That last thought came to her as she finally succumbed to sleep. And it was the one thought that lingered the whole next day. Every time the phone rang, she thought it, wondering if it was Derreck calling. Every time the door opened to the gallery, she stood, thinking and wishing it was Derreck.
When the mailman saw her, he waved his usual handful of junk mail. Macy collapsed into her chair and fought the urge to sigh. Sighing would have allowed that horrible feeling of crying to creep its way back in.
“Not excited to see me?”
“Sorry, Hank, didn’t mean to just sit like that.”
Macy took the mail and smiled at the aged mailman. His grey hair stuck out of his hat, but somehow matched his puffy cheeks and large, red nose. He had a humble face but his eyes told a story of a lonely man.
“How’s your morning?” Hank asked as he double checked his mailbag for any leftover mail.
“I’m alive and I made it to work.”
“The first part I like,” Hank said. “The second...” He waved his hand. “... that’s a crapshoot, right?”
Macy nodded.
“But we all have to work.”
“Yeah, to hide behind our real lives and what we want to do,” Macy said.
“What? You don’t think I dreamed of becoming a mailman as a kid?”
“Did you?”
Hank laughed. “No. I wanted to build tree houses.”
“Why didn’t you? Why don’t you?”
Hank leaned over Macy’s desk. “Turns out, I’m afraid of heights. So much for that career.”
He tapped his hand on the desk and wished Mary a great afternoon.
The conversation shouldn’t have had any value to Macy but it did. It really did. Imagine having a dream and not being able to follow it... because of fear?
Macy scoffed; she was living that nightmare.
All she had to do was look in the closet at her apartment to understand that kind of fear. She thought about Hank for the rest of the day, which was as a nice break from obsessing about Derreck Hagan. Thinking about him made Macy wonder what he was doing right now. Signing new business deals? Or was he out finding a new woman to take Macy's spot? She thought about the diamond encrusted heels and Derreck gently placing them on another woman's feet. It bothered Macy, almost enraging her, but there wasn't a thing she could do about it.
When Stacey came out of her office, holding a stack of invoices and payables (something Stacey insisted on looking at but had no idea what to do with) she tossed them to the edge of Macy's desk and then just stared at her.
"Something happened," Stacey said.
"I met
him
last night, at eight."
Stacey smiled. Macy didn't.
"Oh no," Stacey said. "That's not the face of sex, is it?"
Macy didn't respond. She did have sex with Derreck - which was explosive and hot and still lingered in her desperate body - but it was how it all ended that bothered her.
"Were you afraid when you sent your art to that magazine?" Macy asked.
"Afraid? No. Why would I be? Either they like it or they don't. Doesn't mean I would have stopped painting."
"You don't fear judgment?"
"From who? Strangers?" Stacey smiled. "I fear myself though. I'm the hardest critic."
"Yeah, I know that feeling."
"But there's a difference, Macy, between judging yourself and judging your flaws."
Macy swallowed hard, finding emotions again.
"You know I'm right," Stacey said. "Your flaws are you, imperfections that make you perfect. Love them."
Stacey patted the desk and walked away.
Just before she got to her office, she looked over her shoulder and smiled at Macy.
Macy smiled back but she didn't feel much better.
In fact, she hated when Stacey smiled like that. It meant she was up to no good.
Seeing that smile kept Macy on her toes for the rest of the day. With Stacey in hiding, working hard on yet another project, the gallery and office was quiet and calm and the seconds moved like mud. She couldn’t find enough work to do. The phones were quiet, no customers came in, and Stacey didn’t show her face again. When she lost herself in a project - or ten - she would stay hidden in her office and own personal gallery. It was a huge room, almost like a warehouse, with tall ceilings, paints, papers, and anything an artist could dream of. She would order food to be delivered to the back door and even set up a futon bed in the corner to sleep if the urge came to actually sleep. The soft glow from the back office made Macy’s stomach churn, wishing she was the one hiding behind a closed door, working.
The difference though was that while Stacey may have hidden herself to work, she would then open the doors and let the art be exposed itself. When Macy finished her paintings, she would simply turn the closet light off in her apartment and shut the door.
Everything stayed hidden.
When the end of the day came, Macy closed up the gallery and left, hurrying on home. She locked her apartment door and dropped her bag to her right. She then kicked her shoes off, almost falling on her face, her eyes intent on the closet door. The need to paint hit her hard. She had nothing to do, nobody to talk to, and more than anything else, she needed to get Derreck off her mind.
Macy stood at the closet, holding the door handle. The closet open and she stared into a walk-in room that served as her hidden secret. She thought about Derreck Hagan. His billionaire status. His command and power. The way he spoke at his investors meeting with ease. How he took Macy just to keep people talking, wondering, concentrating on him.
Oh, the sex.
Macy’s hand started to tremor as she thought about holding the back of the leather couch, bent over, her sex throbbing, accepting Derreck’s body.
Maybe she should change, even in small doses. Little steps.
Macy looked around her apartment and smiled.
Fine, she thought, Derreck wants me to stop hiding...
Even though she knew she would never see Derreck again, something inside her told her to listen to him. If a man like that could look beyond her curves and bigger figure, wanting to really see her, then Macy wanted to try to be that person.
