One was a wide angle landscape—mountains in the background and trees in the foreground with a lake in the middle. The other was a herd of running horses, each horse painted in a different style, from cave-painting to Baroque to impressionist to modern photorealistic. I’d never shown them to anyone, and now they were right in front of Aaron and Will.
Will, who was an artist.
An honest to God…
Serious…
Professional…
Artist.
His and Aaron’s backs were to me, so I seized the opportunity to cringe and mouth fuck my life before I turned to put the iced tea jug back in the fridge. I brought the glasses to the guys, but that wasn’t enough to pull Will’s focus from the landscape painting.
Then he moved to the horses, and I held my breath, silently wishing the chandelier would snap off its chain and squash me right there on the floor.
And oh God, now he was taking off his glasses the same way he did when he was looking at his phone or something. When he wanted to look closely at something. Fuck…
The trajectory of his gaze landed on my signature, and I sent up another prayer for that chandelier to come down, but it rudely stayed securely anchored to the ceiling.
Will turned to me and gestured at the painting with his glasses. “Did you paint these?”
For a heartbeat I debated punting and saying they were from one of my siblings or even my dad, but Will would see right through me, so I just nodded and tried not to die. “Yeah,” my voice came out as a pathetic squeak. “I did.”
He looked at the painting again. Then moved back to the first. His expression was unreadable, but goddammit, he was looking at my art and he knew it was my art and I was going to die.
I cleared my throat. “That one was just a Bob Ross tutorial. I should really be using oils if I’m going to use his tips, but… ugh. And anyway I’m still trying to get the hang of how to paint mountains, and I swear to God, clouds are going to be the death of me. And I still can’t figure out what the hell I did wrong on that tree, but it’s—”
“Kelly.”
The gentle sound of my name stopped me dead in my tracks. My teeth snapped shut, and I looked at Will.
He tilted his head. “Why are you apologizing for your art?”
“I…” Wow. I had no idea how to answer that. Why was I apologizing for it? And why did he seem to think I shouldn’t?
He stepped closer to me and wrapped an arm around my waist. With his other hand, he gestured at the first painting. “I’ve got students who could learn a thing or two from this about reflections on water.”
I lowered my gaze. “They’d be better off learning it from Bob Ross than from me.”
“There’s no shame in learning from Bob Ross.” He pulled me a little closer and kissed my cheek. “Especially since you’re obviously learning.”
I looked up at him, sure I was going to find some sarcasm or something patronizing in his expression. But I didn’t. His eyes were perfectly sincere…and focused on my painting.
Without turning to me, he asked, “Where did you learn to paint?”
“I told you.” I laughed nervously. “Bob Ross tutorials.”
Will’s eyebrow arched, and he gestured at the horses. “I don’t think he ever did one like that.”
Cheeks burning, I avoided looking at him or my art. “I watched a lot of tutorials. Not just his. And then it was just trial and error, I guess.”
“You haven’t taken classes?”
I shook my head.
“Did you ever submit your paintings for online critiques?”
Oh Lord, just thinking about it made me gag. “No. Never.” I glanced at the paintings, then at Aaron, whose expression was unreadable. “I, um… I don’t think anyone’s seen my work since… Probably since before I started medical school.”
“No one?”
The scrutiny was almost unbearable, and I laughed nervously. “No one. And yes, I know, it’s obvious.”
“Uh, no. It isn’t.”
I finally met his gaze, and his expression was as full of sincerity as it was surprise. “Huh?”
He gestured at the paintings. “You’re painting like this just from online tutorials. No critiques. No feedback.”
I nodded. “I mean, aside from my dad telling me it was time, money, and energy that I clearly needed to put into other things.”