Chapter 59

I was surprised to see Maria, the girl from History who had vowed not to let any man but her husband see her starting up the stairs. Jack and I were back in the garage after eating dinner, experimenting with the studio setup.

Maria came in and told us she had no problems doing the interview there while we worked. Laurie was gone but she did have Bozo to keep her company. He might be reserved with Laurie and Posie, but with the older crowd, it was every man for himself.

He stuck his nose in her crotch and I yelled at him to get out of there.

"It's OK to smack him if he does that again," I said.

"That's OK. I'm used to it."

My boyfriend, Mr. Tact said, "Do you have a dog or are you talking about boyfriends?"

She didn't answer but she did turn a deep shade of red.

Jack apologized and got her talking. Soon, he volunteered her to pose as we set up different backdrops and tested the lights. At one point she was kneeling on the floor, Bozo lying next to her with his head in her lap, while I was on a ladder holding the sheet up as Jack snapped several pictures.

Maria was heavily into her religion. No, she didn't walk around with a Bible, talking people's ears off, trying to convert them. She did go to Bible class every Tuesday night and the early church service on Sunday, sticking around and talking with others a couple of hours after the service was over.

As soon as she started talking about her faith, I knew that Jack had found his button.

"Maria, do you ever pray to God when it's just you in the church?"

She seemed to glow a little bit more. "Sometimes."

"If you don't mind me asking, what do you pray about?"

"It depends. Sometimes something will bother me and I want some help. Sometimes I just feel like talking to him, telling him how I feel about him, what having him in my life means to me."

"I got it. Maria, I'd like to observe you praying to him, telling him how you feel, and take some pictures of it. Do you have any problem with it, or would the church?"

"I don't think the church would. I might feel a bit weird. Kind of embarrassed, I guess."

He reached out to her and took her hand, pulling her to her feet.

"Come up to the apartment with me. I want to show you something. You too, Jill."

Once our direction was established, Bozo led the way. We went inside and Jack went over to his computer and booted it up. He asked me to get us all something to drink and told Maria to sit on the couch.

When I came out with the lemonade, Jack was uploading his memory chip and Bozo was sitting next to Maria, his head leaning against her left knee.

"Boy, he took to you quick. You must have a dog."

"Yeah, we have two labs, a male and a female."

"Black like Bozo?"

"Oh, yeah."

"Have you had any puppies?"

"No. The male has hip dysplasia and we had to get him neutered. I'd like to breed her, though. Do you think Bozo might be interested?"

"Interested? The way he was sniffing between your legs? He'd be thrilled, I'm sure."

"Have you got papers?"

"Yes, Ma'am. He may not act like it, but he comes from a long line of champions. I could probably get a room full of ribbons and trophies out of him if I wanted to devote my life to dog shows."

"She should be coming in to heat in the next month or so. Maybe we can work something out. I can't afford much. Would you be interested in the pick of the litter?"

"I'd have to really think about that. We've all got dogs and I don't think any of us would want another. Maybe you could give us something after you sell a few of them."

"That could work."

"I want to be able to take portraits of the whole family. Oooh, and the birth," said Jack.

"You sure you don't want to take pictures of them humping?"

"No, Dear. You and I are the only ones I want humping pictures of."

Poor Maria wasn't expecting that. She sneezed a mouthful of lemonade, then spilled most of her glass trying to put it down while covering her face. The fact that half of it came out of her nose didn't help.

"Dammit, Jack. Look at the mess you made."

I went to the linen closet and got a couple of towels, cleaning her and the table as she tried to apologize.

"Maria, it's all right. If my boyfriend wasn't such a dweeb, we wouldn't be doing this. Are you sure you want to let him take pictures of you?"

She looked over at him and then looked mesmerized. She was staring at a picture on the monitor. She was sitting on the floor. The sheet was behind her but you could see the excess length crumpled on the floor behind her. Bozo was laying next to her, his head on her lap. She had one hand over the back of his neck, her fingers working on his spot behind his ear. His eyes were closed and there was a look of ecstasy on his face.

Maria looked like women in some of the paintings in Daddy's coffee table book of great art. Her eyes focused on something not of this world, her natural beauty shining forth. Glowing.

She said, "My Lord!" reverently, almost too quiet to hear. There was a tear coming down her cheek from her left eye, another one forming in the right.

She looked up at Jack, sniffed and said, "I want that picture. How much?"

"I don't know. I'd have to do some work on it. You're off center a bit so I'd need to crop some off the left side, then off the bottom so you don't see all that extra sheet. I could take the dog out if you want."

"No. I want that picture," she said, pointing at the screen. "Just the way it is."

"I don't have any photo paper, I couldn't print it tonight."

"Just give it to me on a CD. I'll print and frame it myself."

"OK. If you're sure. How does $50 sound?"

"Fine. I didn't bring any money with me. Let me call my father and he can bring it over."

I said, "Don't worry about it, Maria. You can bring the money to school tomorrow. Jack, put it on a CD for her."

