Spanish Crossings by Simmons John

Author:Simmons, John
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloodhound Books - literary fiction
Published: 2021-05-20T00:00:00+00:00

It was time to head back to the office to clear up some outstanding pieces of work. Later a conversation with Pepe awaited her. It was one she looked forward to with eagerness, anticipated with dread.

25

Lorna found it strange – a glimpse of an unknown domestic life – to return home to the flat, expecting someone else to be there. And he was. Pepe got to his feet when Lorna opened the door. He had been sitting on a wooden chair facing the chimney breast where the large portrait hung.

“Are you OK?” Lorna asked. “Did you sleep? Find something to eat?”

Pepe answered the questions with an almost sulky nod. She realised he had been looking at the charcoal portrait on the wall. Caught in the act of looking at a picture of a naked woman, he showed his embarrassment.

“Don’t you like it?” she asked. “It was done by a proper artist.”

She stood in front of the portrait, studying it as if for the first time, hoping that she would convince Pepe to do the same. It was a nude portrait of a woman, and the face was unmistakably Lorna’s. Dark shades of charcoal gave form and depth to her body in the portrait. She stood straight and staring, as upright as a pine tree, with no hint of stooping in her back or knees, breasts pointing forward. Black eyes were fixed on the viewer, unflinching, daring, no trace of a smile. Defiant, Vincent had insisted to her. She had been his reluctant muse, hating to be drawn or painted, but it was that discomfort he had found interesting. He wanted to capture her discomfort in charcoal, in pastels, pencils, oils and watercolours in a series he called After the Spanish war.

It was a quality that made Lorna unlike any other model he had ever had. Still her eyes stared their defiance at the viewer, even when that viewer was Lorna herself. The burnt charcoal black was smeared here and there, like markings left on the surface by a fire. She remembered how Vincent had rubbed his fingers across the flesh, moulding the skin into its contours. The overwhelming blackness of the medium dominated everywhere except, and this was the section of the work that Lorna loved, the midriff that was covered by an object painted in vivid colours. Her charcoal hands held a bowl of fruit in front of her stomach; the bowl rendered in green pastels of many tones, containing half a dozen spheres of bright orange. Lorna liked the contrast of black and grey lines with this area of deep vibrant colour; it allowed her to look at the portrait without shyness.

“Did you have to?” asked Pepe.

“Of course not. I agreed to. There were more but this is the only one I have. You might, in time, find others in galleries.”

“Are you happy with that? Do you not find it shaming?”

“Why? It is only a woman. I hardly think of it as me.”

“It is you. It is beautiful.”

“Oh Pepe, come on,” taking off her beret, “we have so much to talk about.

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