Picture Imperfect

Wednesday 18th



Another morning without an alarm clock bothering my delicate artistic sensibilities. I keep my eyes closed for a while before bothering to discover what time it is. What’s happening today? Oh yes. Rhoda’s coming ‘round. What’s she going to say? ‘Darling – you know how much I admire your work and we’ve really given it a good shot, haven’t we. But…’

I start to wonder about Rhoda’s love life. I’m not really sure how old she is and we don’t talk about personal stuff. I would guess that she’s over fifty. She doesn’t wear a wedding ring. She dyes her hair a sort of blue/black, but has a big white streak on one side, as if she’s trying to give the impression that she doesn’t dye her hair and is naturally going stylishly off-white in just one area. I’m trying to think where I’ve seen that look before, then remember that it’s Immodesty Blaize, the burlesque artiste, though I’m sure Immodesty is wearing a wig.

Rhoda often mentions that she’s buying an expensive gift for some young beau she has on the go. I’m not sure how many of these there actually are, or whether she has more than one on the boil at any one time. She is very sexy (very big bottom, tiny waist and big boobs), with the most yummy mouth you’ve ever seen, so I imagine it’s quite easy for her to attract young guys like she does. Her money wouldn’t be much of a drawback, either.

In fact, I don’t really see why she bothers with all the gifts. I would imagine any red-blooded male would be only too glad to sleep with a woman who looked like that. I’m sure she makes a big profit from all of her artists (present company excepted) and can treat herself to that sort of lifestyle. And why not? I think I might do exactly the same if I was her.

I start to wonder what it would be like; being pretty wealthy and having a bunch of handsome young studs at your beck and call. You’re sitting at home, you’re feeling horny and all you have to do is pick up the phone. It’s either deeply fulfilling and supremely sexually satisfying or lonely and depressing. I don’t think there’s an inbetween bit with that sort of carry-on.

I finally take a look at my alarm clock to see what time it is. It’s 7.15, so I have a big stretch and get up, feeling very refreshed after another good night’s sleep. Maybe I sleep better on my own. I can’t remember what time Rhoda said she was popping over. I think she just said ‘morning’, though what her interpretation of morning is is anybody’s guess. She refers to getting into her office at 10 a.m. as ‘the crack of dawn’ or ‘the middle of the night’.

I purposely avoid looking at the paintings, which are still leaning malevolently against the hall wall.

I don’t feel as angry at Mark as I did yesterday. It could be that I got it all out of my system with yesterday evening’s frenzied painting sesh. Kristin and Mrs Goddard certainly whipped up some angry, resentful feelings between them, though. I know they were only trying to help, but still.

This morning, my thoughts are more like ‘Well, it’s only a week. This time next year we’ll be having a laugh about it.’

Maybe it’ll turn out to be a disaster. Maybe Danny Crump isn’t as much fun as he used to be. Maybe he’s an alcoholic. I don’t know him at all, but I could imagine he’s the type of boorish mega-nerd who would leave Mark on his own if by some miracle he got lucky with some near-sighted, intoxicated girl he met on the beach. But what if she had a friend? Danny is also the sort, I suspect, to try and impress his mates by getting them ‘fixed up’ with some bikinied beauty, so they’d be in his debt forever.

If Danny left Mark alone, Mark could wind up being the only company for the two girls, whose names I’ve already forgotten. Was one of them Margaret? Margot? Yes, Margot. That was it. And the other one? It’s gone completely. Margot was pretty attractive, though.

I realise that I’m clenching my teeth together and pursing my lips angrily as I think about this. Damn it! I just can’t stop thinking about Mark on this f*cking holiday! No matter what I think or do, I just can’t put it out of my mind. I can’t stop it putting me in a bad mood. Damn you, Mark. You are ruining my week. In fact, I can’t remember a worse week since I started going out with him.

