in the room he used as a studio, going through his recent work. He wanted to be sure he had enough for a solid show. The moment anything came up to do with his art, he forgot everything else.
Sarah went to the back of the house to find him, and saw him frowning at several paintings he had leaned up against the wall. He needed twelve pieces of recent work for the show. He didn’t even hear Sarah walk into the room and looked up in surprise when she did.
“I just don’t know,” he muttered. Sarah’s hair was wild and frizzy and all over the place, she was wearing cut-off jeans as shorts, flip-flops, and a tank top, and wishing she had lost the five extra pounds she’d been complaining about, before the trip. Now it was too late, but she knew that John loved her just the way she was. They had been madly in love with each other since college, and married for eighteen years. “What do you think?” John turned to her with a worried expression. “I’m not sure this new thing I’ve been doing is fully developed yet. I wish they’d given me more time before the show. I’m not ready.”
“You always say that,” she reassured him as she came to stand behind him and put her arms around his waist. “You have a fantastic talent, and you always sell all the work in every show. It may not look ‘fully developed’ to you yet, but it will to everyone else. And I like this new turn your work has taken. It’s strong.” His palette had gotten bolder. He was a very good artist, and it had been his passion all his life. Design was what he did as a job. Painting was his love. And Sarah of course. She was the love of his life. Alex was the product of that, but Sarah was its source. They adored their boy, but John and Sarah had often admitted to each other that they felt like two people with one soul. They felt blessed to have found each other.
“And you always say you love all the work.” He looked over his shoulder and smiled at her. “How’d I get lucky enough to find you?”
“Blind luck, I guess. I don’t mean to be disrespectful of the concerns of a great artist, but if we don’t pack, we’re going to be walking around naked on this fancy boat your mother chartered.” Her angst over what to take every year, and what was expected of her, kept her from packing until the last second. That and the fact that she worked hard at Princeton, was constantly available to her students, and hated thinking about clothes, particularly in the rarefied world his mother lived in. It was on another planet from their comfortable, easy life. She loved the way they lived, even if their house in Princeton was beaten up and old. It suited them. Most of all, it suited her.
Because he had grown up in it, John was able to travel in his mother’s lofty circles, and was just as happy in their bohemian academic life. Sarah had never set foot in that other world until she’d married John. Her parents were academics, and so were all their friends. She couldn’t remember seeing her father in a tie, and her mother wore Birkenstocks when they went out. So did Sarah usually, but she knew the kind of effort she’d have to make for Olivia. It used to traumatize her, and she’d been terrified she’d make some terrible social faux pas, or use the wrong fork at his mother’s elegant dinner table. Now she knew John didn’t care and loved her no matter what.
Olivia had been brought up with the niceties of life even when they’d been poor. Her mother had inherited beautiful silver and china from her family, even though they’d lost their money. Sarah knew nothing about that world. And John was intelligent, gentle, and charming wherever he went. Sarah had fallen in love with him instantly when they met in college. She had no idea who he was, or the enormity of the wealth he came from. He was a simple, unpretentious, down-to-earth person and kind to everyone, rich or poor. Unlike his brother, Phillip, who Sarah thought was a snob. Their mother wasn’t, but she was so powerful and successful that the world was at her feet. It had been heady stuff to absorb, and Sarah had