by Gina Amos
CHAPTER SEVEN
Kevin Taggart lived in a brick bungalow between his two neighbours, Ashleigh Taylor who led a busy life and Rose Phillips who led no life at all. A redundancy package offered by his employer had seduced the former insurance assessor into accepting an early retirement which allowed him to devote what was to be the remainder of his life to his passion, landscape painting. He painted watercolors mostly, because he liked the soft hews of peaceful landscapes - mountains, seashores and small boats lying on their sides, cast adrift on remote beaches somewhere in his imagination. He thought of himself as a talented artist even though he had never had an exhibition. When he didn’t win a prize at the local community art show earlier in the year, he was disappointed; disappointed that he’d not at least received a highly commended award. However, he was convinced that it was only a matter of time, before someone, somewhere, would recognise his talent.
When Ashleigh Taylor moved into the neighbourhood, he was second in line behind the Blake sisters to introduce himself and welcome her to Eden Street. Kevin wasn’t sure what she did for a living, but he knew she worked long hours. When she left the house at odd hours of the night, he would listen to the moan of the garage door and the roar of the diesel engine of her Landcruiser as it turned over and reversed up the driveway. He waited for her to return. Sometimes it wasn’t until the early hours of the following morning when the sound of the roller door drifted across the side fence into his open bedroom window. Kevin didn’t mind the disruption, he didn’t sleep much anyway, he thought sleep was a waste of time, especially when he had so much on his mind and so much he had to achieve.
He had looked at her with an artist’s eye. Ashleigh was not beautiful in the true sense of the word, but she was well proportioned, had an open face, long limbs and a trim, toned body. She had the milky white complexion of someone who spent too much time indoors. Her thick, wavy hair framed her face and was the colour of chestnuts. He liked the way she tucked it behind her ears, and the way it bobbed against her shoulders when she walked. But what struck Kevin mostly about Ashleigh Taylor, were her steely blue eyes. When he first looked into them, he recognised that they were the eyes of someone who had seen too much or had seen things, most people would not want to admit to seeing. With her expensive and conservative clothes and her confident manner, Kevin was puzzled by the fact that she was living alone in a modest house next to his. He wondered if she was a sex worker.
