The hidden painting chapter 15

‘C’mon!’ Jaspers says patting Cindy’s stretched out legs. ‘Lets go out for lunch and get out of this place for a change!’

Cindy lifts her head and looks at Jasper, a person she is feeling more and more connected with every second they spend together. ‘I think that’s a very good idea indeed!’ she answers as she removes her feet from his lap, sighing as she hauls herself off the comfortable sofa.

Jasper rises quickly, as per usual, and makes Cindy jump when he claps his hands together closely followed by, ‘I know this little Italian place the next town over that should hit the spot!’

Cindy begins to salivate as Italian is her favourite type of food. She thinks a real, stone baked pizza will do nicely and follows Jasper, who is making his way towards the front door, hearing his keys jingle as he puts on his coat. Ever the gentleman, he waits for her, holding the door open before they leisurely get into his car and he turns the engine over.

They converse about Doug and the disappointment Cindy feels, along with her continuous pang of guilt and gratitude that comes from telling him the real reason she showed up at his door which seems like a lifetime ago.

‘So,’ Jasper starts, ‘what was your mom like?’

Cindy, sporting a smile, tells Jasper the story of when the nurse in the hospital allowed her access to the staff room to make hot chocolate the night she died.

Just as the tale comes to an end, Jasper pulls into a shady looking residence, where Melina exits from after he beeps the horn twice.

She is smiling as she approaches the car…until she notices Cindy sitting in the passenger seat. Her expression mirroring Cindy’s, changes into that of disappointment.

‘I said I’d better pick her up or god only knows when she would come home!’ Jasper explains as Melina walks towards the car.

Cindy would never have agreed to go had she known Melina was joining them. She, being under the impression there is thunder in paradise, didn’t want to be around when she did, finally, return home, thinking there would be words between the two for her staying out all night with that creep, Franco!

Melina, who gets in the back, behind Cindy, makes a point of kissing ‘her’ man passionately through the gap between the two front seats, rendering Cindy even more uncomfortable! They eventually break apart and Jasper begins to drive in the direction of the restaurant.

 

During lunch, Cindy taking her first bite of what is a delicious pizza, Melina asks, ‘what did you two get up to last night?’ nonchalantly.

Cindy, under the impression Melina had slept with Franco, and not for the first time either, lets Jasper answer that particular question.

To her horror, Jasper informs Melina of the painting, and she doesn’t seem happy about him helping Cindy find it.

‘When you bought the house, you bought it with everything in it, no!’ she says in her Latina accent.

‘Yea, but the painting is rightfully Cindy’s, and who knows whether it was there when I bought the place!’ Jasper tries to put her straight. ‘The place was vacant for four months before I moved in!’ he reminds her.

‘And how much, exactly, is this ‘painting’ worth?’ Melina asks using her fingers to make bunny ears when she uses the word, ‘painting’!

‘My mom told me it would start my life off nicely!’ Cindy answers, thinking Melina to be only seeing Jasper with dollar signs in her eyes. Melina’s questions proving Cindys presumptions.

Melina looks at her, as if throwing her daggers! Cindy gets the message loud and clear that she wants nothing to do with her. She continues to argue with Jasper over the real owner of the painting, Jasper surprisingly backing Cindy up all the way.

Cindy wants to say something about the new credit card, the one with Melina’s name on it, so she can do what she has done everyday since the interview with Julius, and buy all of the high end pieces of clothing and accessories that her heart desires, but she holds her tongue knowing Jasper has already purchased the ring. She still cant understand what it is about Melina that Jasper loves. He already admitted that she is usually, ‘too tired’, after their day of shopping to perform in the bedroom. What does he see in her that influenced him into buying the ring in the first place?

Cindy devours the twelve inch pizza, Melina only eating a few slices as, ‘she’s watching her figure’, a comment which Cindy feels was said in her direction. She doesn’t say another word, for fear of another attack, until the usual fight over the bill occurs between Cindy and Jasper…Jasper winning!

 

When they arrive home, Cindy finds Melina inspecting each and every piece of artwork she can find!

‘I’ve already checked them!’ Cindy informs her, afraid that if Melina finds it first, whether on the wall or in a corner she hasn’t yet looked in, she will run off with it, leaving Jasper behind…devastated!

Cindy retreats to her room, laying on the bed, going over and over in her head who else might have an inkling to the paintings whereabouts.

She falls asleep, not waking until the morning when Lois suddenly pops into her head. She silences the alarm and sits bolt upright. She has the urge to drive to Lois’s house immediately, but talks herself into waiting a few hours, before going!

