CHAPTER 12

"Why would you schedule a meeting straight after a flight from Australia?" Levi says.

Actually, it's more that he blurted it out without any thought because his freckles light up like a dozen Christmas trees and his ears turn pink at the lobes. His reddening neck exposes him further. My eyes move up from his broad throat, over his chapped lips. His eyes – big, softly brown – are currently horrified. His hair is pulled back into a bun. Very messy. Very not like Nicholas. Still, he looks like a soft, little god.

He's different today. He maintains eye contact, despite his discomfort over the question he's asked me. There's an aliveness in his eyes that feels familiar.

I release him from my scrutiny. Not everyone with this particular kind of arresting gaze has something wrong with them. It's not fair to go looking for Nicholas in every person who displays some kind of heightened happiness. Or sadness. And I shouldn't compare him to Nicholas like this too. I've never felt the need to compare anyone to Nicholas. There's no reason to start now.

I answer his question. "If not tonight, we would've had to wait until the middle of April."

His curiosity makes me want to smile. I manage to keep it away. "That would've been okay," he says, as if my reasoning had anything to do with his comfort or convenience.

"No, it wouldn't have."

"But I mean, surely you need to sleep or something." He rubs his thumb over the cover of his notepad and then picks up his pen, fidgeting with it, before filling the air with a clicking sound. The way his shoulders shake slightly, he might be tapping his foot rapidly beneath the desk.

"My sleep is none of your concern, Mr. Anderson." Of course, there were a million other, kinder ways to have set him at ease. But I'm worried if I'm kind to him he might ask more personal questions, and I might answer them, and then I might find that I like telling him things.

He drops his gaze again, sufficiently embarrassed. Click. Click. Click. "Yes. I'm sorry."

"You said you wanted to discuss a few things before you make your decision," I say, eager to get this meeting started.

He grabs his notepad and clears his throat. Click. Click. Click.

I rise from my chair, walk around my desk, and pluck the pen from his grasp. Then, I hand him a newly-sharpened pencil.

He pulls his lips into his mouth as if to stop a smile. It's a half wish that he would"ve let it show. His smile – I wanted to see it.

When he lifts his eyes to me again, his smile breaks through, and my pencil is lying elegantly between his slim fingers, poised over the blank page of his notepad. I return to my seat.

"If I work with you, will you just call me Levi?" he says.

My eyes narrow. Is he trying to make this hard? He is an artist, in need of money, presumably. It doesn't make sense that he would make strange demands, as if I am in more desperate need of his paintings than he is of the money it would earn him. If he's trying to upset the power dynamic here, he won't benefit from it.

"Why is that important to you . . . Mr. Anderson?"

He hesitates at first, but his too-bright eyes tell me he'll take the risk and answer me. When you learn to recognize manic eyes, it's hard to unlearn it.

"Because most days I don't know who I am, and hearing my name helps me feel like I'm still me, and I'm still here – in the real world."

Against my will, my heart lurches in his direction. I acquiesce immediately. Nicholas, too, often felt like he didn't know who he really was. "Okay . . . Levi."

His dimples deepen with his smile. I don't know if there is a more beautiful man breathing on this earth right now. "And would I be able to call you Hayden, instead of Mr. Ashford?" he says.

To keep his dimples on display, I agree without hesitation. "Yes."

"Okay, awesome. Hayden." His dimples remain. He appears to like the sound of my name coming out of his mouth. I like his name on my lips too, and, for the first time in two long years, I feel the genuine need to return someone's smile.

"It feels important and fair to tell you where my art comes from," he says. "Sort of a disclaimer, if you will. I do this kind of thing when I meet new people, it's almost like a warning, so you can back out. After I explain the conditions you and I will be working under, you might change your mind, and that'll be totally fine."

Do I dare guess what he's about to say? I have plenty of experience. He"s waving a bright red flag. A warning telling me to turn back. You know where this road leads. Turn around and take a different route.

My eyes move to the pencil in his hand, then to the semicolon tattoo between his thumb and index finger. I wait for him to give me this disclaimer.

"I have Bipolar Disorder," Levi says. "It's basically a mood disorder and sometimes it affects my job. My work patterns can be erratic and unreliable. My boss, Daniel, is very understanding, and he tries to help me. I'm not really an actual artist. I'm just a gallery assistant. The painting you bought—" he points to the wall to the left of him, "—was painted during one of my manic episodes. Manic means—"

"Are you manic now?" I ask. He is.

