Page 107 of Painting Celia

León’s grin widened as he watched her, his eyes softening.

A weight, a mantle around her of black and blue tension, wisped away into nothing. The bone-deep burden had gone unnoticed until now, its absence dizzying. Disorienting—a lightness unlike falling, different from floating. She might slip upwards into the sky.

The relief of it.

She ran and threw her arms around León’s waist, pressing her face against his chest. As his arms closed around her, she burst into loud sobs.

“I know,” he said, stroking her hair. “I know.”

She was capable of it. Inspiration.

She’d been so afraid she wasn’t.

Twenty

León quietly navigated the dark kitchen, stopping to lean against the dining room doorway. “Celia?”

Her face, hovering in the darkness, turned up to him immediately. She sat at the dining table, lit from below by only her laptop screen.

“It’s late,” he said. “Come to bed.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I thought if I could write enough of it down, I could sleep.”

“I’ll help you sleep.” He let his hand slip down the door frame, the whisper of his palm against the wall curiously louder in the dark. She smiled.

The sudden urge to paint washed through him. He saw charcoals and midnight blues around her and Celia’s face softly illuminating the night like the moon. For a minute, she was the source of light, not the computer.

Then she closed the lid, winking the image away.

“Big night for both of us,” she sighed as she rounded the table, guileless in her sweats, and slipped her hands around his waist.

“We’re just getting started.” He reached up to brush back her hair, tucking it behind an ear. He could barely see her face, the moonlight outside filtering in to trace its curves.

She leaned her hips against him, and he felt that rush start in his blood. His Celia.

“Did you enjoy your opening night?” she asked, those wonderful eyes of hers looking up at him through those wonderful lashes. “I’m sorry if I stole some of your attention.”

“No more sorries.” He planted a soft kiss on her forehead. “We were there for hours. It was plenty.”

She nestled against him. “It felt like minutes.”

“I know.” He stepped back, reaching up to capture one of her hands as she released him. “Make no mistake, tomorrow I’ll gush about being in this show. I thought you’d want time tonight to make your lists.” He stepped back again, pulling on her wrist so she’d follow. Then he paused and stopped pulling. He wouldn’t like it if she towed him around, would he?

She followed anyway. “Things really will change now, won’t they?”

He turned for the bedroom, draping an arm around her shoulders. “Not everything.”

•••

The leasing agent was eager to show the warehouse, and Celia met him an hour before the gallery opened. She’d wandered the first floor, of course, but never explored it with an eye to ownership. A tiny fear kept buzzing in her; could she find another building if this one was wrong?

But it was perfect.

The open main floor smelled of art—pine wood and stretched canvas and varnish and oil and clay. She hadn’t noticed last night, the scents too fragile to compete with the perfume and wine of a gala. The old brick walls soared over a dozen feet to iron rafters and sprinklers and a constellation of halogen light fixtures. Fan blades moved a mild breeze of clean air, their simple white noise masking the sounds of the city street outside.

When the artworks went home to their makers, the room would again be a ready sanctuary, a simple brick shell waiting for creation to refill it. Celia felt the room’s potential like a tangible thing, a shiver, a caress.

Across the smooth cool floor, long crosshatched paths of sunlight fell from tall paned windows, and Celia could envision her fledgling artists working there. Fed and bathed in sunlight, their art would be born into the world.

---