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Sophie or Sadie lets the bedsheets drift down to her hips, exposing those tits I’d been so adamant about a few hours ago. I take another drag of the reefer burning in my fingers.
“What kind of work?” she asks.
I jerk my head to the open window leading to the balcony of my hotel room. Across from it is the building I’d been working on. A top to bottom mural stains the old red brick. It’s political. It’s provocative. It’s dark and bold with strong lines and big colours. It’s legal.
Most of the work I do at the side of buildings these days is legal. Most of it. They let me hang forty feet from a rooftop with a cannister and let me paint whatever the hell I want. They actually pay me to do it. I have a crew, people who do what I say and paint where I tell them to paint. Work like this doesn’t pay what a gallery piece does, and I still do those because a guy’s gotta eat, but the street art is what I love. The big pieces on display for the world, not just the ones kept tucked away in white-walled galleries that no one can afford.
People don’t know me, not really, but they know the work, they know the name.
“You did that?” I nod and she smiles. “Why don’t you come back to bed? We can waste time until you have to leave. You can do anything you want to me.Anything.”
Tempting. But I need space, I need to think and clear my head and push out all the dark thoughts that have been seeping into my head for the last few days. It used to be Kate that did that. She redirected me, made me feel something other than this weight that’s always crushing down on me, this darkness that’s always haunting me, the emptiness. But now there’s no sunshine to pull me out of it. No Kate.
I don’t love you Kate.
“Like I said. You can crash here if you need a place for the night. I’ll be out of here by seven.” I don’t wait for her to respond, and instead head out to the balcony, shutting the sliding door behind me.
I stare out at the building, at my work, and then I stare at my phone. At her name. Kate. At her number. Kate. At the last text I sent her that she never responded to. Kate. Kate. Kate. The woman has always been a near ghost on social media, but I still stare at her Instagram longer than I should. There’s a new picture, posted a few days ago. A painting she’s restoring by an obscure artist I’ve never heard of.
Breakthrough today with this piece. Successfully removed an old layer of overpaint! #artrestoration #HemlawSchoolOfArt
Most of her account is art. No face. No smile. Just a piece here and there and the odd peek at her hands holding a brush. None of it’s hers. Kate’s work has always been good, but the really good ones, the honest ones, she’s never shared with anyone.
“It’s personal,” she’d said to me once. “No one gets to see these parts of me.”
“Then why do you show me?”
“Because you’ve already seen all the parts of me.”
And now I miss all those parts.
So maybe I should call. Just to check up on her. Just to make sure she’s okay.
Or maybe, maybe I could call and tell her. Tell her that she hasn't left my mind since the day we last spoke, that her face is all I see, that I miss her. That I'm fucking nothing without her. I fucked up, I know that now, and I just want her to tell me what I need to do to fix it so that I don't have to do this anymore. So I don’t have to be without her.
“James?” Her voice sends a tightness to my chest. It's tired and scratchy, like I'd gotten her out of bed. And I suppose given the time, I probably have.
“Kate,” I say back.
There's a silence and then she says, “Is... everything okay?”
Of course she'd ask that. My Katie. Always worrying, always making sure I'm okay, always making it so goddamn easy for me to come back.
“I’m good Katie.”
Another stretch of silence. “You sound...” she pauses to clear her throat. “Why are you calling me?”
“I just... I guess I just needed to hear your voice.”
She sighs. “James... I thought I was clear.”
“You were.”
“Then why are you calling?”
I rake my hand through my hair, pulling it at its roots. “I fucked up. Okay? I shouldn't have... I can't not have you in my life. I need you in my life.”
“James—”