His shock is understandable. I've placed him in an awkward situation by not acting like most people would after his declaration. I am also a perfect stranger, demanding access to the most private parts of his psyche by asking that question.

"Yes, but still climbing," he says finally. And when the silence ensues, he fills it in. "I – I'm not trying to overshare or anything. It's just that it's better to get it out of the way early because people—"

His face is red again.

"People . . .?" I prompt. We had kept Nicholas's diagnosis so under wraps, he wouldn't have experienced judgment, but still, it had been Nicholas's greatest fear – the judgment of others.

"Sometimes, people aren't nice about it. Sometimes they can be mean, the things they can say—"

"What do people sometimes say?" I ask, despite my resolve to remain neutral.

"Snap out of it or just calm down. Or just get over it. Or we don't have time for this. Very judgmental. Sometimes, people don't understand . . ."

"I'll try to understand," I say. What's one more chance to learn something about the thing that sent Nicholas to his death?

Levi stares at me across the desk. He looks impressed. He needn't be. I'm no hero. His breathing increases ever so slightly. He pulls the skin at the corner of his bottom lip between his teeth. Then he inhales deeply, drops his gaze, and starts writing in his notepad with my pencil. I'll bet my entire family's fortune he's doodling.

Then, he doesn't stop talking. "In the past, when I was manic, people would tell me how happy they are that I'm finally happy again, that they wish they could be manic like me because then they'd get so much done. Everyone wants to be around me when I'm manic. It's exhausting, actually. Oh, also, when my mom visits me, she never stops talking about how clean my house is when I'm in a—" he makes air quotes "—good mood. I hate that the most because she's so mean when I'm low."

"Because you can't keep your house clean when you're low?" He's most certainly over sharing and he'll hate himself later for it, but I won't judge him.

He fidgets, nodding rapidly. "Yeah." And then, "When I paint, it's not really me, you know. It just kind of happens – the paintings. I – I don't think anyone should take them – or me – seriously. They don't mean anything."

"They do," I say. And then to clarify, "They mean something."

His stare is disarming, so I bring us back to business. "I have no particular schedule for when these paintings need to be done," I tell him. I hate that it sounds like I'll be waiting for him to be in a state of uncontrolled mania in order to get out of him a painting worthy of hanging on my wall.

"I might never paint anything."

"Fair enough. Our arrangement will be based on what you produce. If you produce nothing, you'll earn nothing. If you produce something, I'll pay its worth. Think of it as an open-ended arrangement – no deadlines."

"Uh, okay. That – that works, I guess."

"Is there anything else you'd like to discuss?" I ask.

"Yeah. I also have a bit of OCD." He laughs. "The thoughts. They don't stop. Also, severe social anxiety." He laughs again. "I don't do people." Then, his eyes grow wide. "No, no. I mean, I don't do – I mean, I do do people. Not like – I'm not like, into bestiality or anything. I just meant—"

"I know what you meant." I'm watching him climb. His words are coming out a mile a minute. Hardly a breath taken between words. The left side of his body thrums at a steady pace – he's jerking his knee beneath the desk. "But I'm referring to any questions you might have about painting for me."

Levi's eyes grow wider. "Ohhh. Sorry. I got distracted. Right." He inhales. "So, YouSaidYouWantedToGoToAPlaceNotFound? WhyDidYouSayThat? WhatDoesThatMean?" His eyes leave mine to focus on the notepad, the pencil poised like he"s ready to take notes.

"I have everything I could ever want in this life, Levi—"

He pulls his lips into mouth, like he's trying not to smile. His dimples give him away. I'll use his name often.

"—And for a person who wants for nothing, it makes sense that I would search for the things I don't already have." It's only a small part of the truth, but for now, it's enough. "What is the place not found for you?" I ask.

It's a deeply personal question, and I almost regret asking it, but he's already shared more than he should have with me. A little more won't hurt. The seconds tick by and my conscience wins. With a sigh, I forego my itching curiosity, making a feeble attempt to retract my question and steer him away from my unintended trap to get to know him. "You don't have to answer that," I say reluctantly, but sincerely.

He answers anyway, as I'd suspected he would. "It's the place where the noise stops and everything is quiet," he says. He speaks again after a long pause, soft and filled with hesitation. "I'll paint for you. Do you still want that?"

Even after having met him a small handful of times and even knowing that this is nothing more than a transaction, I'm unable to escape the thought that he is like me.

"Yes," I answer.