 

As Cindy wishes the morning away, she witnesses neither sight nor sound of Jasper and Melina. She would have used Jasper as a sounding board, but suddenly finds herself in her car, sitting outside Lois’s house, having no recollection of how she got there! Its as if she disassociated from reality, wanting answers, adrenaline being the culprit!

Cindy gets out of the car, and opens the white wooden gate, walking up the path to Lois’s front door. She looks at the perfectly manicured lawn and beautiful bushes and plants on either side in awe. ‘She must have a gardener!’ Cindy deduces in her head, ‘lawn like that would have to be mowed at least every two days!’ She’s fully aware that Lois isn’t the young woman her mother knew her to be! ‘Yea!’ she nods, ‘this woman definitely employs someone to manage this garden!’

She rings the doorbell, hearing its chime go off inside the house, and waits. ‘I’m not going to look in the window this time!’ Cindy reassures herself, noticing brand new bedding plants in the stead of the ones she stepped on, and crushed, the first time she paid Lois a visit!

 

As she opens the door, Lois holds a glass of her infamous iced tea in her right hand.

‘Oh!’ she says looking surprised to see Cindy again!

‘Can I talk to you?’ Cindy asks, looking lost.

Lois looks her up and down, her face showing her surprise, until finally she says, ‘of course,’ and opens the door far enough for Cindy to enter. ‘Would you like a glass of iced tea?’ she asks holding up her own.

‘That would be lovely!’ Cindy answers in the politest tone of voice she can muster!

Lois leads Cindy towards the kitchen and indicates her to sit at the breakfast bar again. She takes a pitcher from the fridge and Cindy begins to remember how delicious her iced tea was the last time she visited, licking her lips unbeknownst to herself!

After a refreshing sup, she gets down to the business end of things. ‘Can I pick your brain?’ she asks.

Lois, looking confused says, ‘why not!’ and shrugs her shoulders.

‘Did you ever hear my mother talk about a family heirloom that was passed down from generation to generation over the years?’

‘What kind of heirloom?’ Lois asks with a furrowed brow.

‘A painting of Marie Antoinette from the 18^th century!’ Cindy answers, trying to gauge her answer by her facial expression.

Lois, who acts as cool as a cucumber, takes a sup of her drink and simply says, ‘no!’

Cindy, disappointment soaring through her blood, finds herself divulging information she didn’t intend on sharing! ‘Please, could you think back? My mother hid it in a false panel in a dresser which resides in the ‘big house,’ and it was her dying wish for me to come and retrieve it, mom saying it would set me up for life!’

Lois looks blankly at Cindy, making her feel uncomfortable. ‘I’m not accusing you of taking it or anything!’ she says, trying to sound sincere, ‘but if you even knew about it, it would help me greatly in trying to locate it!’

‘I’m sorry dear,’ lois begins, ‘I was in Europe the year mother fled with you, and I never heard her speak of something that valuable. From what I gathered, your father, although rich, had your mother on a tight budget, so if she had owned something as valuable as you say, I would have known about it! Before I left, your mother and I were the best of friends and I can’t imagine her being able to keep this ‘heirloom’ and not tell me. No offence dear, but your mother was the type who shared everything with me! When I left, we tried to stay in touch, but I sent her letter after letter and she never responded! Then, when I arrived home and she was gone, your father handed me a stack of open envelopes. He had obviously being reading the content of the letters, but I will never be able to get over the fact that she just upped and left without divulging as to why, or where she moved to. I was shocked that our ten year friendship meant so little to her, and vowed never to speak the name ‘Sadie Deveraux’, ever again! That, of course, was until you turned up!’

Cindy sporting a look of shock, her eyes wide, her mouth open, never knew that her mother told absolutely no one about her whereabouts after she fled! She understands why Lois would have a grudge, hell, she would have been pissed off too! But she didn’t believe, until that moment, how desperate her mother wanted her father not to find them. She knew, from what little her mother spoke of him, that he was an awfully abusive man, but she found it hard to comprehend how abusive he was. Now she doesn’t know what to think! She fled without her safety net, making Cindy ask herself, ‘did he threaten her life?’ From what Lois revealed, she begins to think so!

Cindy thanks Lois, leaving a half full glass of delicious iced tea on the breakfast bar, and leaves, getting into her car and driving! She drives until she calms down, digesting Lois’s fury, and realising that she is seriously angry at her father!

When she is calm enough to picture her mother’s situation, and not want to bring her father back to life so she can torture and kill him all over again, she finds a McDonalds with a drive through and binges out.

 

Cindy returns to the house, letting herself in and hangs her coat on the rack. As she moves towards the kitchen, munching on cold chicken nuggets, she begins to overhear what is unmistakably an argument between Jasper and Melina.

