Spiridon and Nikolos were both laughing as they remembered.
“Oh no!” I laughed. “What happened to the painting?”
“The painting was ruined, but I couldn’t tell Nikos that. He was so proud for saving it.” Spiridon looked at his son and smiled lovingly.
Nikolos nodded, basking in the warmth of his father’s love decades after the fact.
Spiridon and Nikolos traded painting stories back and forth like that for an hour. Some of them included the misadventures of young Christos as well. Every single tale was filled with excitement, fun, and love. My childhood had been nothing like it.
“And that’s what you did for a living for all those years?” I said to Spiridon with an amazed smile. It sounded like a continuous vacation to me.
“Yes,” Spiridon said. “For a long time.”
“Why’d you ever stop painting?” I asked.
Spiridon sighed mysteriously. “That’s a long story,”
I glanced at Nikolos, who raised his eyebrows before looking away. Okay, they weren’t going to tell me.
“Maybe you should be a landscape painter, Samantha,” Nikolos said, drawing attention away from Spiridon.
“You think?” I said.
Nikolos shrugged his shoulders, “Why not? It’s a job like any other.”
It never ceased to amaze me how the Manos men took it for granted that I was going to be a successful artist someday. Now Nikolos was doing it too. Christos had the most awesome family I’d ever met. I was so glad to be a part of it.
I shook my head and sipped more lemonade, which was delicious, as always, and basked in the warm spring air. It was hard to believe working for Nikolos was an actual job. It was like hanging out with my friends.
Lucky me!
I sat at my drawing table in the studio at Spiridon’s house, working on drawing drapery. Drapery meant the way cloth folded, usually on clothing when people wore it, sometimes just hanging like wrinkled blankets or hanging tablecloths and curtains. It was part of our homework for Drawing The Costumed Figure.
It was almost like doing fashion illustrations.
I’d already drawn a bunch of pictures of princesses in fluffy dresses and hot guys in slick suits striking GQ poses. I had a bunch of internet browser windows open on my laptop showing photos of various gowns and runway models, male and female. I was really liking this whole Art major choice of mine. My parents were really out to lunch about art.
Whatever.
Christos was out, hanging with Jake. Spiridon was out too, I wasn’t sure where. He tended to come and go without explanation. I could only assume he had an entire adult life he was living, but I never saw it. Maybe he was secretly a handsome Greek mafia kingpin?
I chuckled to myself.
My laptop was open next to me, playing iTunes. Wonderwall by Oasis wafted from the speakers on warm, loving waves while I drew in my sketchbook.
I was busy putting the finishing touches on a hot guy in a tuxedo who looked alarmingly like Christos. I hadn’t even realized I was drawing him. I sat back from my sketchbook and realized the tux guy stood next to a girl in a wedding dress.
How had that happened?
I swear, I hadn’t done it on purpose.
Maybe next I would draw babies in bodysuits.
I blushed to myself. What was I thinking?
I shook my head and stood up to stretch my legs and take a break. I started Wonderwall over from the beginning and danced alone, swaying to the groove, thinking about Christos, hugging my arms around myself.
I was so in love with Christos.
He had saved me from the horrid future my parents had planned for me. My life had opened up to possibilities I’d never dreamed would ever come true when I was a girl. Now I had hope like I’d never known hope before.
I was truly blessed.
My cell phone rang abruptly, cutting like a strident scream through the comforting music emanating from my laptop.
I jumped.
My phone was also on vibrate, and it danced maniacally in the tray of pencils attached to my drawing table where I’d left it, making the pencils rattle and clack together horribly.
Dread.
I grabbed for my phone, but it danced from my fingers.
Christos.
Something was wrong. On the third ring I got a hold of it. Oh no, Christos. My gut was churning.
Not again.
Falling, falling, falling.
I looked at the screen on my phone. It read:
“Mom & Dad”
What the hell? My heart was jumping in my chest. Images of Christos in a drunken car crash flashed through my head. So why were my parents calling me? They wouldn’t be the first to know if he got hurt. Would they? No, that didn’t make any sense.
So why were they calling?
I frowned. I could hazard a guess.
Did I even want to answer their call? They were probably going to bitch me out again. I sighed dramatically and answered my phone on the fourth ring, sounding irritated. “Hello?”
“Sam?”
“Dad?”
My dad cleared his throat.
I winced.
“Sam, I’m calling to inform you that your mother has moved out.”
“What?” I was totally confused.
“She’s taken an apartment in Friendship Heights. And she has taken a lover.”
“What? Dad! What are you talking about? You aren’t making any sense.” My stomach, which had imploded, said otherwise. Every organ in my body had been sucked into the black hole forming in my abdomen.
“Your mother is seeing someone,” he said flatly. “Another man.”
“What do you mean seeing? Like for a meeting or class or something? I know she’s always talking about taking tennis lessons at the country club.”
“Sam, your mother is having an affair. With another man.”
Silence punched me in the stomach. That black hole wasn’t the only thing hammering away at me. Every atom in the universe was rushing at me in a super nova of impending disaster.
Some detached corner of my brain shouted inside my head, “Who cares! Mom is lame! You’re lame!” But that voice was thin and tinny, drowned out by the cosmic thunderstorm that was unwinding inside me.
After more silence, I finally spoke in a mumble, “Mom is having an affair?” Tears dripped down my cheeks against my approval.
“Yes.”
“With another man?”
“Yes. Someone she knew in college. He rides a motorcycle,” Dad said with no hint of irony.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” I stammered.