The Truth About Delilah Blue (25 page)

“What’s that?” Elisabeth grinned mischievously and looked at Lila, her mouth dropping open into a big smile. “Is that for me? For my birthday?”

“Maybe we should wait.” Lila slid her bag off the table, in no mood to be doling out gifts. “Open it at home.”

“Are you kidding? I could never wait that long!” Her mother pulled out the box and set it on her lap. “You know what the last present you gave me was?”

Lila shook her head.

“A painted wall plaque with your handprint in it for Mother’s Day. It’s hanging in my bedroom. You signed the back
LOVE
,
DELILAH
,
MAY
1996. Do you remember?”

“Kind of. I’m not sure.”

Elisabeth undid the ribbon and tore into the little package as excited as a child. She held up the turquoise box and
pried off the lid. Her eyes flashed when she saw the bracelet.

“Oh, sweetheart, it’s beautiful.”

“Try it on. See if it fits.”

“This must have cost a fortune.”

She shrugged. “Not really. I got lucky.”

Elisabeth slipped it on to her wrist and held it up to the lights shining down from the ceiling. “You remembered my story?” She reached out and smoothed Lila’s hair. “It’s not a necklace, but still. I love it. I won’t take it off for anything in the world.”

They were surrounded by undressed Lilas. Lila birthmark, blistered heel, and left breast slightly smaller than right. Under that, Lila gluteus maximus, deltoid, latissimus dorsi. Lila knuckles, beneath that lay Lila underneath, Lila proximal phalanx, Lila humerus right and left, Lila sacrum. Behind those, more twisted together, less visible to the naked eye, was a tangle of fallopian tubes, esophagus, and perforated soul. All captured for eternity in graphite, ink, oil, acrylic, and, yes, even Magic Marker.

When she’d been alone with Adam, the long, escapist art sessions had seemed anything but raunchy. They’d been tiny jewels, these afternoons, just the two of them. But now, standing in his studio, introducing her mother to him while surrounded by wall-to-wall evidence of their closeness, the sweetness was flattened somehow. Lila wished she’d
thought to introduce them at a Starbucks. A gas station. Anywhere but here.

“Nice,” Elisabeth suppressed a smile as she assessed a delicate graphite rendering of her daughter’s breast and shoulder.

Lila remembered this one well. It was drawn on a rainy afternoon, and Adam had set up his stool closer than usual. So close she could smell his toothpaste, his lemony shampoo. She’d been able to study him as he worked, the way he chewed on the inside of one cheek when he was focused. It was the first time she’d wanted to kiss him. She might have too, but Adam’s sister had come home with a new rug for the living room and needed them to bring it in from the car. Once the furniture had been moved and the rug positioned and the beer poured, the moment was gone.

The electricity of that afternoon wasn’t lost on Elisabeth. She looked at Lila and arched her brow.

“Nothing like a wash of natural light for painting skin, hmm?”

Lila nodded. “I thought you’d appreciate his talent.”

Elisabeth looked him over. She was dressed in a teal sundress, one that gathered tight across the bust and tied at the shoulder with spaghettini straps, one of which had slipped clear down to the crook of her arm. Elisabeth did nothing to adjust it. “I do.”

If Elisabeth weren’t her mother, if she were anyone else, Lila would have sworn she was flirting. But it was impossible. Her mother was at least twenty years older than Adam, plus he was her daughter’s…something. Friend, at the very least.

“You’re a wonderful artist, Adam,” Elisabeth purred, letting her fingers trail along the bottom of a canvas.

He tripped over a pile of rags and righted himself, his cheeks beet red. Though, knowing Adam, he was blushing out of self-consciousness rather than flattery. “Thank you.”

There was a thump from the front of the house and a young voice called, “Mummy?”

“Back here, sweet pea,” called Elisabeth.

“Wait,” said Lila. “Kieran was in the car?”

“Napping. She was up until two last night so I didn’t want to wake her when we pulled up.” When Lila showed her surprise, Elisabeth explained, “I had Finn and a few of the other neighbors over. Kieran gets overexcited and can’t sleep.”

“Or it was noisy,” mumbled Lila.

“What’s that?”

“Nothing. Just I can’t sleep when it’s noisy.”

“Doesn’t bother me. Then again, I always keep those little earplugs in my bedside table.”

Before Lila could ask if she keeps those for Kieran, her sister raced into the sunporch and her eyes bulged. “Whoa!” She spun around in a slow circle, taking in her sister’s naked body.

“Mum,” Lila scolded. “This is a bit much.”

“Nonsense. Children should be surrounded by art without the constraints of censorship. Isn’t it wonderful, Kieran?”

