The Little Dreams of Lara Cliffe by Milly Johnson

Author:Milly Johnson [Johnson, Milly]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

Starry Nights and Sunflowers

They had fast-track tickets for the Van Gogh Museum too.

‘Wow, this is massive,’ said Vicky, looking up at the number of steps there were between floors. ‘How many pictures did he do?’

‘I think it’s nine hundred actual paintings plus a zillion drawings,’ said Lara, recalling a TV programme she and Freddie had watched recently. ‘And do you know how many he sold in his lifetime?’

‘A hundred?’ Pip guessed.

‘Don’t be daft, it has to be more. Two hundred?’ said Vicky.

‘No, I know this – the answer is one,’ said Jo.

‘That’s a myth, Jo, but the truth is that he hardly sold any. He used to swap some for paints and pencils and even food, sometimes,’ Lara answered.

Vicky whistled. ‘He could have bought a lot of pancakes for what they sell for now. How come you know so much about him anyway? I wouldn’t have had you down as an art expert.’ She nudged her friend playfully.

‘Freddie,’ explained Lara. ‘He’s got such a soft spot for old Vincent that he made me into a fan too. He was going to bring me here last year, but I said I didn’t fancy it much then.’ And she sighed. ‘I should have, shouldn’t I?’

‘Well, you can come with him in the future, can’t you?’ said Pip.

‘Yes, and I will,’ replied Lara.

Anyone who judged Freddie by how he looked would never have thought that underneath that rough-looking outer shell was a very gentle soul who enjoyed walking around museums. He watched TV programmes about history and music and read books about art. He might have been a lover of AC/DC and Meatloaf, but that didn’t stop him from listening to classical music too. He liked to take a long bath and have Beethoven booming out of the old ghetto blaster he’d had since he was a boy. It was still going strong because Freddie looked after things. And that included Lara. She had never been with anyone who treated her as something valuable, as he did.

‘I used to hate going around museums when we were at school, didn’t you?’ said Pip. ‘Remember that place with all the mummies?’ She huffed. ‘Seen one, seen ’em all.’

‘Yep,’ agreed Vicky. ‘There were only so many Anglo-Saxon spearheads I could look at without slipping into a coma.’

No one was bored here though. There were floors and floors of paintings, each one a footstep on the path of Vincent’s short and tragic life.

‘He died at the same age we are now,’ said Lara.

‘Look at everything he did in his thirty-seven years,’ said Vicky. ‘He really was a man with some get-up-and-go.’

Lara’s thoughts once again strayed to Danny. Vincent Van Gogh could have taught him a thing or two.

The next floor up was much busier than the first one.

‘Ah – that explains the crowds and the queues,’ said Jo as they came to a large information board. ‘The famous Starry Night picture is here on loan from New York. We have to see that.’

Vicky, who was very

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