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"I can't justify giving her money to stay here. She should
be at the university." She snorted a laugh for thinking
she had any money to spare. The medical bills were yet
to come in for the reconstructive surgery.
"I agree with you. She'll find the right way more quickly
if she spends her own money. You'd take her back in,
though, wouldn't you, if she needed a place to stay?"
"In a minute."
On the Friday of the exhibit opening, Josey and Roy
waited on Josey's porch for Mary and Ellen to drive in.
Josey had changed clothes four times before settling on
a pair of black slacks, a white shirt, and a vest. Her
unruly gray-black hair curled around her ears. She and
Roy climbed into the backseat of the Taurus.
Since Mary had met Mac, her anger toward Roy had
faded into a thin veneer of sarcasm. She'd told Josey
not long ago that what she missed most was the way
Roy made her laugh. Mac was a more serious man.
Josey stared at the passing landscape. The hills of the
county flattened in the next one. The woods turned into
fields, the streams into sloughs, heading toward the
Wolf River and its flowages. Closer to Appleton, urban
sprawl took over the scenery. Tracts of immense
houses sprang out of flatness with nothing to soften their
starkness.
They took the north ramp onto Highway 41 and turned
east onto College Avenue. Parking behind the gallery,
they entered through the back door. Jewel was standing
at a banquet table, talking to Annie. Both looked up as
they entered.
"Annie is our server tonight," Jewel said.
"How . . . ?" Josey asked her niece, as Annie popped
the cork on a bottle of champagne and poured the
foaming liquid into glasses.
"I stopped in. She needed a server." Annie nodded
toward Josey's paintings, highlighted by overhead track
lighting. "I can't take my eyes off them."
"Did you quit your job?" Josey asked.
"I got someone to work for me. Who is the Woman in
the Mirror?
Mary accepted a glass and whispered something in
Annie's ear.
Annie dropped the question.
Others flowed in the back door, and Jewel took Josey's
arm. "I want you to meet the rest of our artists."
The last thing Josey wanted was to talk about the
Woman in the Mirror. She skillfully led any inquiries
back to the artists' own works. Before long, though, she
found herself standing in front of her own paintings,
surrounded by others.
"You've caught the woman's emotions so well," one
said.
"A good friend of mine," Josey murmured the lie.
Jewel rescued her, herding them all into a line near the
entrance to meet the public. It was going to be a long
night. Josey bolstered herself with a glass of wine. They
had drunk the one bottle of champagne.
After a while, the artists drifted off one by one to
mingle, she among them. She looked for Ellen and
Mary and saw them in a far corner, conversing with one
of the artists.
Ambling over to Annie, she held out her glass for Annie
to fill and gazed at the crowd that had gathered. She
knew no one but her friends, her niece, and Jewel. This
would be a good time to network with other artists, to
share techniques and marketing tips, if she could just
avoid talking about her own set of paintings.
Annie startled her by asking, "It's not my mom in those
pictures, is it?"
"Your mother? No, Annie. What made you think that?"
The girl shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't seen much of
her. She might not tell me."
"She'd tell you," she said, not at all sure that was true.
She took Annie's hand awkwardly and squeezed it. "It's
not your mother."
Recalling Mary whispering in Annie's ear, Josey asked,
"What did Mary say to you?"
"That she represented all women."
"She does." Those were the words she would use if
asked.
Jewel was greeting two men and a woman at the door.
Hearing Annie's quick intake of breath, she turned back
to her.
"That's Dr. Fletcher and two of the other English
professors. You've got to meet her, Josey," Annie
whispered urgently, her face flushed, her voice
animated.
"I'm sure Jewel will bring her over," Josey said. "First I
need to connect with these other artists." Already she
had forgotten their names.
Carrying her glass of wine, she crossed to the painting
next to her series, memorized the artist's name, and
waited for him to approach her. Artists were drawn to
someone showing interest in their work. Several people
crowded around her series, but she studiously ignored
them. She had no interest in selling to a private party.
"There you are," Jewel's strident voice raised the hair on
the back of her neck. "Stop hiding, Josey. Your series
is the talk of the show."
"I'm not hiding. I wanted to exchange notes with some
of the other artists." Where was the person who had
slapped the paint on this canvas? She liked it. "Can you
point this artist out to me? I want to talk to him."
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