The Beach at Painter's Cove

by Shelley Noble

  “How did you do that?” Steph asked.

  “Do what?”

  “It’s Paolo,” Issy told them, and ran outside to welcome him.

  She’d hoped to have a couple of minutes to warn him of what to expect, but she should have known better. They all followed her out and stood on the porch like they were welcoming a returning prodigal.

  He climbed out of the little car and stretched to his full height. Pushed his dark hair back from his face and smiled at Issy. He was dressed in black jeans and a gray stretch tee, and Issy could practically hear her family sigh in appreciation behind her.

  “Cara,” he said, coming around the front of the car, his arms outstretched. He gave her a double air kiss but lingered on the second one. “Welcoming committee or lynch mob?”

  She laughed. “Oh, I’m so glad to see you.”

  He stepped away and reached into the car, brought out a fat metal tube. “Wait until you see.”

  Issy took it, dying to peek inside. “Did you bring luggage? I hope you can stay for a week.”

  “Be careful for what you wish for. Things are afoot. But yes, I brought luggage.” He reached back into the car and brought out a metal suitcase. “Actually, I didn’t unpack from D.C. I may need to do laundry.”

  She took his arm. “Did I say how glad I am to see you?”

  No one moved aside as they walked up the front steps, but Leo stepped forward, both hands held out. “You must be . . . Paolo . . . Welcome.”

  Paolo smoothly dropped the suitcase, took her hands, and kissed her on both cheeks.

  Leo smiled, years shedding from her, and in that instant Issy wondered if loneliness was pushing her mind into the past.

  He barely had time to snatch up his suitcase before Leo took his arm and led him into the house. “I’ll do the introductions once we have you settled with a nice drink. Too many names to remember after such a long drive.”

  Fae rolled her eyes and followed them in. Steph was staring at Paolo as if he’d ridden in on a white horse instead of a ten-year-old Alfa Romeo that belonged to his father.

  “My, my,” Jillian said beneath her breath as Issy passed her. “I take it back, Oops. You have been busy at the museum.”

  “He’s my colleague.”

  Jillian lifted her trademark eyebrow. “In that case . . .”

  “Don’t even think it.”

  Jillian flicked her hair and breezed inside.

  Issy poked Steph. “Wake up.”

  “Wow,” Steph said dreamily, and went inside.

  Only Issy and Fae remained on the porch. “Maybe I should have met him off-site,” Issy said.

  “The face of a Botticelli angel,” Fae said. “We’d better go in and save him from his admirers.”

  When they reached the parlor, Paolo was ensconced in Wes’s wingback chair, Jillian was handing him a drink, and Stephanie was standing nearby still looking a little star-struck.

  “See,” Fae said. “The Adoration of the Whitakers.”

  Steph saw them and walked straight over. “Is he real?”

  Issy frowned. “You mean, for real? Like is he really like that or putting on a show?”

  “No, I mean is he human or fey?”

  Issy looked at her aunt with a little consternation. How on earth had she taken a fairly sophisticated twelve-year-old and made her believe in the Otherworld in a few short days?

  “I believe he’s human,” Fae said, and looked to Issy for confirmation.

  “Of course he’s human. Don’t be ridiculous.” Issy carried the metal tube over to the couch and sat down. Glanced at Paolo, who was totally absorbed in some story Leo was telling him.

  It was nearly twenty minutes before Paolo said that he was on company time and he really should get to work.

  The ladies protested, all except Issy, who was beside herself wanting to get a look at the plans he’d brought.

  She jumped up. “I’ve set us up in the music room,” she said, and practically dragged him out of the room.

  Stephanie slipped out of the parlor. Grammy seemed perfectly normal. She’d told Paolo all sorts of things about the artwork and the artists. She knew who Paolo was and talked about his work with Issy.

  That made her feel a little better—a little, not much. She was still worried about what was going to happen to Grammy—and to herself. She’d been busy since her mother had dropped them off. Lots of fascinating things had happened and made her not think so much about whether her mom and dad were going to come back. They wouldn’t leave Amanda, Griffin, and her, would they? Jillian left Issy and Steph’s mom, but that wasn’t the kind of thing you inherited, was it?