For the first time since moving into the apartment, Macy took her painting supplies out of the closet and into the living room. She had a small table, an easel, a horribly uncomfortable stool that was that only stool that Macy liked to use, plus an array of paints, brushes, pencils, sketch pads, and notebooks to write about her ideas. She had known a few people who could close their eyes and sketch an idea, but for Macy that didn’t work. Through a creative writing class in college she found that by writing what she thought about and saw in her head made it easier to paint.
Starting felt strange, so far out of Macy’s comfort zone that she considered stopping. She pictured herself taking everything back into the closet and having a long hot shower. There she could cry without realizing she was crying, without seeing the tears even though she’d feel the pain. But when Macy started to paint, even just drawing a few random lines up and down a fresh piece of paper, she suddenly felt alive and liberated. Soon the paper became a mess of shapes and the best part of it all was that it all meant nothing. It equaled nothing, it had no purpose, no meaning, and Macy had absolutely no pressure as she threw colors and lines to the paper, over and over. Some of the colors and lines blended together creating pretty looking designs. Others mixed and became an ugly color.
Either way, it didn’t matter.
The only thing that mattered was that Macy finally came out of hiding.
She tore the paper from the pad and walked it to the dining room table. She sat back down and stared at the blank piece of paper. An idea came to her and she reached for her pencils.
There, she sketched something that looked like Derreck Hagan. His chiseled features against the backdrop of heavy black lines. She drew him as though he were hiding in the shadows of something.
Of light.
Of himself.
Of a way Macy almost wanted him to be.
She found herself lost within time, not caring about anything. A first in a very long time. And even when her cell phone started to ring, she ignored it.
She ignored it when it rang again, and ignored it for the rest of the night. By the time she took a break from painting and drawing, four hours had gone by. And when she told herself that was enough for one night, she continued some more, watching midnight come and go. There was something liberating about painting through midnight, letting a new day arrived while doing something she truly loved.
Packing everything up and putting it back into the closet just before one, Macy felt really good. When she closed the closet door, a small sting of pain ran through her, reminding her that she was still hiding.
Little steps though, that’s all that counted.
And just before falling asleep, she thought about the art competition that Stacey had won. A smile grazed her face, knowing that if she had sent in her artwork, she would have won.
She also thought about Derreck, wishing he had been there to see her paint. To see her not hiding. To... just be there, with her.
From the first
yawn, Stacey wanted to know what had kept Macy up so late. Macy felt a small fire inside her stomach, wanting to burst out and tell Stacey the truth, maybe even take some pictures of the stuff she had worked on, for Stacey to critique... and get jealous over.
But that didn’t happen.
Macy left it at a simple reason.
“Just a long night.”
She repeated it five times over before slipping in something about Derreck. Something she didn’t mean to do and regretted because when she said it, Stacey got that big smile on her face.
The trouble smile.
The day moved on and Stacey eventually let up on Macy. There was something obviously different in Macy’s eyes and face. Each night she went to bed earlier, but not by much. It was like she had been satisfying her longing urges, but while they became satisfied that didn’t mean they would go away. And each night before bed, she thought more about Derreck Hagan than anything else.
Friday came, finally, leaving Macy with the possibility of having a weekend that she had been thinking about for a long time. She wanted to lock herself in her apartment and paint. Nothing but paint. Order food when she got hungry, sleep when she needed a nap, and nothing else.
Nothing.
At four in the afternoon, Stacey emerged from her office, looking a little tired but happy. Too happy.
“Macy, did you process the orders for McGinnely?”
“The lawyer’s house?”
Stacey nodded.
“Yes. I called his office to confirm delivery to his house and his secretary had payment in hand for us.”
“Really? He paid for everything?”
“Everything.”
“That’s a lot of money,” Stacey whispered.
“Yeah, it is.”
Stacey took a breath, staring towards the front of the gallery, her eyes dazed. Macy knew that look, that wild eyed romantic look, trying to come to terms with a dream coming to life.
“Why don’t you cut out early?” Stacey asked. “I’ll punch you out at five, but leave now. Get a head start on the weekend.”
“No,” Macy said. “I won’t do that. I have a few more little things here to take care of.”
“No you don’t,” Stacey said. She now looked at Macy. “Turn off the computer and enjoy your weekend. This was a big deal for us, really. If things keep growing this way, we’ll be talking expansion soon. I’ll need you more, Macy. More business decisions, more financial decisions, maybe even a few art suggestions. Do you still paint?”
The question came like a blast, hitting Macy right in the chest.
She leaned back in her chair, ready to find a way to lie, but her red face stood no chance.
Do I paint? Macy thought.
If she looked hard enough she could probably find residue on the very tips of her fingers or under her nails.
“I... dabble,” Macy managed to say.
“Really? That’s great. You were pretty good, from what I could remember.”
“Yeah, it’s just fun, something to do.”
“I remember when I felt like that too,” Stacey said.
She sighed again, her happy face looking somewhat defeated.
“Maybe you should take a break,” Macy said. “Before all the expansion talks really start. Why not take a week or month off? Relax and enjoy...”
“Business calls,” Stacey said. “And none of that should matter to you. You go home and enjoy your weekend. Paint me something, for Monday.”
Macy laughed and stood up. If Stacey wanted her to leave, she would. No arguing with the boss. Especially about starting the weekend early. Macy didn’t bring up the
paint me something
comment and when she got home and opened her apartment door, she froze for a second, realizing what she had done.