If eyes could kill, Aurore’s would murder the ebony black shirt I was holding.
Her fingers tapped impatiently on the corner of the beige sofa she was seated on, and her legs were crossed together in hostility.
“What’s in your hand?” Her brow rose slightly. “You really thought I’d wear your shirt?”
Obviously not. Her accepting my hair dryer and a towel was already unexpected. I readjusted the cuffs of the ink-black shirt I switched into after the sprinkler incident and sat across from her on the chair.
“No, I thought you’d be pleased to ruin it into pieces. It’s by far my favorite.” I demonstrated the same sarcasm as hers.
“By all means, then, I’ll take it.” She leaned forward, grasped the unlucky shirt in question, and observed it with disdain. “It’s nothing special. It’s black, like the one you’re wearing. I bet you’re the kind of control freak who sorts his shirts by color in his closet?”
“By shades, you mean. From raven black to white ivory.” Always in the same order.
She squinted her eyes at me as if I were the Collatz conjecture before focusing on the toasts on the transparent coffee table—one of the only pieces of furniture left in this place.
“It’s the same toast as the gallery opening I went to with Ajax.”
She meant me, yet I believed she was referring to someone else. Someone worthy of her memory.
“You liked them.” I hooked a foot around my knee and prepared myself for her new flood of speech that should come in one, two—
“The Sad Girl,” she dropped, resisting the food with a new will that surprised me. “You were one of Bernard Dupont-Brillac’s students seven years ago. That’s where you saw me. At Les Beaux Arts, where I was posing as a muse.”
She linked her slender fingers together.
“Yes.” It was never my intention to lie to her. I was on her side; she just didn’t know it yet.
“I don’t understand.” She shook her head, her voice breaking ever so slightly. “I never saw you at the classes.”
“You don’t remember” was the only clue I could give to her.
For three weeks, I had seen only her and the long dresses she wore for the class.
And she never glanced in my direction.
She was part of my canvas, but I was the outsider, painting the artwork.
“It doesn’t matter. And then you followed me that day on the bridge for what? Impressing your artist friends that the weird girl was crying?” I let her assume that. “Don’t tell me that Augustus sent you that evening as some kind of sick joke!”
Augustus. That despicable human. “A sick joke?”
“Yeah, the one who broke up with me the day after my life fell apart because he was in love with all-too-perfect Violette.”
I snapped my brows. She seemed pissed.
“That day you so kindly illustrated for the world to witness,” she finished spitting her venom. “Anyway, I searched for your family name, Clemonte. No wonder you had to struggle in a chateau in the middle of France.”
She didn’t know what she was talking about.
“You want me to apologize for being born into the Clemonte family?” I remained calm, not having any desire to expose any part of those years.
“You’re right,” she mused. “I shouldn’t have said that. That was off topic and pretty much insensitive.”
“Was that an apology?”
She fired her eyes at me. “You’re the one owing me countless apologies. Don’t you dare hope for one, or you’ll die waiting for it.”
“As I told you, I can be very patient, and I don’t have a problem apologizing about hiding my identity from you.”
“I need to know why you painted me. Why me?”
I cracked my knuckles. “On the bridge, you seemed tempestuous and soulful—”
“No, I was heartbroken and sad, Spectre. And on top of that, you’re making fun of my misery with over-the-top words.”
I couldn’t perceive what I had said so offensively. It was the truth—why would she believe I was making fun of her?
The world was blank in grayish monotone colors. Uninspired.
But she was life. The incarnation of it. A rainbow of emotions.
“You have succeeded in externalizing emotions that some people are unable to get out.” I thought this through. “And I knew that such pure and vulnerable emotion would touch the world. I didn’t paint your weakness but your strength.”
Her chin shook, but she remained proud, as if a block of ice was keeping the torrent locked inside her. “Why am I truly here? You want to impress me with luxury so I would accept your contract?”
“You said you wanted to be by the ocean.”
Her eyes doubled in size. “I don’t understand.”
“To be inspired,” I added. “You said you wanted to be by the beach. This is my place of work. I want to show you my studio, and I hoped for you to be inspired since you’re lacking it.”
“Way to rub it in my face.” She chewed on the inside of her inner cheek. “You’re certainly not on the highlight of your blossoming yet short career. Have you read what every newspaper says about you?”
“I don’t stoop to paying attention to criticism. Especially the nonconstructive ones.”
“You can’t pretend this doesn’t hurt you,” she affirmed as if she could feel for me what I didn’t. She then rose up, crossing her arms. “Show me that studio of yours, then, even if I bet it’s empty judging by the fact you haven’t been able to paint anything in six months.”
