Twice Shy by Sarah Hogle (ebook offline reader .TXT) 📕

He begins to point, then tugs his fingers through his hair sheepishly.

“Listen, if you happen to have any tips, I’m all ears. I don’t know why Violet asked me to paint a mural. I haven’t painted since art class in high school.”

Wesley loses his hold on his restraint and drags over a chair, positioning it two feet from mine. He second-guesses the distance between us, then drags it another foot in the opposite direction.

“Are those supposed to be trees?” he asks benignly with a motion toward my green-black blobs, to which I can’t help but laugh.

“If you have to ask, I guess they’re pretty bad.”

“No! Not bad. Not at all.” Lies. “Here, try this.” He plucks two brushes with flat, fanned bristles from the plastic tub, one for him, one for me, and dips them in water. Wipes the excess carefully against a paint-stained rag. “These are perfect for coniferous trees.” He dabs his into hunter-green paint and then creates a realistic fir tree in seconds, like it’s nothing.

“You don’t always need to have your brush loaded with paint,” he says. “If you let it fade out, you end up with softer branches. Then you come back, like this, with a little bit of yellow. These brushes are handy for grass, too.” He demonstrates, barely tapping the bristles against the wall but managing to leave behind feathery strokes of yellow-green grass.

I copy him. “Ahh! Look at my tree! I made a tree!”

“Very good,” he replies, even though his tree is much better.

“Would you mind helping me?”

Wesley doesn’t take any convincing. He asks what I’d like him to do, and I put him on tree duty. I try to mirror whatever he does on my side of the mural but keep stopping to watch him work. He makes all sorts of trees, using different brushes for the trunks, for different textures. He knows exactly which brush is the right one for the result he wants. Which colors to use. “You’re really good at this,” I say.

He grumbles noncommittally, arm stilling its movements. It takes him a while to get back into the groove, and as I watch his progress, I also watch his cheeks and neck redden.

I can’t believe it. He’s self-conscious.

“No, seriously, you’re an actual artist,” I force myself to tell him, like I’m trying to pet a dog who might bite me. “You’re legit.”

“Not really.” He squirms.

“You must paint all the time, then? To be this talented?” There are a few landscape paintings hanging up in the cabin, but I assumed he or Violet bought them.

“I’m not . . . I’m not that good.” Wesley rubs the nape of his neck. I think complimenting him is making it worse. It’s so humanizing, to see this giant starchy potato get all pink and flustered simply because I’m bearing witness to his fluffy trees. It makes me want to compliment him more, which is a disturbing development.

“Anyway.” He rolls his shoulder and tries to twist himself so that I can’t see his face. “Light. And shadows. Um. So, look, there’s the sun, so . . .” He darts me a sidelong look. “Pay attention to the art.”

“I am.”

(Awful, is what I am, but in my defense he walked right into that one.)

His blush is furious. You could fry an egg with it. “Look at my brush, please. You’re missing important techniques here.”

He adds whitecaps to the waves, and reflections of overhanging trees. I imitate him. He isn’t as precise anymore, fumbling with the paint bottles, knocking over our cup of water. He mutters and grumbles and, honestly, looks completely miserable. I have never seen him like this. I’m so startled that I don’t know what to say.

“Thanks for teaching me,” I say, nodding at the wall, where a waterfall lagoon mural is slowly emerging from the mess I made. “I appreciate it. You must have taken quite a lot of pity on me and my painting abilities to help out somebody you hate.”

It’s a joke. It’s mostly a joke.

Wesley swivels his head, eyebrows knitting. “I don’t hate you,” he says slowly, like it’s obvious.

“Kind of thought you hated everybody,” I say. It’s another sort-of joke that falls flat.

“No.” He looks hurt. “I liked Violet. I like my family.”

This piques my curiosity. “What’s your family like? Are they all giants?”

“My mom’s four eleven.”

“Holy cow, your dad must be Paul Bunyan.”

His grunt tells me this conversation is closed. Then, a few minutes later, after I’ve forgotten and moved on: “I’m not that tall. The national average for men in the Netherlands is six feet. If I lived there, no one would even notice me.”

I stare.

He swings away.

“Could you teach me how to draw a pirate sh—” I begin to ask, but Wesley drops his brush in a fit of frustration, rising from his chair.

“I’m not any good at this.” He sounds so resigned. And sad.

“What?” Not any good at this? What in the hell is he talking about? “Are you kidding? You’re amazing at this!”

“No, I’m not,” he mutters under his breath, cleaning up after himself jerkily. I can tell now that staring bothers him, but it’s impossible not to.

“Wesley.” I stand up.

“I should be cleaning. I’m too busy for this, I shouldn’t be messing around.” He holds out a hand like a stop sign, as if to say, Don’t you dare move. Stay where you are. “You’ve got this,” he assures me, gravely serious. “You’re doing great.” He keeps his hand up—Don’t come any closer—all the way out of the room.

I gape at the doorway. Then the mural.

“Okaaaaaay.”

I keep going for about two minutes longer, but concentration’s a pipe dream. I’ve got to go see what’s up with Wesley.

I find him in the kitchen, standing at the sink rinsing out his paintbrushes. I can’t tell if he’s hanging his head because he’s upset or just tired, but he isn’t his usual rigid self tonight.

In this silent house, my footsteps are an uproar. Wesley glances my way, eyes shuttering. We’re hungry and exhausted, a dangerous mix. We’re sick of