When I look over at him, he’s studying me, tilting his head a little. “What do you think happens?” And then something changes in him. It’s small, not even something physical, but something… internal. Like my answer to this question is critical.
“There are only two options.”
He smiles and nods his head. But he stays silent.
“Cut down the tree or tear down the building,” I answer.
“Which do you think will happen?”
I look around at this beautiful place. The glass is a work of art in and of itself. They are not just rectangular panes, they are all different types of shapes. Triangles mostly, but some are square, some are circular, outlined by thick metal lines, similar to a stained-glass window, except all the glass is clear to allow the sun to shine through.
I look at all the rows and rows of potted plants, then a wall of hedges along one side of the room. My eyes take in the many saplings. Some are even out of the ground, their roots wrapped in burlap. Like they are waiting to be transplanted. There’s a system of pipes with spray nozzles over many of the benches holding seedlings, and there’s a workroom off to one side that looks like an office.
I look back over at Spencer. “You’re going to destroy this room.” I pause, because it’s painful to even picture it. But then I look up at the tree and imagine how many years his gran must’ve cared for it to be so big. “How old is it?”
“As old as me,” he replies as he looks around at the room. Maybe trying to come to terms with the fact that he has to tear it down to save this one life. “The crews are coming in next week to take everything away. I’ve sold all the plants.” He points to the big buckeye. “Except that one, of course. It gets to stay forever. My gran lost herself in here. She never recovered when my gramps died before I was born. She really did dedicate her life to plants. When she died and left me this place I expected to have instructions, ya know?” He draws his gaze away from his tree and looks down at me now, his blue-gray eyes a little turned down with sadness. “But there was nothing in the will about the greenhouse.” He shrugs. “I was sorta lost over it. I didn’t know what to do, so I just kept paying her two gardeners and pretended everything was fine. The tree really needed to be set free a long time ago, but I guess she couldn’t bring herself to destroy the room to save it.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m not sure what I’m sorry about, really. Maybe that you are the one who has to make the decision. Or maybe just because it’s a sad story and it deserves an apology.”
He inhales deeply and then lets it out slowly. “Yeah, but that’s not really why I brought you here.”
“No? Not to see the tree?”
He shakes his head. “No. I have a request and I’m hoping that you’ll say yes, even if it sounds a little weird.”
I just stare at him, waiting for it.
“Let me paint your body.”
“Excuse me,” I laugh. “What the what?”
He walks over to the office and pulls out a cart, then drags it through the grass, bending the perfect green blades and leaving tracks in the carpet of green. The cart is filled with painting supplies.
“You’re serious? My body?”
He holds up a finger and walks back to the office and comes out with a portfolio. “Please, Veronica, have a seat.” I think it’s the formal use of my name that makes me obey, but I have to admit, I’m curious. I sit down in the thick grass.
Spencer lies down next to me, propping himself up on his elbow, and opens the black portfolio. “This,” he says as he looks up at me with the most serious expression I’ve ever seen him wear, “is what I do, Ronnie. Besides build bikes and major in business in college, of course. This”—he pokes the clear plastic that covers the first photograph in the collection—“this is what I do. I paint naked girls.”
I take the portfolio from him and look closely at the images. They are beautiful, but they’re naked. “You want to paint my naked body?” I ask, as I look back up to him.
“Yes,” he says, holding my gaze. And then he breaks it and turns back to the page. “This was my model in France. I studied as an apprentice there a couple summers ago and that’s where I created this portfolio. But I’ve been busy.” He looks up at me sheepishly now, maybe embarrassed about all the trouble he’s been in. “And to be honest, I’m a little picky about my models. They have to be perfect. Not like, perfect bodies, just… perfect for me.” He stares at me. “You know?”
I look back at the book on my lap. These girls look like they are wearing clothes, but it’s an illusion created with liquid color. Put the shadows in just the right places and things take on depth. Curve a line that should be straight, and suddenly it pops out of the canvas.
Spencer Shrike seems to be a genius at manipulating perspective with paint.
“You really are an artist? You weren’t in my class just to pose naked for me?”
He laughs big now. “Well, yeah, Bomb. The whole reason I asked to join the class was to get close to you, that’s true. But I am an artist. And next week I’ll stop being a model and start being a student again. But what I want to know right now is will you let me paint you up in here and take some pictures so I can have them framed and shit?”
“You want to frame me? Naked?”
He nods. “I really do.”