“Come on. I’m her big sister. It’s different.”

Kieran blinked at a drawing of Lila’s bare hip and tried not to appear too shocked.

Adam sat on a stool, whacked a dry paintbrush against his thigh. “Did Lila tell you I sold a painting of her? To a fashion designer.”

“Well,” said Elisabeth. “Very impressive to be selling before you graduate. Delilah, did you hear that?”

“I was there.”

“You haven’t heard the best part,” said Adam, tapping Lila now with the brush. “I met with the designer again today. It involves you. She’s using
Nude with Denim
in her new ad campaign. Your portrait will be on billboards across the country. Times Square even.”

“Seriously?”

“Delilah Blue,” Elisabeth said, cupping her daughter’s cheeks in her hands. “You’ll be famous.”

Lila pulled away.

There had been a student exhibition earlier in the week. Thursday night at the Mommesin Gallery. Seeing as only L.A. Arts student pieces were shown, there’d been quite a few nudes of Lila. There were poses she was proud of, poses that made her shoulders or neck hurt just to think of them. Some of the students had beautifully interpreted what she offered—captured the ribs rippling beneath the latissimus dorsi in her scapula rotation pose as Lila had intended. Others missed the challenge presented in the bulging deltoid, the protruding trapezius, the angled scapula, and simply drew a coquettish girl with one hand at her head, the other at her hip, as if she were posturing for an incoming ship full of sailors.

Certainly there were nudes other than Lila, glittering under the halogen spotlights. At least six, maybe seven other models’ sternomastoids and mandibles looked down upon her. But their poses lacked something hers didn’t. A certain vulgarity. An ugliness that was fresh and dirty, almost animal. There was no point to being attractive as an art model. To make yourself sexy was to miss the point.

She looked up to see Adam staring at her, and quickly averted her eyes.

The thing was, no one in the crowd had noticed Lila the person. No one realized the breasts on the walls were living, breathing, and walking around the room in search of a glass of champagne.

It was the artist who was celebrated, never the subject. Even if Lila was hanging in the Louvre or lolling across the gutter of
New York
magazine, her identity would be unknown.

“Mum, we should go,” said Lila. “We’ve invaded Adam long enough.”

As they approached the door, the bell rang. Adam pulled it open to be greeted by none other than Lichty himself. He stood in the shadows of the porch, looking outlandish in a polo shirt and plaid golf shorts. “I’m in a bit of a hurry. Just need to pick up those Modern Art History papers if you have them ready.”

“Perfect timing,” Adam said. “Look who I’m just releasing into the wild.” He opened the door wider to reveal Lila and her family. If Lichty had wondered how close she’d become to Adam, he hadn’t let on before and he didn’t let on now. He nodded to Lila and stared at Elisabeth a bit too long, probably re-savoring the terrible moment she’d come by to pick up Lila after class.

Adam disappeared into the next room to dig up Lichty’s papers while Elisabeth wiggled her way closer to the door. She leaned against the wall and smiled at Lichty. He said, “Looks like something of a party.”

“Should be.” Elisabeth nodded toward Lila. “Every day is a celebration to me now. I haven’t seen Lila since she was eight years old.”

“Well,” said Lichty. “This
is
a special. Were you off somewhere working?”

“No. I was right there at home,” said Elisabeth. “My ex-husband kidnapped her and I only just found her a couple of months ago.”

His had been an innocent question, intended to do nothing more than help pass the itchy, crawly, post-scholarshipdenial minutes until Adam returned. Lichty’s eyes flicked over Lila, then darted away, embarrassed. Horrified. He hadn’t counted on seeing right through Lila’s clothes, not here at the door without any studio lights to make things official. He didn’t count on seeing through her Nice ‘n Easy roots to the dirty-blond stems sprouting beneath. It was too much at three-seventeen on a weekday, with traffic whizzing past and sparrows hopping beneath the bushes looking for crumbs. He rubbed his neck and glanced toward his Beetle, mumbled, “I should wait in the car. I have a few calls to make.”

The look of discomfort on the man’s face made Lila bristle. She wanted to pin him to the welcome mat and scrape off his eyebrows with a palette knife.

Elisabeth continued as if nothing happened. “I suppose my daughter has told you I’ve taught art up in Toronto.”

“She hasn’t actually.”

“I’m sure you’ve heard of it. Bromley Kerr. Great school.”

He nodded out of politeness. “Sounds like a fine place.”

“I really just substitute, but I find it’s the subs who are the ones who are able to offer the freshest viewpoints.” Her other spaghettini strap fell down. “Since we’re out there in the real—”

“Pardon me,” he said, suddenly fascinated with her wrist. “Your bracelet.”

