The hidden painting chapter 1

After I wrap myself up in the fluffy blanket from the back of the couch, I take a sup of hot chocolate from the biggest mug I could find in the kitchen. ‘Ah! Now that’s satisfying!’ I say to myself before placing the mug on the coaster, on the rickety, old, wooden table beside me. With my book poised on my lap, aided by a cushion, I hear the door slam. ‘And he didn’t even say goodbye!’ I mutter under my breath and reach for the delicious hot chocolate again.

The aroma transports me back to when my mother used to make it for me. She made it with boiling water, whereas I like to warm the milk in the microwave before adding in the chocolate powder. My way is much richer and more satisfying!

I look at my watch, its 2:30. I open my book from where I left off and begin to read. I hear the door slam again and think to myself, ‘he wasn’t out long!’ Then I look at my watch again, shocked to see that its five o’clock. When I was a little girl, I used to think that reading a book confuses the space time continuum, a sentiment that I stand by in adulthood!

‘Have you been sitting there on your fat ass all afternoon?’ Mike bursts into the room announcing his presence with an accusation. Before I can get a word in edgewise, he goes off on one of his rants. ‘You are a worthless bitch! A waste of air! Since you lost your job, you’ve only been to three interviews and you couldn’t even get them right! You just want to sit and read books all day, like you’re a lady of leisure! When I say I want you to contribute to the bills I mean it! This isn’t a hotel, so get your lazy ass off my couch and get a bloody job already!’

I begin to defend myself. ‘I had one interview this morning and have another two tomorrow!’ I say timidly.

‘You have an answer for everything, while you sit all cuddled up on my couch with my blanket!’ he removes the blanket from me with force, knocking my book, and the cushion, to the floor. My body begins to tremble! I brace myself for a beating that thankfully doesn’t come.

‘I’m going to visit my mother now, is that ok?’ I ask, as my mother has end stage breast cancer and only days to live.

‘Are you actually asking for permission?’ Mike laughs derisively. ‘Go,’ he orders, his eyes wide and threatening. ‘If it means me getting some peace and quiet, then go!’

I’m actually afraid of the man and what he’s capable of, so I hightail it out of there, picking up my book as I go and hurry towards the front door. I take my keys from the bowl on the table in the hall and quickly walk to the safety of my car.

I feel a sense of anger wash over me! I don’t understand how Mike turned into such a dirtbag. When we met, he was one of the sweetest guys, so noble and courteous. He did little things like open the car door for me, and push my seat in when we went to dinner. That all stopped when I lost everything!

I used to manage the local bookshop. Mr Godfree hired me straight out of school and groomed me into a managerial position. He even let me live in the apartment above the shop for nothing more than peace of mind that his livelihood was being looked after. He retired five years ago, knowing that his business was safe in my hands.

After he died suddenly last month, his son gave me a small severance pay package and some money to find a new place to live. He’s a property developer and had been itching to get his hands on the building to transform it into apartments ever since his father retired.

Of course what Mr Godfree Jr. gave me was not nearly enough to rent a postage stamp yet alone an apartment. Suddenly I was homeless and jobless and had nowhere to go. As Mr Godfree was dead, he obviously wasn’t available as a reference and equally I don’t have a letter of recommendation from him. When you couple that up with the fact he took me in straight after school, meaning I have no actual ‘qualifications’ to speak of, getting a job in this climate is going to be tricky!

I have tried to explain that to Mike numerous times in the past three weeks, but he won’t listen! He is oblivious to the amount of effort I’m putting into getting interviews, yet alone a job. When they ask on the application form for referees, I have to leave that section blank. God only knows what the potential employers think when they see a thirty-four-year-old woman with no qualifications or referees to her name. They could be thinking that I have been in prison, or something to that extent.

After Mike offered to open his home to me, telling me to treat it like my own whilst I looked for a new place, I felt relieved that at least I had somewhere to go. As I walked into the house, I presumed we would be cohabitating as a couple…oh how wrong was I! From the second I stepped across the threshold, I saw a sudden change in Mike. He planted my suitcases in the spare bedroom and gruffly told me he cleared the top shelf in the bathroom!

I sat on the edge of the squeaky single bed in the tiniest room in the house thinking ‘what have I done!’ I couldn’t move out because I didn’t have the money, but equally, I saw us as a couple, a sentiment that was obviously not reciprocated!

