‘I’m so happy you enjoyed S-O-S Club,’ Lizzie said, in between enormous bites of burrito. ‘Most people I know would run a mile if I asked them to take part. The kids are wonderful, but the prospect of all of them bearing down on you at once must be terrifying if you haven’t experienced that before.’
I shook my head. ‘It wasn’t terrifying at all. In fact, I loved it. I didn’t think I would, to be honest, but it gave me such a rush to share those biscuits with them. It made me remember all the baking we did as kids, and how magical it was to see something we’d mixed together coming out of the oven as finished items.’
My cousin grinned at me. ‘You’re a natural, Nell. And the kids adored you. Especially Eva.’
‘She’s one smart kid.’ The thought of the little girl with an attitude far beyond her eight years made me mirror my cousin’s grin. ‘And how gorgeous is her mum?’
‘I know. Shanti Michaelson is one of those women who could look elegant no matter where she was or what she was wearing. You can see where Eva inherited her beautiful features. So, I bet when you decided to come to San Francisco you never thought you’d end up as an after-school club volunteer?’
I didn’t. But then I was quickly learning that San Francisco had many surprises waiting for me. Already, my mind was abuzz with possible recipes to share with the children and I realised that, for the first time in a long time, I felt fulfilled. It was a good feeling.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Rare finds in Haight-Ashbury
‘Morning, Nell.’
‘Morning.’
Rosita, the constantly smiling owner of the New Age store beneath Lizzie’s apartment, smiled as I entered her shop. The smell of woody incense and spicy candles curled around my nostrils, infusing everything around me with the aroma. After helping me with Lizzie’s surprise, Rosita had invited me to pop down for a cup of herb tea whenever I felt like it and we had struck up a friendship.
I handed her a plate of freshly baked cinnamon and nutmeg sugar cookies I had baked that morning. ‘There you go. I tried a new recipe today.’
‘Oh, chiquita, you are wonderful!’ She picked up one of the still-warm cookies and took a bite. ‘Girl, these are something else!’
I felt a thrill at the sight of my new friend enjoying my edible gift. ‘You think they work?’
‘They’re so good. You’re one talented lady. You know, I have just the tea to accompany these.’ She opened a glass-lidded tea chest and produced two bagged teabags. ‘Lemongrass green tea – they’re new in this week.’
As she made the tea I looked around the shop at the clothes, bags, scarves and stacks of incense and candles as colourful as the rainbow mural on the wall outside. ‘So, how’s business?’
Rosita shrugged. ‘Quiet for now but the tourists don’t arrive until lunchtime. Yesterday I sold my entire stock of tie-dyed tees to a Japanese tour party. So, you can celebrate with me.’ She handed me a mug emblazoned with a peace sign – a motif I had seen in almost every shop window along Haight Street.
The lemongrass green tea was fragrant and matched the spiciness of the cookies perfectly. ‘I might buy some of these teabags,’ I said, inhaling the grassy aroma. ‘It’ll give my system a break from all the great coffee I keep drinking.’
‘You can have a box,’ Rosita smiled, ‘if you promise to test all your recipes on me.’
I clinked my mug against hers. ‘Deal. I’m going to do these cookies with the kids this week but I think I might add lemon water icing and maybe pull back on the nutmeg.’ I loved the rush that creating recipes gave me.
‘Sounds good. So what are your plans today, Miss Sullivan?’
I grinned at the prospect of my intended activity. ‘I’m going shopping!’
Not far from Lizzie’s apartment were several stores that had quickly become firm favourites of mine. One was Well Beloved, a vintage clothes shop, tucked between a Tibetan goods store and a shop that sold hand-carved pipes, tobacco and – erm – other products to smoke. I had first wandered into the clothes store in the middle of my first week here when Lizzie had popped to the food mart to buy supplies, and been blown away by the sheer number of vintage garments filling the small space of the shop. Like all of the stores in this neighbourhood, what the shop lacked in square footage, it more than made up for in height; consequently the racks of clothes soared right up into the ceiling and the owners had constructed an ingenious system of pulleys and long-handled hooks to bring down any garments you wanted to look at.
