Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 105846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 529(@200wpm)___ 423(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
“By the way, Bennett, I really appreciate what you did for my sister today. Thank you,” Josie interjects on a rush, not even giving Bennett time to respond before quickly turning back to me. “Let’s get out of here.”
“C’mon, Josie,” Clay states as soon as he arrives, his golden-brown eyes locked on my sister. “Just talk to me for a minute.”
“No.” That’s all she says.
“You’re in my bar, babe,” he comments with a little smile. “And you never come into my bar.”
“I’m only here because of my sister. Not you.”
“Are you sure about that?” Clay questions and places two hands to his hips. “If I recall, you said you’d never step foot in this bar again. Not for any fucking reason.”
“Sometimes we have to make exceptions and do things we absolutely don’t want to do because it’s for the people we love,” Josie retorts and grabs my hand. “Let’s go, Norah.” Between one second and the next, we’re on our way out the door, Bennett Bishop and Bartender Clay nothing more than a memory.
Well, well. Seems to me I might not be the only one keeping secrets in this family. Or in Red Bridge, for that matter.
13
Bennett
Saturday, August 7th
Nine Inch Nails pounds from the speakers hung discreetly around my studio, and Trent Reznor sings about how nothing really matters anymore.
I wish I could agree with him.
I push and pull my brush across the wall-sized canvas before stepping back to get a vision of the piece as a whole. An abstract vision of yellows and blues and reds and greens stares back at me. The work is undefinable, but at the same time recognizable.
It’s exactly what it should be.
I’ve never been the kind of artist who stays boxed into a certain style. I’ve dabbled in impressionism and surrealist-style portraits with a raw edge. I even spent a year doing purely conceptual art that was meant to shock my audience.
But for the past two years, I’ve been immersed in the abstract, my intention focused on creating a picture, a painting, that I haven’t planned. That might seem arbitrary and even a little destructive, and truthfully, it is, but what it isn’t is predetermined—because life isn’t either.
The beauty in this, I’m finding, is that even though nothing I’m creating is preset or even visually something tangible, the human brain will still want to associate it with something we’re already familiar with because it craves logic and comfort.
I inspect the edges and the center, and I run my fingers across a part where I know the paint has yet to dry. Indentations that mirror the size and shape of my thumb and index finger imprint themselves into the wet paint, serving as a signature that I was here.
Three weeks of work, finally done.
My sister Breezy will want to sell it to the highest bidder. I kind of want to burn it.
My oldest brother Logan used to call my destructive impulse with my creations “madness.” But he’d also light the match and watch it burn with me. Looking back, that’s probably a good metaphor for why our relationship ended up the way it has.
I turn my back on the canvas and head over to the sink to wash my hands. When I turn around, it’s still there, staring back at me, a talisman of my demons.
Maybe a bonfire is a good idea tonight.
Disgusted with my own predictability, I shut off the music and head out of my studio and back into the main house to distract myself with coffee.
Unfortunately, my cell phone rings before I can even make it inside. There are only a handful of people who utilize this number—who even have this number—and I already know who the caller will be before I answer. I finished a painting and, somehow, she knows it. I swear she’s got to have a hidden camera in my studio at this point.
“What do you want, Breezy?” I question the instant I put the phone to my ear.
“A simple hello, how are you, sis, would be nice, you know?” She lets out a sarcastic laugh. “But I guess I should just be thankful you at least answered your damn phone.”
“To what do I owe the pleasure of this call, sis?” I ask, cutting to the chase. I may be an asshole who doesn’t answer, but Breezy doesn’t call without business.
“You know, I read the most interesting article today in a small-town newspaper. It showcased a hero of sorts. A hero who apparently punched some guy in the face and ended up in handcuffs a few days ago.”
Fucking Eileen Martin. Clay made sure he stopped by my place the day the article came out in the Red Bridge newspaper. Although only first names of the people involved were published, Eileen made sure she got a good photo of me in the back of Sheriff Peeler’s car.