The Cinderella Deal - Jennifer Crusie [2]
“I swear I hear a cat crying,” she told Julia. “Listen. Do you hear anything?”
Julia paused and then shook her head. “Uh-uh. Your water’s starting to boil. Maybe that’s it.”
Daisy took the kettle off while Julia took down two mismatched cups and saucers, plunking her Constant Comment tea bag in a Blue Willow cup and Daisy’s Earl Grey in the bright orange Fiestaware. Daisy poured the hot water over the bags and said, “Pretty” as the tea color spread through the cups.
“Forget the pretty tea.” Julia picked up her cup and carried it back to the table. “You’re in crisis here. You’re out of money and you can’t sell your paintings. How’s the storytelling going?”
“Budget cuts.” Daisy sat down across from her with her own cup and saucer. “Most libraries can’t afford me, and it’s a slow time for bookstores, and forget schools entirely. They all say I’m very popular and they’ll use me again as soon as possible, but in the meantime I’m out of luck.”
“Okay.” Julia crinkled her nose as she thought. “How else were you making money? Oh, the jewelry. What about the jewelry?”
Daisy winced with guilt. “That’s selling, but Howard won’t give me the money until the end of the month. And he owes me from the end of last month, but he’s holding on to that too. It’s not that much, about a hundred, but it would help.” She knew she should go in and demand her jewelry money, but the thought of Howard sneering at her wasn’t appealing. He looked so much like her father that it was like every summer she’d ever spent with him condensed into two minutes.
Julia frowned at her. “So how much do you need? To keep the wolf from the door, I mean.”
Daisy sighed. “About a thousand. Last month’s rent, this month’s rent, and expenses. That would get me to when Howard pays and then maybe something else would turn up.” That sounded pathetic, so she took a deep breath and started again. “The thing is, I quit so I could paint, but I’m spending all my time trying to support myself instead of concentrating on my work. I thought I’d have a show by now, but nobody understands what I’m doing. And even though I almost have enough paintings for a show, I’m not sure what I’m doing is right for who am I now anyway.”
Julia sipped her tea. “Ouch. Hot. Blow on yours first. What do you mean, you’re not sure what you’re doing is right? I love your paintings. All those details.”
“Well, that’s it.” Daisy shoved her tea away to lean closer. “I like the details too, but I’ve done them. I think I need to stretch, to try things that are harder for me, but I can’t afford to. I’m building my reputation on primitive narrative paintings; I can’t suddenly become an abstract expressionist.”
Julia made a face. “That’s what you want to do?”
“No.” Daisy shut her eyes, trying to see the paintings she wanted to do, paintings with the emotions in the brushstrokes instead of in the tiny painted details, thick slashes of paint instead of small, rich dots. “I need to work larger. I need—”
The mewling cry that had teased her earlier came again, louder. “That is definitely a cat,” Daisy said, and went to open the window.
The wind exploded in and stirred Daisy’s apartment into even more chaos than usual. Liz rolled to her feet and meowed her annoyance, but Daisy ignored her and leaned out into the storm.
Two bright eyes stared up at her from under the bush beneath her window.
“You stay right there,” she told them, and ran for the apartment door.
“Daisy?” Julia called after her, but she let the door bang behind her and ran out into the rain. Whatever it was had vanished, and Daisy got down on her hands and knees in the mud to peer under the bush.
A kitten peered back, soaked and mangy and not at all happy to see her. Daisy reached for it and got clawed for her pains. “I’m rescuing you, dummy,” she told it when she’d hauled it out from under the bush and it was squirming against her. “Stop fighting me.”
Once inside, she wrapped the soaked little