I remember the effect that the two paintings had on me last night when I put them next to each other. Often, when you get that sort of feeling from your own work, you take a look at them the next day and all the power you thought you’d achieved has gone. It was all in your mind and the painting just looks at you, mentally transmitting a message like ‘Ha! You thought we were really good, didn’t you! Now look at us, you deluded, talentless bitch!’

With a little fear in my heart, I turn the hall lights on and take a look. The paint has dried a little, so it doesn’t look exactly the same as last night, but the impact is still there. I now get the familiar ‘is it good or is it bad’ feeling rising up, so I turn the hall lights off and go back into the kitchen to make another coffee.

Just as I’m sitting down and thumbing through an eight month old copy of Vogue, the doorbell rings. I look at my watch – it’s only 8.17! Who the hell…?

I spill my coffee as I get up. Surely it can’t be Rhoda this early? Is it Mark? Has he come back after a couple of days because he couldn’t stand it and missed me terribly? Will he be out there with his bags, begging my forgiveness?

I look through the peephole in the door. It’s Rhoda, of course. Anyway, Mark has a key.

It seems like she’s in the flat before I’ve even opened the door properly. She breezes past me and the canvases straight into the kitchen. I’m left standing in a cloud of spicy, sensuous perfume that leaves the air sparkling with sage and jasmine. I don’t know where she’s come from and she isn’t wearing a coat.

‘Any coffee on the go?’ She looks around the kitchen and spots the coffee maker, pouring some into the cup I’d just been drinking from. Her eyes roll up into her head as she takes the first sip. ‘Coffee is better than sex and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.’

Maybe she doesn’t have such a good time with her young men after all. I’m amazed to find that she’s so glammed up at this time of day. She looks around the kitchen with an expression of bafflement on her face.

‘Have I been in here before?’

‘Yes.’

‘Thought so. What is this? What is this on the mug?’

‘It’s Patrick from Spongebob.’

‘Mm.’

‘I didn’t realise you were out and about so early.’

‘Haven’t been to bed yet, my sweet. I’m still up from last night. As far as I’m concerned, it’s still Tuesday. I was with Kevin last night, well I’m telling you ‘Kevin’ like you’d know who that is but you don’t know who I’m talking about do you and why should you?’

‘New boyfriend?’

‘I suppose he is. But ‘boyfriend’ is such a stupid term for the whole thing isn’t it. It’s as if you’re hanging around with some six year old child or something. Hello everybody this is my boyfriend Peter, he’s just started school, isn’t he a sweet little thing? How tall are you now, Peter? Anyway, Kevin is a post graduate student in some university or other. He’s actually twenty-five which is a nice change. Handsome like you wouldn’t believe. I mean really wouldn’t believe. I bumped into him in Selfridge’s food department yesterday afternoon.’

‘What, you mean you picked him up in Selfridge’s?’

‘Yesterday afternoon. Does that sound terribly awful? He was browsing near the Italian deli section. Do you know it? I bought some of their truffle sauce and this is a trick you may like to remember, Chloe, I asked him if he’d ever had any and he hadn’t so I asked him if he’d like to smell it and you know what truffle sauce smells like and after that he was hooked. I’d landed him like a forty pound salmon, which reminds me they sell fabulous smoked salmon there, too. Also, that’s a pretty poor metaphor as you can’t bonk a salmon, really, can you. Unless you’re another salmon and even then I’m not sure that’s what they do.’

‘What is that perfume you’re wearing?’

‘Well, it’s still technically Tuesday, so it must be Tom Ford Jasmin Rouge.’

‘It smells fabulous.’

‘Here.’

She takes a deep red perfume spray out of her handbag and squirts me on the wrists and on the neck. It’s a fantastic, voluptuous smell that actually makes me feel slightly dizzy for a few seconds. So this is what it smells like to be rich, I think. God know the effect this stuff must have on a man. They’d want to die in it.

‘It’s lovely. I mean, it’s fantastic.’

‘Oh my good god you’ve just reminded me.’

She fishes in her handbag and pulls out a Selfridge’s carrier bag.

‘Here. This is the truffle sauce. You can have it.’