I wasn’t likely to pass up a shopping opportunity, especially as I had already worked my way through the clothes I had brought with me. This, I told myself (as if I needed an excuse), was another part of becoming the new me. I felt like I wanted to look as different on the outside as I was feeling on the inside – so to buy something from my temporarily adopted new neighbourhood was the perfect way to do it.
I spent a while looking through the racks, sorting through sixties tie-dyed t-shirts, fringed tops and Indian-inspired shirts, until I came to a collection of sleeveless mini dresses in delicate, floral fabrics. In the middle of them I found a beautiful cream dress covered in a mass of tiny yellow primrose-like flowers, with pale gold ric-rac braiding around the collar and hem. It was fraying a little in places and in need of a bit of repair but it was perfect. Sunny, kitsch, a little bit eccentric – in fact everything that The Haight was proving to be. I loved it immediately.
‘I was wondering who would buy this,’ the lady behind the counter said, studying me. ‘Have you picked it for you?’
‘I couldn’t resist it,’ I nodded as I handed her a twenty-dollar bill. ‘I really like the print.’
‘Late sixties,’ she said, a hint of wistfulness in her eyes. ‘Around ’68, ’69 I’d guess. The Summer of Love and all was beautiful … It’s seen better days but with care it could last a lifetime.’
‘I was thinking I might customise it,’ I said, stroking the faded floral fabric as it lay on the glass counter. ‘Bring it back to life again.’
The woman’s smile reminded me of Mum and for a brief moment I found myself missing her. Since my arrival I had spoken to her and Dad a number of times and they both seemed thrilled that I was doing something so exciting. Knowing that Mum had been a little concerned about me being in America, I had edited what I’d told her a little – but I would certainly have a lot to tell her when I got home …
‘I have the perfect thing!’ She ducked behind the counter and garments, shoes and boxes started flying in all directions. ‘Now where did I …? I was certain I’d put it … Aha!’ She reappeared, a little flushed for her journey and handed me a wooden box with a beaded panel inserted in its lid. ‘This arrived months ago with a box of garments. I’d like you to have it.’
Surprised by her gesture, I opened the box to find it stuffed with scraps of fabric, buttons, glass beads and embroidery silks. ‘Wow, this is fantastic! But are you sure? I’d be happy to pay for it.’
‘Of course I’m sure. I’ve kept this box waiting for the right customer,’ she replied. ‘I think you should find something in there to bring beauty back to the dress.’
‘I’m sure I will. Thank you.’
She folded the dress, put it with the box into a brown bag with string handles and handed it to me. ‘You’re welcome. You have a nice day, now.’
‘I will. Thanks.’
A blond-dreadlocked man in an Indian shirt, wide denim jeans and sandals held the door open for me as I left the shop and I caught a waft of patchouli scent as I thanked him. Pleased with my purchase, I rounded the corner and began to walk up Masonic Avenue, past bars, shops and cafés.
A sudden burst of sunlight from behind the grey clouds made me look down – and I screeched to a halt.
The pavement beneath my feet appeared to fall away into a deep chasm. Shocked, I half-fell back from the jagged edges of the paving slabs exposing vertical walls of earth tumbling down from my feet. How had a chasm so deep opened up outside the shop? And was the
silver streak miles below the shattered pavement a river?
And then, I heard laughter. Breathing heavily, I turned to see a group of middle-aged tourists by my side.
‘Clever, huh?’ A short, squat man with a very red face and twinkling eyes pointed at the gaping hole in the sidewalk. ‘Plain got me first time I saw it.’
‘We’re from Ohio,’ an equally squat woman chimed in. ‘They don’t have this kinda thing there.’
‘Thought I was done for, I did. Almost stopped my heart.’
As my own heart was currently threatening to beat out through my ears, I sympathised with him. ‘I thought I was going to fall.’
