The Painter & the Pretty Girl

c h a p t e r e i g h t : george

Steadfast love and faithfulness meet; righteousness and peace kiss each other. Psalm 85:10

I TOOK A DEEP BREATH as I walked into Pastor Tony Spencer's office inside the small church he pastored in the heart of New York. It was a small, cloistered space, but I didn't mind that. The coziness of the office only reminded me of an art studio I'd had a long time ago, one where I'd been mentored, feeling the warmth of the brush in my hand and seeing the vivid colours splash across the canvas.

"Hey," I said, clearing my throat. "I wanted to ask you about something if you're not too busy."

Pastor Tony looked up, then winced as the sunset's orange rays slanted across his mahogany skin, and got up to close the blinds. "Take a seat, George. What did you want to talk about?"

I knew what I should have said. I should have told him about the wedding that I was planning, the troubles that I'd been through, the fact that I was about to marry a woman not because we loved each other but because we needed each other. Or rather, I needed her. I couldn't picture Georgia Philips needing anyone at all.

"It's about..." I cleared my throat as I sat in the rickety folding chair across from his heavy oak desk, the only thing of any sizeable value and imposing stature in the room. The rest of it was worn, well-loved, and faded, even the paperbacks having cracked spines and the notebooks tattered. "It's about Georgia."

THat was the truth, and it wasn't. After all, she was the source of my waking dreams and sleeping worries, of my sleeping dreams and waking worries. Georgia. A girl I'd been unable to eradicate from my mind since we'd met. No matter how I tried, she was an indelible mark.

"What about her? The two of you are... friends, aren't you?" he raised a brow as though unsure of whether he was even using the right word. I didn't blame him for that. I wasn't even sure where I stood with Georgia most days.

All I knew was that she'd be my wife soon, barring any complications. "We're... We've been everything but friends."

Tony cocked his head to one side. "Explain."

That was one thing I liked about the older man. He lent a listening ear in a way that never made me feel judged or criticized, as my own father had often done. Despite the fact that I hadn't stepped foot in a church, willingly, in a long time, the moment that I'd walked into Tony's, I'd felt welcome. Whether it was his Southern accent, since he was a Texas transplant, or his gentle, fatherly demeanour, I couldn't be sure. All I knew was that it made me say far too many things i probably never should have confessed to anyone, let alone wanted to.

"Well..." I shrugged. We were a tangled series of knots woven into a tapestry. To start at the beginning required me to know where it was, and she felt like a thread woven into the very tapestry of my being. "We met before alexander and Katerina were ever engaged."

He rested his chin on his palm. "interesting. I always thought the two of you became acquainted when she went to Los Angeles with Katerina and alexander."

I shook my head. "We had a... a brief meeting in Italy, a year before that ever happened. It was right around the time my father died."

"Ah, your father." Pastor tony rubbed his balding head. "I knew him. He was a great man. He had his own share of flaws, but I know he cared deeply for you and your sister."

I was no longer enraged by simple mentions of my father. That anger and passion had cooled into a quiet grief that lay mostly dormant, biding its time until some strange fit of melancholy would overtake me. "I know he did his best, especially after my mother died."

"But you're not here to discuss your father, are you?" he said.

I shook my head. "No, I suppose not. It's only that, I was wondering if you would help me with something related to Georgia."