I take the bag and put it in the fridge. Posh perfume, truffle sauce and it’s not even nine-o-clock in the morning yet. I’ve still got to find out why it’s still Tuesday for Rhoda. Luckily, she’s not one of those people you have to push hard for information of that sort.

‘So we went shopping together and it was obvious we were getting on like a house on fire, particularly after I bought him a Burberry sports watch. I could see he couldn’t take his eyes off me or off my tits at least, so I thought why not cut to the chase and book into a hotel right now. Of course most of the good hotels in the West End are booked solid at this time of year particularly if you want a room at short notice…’

‘Why didn’t you go back to your place?’

‘Even if I could have got a cab immediately, it would have taken forty, fifty minutes at that time of day and I didn’t want to spoil the magic and then it hit me; we’d only been in Selfridge’s less than an hour ago possibly and there’s Selfridge’s hotel. We were in Piccadilly, so you could walk to it in about ten minutes or so. It turns out it’s actually called The Selfridge which I didn’t know did you? So I rang them and booked a room and they had quite a few free which surprised me, but you realise why once you get inside. All very nice but a bit on the small side, you know? Not that that really mattered. At least the room had a bath and lots of free things. And a bed, of course.’

Bending slightly under this gale force hedonism, I realise that I’m still in the dark about why Rhoda is actually here in the first place. She rummages around in her bag. Perhaps she’s looking for more truffle sauce. I notice that the kitchen smells strongly of it and can’t wait to see what it tastes like. I see what she means about the smell. The kitchen smells like people have been having sex in it, which unfortunately has never happened in real life.

‘So anyway. Room service, Champagne, bonking until seven or eight, then dinner in the hotel restaurant which was surprisingly good considering the things I’d heard about it from other people. Romantic walk around the West End, then we went to this bar in St Christopher’s Place. Did you know that amber place is still there? After all these years? It’s still there? I mean – who buys amber? Ghastly, vulgar stuff. Anyway, staggered back to the hotel for a bit more bonking then I had a lovely long soak in the bath, which believe you me I needed by that time. Unfortunately, the free bathroom stuff turned out not to be up to it, but you can’t have everything.’

It never stops.

‘So! By this time I was absolutely starving again, so we found this fantastic Persian place down Bond Street which I had literally never seen before.’

‘What time was this?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. It had gone two, though. Or two-thirty? I mean, I must have walked down Bond Street god knows how many times and I must have walked past this little place just as many times. It was like it was invisible and I asked one of the waiters how long they’d been there in case they’d only opened up the week before or something and he said they’d been there for thirty two years. Can you believe it?’

I’m going to tear my head off in a minute.

‘We had this mezze that seemed to go forever. I drank rather too much, I’m afraid, and…’

She stops what she was going to say and stares vacantly into the middle distance. For a moment, I wonder if she’s ill. Or intoxicated in some way I haven’t encountered before. She looks at the floor, then looks at the ceiling. She slowly places the coffee mug on the kitchen surface and strides out into the hallway to where the canvases are leaning contemptuously against the wall. She finds the light switch and puts both hall lights on.

She stares at the canvases for a full minute without saying anything. I have to say that I’m feeling a little anxious. She takes a deep breath and exhales slowly. Then, she takes a tiny black mobile out of a pocket and presses a button on it, placing it to her ear. She’s breathing deeply, her boobs rising and falling and her lips pursed. She flicks a stray lock of hair away from her forehead. God – she must be irresistible to men. No wonder she can pick up handsome hunks in department store food halls on weekday afternoons. I’m so jealous.

‘Clementine? Sorry to call so early, darling. Have you got a pen handy? Well look – I’m sure you’ve only just woken up, but I haven’t even been to bed yet. It’s still Tuesday as far as I’m concerned. Listen. Ready? As soon as you get in to the office, give Jake Chalmers a ring. Tell him I want him to pick up a couple of seven by sevens ASAP. He’ll need the bigger of his two vans. He’s got a three tonner hasn’t he? Tell him to use that.’