  She went outside. She’d meant to come out earlier to see if she could find traces of whatever had been moving through the trees the night before. In the daylight it didn’t seem that faeries could be possible, and she’d almost convinced herself it had been late fireflies, then Paolo showed up looking just like a dark-haired Legolas from the movie.

  And suddenly the possibilities made a lot more sense. Issy said he was human, but maybe Issy didn’t know. Did the Elf King know Paolo was here? Would they know each other? Were they enemies or friends? Should she try to warn him?

  Or should she tell Aunt Fae.

  But Fae wasn’t in the parlor anymore. She wasn’t in the kitchen and she wasn’t in her room. She might have gone home without Steph seeing her. She was good at that.

  Steph went outside and walked to the knoll where great grandfather Wes was buried. She looked across to the other side of the cove. Saw the roof of Aunt Fae’s cottage poking out of the trees, followed the line of beach rosebushes that stretched along the shore. A head appeared momentarily behind the bushes and she knew someone was in the meadow, but it wasn’t Aunt Fae.

  She scrambled down the grassy slope of the knoll until she was on the beach. And suddenly felt seriously alone. To her right, the sound looked like a painting, still and blue. Almost the same color as the sky. To her left were inlets, bushes, and tiny hidden beaches. Across from her at the back curve of the cove, a pile of boulders formed the platform where Grammy dove in and met Great-Grandfather Wes.

  Everyone knew the story, even the part about swimming nude and making love. That was a little icky, thinking about parents and grandparents doing stuff, but the Elf King—did the Elf King have a wife? Was it Aunt Fae?

  Steph started over the beach and her sandals immediately filled with sand. She kicked them off and grabbed the straps in one hand. The sun was behind her and she knew she should be helping with dinner, but she needed to see who was in the meadow.

  She splashed through the water until she took a step and dropped down to her waist. Great. Grammy dove. Of course it was deep here.

  She threw her sandals as hard as she could and managed to get them to a lower rock, then she plunged in clothes and all and swam to the rocks.

  She heaved herself onto the lowest boulder—her wet overalls weighed a ton—grabbed her sandals, and climbed up the boulders as fast as her slippery feet would allow.

  At the top she stopped to look around. Across the way, she could still see the trees and beach roses, but no cottage. There would be a path from the rocks. She bet she could follow it to the meadow. She quickly put on her sandals and stepped into the trees.

  Today it looked familiar. She should have taken the path to Aunt Fae’s, but she’d been in such a hurry to see that she hadn’t been thinking about getting wet. Now her sandals were squeaking and bits of bark and dirt were sticking to her ankles and clothes.

  It was cool, almost chilly, beneath the trees, but up ahead she could see sunlight. The meadow. She slowed, stepped off the path, and edged toward the light.

  And there it was, completely hidden, green with little tiny flowers sticking their faces up like fairy creatures. Stop it! Not those kind of fairies. Those only existed in children’s stories and Disney movies. She was after the real deal.

  She crept closer. Scooted down to the edge of the grass and there he was
, the Elf King. He was dressed in flowing clothes, not the kind her grandmother Jillian wore. Hers made her look kind of exotic and kind of trashy; the Elf King looked strong and amazing. His long silver hair glistened in the sun and rode the wind as he turned. Not young and not old, but like one of those creatures who could live hundreds of years and barely age at all. That was her Elf King.

  He was moving in slow motion. Almost like dancing, but it wasn’t. Probably some kind of elfin karate. His arms came up and then opened wide and his hands made a series of shapes. He lifted his knee and put his foot down softly, then he lifted it and kicked, still in slow motion, then stepped again. And Steph bet even if she had been sitting right there, she wouldn’t have heard him move.

  The Elf King was preparing for battle. That must be it. Or why do all that karate stuff.

  He stopped, turned his head in her direction. She didn’t move, didn’t breathe. She was afraid to creep away, afraid to stay. She was paralyzed, not with fear, but . . . He must have her under a spell.

