Page 52 of Caught Between Two Billionaires
Mrs. Rosemont is crying, too. When the curtain falls and the actors take their bows, she and I are among the first to rise to our feet, clapping our hands as hard as we can, trying to convey everything we felt and lost and learned in such a basic, universal sound.
It’s only when the lights go up again, and everyone streams out the doors, that she turns to me. “You’re the one who wants to tear down the library,” she says, her eyes tinged red.
“I don’t.” Lying works well for getting someone to switch seats with you. For something like this, honesty is the only way. “I’d love to restore the library, to see it in its glory.”
“Then how can you…” She glances at Sutton but must think better of what she’s going to say about him. He sits with his ankle over his knee, looking supremely relaxed and confident in a theater. He would look this way in a stable or a boardroom. That’s because it comes from inside him, that certainty that he’s right where he needs to be.
“I love the library, but it’s not doing anyone any good with all the books molding and the wood rotting. And no one, not Bardot and Mayfair, not the city of Tanglewood, is going to pay the small fortune it would cost to repair it.”
She sniffs. “That doesn’t mean I’m going to condone a mall.”
“What I’m proposing is something that will benefit the city of Tanglewood, the history of Tanglewood, more than an abandoned building ever could.”
The wrinkles around her eyes deepen. “What is your plan?”
“We go through the books. Find the ones that are worth keeping and the ones that aren’t. Donate the ones of value to the Tanglewood library system for distribution or display.”
“That’s not enough.”
This feels like more than an interest in historical restoration. It feels personal. “Tell me why,” I say. “Tell me why the library is so important to you.”
She studies the velvet curtain, clearly deciding how much to tell me. Secrets are a form of currency. “I went to that library as a child.” A pause. “It was more than a place for books, you understand. It was the place you could learn things, no matter what family you came from. No matter how much money you had.”
“There are other libraries.” It’s strange feeling to argue against myself.
“Not like that one.”
“Not like that one,” I have to concede. “But the books can be restored and find new homes in libraries around the city. Bardot and Mayfair would be honored to fund restoration of some of the best pieces, for better preservation and display.”
She mulls that over, her shrewd eyes on the curtained stage, probably imagining how it would look. Not only the value, but the fact that the Tanglewood Historical Society had managed to secure it for the city. It would be a win. “I’ll have to talk about it with some of the others. I’m not making any promises.”
“There was a library I went to,” I tell her, cashing in my own secrets. The times between husbands. “We mostly wouldn’t talk to the librarians unless the computers broke. The machines told us where to find books. Then one day I went in and there was a brand new book about Leonora Carrington, the glue still tacky where they’d put the library label on. I could barely find a few lines and one photo of her work in the other books.”
“An artist?” Sutton asks, his voice soft.
“A painter. A surrealist.” None of those words accurately convey what she meant to me. “She painted mythological creatures, but they’re… they’re these radical statement about existence, about transformation, about sexuality. She’s the reason I believed I could be a painter.”
Sutton makes a small sound and squeezes my hand.
“But there was nothing—no store where you could walk in and buy a book about her or a print of one of her paintings. It was like, in the world of money and power, she never existed.”
I don’t share that she was expelled from multiple schools for wild behavior. That she was a revolutionary and a vocal feminist. Her family never understood her desire to be an artist.
Sometimes it’s an act of rebellion to simply exist.
“My father was a carpenter,” Mrs. Rosemont says, her throat working. “Kitchen cabinets and basic furniture, that kind of thing. He never made anything artistic at home. I wouldn’t have known it was even inside him, if it weren’t for the library.”
A thump in my heart. “He made the wall?”
“They paid him twenty dollars for the whole project.”
“Oh my God. I can’t believe your father made that. It’s incredible.”
She shakes her head. “It broke my heart when they shut down the library. But it’s always been there. Waiting, I think. Waiting for someone who cares enough.”