So, she’d spied on me.
She probably found some flattering articles announcing the end of my career if I didn’t reinvent myself with something brand-new. My old art pieces were defined as “déjà vu” and too macabre for the audience. And now, I had become even more ghastly than usual, unable to produce anything that would see the light of day.
“Follow me.”
Not that I gave her a choice when I stomped to the end of the corridor and unlocked the door leading to my studio, my hand nevertheless remaining nailed to the handle as if I was forced to bring a monster into my home.
I knew it’d be a terrible idea from the moment my brain tried to mix shades to reproduce the exact color of her lips. It’d have taken me easily an hour at most if my brain cells in question hadn’t been hypnotized by guessing the taste of them, leaving me with a growing frustration between my legs. The contact of her subtle touch had left my skin tingling for several days. If she were to enter my studio, she would stay here. At least, the memory of her would. An idea that I couldn’t tell if it was pleasant or not.
“What are you doing?” She was frowning heavily. “It’s like you’ve seen a ghost that doesn’t want to leave you in peace.”
“Well, maybe that’s exactly it.” Except for the fact she wasn’t a ghost, and I needed her.
“Great. Looks like the ghost and I are gonna be great friends.” She pushed the door open and crept into my atelier.
Here we go.
“Okay, this is enormous. How many easels do you need? You have like ten of them? I see broken canvases, tables like those of architects with rough, unfinished sketches. It’d honestly look like a worksite if it weren’t for the large windows—” She burst into a laugh out of nowhere. “It’s a mess. Who would have thought you were messy? I took you for an android incapable of emotions.”
My Adam’s apple bobbed as she stepped into the middle of my “mess,” as she had described.
Her stare was locked on the paintings hooked on the walls. “The Sad Girl isn’t here.”
“She’s still in an exhibit.” And I wouldn’t risk bringing Aurore face-to-face with my painting, or she’d burn it into ashes, my career with it.
She did not go further on the subject. “You read my conditions?”
“Yes. You’ll have the power of decision, and no—” My eyes traveled to her, a nerve working my jaw at the sole thought of—“nudity.”
Her nudity, to be exact. A very disturbing thought that would probably reduce my sleeping schedule for the upcoming weeks.
“Right.” She gulped and drifted her eyes toward my artworks in progress. “Everything you’ve done lately is pretty morose and dark, might I add.”
Her eyes landed on the portrait of a man I’d painted with a liner brush. Like in all of my paintings, except for The Sad Girl, his identity wasn’t perceptible. Most of the time, it was by a game of contrast, but this time, his eyes and forehead were hidden by messy lines. Tears leaked, and a silent roar escaped his lips. Only one of his bleeding fists was visible, hitting an invisible enemy. Maybe she was right.
“You don’t like it?” As if her feedback had any importance to me. I shouldn’t care. I didn’t care. I wouldn’t care.
“It’s unsettling.” She focused on the artwork by squinting her eyes. “It’s like when you’re angry and want to scream all your guts out, but you just remain silent in an argument because you know it’s pointless. The lines form some clouds, circling as if his brain is exploding by a flux of emotions, eating the man alive. It’s like a void. Emptiness.” She blinked away, becoming her stormy self again. “But that’s not the point. It’s still morose and even morbid.”
Morose. Morbid. All of those words were negative.
“That’s why you’re here, to brighten up and fill my days with that sunshine temperament of yours.” I demonstrated the same sarcasm as her.
“Your days?” Her loud voice echoed across the room. “How long will it take to make one painting exactly?”
“As long as it’s needed, and I never implied it would be a painting. I’d probably only sketch you. It’d be faster and more veritable.” My shadow blanketed her as I loomed over her. “I want you as my muse. I have a deadline in a month, so we have a month. We may finish early if you inspire me.”
“If I inspire you?” she screamed. “Have you seen me? I’m trying to be the complete opposite of that nightmare you’re painting! If you expect me to cry again, I—”
“I don’t. I need you because you’re the—” I searched for the right words. “You’re the strict opposite of me. I’ve been given an opportunity with a deadline, but for that, I need to paint something ‘happier’ and more in that hopeful spirit of yours. I need to reinvent myself, as you must have read somewhere.”
An opportunity I had been refusing for months despite Eric’s complaints until meeting her again.
“Do I look happy to you? I want to murder you, Spectre! I’m not the right flowery person you need!” She waved her hands hysterically. “Plus, from where you stand, you’re already pretty much inspired for an exhibition in a haunted castle.”