  He stepped toward her. “Hello there.”

  That did it; she broke and ran.

  Chapter 17

  Issy led Paolo through the second parlor, past the door to what had become Leo’s television room.

  The music room looked one hundred times better than it had a few hours ago. A little vacuuming, furniture polish, and tender care had done wonders. The sunshine lit the back windows, and only a few streaks where Stephanie had issues with the Windex remained.

  “Incredible,” Paolo said, looking around. “Very eclectic artwork.”

  “And so much of it,” Issy said, putting on her best gallery-visitor imitation.

  Paolo laughed. “Are they all originals?”

  “As far as I know.”

  “Even this?” He picked up a misshapen papier-mâché object that was supposed to be an apple.

  She took it from him, the dried faded tempera paint left residue on her fingers. “Even this,” she said, turning the apple in her hand. “I made this for Wes in art class in second—or was it third grade? Vivienne said it was stupid to give to Grandpa because apples were for teachers. But now that I think about it, it was totally appropriate. Living at the Muses was the best education I could have hoped for.”

  She put the apple down. “So show me these specs.”

  Paolo spread the sheets out on the table and anchored the corners with whatever was handy. A geode. A Chinese paper knife. A palm-sized book of poetry. The apple.

  “So this is what they have. Four rooms of Toulouse-Lautrec.”

  “Okay. That seems straightforward enough.”

  “Not excited yet?”

  “Sure, it’s a great collection.”

  “But it will be really great when they get this . . .” He pulled a smaller sheet from the bottom. A brochure from the Costume Institute at the Met.

  Issy smiled as she caught on. “They want us to present the paintings in 3-D using authentic period costume.”

  “How much fun is that?”

  “How many rooms do we get?”

  “Depends on how many full glass cases we can commandeer.”

  “Every spare one we have and can borrow or steal,” Issy said, already imagining the configurations of the room. “Or even better . . .”

  “Here we go,” Paolo said, and settled back to listen.

  “First, no exhibits alternating paintings and costume cases around the perimeter of the room. No ‘A Stroll Through Montmartre’ with an info plaque and a glass case with random clothing pieces. A: women’s stockings circa . . . B: children’s shoes . . . C: parasol.” Issy walked away, came back. “We’ll have to use mannequins. Possibly people in period costumes visiting a museum. Or . . . no, we’ll have mannequins depicting the people in the paintings.”

  Paolo threw his head back and laughed. His laugh always made her feel . . . happy. “I told Dell you didn’t need to be on-site to nail this one.”

  Issy rested her hip on the desk. “But I will have to get back.”

  Paolo immediately became serious. “Is there a problem with that?”

  Issy shrugged. “There’s no money. I can’t support the family for more than a month or so. I can’t stay, and yet how can I leave them?”

  He shrugged. Shoved his hands in his pockets. “You are sitting on a gold mine, so to speak.”

  “I know, but Fae says Leo would never sell anything. They’re so much a part of her existence. She seems to be living just to keep the Muses alive. Both her children want to sell it and move her and Fae into a home. It’s a huge mess. And for once, I don’t know what to do.”

  There; she’d said it. Give her an exhibit and she could make it work. No matter what kind of shape it was in. But an exhibit wasn’t a family. And her family needed more than she knew how to give.

  “You’ll think of something. You always do. Now, come on. I think it must be happy hour. And I just happen to have brought two bottles of excellent Pinot Noir which never made it out of the car.”

  They rolled up the specs for the new installation and returned them to the tube. “I’ll show you to your room, and then I’ll tell Leo that we’re going out to dinner. I don’t think she’ll mind, she seemed tired and I’m sure she would enjoy a quiet evening at home with the television. Unless you’d rather eat with this crew.”

  “I think you could use a night off. By all means.”

  “It won’t be haute cuisine.”

  “Not a problem.”

  They were coming back downstairs from dropping off Paolo’s suitcase when the front door opened and Mandy and Griff burst into the foyer followed by Chloe carrying backpacks and crafts and pictures drawn at the day camp.