“You like it?”

“Looks very familiar. Where did you get it?”

“My beautiful daughter gave it to me for my birthday.” Elisabeth reached out to touch Lila’s elbow.

Lichty turned to stare hard at Lila. “You gave it to her?”

No.

No.

No.

Lichty meeting Elisabeth should never have happened. “It’s not what you think. I checked at—”

“I don’t know what you’re playing at, Miss Mack.”

Elisabeth interrupted. “It’s Lovett now. Mack is just a name her father dreamed up. Not even legal.”

“It’s my bracelet.”

Lichty’s bracelet? In the model’s stall? Why hadn’t she considered that? What was wrong with her? She tried to answer but had no idea what to say.

Elisabeth laughed, haughty in her anger. “You, sir, are incorrect.”

“Am I? Let’s examine this, shall we? My partner gave me a bracelet. It had a loose clasp. It fell off my wrist. I’ve been looking for it for weeks, and now here it is on the wrist of my model’s mother.”

“Are you accusing my daughter?”

“Mum…”

A packet of papers floated over Lila’s shoulder and forced themselves into Lichty’s hand. Adam’s face appeared as he wrapped his arms across Lila’s and Elisabeth’s shoulders and gave them both a squeeze. He looked from Lila to Lichty. “What’d I miss?”

A
DAM’S STUDIO WAS
strangely bright. There was a full moon and without curtains or shutters, the light fanned out
across the drop cloth like shards of glass. She and Adam had been sitting on the floor for hours, leaned up against the wall, taking turns sucking red wine from a box.

Adam wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “You don’t know you’ll be fired. How could he after what he just heard about you.”

“Like I’d dare show my face.”

Adam fell silent. Just gazed at their shoes and tapped her foot with his.

“It’s not as if I even liked modeling. The guy never adjusts the air conditioning. Never brings in the heater. I swear, eventually my neck would have been permanently wrecked. It still hurts from the Three Pencil Class. Being an art model is way harder than it looks.”

“I know.”

“Plus the floor is never swept. There must be a decade’s worth of skin follicles and grit in that changing stall. And don’t get me started on the robe. Is it so freaking hard to bring it home for the weekend and drop it into the wash?”

“Sometimes I can smell it while I’m cleaning brushes at the sink.” Adam allowed his hand to reach over and squeeze her leg. “Modeling is a total grunt job. So why are you so upset? You’re worse than after getting turned down for the scholarship.”

Her first instinct was to pull her leg away. Instead, she lifted the wine box to her face and drank. Wine dribbled down onto her T-shirt and she made no move to do anything about it. “I don’t know.” She looked down at his hand. It wasn’t the typical elegant hand you’d imagine on an artist. Adam’s hand was wide and sturdy. Mapped with veins and power. Competence. Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was the day, but suddenly, that hand seemed the most fascinating
object in her world and she didn’t know how she’d missed it. She wanted to touch it, kiss it, feel the fingertips against her skin.

She set the wine box on the floor. “Is your offer still open?”

“Which?”

“New York. I think I want to come.”

“Seriously?” He sat up taller and looked at her. “I’d love it. I’ve been thinking, you know, about your home life. You need to get away from it for a while. Just let the dust settle. But I’m planning to bump up my move date. My cousin’s leaving in December now, and I’ve applied for a transfer to NYU.”

“You won’t get that by December.”

“So I’ll take a few months off and finish my degree next year. In the meantime I’ll be working.
We’ll
be working.”

“We’ll get one of those booths, like you said. Set up on Prince Street.”

“We’ll hang out at the MoMA and the Frick.”

“I’ll get new cowboy boots. New York cowboy boots!”

“We’ll polish the cat.”

“She’ll be our model.
Nude Sleeping on Counter. Nude Watching Birds. Nude with Dead Mouse
.”

“It’s New York.
Nude with Dead
Rat.”

She hugged herself. “How many bedrooms?”

He hesitated, pushed his glasses up his nose, then wrapped his arms around his knees. “It’s more of a studio.”

She looked around the room, her eyes resting on his unmade bed over by the far wall. White sheets, blue duvet balled up and dangling off the end.

“I’ll sleep on the floor.” He grinned. “Like the gentleman you know me to be.”

She flipped her hair over one shoulder and moved closer, setting her hand on his shoulder and tracing the seam of his T-shirt. “About that…”

He waited, barely breathing.

“Your previous offer. I think it had something to do with removing your pants.”

He started to get up. “You want to draw me? Or paint me, maybe?”

She pulled him back down. Reached her arm around his neck, touched her lips to his earlobe, and took in his scent. After a moment, she heard herself whisper, “No.”