Page 2 of Just Say (Hell) No
Hugh frowned over the photo of a brightly colored card. “The Fool,” he read aloud, then raised a dark brow at Marko. “Seems a bit harsh.”
“It’s my Tarot card of the day,” Marko said. “In case I was wondering.” He scrolled down and read aloud to Hugh.
Chin up, baby. The Fool isn’t always foolish. Just willing to take a chance and learn from it. Not every unexpected leap is too far, and not everyone who strays from the path is lost. I’d bet on your judgment every time. There are more important decisions coming your way. I’m guessing you’ll choose right again. Love you.
“Good to know,” Hugh said. “Next time I face the decision of whether to chuck a bag containing sharp objects at a mate’s head, I’ll consult the Tarot first and hopefully discover that it’s a brilliant idea. Nothing like a mum, is there?”
“You aren’t the one whose changing cubicle will be stuffed with knitting wool tomorrow,” Marko said.
Hugh stood up and put a hand on Marko’s shoulder. “Well, you know,” he said, “a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.”
Nyree Morgan came to life slowly.
It wasn’t really “coming to life.” It just felt like it. Or like swimming her unwilling way up from the depths of the darkest sea, finally breaking the surface and wishing she hadn’t.
Her cheek was stuck to something. A piece of sketching paper. She peeled it off with a grimace and sighed. From the light coming in through the garage’s windows, it was already mid-morning.
She didn’t have a drinking problem. She had a painting problem. She was lying on what passed for her couch, and the substance on her cheek, she discovered after some exploratory work, was burnt umber.
This had to stop. If she were going to achieve her dreams, she needed to stop putting the work off and start dredging up some good old-fashioned Kiwi grit. Get stuck in and get it done. It was a dirty job, but somebody had to do it, and that somebody was her.
Painting Pookie.
She’d prepared the canvas two weeks ago, but had avoided starting on Pookie, Savannah Calloway’s overfed dachshund, until last night. She’d told herself she was turning Pookie over in her mind until she got his personality right. It sounded good. It just wasn’t true.
The truth was, she hated Pookie. She shoved a hand through her unkempt mass of black hair, yawned, and eyed the notice board next to her easel without enthusiasm. Twelve shots of Pookie in various stages of fat, irritable, thoroughly spoilt dogdom. And next to it, the canvas on which a slimmed-down, friendlier Pookie, the Ghost of Pookie Past, was taking shape.
Right. She needed to finish the painting within the next week, because Savannah was planning to unveil it at Pookie’s wedding in exactly four weeks, and that would be barely enough time to apply the varnish and allow it time to dry. If the portrayal favored Pookie enough, she had a feeling she could be asked to paint the bridal couple.
Pookie and Precious.
Who was a Chihuahua.
In her wedding gown.
And veil.
She thought about it while scrubbing at her face with rubbing alcohol, wrinkling her nose involuntarily at the smell, then going to work on her hands. She’d finished painting at four this morning—or rather, she’d sat down, paintbrush in hand, to contemplate her work, and had apparently fallen asleep where she sat. Now, it was after ten, and she had a shift at Bevvy at four.
She thought about it some more while she was pulling her hair back into a messy ponytail and finding her running skirt and bra in the washing basket. They were clean, so there was that. She laced up her trainers, bounced on her toes a bit, rolled her head on her neck, considered a coffee, stuffed her EFTPOS card into the pocket of her skirt instead for after, and went for her car.
She’d get alert. She’d get inspired. She’d get fit. She’d think of a way to make Pookie beautiful, to draw out his better doggy self. The self he could have been with a little more training and a little less hand-feeding. It wasn’t Pookie’s fault he was a terrible dog. He couldbea wonderful dog. She couldmakehim into a wonderful dog. She just had to believe.
And clap her hands, if she believed in fairies.
She was out of the garage on the thought, into her Beetle, and through the Sunday-morning glorious-New-Zealand-day traffic, all the way to St. Heliers, home of so many of Auckland’s rich and famous. On her way toward the best sea views available to a person living in a garage in Mt. Wellington, a person who needed to be painting again by noon.
Light, sea, sky, and greenery to ease the mind and lift the heart. Endorphins, clean air, and caffeine. And, hopefully—Pookie-inspiration.
Marko dumped his bags inside the door of his new Auckland house and looked around with less enthusiasm than the place deserved. He still missed Dunedin, and his less glamorous but comfortable house there. He should buy something to hang on the walls, take advantage of the light. Art, maybe. How did you buy art? No clue. The question hadn’t exactly come up in his life before.
After that, he thought about a second breakfast. He needed to loosen up first, though. A jog, a feed, and this afternoon, he’d play a round of golf and loosen up some more, then cook a steak and a baking tray of veggies. Start replacing the six thousand calories he’d burned last night, then get to bed early so he was ready for training tomorrow.
For now, he made a quick smoothie with broccoli, blueberries, and oranges, added an extra scoop of protein powder and a couple organic eggs, and drank the whole mess down while unpacking his bags and pulling off his tracksuit. Finally, stripped down to a singlet and rugby shorts, he headed out the door and toward Dingle Dell, the bush reserve that stretched out behind his house.
He’d take in a little birdsong and bush, then run up to the headland, down to the beach, and along the sand until his calves burned and his legs let go of the stiffness, then turn toward home, a shower, a soak in the spa tub, and second breakfast.
It only took a block for the plan to go pear-shaped.