  “Hooligans!” Chloe said, laughing. She looked up and her smile transformed.

  Paolo had stopped, one foot arrested in the air on its way to the next stair tread. “Ah, bellissima madre. Please tell me she’s divorced.”

  Issy laughed and they continued down the stairs to where Chloe stood, smiling and soft and welcoming.

  Paolo hurried forward. “Let me take those for you.” He swiftly relieved her of backpacks and artwork and handed them off to Mandy and Griff, who were staring at him.

  “You must be Paolo.” Chloe stretched out her hand. Paolo took it, turned it over, and kissed the back.

  This was accompanied by giggles from Mandy and Griff.

  “Go put your stuff away, you two.”

  “Where’s Grammy?”

  “I think I heard her in the television room,” Issy said.

  Mandy and Griff ran down the hall.

  “I want to show her.”

  “No, me first.”

  “No, I want to.”

  Chloe and Paolo didn’t seem to notice.

  “We’re in trouble now,” Issy said. “But we have a plan . . . for dinner at least.”

  “I got a pan of lasagna out of the freezer,” Chloe said, pulling her hand from Paolo’s. “There’s enough greens for salad, but we’ll need to make a serious grocery run soon.”

  “Already done. Ogden’s will be delivering any minute now. But tonight we’re going out, me, you, and Paolo—and Ben if he’s free.”

  “What about the family?”

  “They haven’t starved yet, and I really think Paolo has done his duty for today. Not to mention I’m afraid Jillian is going to start hitting on him soon.”

  “Perish the thought. I’ll call Ben.”

  “Great. Let me just tell Grammy and we’re good to go.”

  Issy found Leo and Mandy and Griff watching television. Griff was wedged in the easy chair with Leo, his head resting in the crook of her arm. As Issy watched, Grammy gave him a little squeeze; he nestled closer and Issy could almost physically feel the comfort.

  Climbing into that same chair with Grammy, on those days when the world was just too much, when she didn’t understand, when she just needed someplace soft to nest. For a second she felt envious of Griff.

  Mandy stood leaning over the padded c
hair arm holding up her picture and pointing to each person on the paper and telling their name and what they were like and whether she liked them or not. And Leo listened like it was the most interesting thing in her world.

  Issy stepped just inside the door. “Grammy, do you mind if I take Paolo into town tonight for dinner? Chloe made lasagna that I’ll put in the oven and I’ll set the table and—”

  Leo waved her away. “Of course, dear. You don’t have to wait on us. We do know how to take care of ourselves, don’t we, Griff?”

  Griff just squeezed her tighter.

  “I think we could all use a quiet evening at home. Maybe these two and I will even eat in front of the television. What do you say to that?”

  “On the little tables with flowers on them? Yes. Yes,” Mandy said, and jumped up and down several times.

  “Sounds like fun,” Issy said, wondering at the pleasure an old TV table brought to a child whose mother only cared about “the best.”

  Issy joined Paolo and Chloe in the kitchen. Paolo had tied an apron around his waist and was slathering garlic butter across thick slices of Italian bread. Chloe slid the lasagna pan into the oven. “Ben said to give him a half hour and let him know where.”

  Paolo finished the last slice with a flourish, wrapped the whole loaf in tinfoil, and put it on top of the stove. “I’ll just go get the wine.” He went out the side door like he knew the place, and Issy turned to Chloe.

  “Well?”

  “Well, what?” Chloe said, and started pouring out a bag of salad greens.

  “I felt the earth move and I was standing several feet away.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Chloe dumped the bag in the trash and leaned over the table. “Okay, I do know what you’re talking about. Wow. I had no idea. You said he was like El Greco. He painted the skinny guy with the scraggly beard, right?”

  “I just meant he’s tall and thin.”

  “How long is he staying?”

  “We didn’t discuss it. I’ll see what I can do.”

  “I meant for you. Are you and he . . . ?”

  Issy shook her head. “Friends and colleagues.”

  “Really?” She looked pensive. “Well, that’s good, I guess.”