‘It’s a chalk painting,’ the woman said. ‘Took me a while to figure that out. Whoever painted it knows what they’re doing …’
As she was talking another pedestrian gasped and scrabbled backwards, eliciting more good-hearted guffaws from the group.
‘It’s OK, it’s a painting on the sidewalk.’
‘Near stopped my heart it did.’
‘We’re from Ohio. You don’t get anything like it in Ohio …’
Now that I knew I wasn’t going to plummet to my death, the apparent gap in the pavement fascinated me. When I looked closer I could see the lighted windows of a tiny village clinging to one side of the exposed cliff edge and an eagle’s eyrie with three chicks perched on a rock platform on the other. From a couple of angles it was obviously a painting, but with the sun on the right side it was scarily real. So much so that when I crossed the street and bought an iced coffee at a small café to watch, nearly twenty more people were fooled by the illusion.
Why would anyone go to so much trouble, I wondered? And who had created such a painstakingly detailed work of art – especially one that would be destroyed as soon as it rained?
‘Can I get you another coffee?’ the waiter asked, clearing the table next to me.
‘I’d love one, thanks.’ A scream brought both of our heads round to face the painted chasm once more. A young woman was being comforted by her considerably taller boyfriend, who looked as if his spine might snap from the effort of bending down to put his arm around her. ‘Oh, poor girl. It looks so real when you’re about to step on it.’
The waiter laughed. ‘The guy is a genius. Gets folks every time.’
‘Do you know him?’
‘Personally? No. Nobody does. But we see his work here all the time.’
I loved the thought of someone doing this unseen. ‘I wonder why he does it?’
‘Guy’s an artist. Does this kinda thing all over town. I see him working sometimes when I arrive about six thirty a.m. He’s always disguised, of course. It’s a Haight thing. People wait for his next one.’
‘And they’re all over The Haight?’ I asked. I wanted to discover more of the secret artist’s work.
‘They’re everywhere in the city. If you look for them.’ He collected my empty coffee glass and gave the table a quick wipe with the cloth he carried. ‘Like I said, the guy’s an institution here.’
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: A Haight mystery
OK, here’s something strange.
Last week was my first week walking around SF on my own as Lizzie went back to her teaching and schools’ advisory stuff, so I’ve been trying to get to a different bit of the city every day. And I’ve discovered these really brilliant pavement paintings. They’re painted to give an optical illusion, so you think you’re stepping on a river, or that Spiderman is climbing up the side of a building where the kerb is the roof. Apparently the guy who paints them works all over the city but nobody knows who he is. Rosita who works in the shop below Lizzie’s apartment is a big fan. She follows him on Twitter and she’s been tipping me off about new locations for his work. She thinks he’s an older guy because there’s been a history of secret art appearing around The Haight for years.
How cool is that?
Nell xxx
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: A Haight mystery
I can’t imagine anyone going to that much bother around here.
I’m stuck applying for jobs I don’t think even exist and the highlight of my day is watching Rastamouse with Ruby. I’d marry that mouse if I could. Oh and Greg isn’t speaking to me now because I placed him third on my list of dream men after Ryan G (number one, of course) and Olly Murs. I like them cheeky, what can I say? But he went off to work in a huff this morning and hasn’t replied to my texts. I give up. Why do men ask these questions if they don’t want to know the answer?
You should find out who this dude is. For one reason only: HE MIGHT BE FIT. Maybe that’s just my desperate vicarious ambition for you but I’ve said it now. Hunt him down, Sullivan! And send pics!
(And if he’s minging, at least you only have six weeks left in the same city as him. I’ve seen the films – there are lots of places to hide from psychos in San Francisco.)
Do it!
Vix xxxx
As I followed the new painting locations each day I began to discover new places in the city. A painting on the edge of the sidewalk onto the road that transformed the kerbstones into a skyscraper’s roof garden with delicate tendrils of ivy cascading down to the street far below led me to a beautiful church in Mission. Another that looked like the top of a Coke can with a glimpse of a Caribbean beach through the hole was outside a gorgeous shop selling jewellery handcrafted by an artist collective in North Beach. And a series of paintings shaped like dinosaur footprints filled with sparkling rock-pools pointed the way to a view of the Golden Gate Bridge from Marina Green, which took my breath away. It became a delightful game: almost as if the artist was leading me to the places he loved the most in his city.
