the least bit interested in me that way. Either way, by the time I got out of the van, I was almost dizzy with hunger for him.
Starting up the long sidewalk to the front door, I stopped to look at the only lighted window in the house: Lisa’s second-story bedroom. She was usually in bed early, and I knew it was worry keeping her up.
“Hey, Morgan?” Oliver called from his van window. “You all right?”
I hadn’t realized he’d been waiting for me to get safely inside. I smiled, the warmth of his touch on my cheek still with me. I waved him on. Then I walked up the steps and into the house, heading for my dark sunroom and a very short night’s sleep.
Chapter 61
August 4, 2018
Oliver sat at his folding table, slipping the various wall texts into their plastic frames, when I arrived at the gallery in the morning. I’d slept right through my alarm, but still managed to get there by seven thirty, eating a blueberry muffin along the way. I took out my earbuds to exchange a “hello” with him. I found it a little hard to hold his gaze this morning, remembering the subtle but undeniable—to me, anyway—shift in our relationship the night before. It hadn’t been much at all, just a light stroke down my arm, but it had electrified me and I was certain there’d been more than friendship behind it. You didn’t touch your friends that way.
“I have something for you,” he said, setting down one of the wall texts.
I walked over to his table. “What?” I asked, curious.
He tore a piece of paper from the notepad on his table and held it out to me. “Emily Maxwell’s address and phone number,” he said.
Stunned, I kept my hands by my sides. “You’re kidding.”
He reached over to lift my hand, then pressed the paper into my palm. I lowered my gaze to it. Emily Maxwell, 5278 Kellerman Road, Apex, North Carolina. There was a phone number as well.
“How did you get this?” I asked.
“A friend who’s a state employee got it for me. She said it was easy.”
“I don’t think I can…” My voice trailed off. I bit my lip and looked down at him. “Do you think I’m a coward?” I asked.
“I don’t think I’m in a position to judge.” His expression was sober. “I don’t know how I’d feel in your shoes.” He nodded toward the slip of paper in my hand. “But now there’s nothing standing in your way if you decide you want to talk to her.”
“Thank you,” I said, then gave him a weak smile. “I think.”
I buried the paper in my jeans pocket and headed for my seat on the floor in front of the mural. The scrap of paper seemed to burn through the fabric of my jeans. I could feel it there. The paper might have had Emily’s address on it, but it didn’t tell me what I needed to know. How was she? How horrendously had we destroyed her life?
I did my best to return my focus to my work. The gallery was utterly silent now that Adam and Wyatt had all the art installed. I knew they wouldn’t be in today, and I hoped they’d remember their promise to show up early tomorrow morning to get the mural stretched and hung. I would have to work all night to have it ready for them, but then my job would be over.
Anyone else who looked at the mural this morning would probably think the restoration was complete, but in my eyes, that lower right-hand corner still screamed, “Finish me.” I had less than twenty-four hours to do so … and that was if I took no time out to eat or sleep.
I mixed my paint, added it to my palette, and was once again working on the grass of the Mill Village when Lisa arrived.
“Hi, you two,” she said. “Oliver, I’ve got to get to the office, but I just stopped in to let you know I contacted the Charlotte Observer about the mural and Anna Dale’s story. I’m hoping they’ll send a reporter and we can get some word of mouth going about the gallery.” She looked at her phone. “The caterer finally has his act together, as far as I can tell. But I owe the fact that we can open on Sunday to you two.”
I turned to see Lisa looking directly at me, a mix of genuine gratitude and worry in her face. “It’ll be finished,” I said, assuring myself as much as I was her.
“Get out of here, Lisa,” Oliver said. “Everything’s under control.”
It was nearly noon when Oliver finished hanging all the wall texts. He walked over to where I was still inpainting blades of grass. Reaching toward me, he popped out one of my earbuds. “You’ve been sitting here for hours,” he said, bending over to pry the brush from my stiff hand. I was too tired to offer much resistance. “I’ll take over while you stretch your legs. There’s food in the kitchen, and the art is on the walls. Go enjoy it. The rooms look pretty incredible now that they’re full.”
My body seemed frozen in place in front of the mural. I looked up at him. Pointed to the brush in his hand. “That’s my job,” I said.
“Do you mind if I help?”
I thought about it. I was hot, tired, and hungry. Pointing to the color I’d mixed on my palette, I said, “This is what I’m using on the shaded area of the grass.”
“Got it.” He held his free hand out to me and I rose stiffly to my feet. “Take half an hour,” he said. “Just chill.”
In the kitchen, I wolfed down a rubbery piece of pizza I found in the refrigerator, then carried a Coke with me into the gallery. I was most interested in the work of the students Jesse had helped, financially or otherwise. I wished I could have had one of my paintings in the room with the other student art, but it didn’t really matter. The work I was proudest of would hang in the foyer, the first thing anyone would see when they walked into the gallery.
Some sculptures were displayed here and there in the student room, but I was more drawn to the two-dimensional art. I moved from painting to painting, reading the wall texts Oliver had put together for each one. I stopped at the etching of a plane, a marvel in its detail. The wall text told me that Jesse had discovered the student artist when the boy was in middle school and living in foster care. Reading the texts next to each piece touched me. I could hear Oliver’s voice in them as he described the artist’s background and connection to Jesse, and for the hundredth time, I wondered why Jesse had zeroed in on me to help.