Always the Last to Know(52)

“I’ve been thinking,” I said to Noah, setting his eggs and toast down in front of him. “I think you should move back, honey. I know you hate it here.”

He took a deep breath, the relief clear on his face. “Will you come, too?”

“No. I have to stay, and you have to leave.”

“Are you breaking up with me?”

“No. I just can’t stand seeing you so unhappy.” My eyes filled. “I love you, after all.”

He looked at his plate. “I love you, too. I want a life with you, with kids and everything, but I can’t wait forever.”

“Fair enough.” Was it, though? Was it fair to ask someone to give up trying to get what they’d always, always wanted?

It was a wretched goodbye. I cried. A lot. My tiny bed seemed huge without him. And yet . . . and yet it was easier, too, without him looking like a beaten dog, without him silently judging my paintings, knowing he thought I should be drawing puffy clouds or dogs romping on the beach, rather than trying to stretch and grow. I missed him. I was glad he was gone. I loved being here, doing what I was. I hated being without him.

I tried to get an agent and absorbed their feedback—nice color palette but the content is a bit too familiar . . . once you’ve honed your eye . . . not taking new clients at this time . . . have you considered taking an art class? I had taken four years of art classes, for crying out loud! I could teach art classes! I had a double degree, thank you very much.

That was okay, though. Content too familiar . . . I could use that. Every failure, I told myself, was a step closer to success, even if it didn’t feel that way.

I lugged my portfolio to the galleries who would see me, and sent countless e-mails to those who wouldn’t. I was suckered into paying hundreds of dollars to be featured in a show for a week . . . the “gallery” a former garage that still stank of diesel, the promised opening consisting of cheap wine in plastic cups, with not even a dozen people attending. I entered contests, paying the fees with my hard-earned waitressing money, never once placing. But I tried to learn and absorb from every experience. New York was a harsh teacher, but the best teacher, too.

Months passed. A year. Noah came to visit twice, and I went home to Stoningham to see my parents and nieces from time to time. We were still together. We talked on the phone almost every day. Then less. Then a little less.

My art school friends started leaving the city . . . It was so expensive, so competitive. Only Aneni stayed—even Zach, my professor’s favorite student, left for Cincinnati and a job at an advertising company. So much for your wunderkind, I wanted to say.

Aneni, she of the amazing and bizarre animal drawings, was our school’s pride and joy. She was showing at all the hot places and guest lectured at the Art Students League. Every time she had an opening, I was invited, and she hugged me and introduced me around to her friends, gallery owners, critics. Once in a while, someone would say, “Send me your info” or “Stay in touch,” but it never leveraged into anything.

Aneni . . . she had a true gift. You could see it a mile away, because her paintings were like nothing I’d ever seen before. I was so happy for her, because she was incredibly nice, but I couldn’t lie. I was also jealous. Really, really jealous. How had she done it? Her viewpoint was so clear, her drawings incredibly precise, beautiful and odd. Was it because she was from Zimbabwe that she had such a different point of view? Why did I have to grow up in Connecticut, a state no one (except Noah—and my mother) took seriously?

Of course, I tried to figure out what my art was missing. I knew I could be better, clearer, more. As the months passed, I stayed resolutely openhearted. I took classes when I could afford them, listened to my teachers and tried, so hard, to be better. I pored over the great works at MoMA, the Guggenheim, the Met, the Frick, the Whitney. I went to galleries and studied the paint strokes, the textures, the voices.

I still loved painting with all my heart. It was more like painting didn’t love me. Or the art world didn’t. I’d stare into gallery windows and think, Is that piece really so special, or did someone just anoint it? And if it was anointed, how could I get some of that holy oil, hm?

Then one of my professors sent me a link to a teaching job at St. Catherine’s, a small Catholic elementary school in the Bronx. I applied, and the rather terrifying nun, Sister Mary, seemed to like me. I was good with kids for the same reason I didn’t seem to burn for them—to me, they were entertaining little aliens. Wanting kids never felt as real to me as painting did. I knew what I wanted there. Kids? They were . . . nice. Fun. Kinda cute.

At any rate, I took the job. I had a solid education, appreciated health care and didn’t mind the tiny paycheck, since waitressing was pretty lucrative.

Carter, who taught third grade, took me under his wing, and suddenly, I had new friends, not in the art world. Normal people, many of whom had been at St. Cath’s for decades and had children older than I was. There was a handful of us in our twenties and thirties.

The job was nice. The art room was bright and cheery, and I got hugged a lot.

Noah was furious. If I could teach in the Bronx, why not Stoningham? He saw it as a betrayal, and we stopped speaking for a while. Fine. The way he seemed to be watching and waiting for me to give up made me want to kick him, anyway. Then he sent me a card with a bluebird on the front. Inside, he’d written, “I still love you.” Nothing else.