The Homeless Millionaire

I spent the next three days in hell.

Like all descents into hell, it started nicely. I'd completed the puddle painting by mid-afternoon on Monday and it was really good. I was sure I would start working on something new right away; I'd had tons of ideas pass through my mind while I was painting that puddle. It was just a matter of selecting the one I liked most.

But when I began the selection process, it turned out that all my ideas were worthless. When I was working on something good and it was going well I tended to assume any new idea I had was brilliant. Well, the ideas I'd had while painting the puddle weren't. They were shit.

Within a few minutes, I was banging my head against a wall, just like a couple of days earlier. Then, for the umpteenth time, I had the thought I'd be spouting cool ideas like a fucking fountain if I only had access to a big, brawny Johnnie Walker.

That fucking killed me. I looked around for my pal, and he was absent. I was sure acquiring a Johnnie Walker would bring him back.

So I went on the trek to the liquor store, telling myself the cosmos was in favour of that move: it wasn't raining. When I got there, I went totally crazy and bought two forty-ounce Johnnie Walkers instead of one. I calculated and recalculated my remaining cash on the way home and whatever I did, it turned out I'd have to spend at least a day or two living on air.

But when I got home inspiration struck. My financial plan stretched all the way to the moment I'd get a cheque from Chaz—late May, at best. It was unwise to plan in detail so far ahead into the future. Assorted shit was bound to happen in the meantime. Maybe Tony, following his first confrontation with my talent, would immediately commission me to do a portrait in return for a month's worth of rent.

That was the way my thoughts ran after I got home, and finally got together with Johnnie Walker. Johnnie Walker made me optimistic and kind-hearted. I was even ready to share some with Dave, even though I knew he inhaled the stuff like a fucking vacuum cleaner, meaning less for me.

I knew he was home. This was unusual on a weekday. What was more, he was keeping out of sight. On previous occasions when he was in and I'd just come home, he'd show himself to greet me. I knew he was there from the various little noises he made prowling around in the big room downstairs. Once, I fancied I heard a sob.

Did he get fired? It was Monday, he should've been at work. But it was next to impossible to get fired from a government job. Only total morons, unlikable total morons on top of that, managed to get fired from a government job. Dave wasn't one of those.

I successfully fought down the impulse to go downstairs and invite him for a drink. I had work to do. Johnnie Walker had already told me what to paint next. It wasn't what I wanted to hear, but it was right and true.

I really had no choice but to paint two more my-pal-at-the-pool pieces, for another triptych. That first painting of him begged for a sequel. There would be some action with those two chicks in the second piece. In the third painting, the pool would be empty. Everyone would be gone, but there would be hints what had happened before they left.

That meant going through a real horror with the shadows, particularly in the second painting. In the third the shadows would be even bigger and longer, but they would be easier because there would be no people involved. People were difficult. People fucked everything up. No people meant less trouble.

All fired up, I dove into work and within an hour I was drowning in shit.

Those two paintings took me three days—well, two and a half. I had to start over several times. I was ready to kill myself with my own fist at least twice. It was a fucking horror. On Wednesday morning—the third day—I finally realized this was why so few people ever became professional artists.

It was one thing to have talent and dash off something—a picture, a short story, a new song—when inspiration struck. It was another to keep going day after day whether you felt like it or not, fucking things up repeatedly before getting them right. I was reminded of the writer guy who sometimes came around to that bar in Toronto I worked part-time.

He came to my attention because he drank wine. He'd come in and order a litre of the Italian rotgut the bar had as its house wine. He'd chug it down in record time and order another and linger over that, smoking like a maniac.

I found out that he was a writer thanks to Chrissie—the girl who worked the shift before mine. Sometimes she hung around after her shift was over. She would get herself a drink and sit down behind the bar and smoke and watch the scene. She was another part-timer; she'd told me she wanted to study sociology. The bar was her lab.

That day, the writer guy was in, and engaged in a low-voiced conversation with another guy. Chrissie was seated on the other side of the bar, just a few feet away, ears flapping. Eventually I heard her say:

"Excuse me. I couldn't help overhearing what you were saying, and I'm curious what you do."

"I'm drinking wine," the guy told her.

"No, I meant for a living."

"I'm a writer."

"That's great!"

He snorted, and said:

"You think sitting alone in a room all day is great?"

That shut Chrissie up, and she went home.

I knew now exactly what that writer guy had meant. I suspected I wouldn't have gotten through those three days without my good friend Johnnie Walker. My paranoid pal was still conspicuously absent. I wondered whether he'd disappeared for good, or maybe bad.

The one person that wasn't absent was Dave. Each day he left with the rest of the family in the morning: everything appeared to be normal there. But by lunchtime at the latest he was back. He stayed on the ground floor, then left the house again around four, an hour before he was supposed to finish work.

I didn't spend too much time trying to work it out because I was busy with those pool paintings. But on Wednesday night they finally were both done and I was smoking by the open back window and sipping on the final glass squeezed out of the first of the two forty-ouncers I'd bought. The Noyces had their bedroom window open—it was a relatively warm night—and I could hear they were having a pretty intense conversation about something.

It wasn't a loud conversation, but the amount of furious hissing that went on told me there were some major differences of opinion involved. Naturally I assumed they were linked to Dave's odd behaviour. I strained to hear what was being said but was unsuccessful, and after a while I became ashamed of my eavesdropping. I could tell Birgit and Dave were furious. It was obvious keeping their exchange private was the only reason why they weren't screaming at each other.

I was moving the very next day. Chances were I wouldn't ever find out what went wrong between Brigit and Dave. I'd intended to invite them for a goodbye drink, but I was determined to finish work first, and that didn't happen until well after nine. From the sounds of it, inviting them for a drink wasn't a great idea either. It wouldn't have been much of a party.

I felt obligated to say goodbye and thank them for all their support and assistance and so on. So I decided to hit the sack early and get up early and ambush them at breakfast. They were going to be in a hurry in the morning and that was good too: I didn't like long, drawn-out goodbyes.

A bit later, I went up to the back window to shut it before getting into bed and I got lucky. Birgit chose to do the same exact thing at exactly the same time and I heard her hiss:

"… and don't you think you're going to get away with this."

Then she shut the window.

Dave was in the doghouse; he'd done something very wrong. I revised my plan. I'd hang around until lunchtime, and if Dave returned home as he'd done on the preceding days, I'd invite him for a goodbye drink. I'd be performing a good deed and satisfying my curiosity at the same time. I was pretty sure he'd spill the beans after a couple of whiskies.

I made a few bets on what I'd hear before I fell asleep.