A couple of days in and he started to get nasty, commenting on the amount of time I spent in the shower and price of electricity. I timidly offered to pay for half of the utility bills, ‘too right you will!’ was his answer. I had two grand to my name and knew I needed more to secure a deposit on a new place. I had been spoiled by Mr Godfree letting me stay in the apartment above the bookshop. I knew that anywhere I went would need an upfront deposit and first and last month’s rent. I didn’t have that! I loved working in that bookshop, but my pay certainly didn’t reflect what I was doing. I knew that the additional perk of the apartment was reflected in it. I had absolutely no money to my name after spending my life savings on a car not ten days before Mr Godfree passed!

As I sit in my brand-new car now, I’m glad that I at least have it. It’s my only place of solitude, the only place I feel completely safe! I have considered selling it for an older model but I have to keep telling myself no! I worked too long and too hard for a car that I love and know is reliable in case I need to get away quickly. I look in the mirror and can almost see steam coming out my ears.

‘How did I get to a place where a vengeful man is calling the shots?’ I ask myself as I put the key in the ignition and start the car, tears rolling down my face. Maybe this is how my mother felt until she finally had enough and took me away from the persistent abuse.

When I park the car in the multistorey car park opposite the hospital, I look in the mirror and see that my eyes are red and bloodshot from crying. I can’t believe I’ve gotten myself into this mess! I seem to always attract the wrong type of man! Between Mike and my last boyfriend Liam I feel destined to celibacy! Anything to stop me getting involved with yet another dominant male figure!

‘I could always try my luck with women!’ I think to myself, but shake my head. ‘I could just invest in a good vibrator!’ I nod my head to that thought. At least I’d not be relying on a man to service my needs then, not that Mike ever did that! in the bedroom it was always all about him, my needs were never met!

My mother went through a string of men, including my father, who all treated her horribly. I can’t help but notice I’m on the same path!

I wipe away the tears and pull myself together for the sake of my dying mother. I get out of the car and lock it after me. I’m looking forward to seeing my mom as she is the one constant in my life who is true to her word and treats me with the respect I deserve!

When I enter my mom’s room, I can see her roll her eyes. ‘What’s he done now?’ her croaky voice asks. She could obviously see that I had just been crying! I move closer to her and give her a hug and a kiss. ‘I wish you would ditch that loser!’ she says and winces in pain. I reach for the button to deliver her more morphine but she waves me off. ‘I have something I need to tell you!’ she says, her face contorted in agony! I go to reach for the morphine again, and she swats me off for the second time.

‘What could be so important that you are willing to choose to be in such discomfort when there is no need for it?’ I ask her.

‘Look Cindy, we both know I only have a couple of days left...at most!

‘Mom, you have to think positive…’

‘…no! I need you to hear this!

‘Hear what mom?’

She beckons me closer, so I sit up on her bed and she begins to tell me a story that is either bogus, or is so far-fetched that I might actually believe it!

‘Years ago, when I was married to your father, I inherited a very valuable family heirloom. It’s a small painting of Marie Antionette by a famous 18^th century artist. I didn’t dare tell your father, so I hid it. My thinking behind that decision was that if I ever left him, I could take the painting, and you, and sell it for a tidy sum of money, the type of money that would set us up for life! After the last time your father hit me, I took you out of your bed and we fled from him in the middle of the night, but there was just no time to get the painting! I haven’t had the opportunity to return to that house since, but I don’t want to die and not tell you where I hid it!’

My mother gasps for air so I reach for the oxygen mask and she holds it to her face. As her breathing regulates itself again, she removes the mask and proceeds to tell me where to find this elusive painting.

‘It’s in a small cupboard in the attic of your father’s house. The cupboard has a false panel in the back of it, and that’s where I left it! I hope it’s still there so you can get away from that dirtbag Mike and have a fresh start!’

I can see that her pain is becoming unbearable and when I go to reach for the morphine pump for the third time, she doesn’t object as she has said what she needed to say. She holds the oxygen mask firmly to her face. Her body immediately relaxing as the morphine runs through her veins and she closes her eyes, the pain obviously easing.

I sit with my mom on the bed and gently lean into her, tears flowing down my cheeks. ‘Why is everyone good in my life is leaving me?’ I say to myself as I stay with her, her breathing laboured, and wonder if the story about the painting could possibly be true.

As my mother had hastily left my father when I was only three years old, I wouldn’t know the man if he stood right in front of me! I don’t even know whether he was dead or alive! I do know the address of his old place, but I have had no reason, or want, to go there in all these years. With the situation I find myself in now, I can’t help but wonder whether the painting is still there. I do know that, if it’s as valuable as my mother portrayed, I could buy a bookshop and not depend on anyone for an income again!