She glances at me and raises her eyebrows in exasperation.

‘Tell him to be careful as neither of them are dry yet. He’s to take them to Charlie Haggett’s gallery and leave them there. Charlie’s girl will know what to do with them. Now, you haven’t asked me where Jake is to pick them up from. I’m going to tell you that now. Name is Chloe Dixon. She’s on our client file. Address is on there. This will all happen before midday today, understood? Repeat all of that back to me.’

She taps her foot impatiently and says ‘Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm.’ I can faintly hear poor Clementine’s voice on the mobile. She sounds posh. Finally, Rhoda nods in satisfaction.

‘Excellent. I won’t be in today until about one. Possibly even later. Goodbye.’

She turns to me and raises a hand, even though I wasn’t about to say anything. She taps out something else on her mobile and listens intently.

‘Bloody ansaphone. Hello, Charlie. It’s me. This is a message for your girl, really. I’ve forgotten her name. Sorry. And if it’s you listening, girl, sorry again. There’s a couple of big ones coming your way before twelve this morning. Jake. Still wet. Don’t touch. I’ll be in later this afternoon to deal with them. Be a love and turn the heating in whatever room you’re going to put them in up to thirteen degrees. Thanks.’

She walks over to me and gives me a huge hug.

‘These are absolutely brilliant, Chloe. I’ll have flogged these beauties by the end of the week and I know exactly who I’m going to call first. Do me a favour and don’t go out until Jake gets here. Don’t try and help him, he knows what he’s doing. I don’t want these touched by an amateur. No offence.’

She looks at the two canvases again, tilting her head to one side. ‘Look at the anger! The energy!’

I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I can feel tears in my eyes and suddenly I’ve got my hands over my face and I’m crying my eyes out. It’s such a cliché, but my whole body is racked by huge sobs and I can’t stop it no matter how much I concentrate. It’s loud, it’s wet and it’s beyond embarrassing.

Rhoda comes over and puts her arms around me. I bury my head in her shoulder and create a big damp patch. I’m shaking as if I’ve got the flu or something. She rubs her hands up and down my back and probably wants to get out of here as fast as possible. I wouldn’t be that surprised if I heard her calling a minicab on her mobile as I sobbed. After a couple of minutes, I manage a recovery of sorts and am actually able to speak.

‘I’m sorry, Rhoda. I don’t know what’s the matter with me.’

‘It’s just shock, my dear. Many of my clients have had an emotional response to their first bigtime sale. It’s relief, as well. I don’t like to count chickens, as you know, but these bitches may just push you into a different league altogether.’

To be honest, I’m not really sure which league I’m in at the moment. I didn’t even know that there was a league. I start to cry again, tears streaming down my face. I wonder if I’ve suddenly become one of those weepy types, who are forever bursting into tears for no discernible reason. Rhoda must think I’m insane. Then I realise that it’s not the news about the paintings, at least not entirely. It’s Mark. All the stress, hurt, bafflement and feelings of betrayal from the past five days have suddenly erupted to the surface and Rhoda’s excited reaction to the canvases was the trigger.

Part of it is self-pity, too. All of Mark’s snidey, philistine comments about what I do will be proved wrong. I don’t want to ask Rhoda how much she’ll sell these paintings for, as I don’t think it’ll be polite. Moreover, she probably doesn’t know the exact figure herself yet. But I know the market for big abstracts like mine and I know the sort of people who buy them.

‘Come on, darling. Don’t have a nervous breakdown on me now. If things go as I plan, you’re going to really have to knuckle down and do a lot more work before you can afford to have a complete mental collapse. Not that there’s anything wrong with complete mental collapses. I’ve had two of them myself. They’re like a holiday, really. Cheaper, as well.’

We sit in the kitchen and drink coffee. I have a ciggy. Rhoda is starting to yawn quite a bit. I suppose she’ll go home and have a few hours’ sleep after she’s left here.

