I’m a journalist with an up and coming small town newspaper, (the only one in town I have to admit) but nevertheless our star is rising. I’m Judi Denvers, also their investigative reporter.
I was sniffing out unusual stories and was looking forward to meeting Daniel Carsen, farmer turned artist. Not that I had great expectations, but it was better than my last assignment,
‘How to use Attic Junk to enhance your home.’ That had nearly killed me with boredom, until I met Aunt Katy Kaylene. She could take a china pig and turn it into something that would be the talking point of your sophisticated dinner table. She made me laugh out loud.
So my sights were set low.
I wasn’t expecting my insides to do an unwanted 'flip' when I met Mr Carsen......... ‘call me Dan’.
He came in just under the too tall alpha male and though large he looked sinewy and loose. He had a normal neck, not the muscle bound one of a weight lifter, which was wound loosely in a blue home knitted scarf that made his eyes the startling colour of a summer sky. He had that wholesome look of home made bread and smelt the same!
We made small talk in the usual stiff way for a minute and then he burst out laughing and asked, ‘what on earth do you want from me?’
He meant it. There was no posturing and he was as humble as apple pie cooling on your grandmother’s windowsill.
‘I’m Dan Carsen, one time dairy farmer who has thrown in the milk churn to develop the one thing I am really passionate about and that’s painting. It is my life ambition to transfer all of this,’ and his arm encompassed the surrounding mountains in a sweep, ‘onto canvas.’ I also dabble in drawing people.'
Pixabay
We chatted amiably and had coffee in the outside garden of The Arms Hotel.
When he left I had a second cup and stared into space absorbed by thoughts unusual for me. I had put any ideas of romance behind me a year and a half ago. The thought of the manipulative man I’d given my heart to for too long made my skin prickle in shame. Shame at first for him and then shame on me for allowing it to continue.
I tried to pull myself together but his intense stare had meant something I was sure.
We met twice more in various places in the town. I found his life story intensely interesting and his experimental work both sensitive and commanding. He brought one canvas that I fell in love with. Over the top of it our eyes met and held.
I listened to the recordings I made for the article I was writing more times than was strictly necessary.
I also belonged to a ‘book club gone honest’ so we’d forgotten the books ages ago. We four friends met regularly and truth be told we had become a support group…………..’life support’ Maria dubbed us. We often laughed….. it was our goal and motto.
One afternoon the four of us were having frothy coffees in the Maple tea lounge. Maria was off to Spain for a week so we were saying farewell. To my surprise I saw Dan Carsen walk in and to my even bigger surprise Helen in our group called out to him and waved. I had kept absolutely ‘mum’ about my attraction to him as my romantic history with the group was somewhat tarnished.
He came over and his surprise showed when he saw me in the widening of his eyes as Helen said my name. ‘This is our local reporter Judi, we’re very careful what we say around her,’ she joked.
When he shook my hand it was the first time we had ever touched and I know that he also felt an electrical something pass between us.
‘Oh,’ burbled Helen, ‘and how is Tilly?’ My heart squeezed in genuine pain. ‘Tilly? It sounded by the drift of the conversation that she was someone significant in his life. ‘And young Danny?’ she burbled further, ‘how’s his broken arm, hard on a kid of 5 to fall off the haystack.’
I sat back my mind reeling. I realised that our interviews had simply been about art and his new career, never anything personal. I had been nurturing a ‘viper’ in my breast and it was rearing its ugly head to bite me.
Suddenly a wife! A child?
I was horrified to find myself trembling and enormously sad. But when after a few pleasantries he said goodbye his eyes lingered on me for that extra couple of seconds……..or did they?
‘Oh you girls would like Tilly’ said Helen on a roll. ‘She’s great. Maybe we could consider her as a member of our ‘life support group’. My insides revolted, I hated her already. ‘no rush of course but I’d like to invite her, Dan and Danny to our house for a Sunday lunch and all of you with your significant others. Let’s make it for when Maria is back……….. the 25th ?’ She raised her eyebrows at us. There was a chorus of ‘that would be fun, great, awesome and a muttered ‘I’d rather die,’ from me that I covered up with a cough.
As we gathered our bags, scarves and jackets Helen’s parting comment made me spin round so that I nearly fell over.
‘Tilly is THE most amazing woman on the planet………….she has sold her farm and is taking over Dan’s. I’ve read about ‘laying down your life for a brother’ but to know of a sister who is actually doing that…………amazing! She’s come to help Dan get back on his feet after the accident took his wife’s life. Her son Danny and his new project as an artist are injecting him with a fresh sense of purpose. In fact,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘I’m sure I saw a twinkle in his eye just now.’
She turned to me and with a sweet smile stared straight at me.
The funeral dirge that my brain had been playing evaporated and a heavenly symphony involving violins and a trumpet began to play.
Life had just taken a turn for the better.
Pixabay
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