“I need to see the world through you,” I said. “My art is declining. If you look closely, half the canvases are broken. I haven’t been able to paint anything decent in months, and you are the opposite of transparency and boredom. That’s why you’re here—to stimulate my creative intellect.”
“Creative intellect? That’s how you define inspiration? It’s not something you can control or a set of skills. It comes from your cold business heart, Ajax.” That was the first time she’d called me Ajax. “So, you’re telling me I’m stuck with you for up to a month, where you’d be sketching me until your ‘creative intellect’ decides to cooperate?”
“Yes. I’ve made a room ready for you. The days we’ll work together, you can sleep here so you won’t have to travel back and forth. We’ll not lose any time, and we’ll be able to work in better conditions. I won’t have to worry about where you are and what happened to you.”
“You, worry? Art is not an army commando.” She gestured with her hands, and I sensed the disaster nearing. “Wait a minute!”
She hit the canvas next to her, and thankfully, I was quick enough to save it from its downfall, but my can of paint was not equally lucky and crashed to the floor, tinting my overpriced Richelieu shoe indanthrone blue. My frigid stare hit her, and she minced her way backward. “I didn’t do it on purpose, I swear.”
“It’s fine.” One of my shoes was blue. Clownish blue. I looked like an idiot, and the smile curving her lips was living proof of it. She nevertheless continued walking backward, two steps away from colliding with the life-size Greek statue behind her. “Aurore, I’d advise you to be careful, or you’ll collide with Icarus.”
“Are you speaking in metaphor? I’m not trying to reach the sun and—”
I didn’t give her enough time to explode my unfinished sculpture into the ground as I hooked an arm around her waist and made her spiral back against my chest, dodging the disastrous tornado that she was. The smell of her hair, like orange blossom and cashmere wood, intoxicated my nostrils, my heart skipping a beat. The moment she realized she was in my embrace, she parted away, and my fingers tingled with something new. A feeling of awareness, perhaps. It was similar to the one I’d felt on the rooftop when she slipped into my arms. Again.
“Right. It wasn’t a metaphor.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
She faced me, a strand of her hair falling in front of her burnt umber and phthalo-green eyes. Her face had perfect symmetry, but there was something different.
I never noticed she had freckles before on her cheeks and on top of her small button nose. She must have been hiding those behind her makeup for a reason I didn’t understand. People would pay millions of euros for a piece of canvas speckled with paint—and not one of those paintings compared to her.
I wanted to get to know every freckle of hers.
“Anyway.” She rubbed her hands along her body and fixed her gaze on mine, regaining her hostility. “You can’t expect me to sleep in your mansion. Us, in the same house, it won’t end well, Spectre. I work on the weekends. I still loathe you. I won’t make you pancakes in the morning. First, because I don’t even know how. Second, because I’ll burn them on purpose so you get food poisoning. Instead, I’ll be using all your hot water tanks and emptying your fridge. Because when I’m pissed, this is the kind of villainous fairy godmother that I am.”
“I have a big water tank.” By the way her eyebrows rose, I deduced it was my turn to share the same clumsiness as she with my words. “And you’re definitely more menacing than whatever villainous fairy godmother you’re referring to. Your room will be seafront, with a private balcony and bathroom. You can have your weekends and days off if you’re busy. You won’t see me apart from our work agreement unless you want to eat my pancakes because I do know how to make them, and I’m not opposed to sharing if you behave.”
“If I were to accept, it’d be only for the money and the fact that a little luxury cannot hurt,” she deadpanned. “Especially at your expense.”
“Very well, then.”
She blazed her eyes at me. “So, let’s get this over with. When do we start?”
“You’re not in the mood, Aurore.” My lips curled in an attempt to look friendlier, which, judging by her frown, made me look indeed scarier. “It’s me who chooses when we begin.”
She seized the contract out of her bag, took a pen with haste, and signed it in a rush.
“Oh, Spectre.” She accompanied the hostile, fake smile plastered on her lips by slamming the piece of paper on my chest. “You’re not ready for me. I’ll make you regret wanting me as your muse and for having ever painted me. You chose the wrong woman.”
As she was striding out of my atelier, I knew she couldn’t be more wrong.
I would never regret painting her.
And more importantly, she was the right woman.
“And, Aurore,” I called her back. “I’m breaking a rule here. I shouldn’t tell you this information about that happy project I need you for, but I’m no liar. I’m the artist selected to collaborate with Ever After for their hundred-year anniversary.”
