But my private work had nothing whatsoever to do with landscapes.
My private work was just that. Private.
I flicked on the lights to better illuminate my latest work in progress. The woman’s body was beautifully positioned, arched back with her breasts pointing skyward, her dark hair trailing over her shoulders to pool around her. Her face was out of focus, just a slash of colour at her open lips, and yet she still looked like Anna.
They always did.
I’m a believer in psychic connection, not some new-age idealistic one love philosophy insomuch as an appreciation for that intangible current that runs between us all. Some of us more than others. That knowing that sizzles between two souls as they recognise their shared faces, their shared facets. Their shared darkness.
I’d never felt that with one of my students before. I’d always been careful not to.
Maybe my guard had slipped enough to let Helen Palmer’s tendrils of intuition slip through the cracks.
Or maybe it was simple coincidence that the woman on my canvas was shackled in the exact same way that Helen Palmer’s naked body had been shackled throughout her sketchbook. Maybe it was coincidence that put the exact same expression of hazy rapture on her features.
Maybe it was coincidence that the shadowy form in the doorway was the same man on both images.
Sweet little Helen Palmer wasn’t nearly so sweet, or nearly so little as I’d liked to pretend, and here I was, at thirty-eight years old with over fifteen years of teaching experience behind me, smiling at the revelation that a jaded old artist like me could still be surprised by his students.
And excited by them.
Anna’s gentle laughter rang through my memory.
“Be careful, Mark. You’ve never seen anything like a teenage crush. Those girls will eat you alive.”
“They’re just children, tiny beacons of innocence who want popstar boyfriends and pony club.”
Oh, how she’d grinned.
“Teenage girls are anything but innocent. Teenage girls are tenacious little vixens, skilled in witchcraft and laced with fairy dust and sin.”
“Is that so?”
“That’s so.”
I picked up my palette, mixed some browns in with the darks, and added some hazel to the hair. Yes. With a bit of definition on the chin, a higher arch on the brows, and a tweak on the tip of the nose, the woman on canvas looked considerably less like Anna, and considerably more like Helen Palmer.
But no, not quite.
I reached for a sketchbook.
***
Helen
“A video diary, yeah.”
“And he’s going to watch it?”
“He said so.”
“I’ll bet he is.” Lizzie made an obscene waggle with her tongue. “I bet he’s expecting to see all kinds of stuff on your cute little video diary.”
My cheeks burned. “No. He isn’t. He doesn’t want that.”
“Bull-pissing-shit!” she squealed. “He’s a man. A man with the hots for little Miss Paint-a-lot.” She pulled open my underwear drawer before I could stop her. “You’d better make sure you’re wearing a decent set.” She swung a pair of pink frillies around her head, then launched them at my chest.
I groaned and shoved them back in the drawer where they belonged. “It wasn’t like that.”
“Whatever, Hels.”
I played it down, like it was nothing, but my insides felt like someone had twisted them with a mangle. I felt raw, and wild, crushed yet excited. Please God, let this be something. Anything. I’d take anything.
“Can I have the link, too?”
“No way!”
She pouted like a big baby. “For real? Seriously? What about hos over bros? How come Mr Roberts gets all the juicy Helen insight and little Lizzie is left out in the cold?”
“It’ll be about art,” I groaned. “You’d be bored.”
“If I got bored I’d stop watching.”
“No you wouldn’t.” I poked my tongue out. “You’d be too afraid on missing out on something juicy.”
“Yes, I would.” She poked her tongue out back. “Well, I guess this is progress. How does it feel to have spilled your obsessive little guts to Mr Hunky?”
“Weird.” I flopped next to her on my bed. “Churny. Uncomfortable. Embarrassing.” I rolled to face her. “Exciting. Dangerous. Crazy.”
“You’re crazy.”
“So are you.”
She smiled, and hugged me tight. “And that’s exactly why we’re BFFs.”
“Yes it is.” I breathed her in, the violet bouquet of her mother’s perfume, and men’s deodorant. A nicer combination than it sounds.
“And that’s exactly why you’re giving me your secret diary link.”
Lizzie went at ten. Dad dropped her off back at the Lawnside flats, and I got to beautification. Smoky eyes, plum lipstick, a vague attempt at contouring. I’d hoped to look like Lizzie, dramatic and cool and all grown up, but I looked like a budget children’s entertainer. The webcam didn’t help my appearance any, either.
I grabbed a face wipe with a groan and took the whole lot off again. He’d have to do with me. Just me.
The webcam was kinder this time. My skin looked fresh and healthy in the lamplight, my eyes twinkly. I scrunched my hair for a bit of volume, then adjusted the angle of the camera to record me cross-legged on my bed.