I didn’t plan to tell anyone else about Mark, particularly as I’m still reeling from the reactions of Kristin and Mrs Goddard, but Rhoda is smart enough to realise that there must be something else bothering me. At first, she thinks that Mark (she didn’t actually know his name, but knew I lived with someone) had left me or been having an affair. After a bit of prodding, I finally spill the beans. I tell her about the holiday and everything else. I tell her about Mark’s attitude to money, to my painting, to everything.

‘Can I have one of those?’

She pinches one of my cigarettes and lights it from mine. She stares into space for a few moments and doesn’t say anything. Maybe she’s thinking of something else entirely. She might be thinking about Selfridge’s Food Hall.

‘It’s a weird one, isn’t it. I’ve never heard of anything quite like this before.’

I nod. ‘Me neither.’

‘It’s almost as if he’s single. That’s the sort of thing that a single man would do. Someone with no attachments of any sort. Remarkable.’

‘Everyone I’ve mentioned it to has…’

‘As for just doing it to help his friend out, well that’s about as tenuous a reason as you could hope for. It’s an excuse not even worthy of a two year old. Hmm.’

She rests her chin on the back of one of her hands and yawns again.

‘Shall I tell what I would do? If I was you? You may not like it.’

‘Tell me anyway.’

‘I would walk out of that front door right this minute and I would never return. I would never see him again. I would cut him out of my life completely and give no reason as he doesn’t deserve one. I wouldn’t even bother to pack my stuff. I’d just leave it here to make him feel shitty. Let him spend a miserable day picking though it all and deciding what’s his and what’s yours.’

‘But you can’t do something like that, can you. There’re all sorts of things that make it too complicated.’

‘Tell me one of them.’

‘Well. Just for starters, there’re the bills. He’d want me to pay my share of the next electricity bill when it arrived. Things like that.’

‘Forget all of that. You’re thinking like him. What’s he going to do? Report you to the police over a couple of hundred piddling pounds, if indeed it’s that much? He’d look like an idiot and a cheapskate. Is he going to report you to BT’s legal department? His ego wouldn’t be able to stand it. I’ll bet you any money that everything’s under his name. It’d be part of his control freakery. Forget all that. This will have done irreparable damage to your relationship. Things will never be the same now, but I’m sure you’ve realised that deep down.’

‘I haven’t to anywhere to go. And I haven’t got any money to speak of. I can’t afford to do a big life-changing shift like the one you’re describing. That’s you talking. That’s something that someone like you would do, Rhoda. I just can’t walk out of the door like that. It isn’t as easy for me for lots of reasons.’

‘When does he get back from Spain?’

‘Greece. On Saturday. His plane gets in a half past five or five thirty-five or something like that.’

‘In the morning?’

‘Tea time.’

Rhoda yawns and stretches.

‘Listen, Chloe. I’ve got to get a few hours’ sleep.’

‘You can stay here, if you like.’

‘No. Jake could be here at any time in the next couple of hours and I hate being woken up by any sort of noise. Remember – stay here until twelve midday.’

‘I will. Oh. Rhoda. Why did you come ‘round here in the first place?’

‘I was going to dump you from the agency, sweetheart. Don’t worry. I don’t think that will be happening now.’

She gets up and heads for the front door, air kisses me from about three feet away and disappears, leaving only the odour of truffle sauce and Tom Ford Jasmin Rouge behind her. This place smells like a Parisian brothel.

I saunter back into the kitchen and open the window to get rid of the smell of cigarette smoke. I feel like I just want to go to sleep and wake whenever whatever it is that’s going to happen, good or bad, is over. It’s as if time is this big cloud of treacle that I have to swim through to get to the next good or bad bit.

I try not to anticipate what’s going to happen with the paintings. Just because Rhoda likes them – or, should I say, thinks she can match a buyer to them – doesn’t necessarily mean that anything will happen. I’ve heard of lots of instances where artists think they’re on the verge of some big sale, just to have it collapse at the last moment because of some stupid last-minute decision by someone.

I try to put the whole thing out of my mind. I try to put everything out of my mind.