ANOTHER JOAN?

Chapter 3 Impressions

"'Impressions of the Holy City'?" repeated Father Ken. "Interesting idea."

"Thank you, sir," said Adam smoothly. "Lily seemed very interested in my sketches. She said they were more personal than photos or video would have been." That much was true, and if Father Ken double-checked with Lily, she could confirm that part of the story. "So I thought your congregation would be interested in a painting."

"I like the idea," said the priest. "But I can't commission a painting on my own; I'd have to put it before the Board."

"I'm not seeking a commission. I'm willing to do it for free."

"Oh?" Father Ken was not mercenary in the ordinary sense, certainly not for himself. But Adam knew he was conscious of the need to raise money for charities; indeed, Mrs. G had first run into him during a fund-raising campaign. He would be impressed by a free gift. And it helped that Helen had also donated a picture a year earlier when Kevin married Lily: a picture of Joan of Arc that had proven popular.

"Yes, sir. My going to Europe was a lucky accident, a bequest from my wife's aunt. So I'd like to share the luck. But there are a couple of complications."

"Fixable, I hope?"

"Yes. My wife and I are going off to college at the end of the month, so I've got to start this painting NOW. And the picture's going to be big and our studio-apartment is very cluttered with stuff we've bought for school. It would help if I could do the painting here."

"Well, I wouldn't want to have easels and stuff left behind in the worship area, but there's plenty of space 'backstage', so to speak," said Father Ken. "The office area, for example--"

Including Lily's office. "Fine."

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And so the next day he brought his easel, a large canvas, and other tools. He fussed about positioning his easel "for lighting" until he was positioned near the corridor leading to Lily's office. The lighting actually wasn't as good in this section, but nobody but Mrs. G would know that.

Of course to make the ruse convincing, he would actually have to paint something, but that was no problem for Adam.

He made no attempt to conceal from Lily that he was there. Indeed, at midmorning she came out to chat. Adam was making an outline in pencil at the very top of the canvas, of two hands whose extended fingers were nearly touching each other.

"Let me guess," said Lily. "Creation of Adam, right? From the Sistine Chapel ceiling."

"Yeah. Can't draw it on the actual ceiling, but I'm putting it as high as possible on the wall."

"Creation of Adam in a double sense, eh? Because you're Adam."

Adam laughed. "I'm just a copyist."

"You doin' this by memory, or have you got a model?"

"Oh, I printed out a copy from the Internet. Here it is."

She glanced at the paper. "You know, it's sad. All that beauty at the beginning of humanity, and then look at the mess we've made of it. Well, back to work cleanin' it up."

As the day went on, and Adam watched people pass by on the way to Lily's office, Adam could see what she was talking about. One of the first was a girl several years younger than Adam and with a swollen belly, obviously a case of teen pregnancy, like Bonnie. Later a sixtyish woman in black dabbing at her eyes, possibly a recent widow. Then came a young couple. Adam hoped they were the ones that Lily had mentioned, but they bickered in undignified fashion in Adam's presence, and it was clear that their problem was each other, not a daughter. At least it proved that he was effectively invisible.

Adam was starting to gain new respect for his sister-in-law. His own lifestyle, aside from the occasions where he had to get a day job, enabled him to "live in the Whole and the Beautiful", as Goethe had put it, and to work his own hours except when they irritated Joan. Lily, on the other hand, spent her days helping to shoulder other people's problems, none of which looked as if they could be solved in a day. And, unlike Joan, she did all that without a specific directive from God, though undoubtedly Lily thought of herself as carrying out the Lord's work, underneath the Surfer Girl pose.

All of that made Adam feel guilty about spying and lying to Lily. He told himself that he and Jane weren't BETRAYING Lily; they were helping her do her job, using special knowledge of the situation that Lily lacked.

Adam tried to put the disturbing thoughts out of his head for a while by losing himself in his painting. In a couple of hours he had the penciled outlines of Adam and the Almighty -- the latter of whom, Adam reflected, looked like none of his avatars. He decided to dispense with the complicated background behind God -- this was supposed to be just "impressions", after all. The painter Adam was more bothered as to what to do with the painted Adam's nakedness. Even Michelangelo had gotten into some fuss over displaying explicit anatomy, and this was an American church. He'd better think up some sort of fig leaf--

"That looks cool."

Adam turned around in surprise and found himself looking at a girl several years younger than he. Unlike most of the people passing through, she looked basically healthy and cheerful, in jeans, new blouse, and boots. He hadn't noticed her come into the hallway; had he missed anybody else?

But she was expecting an answer. "Thank you. It's from the Sistine Chapel--"

"Yeah. I've seen pictures." She seemed to think for about half a minute. "Do you do religious pictures a lot?"

"Some." Most of them were inspired by Joan and her divine friend, not by conventional religious piety, but the girl didn't have to know that. "Why?"

She walked up with a conspiratorial air and whispered: "If you want to know what Jesus really looks like, I can tell you!"

TBC