Page 188 of Reckless Obsession

Several canvases are stacked against the wall of the room and on the floor; some are propped against furniture, and some are placed beside the windows. One is still sitting on an easel, unfinished, covered in shades of blue and pink.

That’s probably the weirdest part of all.

My art used to be an aggressive thing. Back in the States, everything I painted was dark, jagged, bleeding, and violently abstract—black gouache, murky grays, smears of deep crimson that looked like crime scene photos.

Now I paint water.

Sky.

Buildings.

The pink-orange wash of sunset against a cliff. I paint bright blue until my fingers stain. I paint coral and gold and the strange soft green of olive trees against pale stone. I use colors with names that sound like they should belong to cocktails rather than paint tubes.

Naples yellow.

Rose madder.

Ultramarine.

Permanent magenta.

I have become unbearable.

If anyone from my old life saw the paintings, they would probably assume I had been replaced by a more stable, more aesthetically pleasing version of myself.

They would be wrong.

I am still me.

My mind still runs too fast. It still offers me different ideas before breakfast, then gets offended when my body cannot execute them all. Some mornings I wake up with the absolute conviction that I should buy a boat, learn Italian properly, redesign Dante’s villa’s entire interior, and paint a twenty-foot mural before sunset.

The trick is learning not to obey every idea just because it arrives loudly.

I write them down.

I eat.

I sleep when I can.

I take my medications—sometimes.

I go for walks when my skin starts feeling too small for my body. And when none of that works, I paint until the noise becomes color.

❧

The late-afternoon sun is finally losing its bite, sliding behind the villa’s terracotta roofline and leaving the yard bathed in a soft, honey-colored glow.

I’m sitting on the weathered stone bench beneath a sprawling olive tree, one leg hooked over my knee, the cool Ligurian breeze rustling the silver-green leaves above my head. On the small iron table in front of me, propped against a heavy jar of turpentine, lies a medium linen canvas.

I’m in the middle of layering fine strokes of slate grey and silver into the fur of Tyler’s cat, Eevee.

She’s a Russian blue with beautiful emerald-green eyes, bone structure that looks sculpted, and the unmistakable energy of a Victorian heiress who knows she’s better than everyone else in the room.

“You look like you are about to deny someone access to a nightclub,” I tell the painting.

Eevee remains silent.

Rude.