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“Glad we could get to this point,” he says, pushing his chair back. “Although there’s a problem.”
I groan. “What now?”
“You need to produce something in the next three days.”
“The fuck?”
“I know, it isn’t much time.” He tucks his tablet under his arm. “But Frost and Gallo want proof that you can pull this off. Ren’s running interference, and I’m guessing that’s the best we can do before they get impatient. Three days.”
“I can’t do something likeThe Concertin three days. I need the right supplies, pigments, whatever!”
“Use what we have. Make it eighty-percent there. That’ll be enough for me to explain that it’s only a prototype.”
“Even eighty percent there is like—” I close my eyes, trying to imagine the amount of work. “I won’t be able to sleep.”
“Then you’d better get started, devil girl.” He walks over to Marina, kisses her cheek, thanks her for dinner, and leaves.
I sit staring at my floor, my appetite gone. I lift the wineglass to my lips, hand trembling.
This is insanity.
Three days? I can’t make an entire master-quality oil painting in three days. Not something even passably good. I need multiple attempts to make sure I get it right. Three days isn’t enough for multiple attempts.
Three days is enough for one fucking moonshot.
“Here you go, dear,” Marina says, refilling my wine.
I shake my head. “I better not. Can’t paint while drunk.”
“Nonsense.” She beams at me. “Picasso did it all the time.”
“You saw the stuff he made, right?”
“Looks can be deceiving, dear. Go on, loosen up a bit. Erick seems scary, but he’s doing what’s best for you.”
“I hope so,” I mumble, but I take the glass, and I head back to the studio, already planning out the next three days of pure hell.
Chapter12
Hellie
My shoulders ache. My hand cramps. My back feels like a bunch of toddlers have been headbutting me in the spine.
I crack my neck and make the smallest paint mark and curse. It looks like shit. It all looks like shit.
The sun’s rising outside. My eyes are goo. My face is jelly, my brain mush.
On the canvas is not much more than an outline. The shape of the composition is sketched out in pencil. Just rough blocking—I’ll get the details right later—but it’s enough for now.
And in the center is the mother.
That’s how I think of her, the mother.
She’s the focus. Her strange, pale face glowing with light, the pearls around her neck, her hair up in looping curls. There’s a piece of paper in her hand—how did I not see that before? I think she might be reading it, reciting it, or maybe she’s singing along to her daughter’s music. I can’t really tell. I like to imagine it’s both. The father, meanwhile, is nothing more than a head, some hair, shoulders, a sash across his back, and a chair. He’s a lump, a nothing, while the women shine, especially the mother.
I’ve been working on her for hours. She’s coming into focus, the rightness, the shadows, and she looks good. Very good, actually, as close to the original as I can manage given my constraints. Eighty percent there, maybe even better. She has to be perfect, or else the whole thing falls apart. The mother is the painting. The mother is the heart.
I have two-and-a-half days, and I’m barely making any progress.