As I followed this colourful trail, I started to hope I might catch a glimpse of the artist at work. It was a delicious mystery and I started taking photographs of each of the pavement paintings when I found them, emailing the evidence back to Vicky, who received each one in her own inimitable fashion:
‘He’s talented with his hands, Nell. That’s all you need to know …’
‘You’ve seen what he can do with chalks. Imagine if YOU were the pavement …’
‘Damn it, Nell. Find him and MARRY HIM. Even if he’s in his nineties and looks like Mr Miyagi …’
It made me laugh every time she replied but it also felt good to be entertaining her while she was facing a very scary time. Her search for a new job was a premonition of what was waiting for me when I returned and I was intensely thankful to be delaying it for a while. It was as if I had a simultaneous view of two parallel lives: what my life in London could have been had I stayed and what it was becoming after making the decision to come here. I did feel a tiny whisper of guilt that I’d left when my best friend was hurting, but perhaps my being here would prove more helpful than if we were together in London. Neither of us needed to indulge in a pity party and I was sure that would have been the inevitable outcome.
When a chalk painting appeared around the corner from Lizzie’s apartment, I took my cousin to see it. She was amazed by the image of a polar bear breaking out of a paving slab ice floe and we spent nearly an hour inspecting the work of art.
‘I can’t believe I’ve lived here all this time and never seen these,’ she said. ‘I thought I’d be the one showing you round San Francisco, not the other way around.’ She squeezed my arm. ‘I’m really happy that you love it here, you know. I was hoping you would. It’s just so wonderful to be able to share it with you.’
Following the work of the unknown artist around the city for nearly two weeks had done more than endear its delights to me. It had made me think about the things I most longed to do with my life that I hadn’t shared with anyone. Maybe it was the safety that being thousands of miles away from home afforded me, but somehow I found it easier to think here. When I’d been at the Council I’d packed my dream into storage u
ntil ‘the right time’. But now I suspected that, had I remained in my comfortable job and focused instead on whether Aidan and I would bite the bullet and get together permanently, the ‘right time’ might never have happened. Being here, surrounded by positivity, creativity and optimism, I could finally allow myself to dream.
They call America the Land of Dreams – and what it might have lacked in ability for its people to realise those dreams it more than made up for in enthusiasm for trying. Everybody here had something else they were aiming for, something deep within them driving them on. Like Marty and Frankie, the cab drivers at Annie’s: Marty planned to retire at fifty; Frankie was saving for a boat to run his own fishing trips out into the Bay. When the time came, I truly believed both of them could see their ambitions come to fruition, simply because of the way they spoke about it:
‘Sure, boats cost money,’ Frankie told me. ‘And I don’t have a lot of that. But every week I’m saving dollars and every year that passes I’m getting closer to what I need. I know the boatyard I’ll buy her from, the specification I want, even the colour of her hull. I can see it in my mind, like I just took a picture. I might be ninety when I get there, but I’ll get there.’
‘Yeah,’ Marty smirked, ‘and then – watch out fish!’
The pavement artist was working out his dream – whatever that was. Could he be aiming for international stardom? Recognition from the art world? Or maybe just the ability to do what he loved, day in, day out, for the rest of his life? Perhaps the chalk paintings were his dream. Maybe he had been stuck in lifeless jobs for years dreaming of filling his city with colour and spectacle. And then, one day, he had resigned, bought chalks and embarked on living his dream …
And so, I considered my secret ambition that only I knew about; the hidden vision that had brightened many a dull Council Planning Committee meeting when I needed to escape and reconnect with the person I felt I really was. In the warm Californian sunshine, it suddenly didn’t seem so unrealistic or out of my reach any more. Was the possibility of running my business even viable? And if so, where would I even start?
Take A Look At Me Now Page 12
