Ghigau 3.

Nikki walked Lydia to school. The morning sun was already potent and they had to shade their eyes when they turned east and it caught them full face. Lydia still permitted short periods of hand-holding, and Nikki could feel the energy of her fidgety fingers moving back and forth as they marched along the leafy streets, peering in to other peoples doorways and windows. When an obstacle appeared in their path, they would step aside as one without breaking stride.  

    She remembered walking this same route with Jamie and could almost pinpoint the day when she’d reached for his hand and he’d wriggled free, preferring to walk unfettered because he was ‘too big now’; sideways glances at his friends betraying his embarrassment. She could recall so clearly the desperate expression he wore when pleading not to be bought short trousers because the other boys in his year were all wearing long. Eventually, the trusting, openness of a little boy was replaced by the taciturn unknowable presence of a young adult man. But Jamie had remained a sensitive soul and had always been kind and affectionate to her. On the rare occasions she and Lenny argued, Jamie would invariably come to her side afterwards saying, ‘he can be such a dick sometimes’. 

    Sometimes it was too much to bear, the absence of him. For weeks and weeks after the accident she had been unable to speak without fear of a jagging scream escaping from her throat. She thought she might go mad. Despite his own pain Lenny had been the one who slowly but surely had brought her back to the world. Lenny loved her more than anything, she knew, and this had sustained him. She loved him too, and without qualification, but the love she had felt for her son was all conquering.

    As they approached Lydia’s school, Nikki found it hard to watch other mothers and fathers kneel to straighten ties, adjust hats and kiss their sons and daughters, then watch them wistfully until their running, chattering figures had disappeared from view. After saying goodbye to Lydia and kissing her on both cheeks twice, holding on to her just a few seconds longer than necessary, and with a parting ‘Love you’, Nikki headed for work. 

    At a brisk pace the gallery was twenty minutes away which would mean arriving just before 9am. They didn’t open the doors until an hour later but there was always plenty to do and she liked to be organised. Hermione had promised to meet her there and brief her on Exa’s proposed exhibition, and that was exciting.  The business had been good for Nikki. Focusing on work dimmed her pain to a dull, insistent ache.

    When Nikki arrived at the gallery, Hermione had already made coffee and presented Nikki’s to her. “There you go” She said, handing Nikki her mug. 

    As usual Hermione was dressed to kill. She wore a dark blue trouser-suit, cinched at the waist and wide in the leg, set off by a white silk cravat and gold sandals. Her discreet diamond earrings sparkled and she looked at least a decade younger than her fifty-two years.

    Nikki glanced down at her own simple summer dress and espadrilles with a sigh. “Wonderful, thank you” She took her cup and sipped.

    “You look tired darling.” Hermione had a way of expressing concern with an undercurrent of reproach. It reminded Nikki of her mother.

    She chose not to respond and instead asked eagerly,   “So did you meet her? What’s she like?” Nikki was referring to Exa, whom Hermione had met yesterday for an informal chat about the exhibition.

    Hermione took a deep breath and leaned forward conspiratorially. “Well, she’s an interesting character that’s for sure. Older than her twenty-one years, and a little— ‘out there’.  I was almost embarrassed to be seen with her, I mean her clothes were—”  she struggled to find the words, “Let’s just say you wouldn’t want your daughter to be out dressed like that.”

    Nikki laughed. “Oh dear, she sounds fascinating”

    “She’s certainly that, outspoken too. Actually I warmed to her after a bit. She's obviously bright, quite opinionated, doesn’t suffer fools and knows what she’s trying to achieve. She reminded me of you darling.” Hermione smiled.

    Nikki laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment. So when do I get to see the work?”

    “Well, she says she has sixteen completely new ones, some at her studio which is in Tufnell Park, but some at her flat which isn’t far from here actually, in Camden.” Hermione replied.

    “Oh really? So is she coming here, or can I see them there?”

    “I have her number, she said to call her and she’ll arrange something with you.” Hermione handed Nikki a black lacquered card with the letters X A embossed on its face in an intertwined design. On the back the words ‘made entirely from re-cycled plastic bottles’ and a telephone number.

    “Brilliant, I’ll call in a bit and set something up.” Nikki said.

    After this Hermione went to the back office to take care of some emails and paperwork while Nikki readied the gallery for opening. Six months prior they had hired a new assistant, Bella, who was doing a post-graduate degree at the Royal College of Art and came in for three days during the week and on Saturdays. 

    “The pamphlets for ‘SW2’s exhibition are here,” Said Bella, after greeting Nikki good morning.

    “Ooh, let’s take a look.”Nikki enthused.

    The pamphlets were printed on rough card cut into the shape of a machete. Along the blade the characters SW2 stood out in red. SW2 (or David Van-Treach to his parents) was a graffiti artist whose cleverly located, stencilled depictions of street violence, particularly knife crime, had found favour with London’s young city traders. By placing his artwork along the commuter routes, on soot-stained bridges and the grimy walls of factories easily seen from train windows, SW2 had soon caught the attention of those earning enough money to buy the bridges and buildings themselves, let alone the artwork. The kind of people who would hang abstract images of murdered youths from Tower Hamlets on their Canary Wharf walls to show themselves and their friends that they empathised with the very folk they had priced out of the neighbourhood. A good sized piece was worth up to twenty-thousand pounds these days and David Van-Treach was doing very nicely. Nikki was pretty sure his followers would have been surprised to find out that SW2 was a forty-two year old ex-banker from Romford who had spent a few years at her Majesty’s pleasure for insider trading. Some people always rose to the top no matter what.  

    “I’m sending them back.” Bella declared.

    Nikki raised her eyebrows, “Because?” 

    “Because the typeface for the blurb is Times New Roman and we asked for Courier.”

    Nikki looked more closely, Bella was right. “Ok, and you feel it compromises the design?”

    “That’s not the point, they haven’t delivered what we asked for. I mean we should get what we asked for shouldn’t we?”

    This was just the sort of thing Nikki might have let go. “I suppose so, but, do they look good?”

    “Well, they look ok. I mean it contains the same number of letters, it comprises the same words, it carries the same message. But it’s not what we asked for.” Bella was intent on making an impression on her new boss, and wasn’t going to be moved.

    “How about this, we ask for a discount, say 10% — as compensation for the error,” Nikki reasoned, wondering if Bella wasn’t a little too fierce for her liking.

    Bella looked doubtful. “Does that send the right message?”

    “Well, it lets them know we are on the ball and benefits us financially, so yes I think so.” Nikki delivered this in a tone that said , ‘decision made’. After all she was the boss.

    “Ok, I’ll get on to them this morning and sort it out.” Bella looked pleased to have the matter resolved. She left to move the rest of the print boxes to the storeroom. 

    For her part Nikki was glad not to have to continue the discussion. She took her regular morning walk around the gallery, seeing the space as a client might. She checked for damaged frames, missing titles, blown lightbulbs, anything that might jar the consciousness and break the serene mood the space was designed to engender, thereby spoiling the experience of looking at the art.

    The gallery had shown a healthy profit for three years running and had gained a certain reputation for finding new artists, hence the exhibition for X-A. Nikki was very much looking forward to meeting her, she sounded feisty and Nikki loved feisty.