She tiptoes towards the kitchen door, which is marginally open, and hears Melina desperately trying to get rid of her.

‘The painting is yours!’ Melina states.

‘Where did you get that from?’ Jasper asks sounding confused.

‘When you bought this house, you bought it as is, which means that if the painting is here, its technically yours!’

‘We had this conversation at lunch, and I refuse to argue about it again! This painting is a ‘family’ heirloom, and I, for one, am not going to interrupt her mother’s dying wish to possess it!’

‘I looked it up!’ Melina states, something Cindy hasn’t even done yet! She wants to know how much its worth and listens intently!

‘Its worth more than this house!’ Melina informs Jasper, Cindy beginning to cough as a piece of chicken goes down the wrong way!

Cindy knew it was valuable, but not nearly to the level Melina stated!

Jasper makes his way towards the door to the kitchen and pats Cindy on the back. Her embarrassment at listening to them fight, is overcome by the need to breathe. After the third hard thump, the chicken dislodges from her windpipe and Cindy inhales deeply.

‘Thank you!’ she says and offers Jasper a chicken nugget. 

He laughs as she is trying to not act surprised by what she presumes he knows she has just learnt!

‘Why are you always here? Always lurking in the corridors?’ Melina asks with fury in her eyes.

‘Melina!’ Jasper snaps leaving her storm out.  

 

Cindy doesn’t expect Melina back anytime soon, an expectation which proves to be true!

She decides, as the deadline approaches much too quickly for her to comprehend, and Jasper being so calm and relaxed about it, to work on a chapter of the biography for him. Jasper always puts his ‘rough draughts’ and ‘outlines’ in the computer program for Cindy to see, but he has yet to do any writing!

Cindy yawns, and just as she is about to call it a night, the phone rings! Its Julius! He is calling to inform Cindy that he was thinking hard about the man who literally saved his life, and has just remembered that, although his uncle didn’t smoke, he always had a cigarette before he began to write, not taking a break from the laptop for hours at a time! He also informs her that he always got a new laptop for every book. How he remembers that is because he found a brand new laptop in a sealed box he was obviously going to write the fifth book with!

As Julius speaks knowledge about Arthur that she wouldn’t know otherwise, she scribbles what he is saying into ‘the bible’, trying to create a better understanding of the man! Julius, being ever helpful, yawns down the phone, Cindy yawning with him like a domino effect, and excuses himself for the late hour. He explains that he was lost in his uncles office, going through page after page of paper, trying to find something, anything else to aid her work.

‘Don’t worry about it!’ Cindy states, ‘I had only just put my work to bed a second before you rang!’

‘Phew!’ Julius utters, closely followed by, ‘you really are devoted to this!’

‘If only you knew!’ Cindy bows her head, and they say their goodbyes.

 

As she feels a pang of hunger, Cindy makes her way towards the kitchen. She can hear Jasper talking on the phone and isn’t sure whether to enter or not. She simply shows her face and points to the toaster. Jasper gesticulating her to come in.

Cindy takes out two pieces of bread from the pan and places them in the toaster. She hits the kettle, all the while hearing a blatantly obvious fight between Jasper and who she believes to be Melina. She predicted her not returning after she stormed out, and she, unfortunately for Jasper, was right!

She listens intently, expecting them to be arguing about her or the painting, when in fact it seems to be about money.

‘Why don’t we set a budget that you can have every month to buy whatever you want with!’ Jasper asks, holding the phone from his ear a couple of inches, waving a bank statement in his other hand.

‘Baby, I’m not saying you don’t deserve nice things, but…’

‘Please let me finish! I’m trying to say that my money will be long gone sooner rather than later if you keep spending it like this!’

‘Baby…. Melina….shut up and listen to me!’

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to shout!’ Jasper looks at Cindy as the toaster dings and she goes to retrieve the butter from the fridge, his eyes rolling, his head moving quickly from side to side not being able to get the opportunity to explain himself in the way Cindy knows he yearns to do! Hell, even she knows what he’s trying to say and she isn’t privy to Jaspers financial situation, knowing only that he comes from a rich family!

‘Are you going to let me talk?’ Jasper asks, sitting at the dining table.

‘Please let me tal…. see, there you go in Spanish again! When are you going to comprehend that I don’t know a word you’re saying when you speak Spanish to me!’

Cindy feels Jasper’s pain. She leaves him to it, a plate of toast in one hand with a bit of grated cheese on top, and a mug of camomile tea in the other and retreats to her room to enjoy the midnight snack!