He burned it, then went over to her with the CD. "Here you go."

She stood up, after warning Bozo, and took the CD from Jack, giving him a kiss on the cheek.

"This is what I was looking for. I never thought I could get it. Right now, I can't think of anything else I want. I'll call you when Princess comes in heat and I may want to do something then. I don't know about the church; I don't know if you could get anything there you didn't get in this. Thanks again."

"Maria. This price is between us. I know it was informal and I'm not doing the proofs and printing the pictures, but you got about ten minutes shy of a $350 package. You can show it around but I don't want a bunch of people coming up to me asking for a $50 picture. OK?"

"OK." She kissed him again and was out the door before we knew it.

Jack went to the door and watched to make sure she got down safely. He closed the door, then saved the pictures to a file labeled with Maria's name and the date.

"Well, that was easy," I said.

"No, it wasn't. You have no idea how much work it took to get her to the point where I was able to take that picture."

"So how come you didn't charge her the going rate?"

"Guilt, I guess. It almost seems like I'm stealing until I look at how much I work to get the picture. I've realized I'm not going to be able to get away with just sending out a questionnaire. I can send out a price list and describe how I work with each person to get the perfect shot but I need to have her right there in front of me when I'm digging. There are so many subtle clues that let me know if I'm on the right track and they're all visual. An email or a phone call just won't cut it."

"That's going to cut down on your time to do the actual work."

"No. The digging is that major part of the work. Once I've found it, I can recreate it. That picture I have in mind for Julie won't take long to get now I know what I want. The people I talk to will be much more likely to buy if they know the basics. Most of the people who've left without buying balk when I give them my price. When they can go to Sears with a $50 coupon, why should they pay $350? Of course, Sears gets their money for the prints. They don't mention it, but that $50 is for some guy to take a bunch of pictures. Then you sit down with the salesman and he talks you into buying pictures for people you hardly ever talk to. Before you know it, you've paid two or three hundred bucks for some pictures that aren't really that good. They don't have a 'love or don't pay' guarantee. You'd be surprised how many people will spend the extra bucks so they don't waste the original 50 they put out."

"Well, we've got to find some way of taking some of the grunt work away from you."

"I need to do the interviews and take the pictures myself. If you want to handle the emails to people who inquire about me, that would help."

"I'll need to get a price list from you."

"That's easy. Prices start at $350 for a half hour sitting, a set of proofs and prints of any of the pictures taken. You can list the prints as three 8X10s, six 5X7s and a dozen 3X5s. Also mention that if the person isn't happy with the result, all money will be refunded with the return of the proofs. Once they decide to have prints made, the refund offer is over. If they want additional prints, they go for $25 a sheet. That's one 8X10, two 5X7 s and four3X5s. I'm not sure how many wallet size I can fit on a sheet. The multiples can all be the same or any combination of the proofs."

"What if they like the pictures but they want to take some more?"

"I don't know. That's essentially a whole new sitting. I might give a slight discount. I'll do it for a lot less if I can do it all at once like I am with Julie. She's getting three portraits for less than the cost of two. Her horse, Julie and her horse, Julie's yearbook shot."

"That's almost like cheating. You can take the yearbook shot along with the others."

"All I did was promise her pictures of each subject that she'll like. I know I can get that shot along with the others and I might only take five or ten minutes. But I know damn well she'll be thrilled with it. What my clients are getting is the result. I bust my ass getting it and if they don't like it, they can send me away without paying a dime. If she doesn't like it, I'll make her put on a dress and do her hair in ringlets and sit her on a stool. But I doubt that will happen."

"All right. I'll handle the emails. What else needs to be done?"

"The shipping tape around the borders of the murals. It's going to be pretty tough for you to do by yourself. Laurie's good in the idea department but she's not big enough to help. I don't want to hire someone I don't know because it needs to be done right. Once that tape's on, you can't pull it off. It it goes on crooked or has a crease in it, I might end up having to buy a new mural."

"How about Mary and Charlie?"

"I'd trust them."

"Are you willing to pay?"

"Sure. How about fifteen a mural."

"Make it twenty. That way they can get a halfway decent meal out of the job."

"OK. No problem."

His next client was st the door when I opened it. "Jill, you scared me. I almost fell down the stairs."

"Sorry about that, Nicky. I was just going next door. Jack? Nicky's out here."

"I'll be out in a minute."

We sat on the couch and she said, "So, what do you think our chances are against Basset?"

"Is that who we're playing on Saturday? I've been so busy with my mother dying and my new sister and Jack's photography that I haven't been paying attention. I hear they're pretty tough. Didn't they blow away everyone else in their league?"

"Yeah. What's this about your mother and sister?"

"My mother left us when I was two. I haven't seen her since then. She showed up at last Saturday's game and it turns out she was in the last stages of cancer. My father's a doctor and got her set up in hospice. He also got an appointment with his lawyer and helped her settle her affairs. It turns out she had another girl who's now three. My father and his girlfriend agreed to take care of her and they handled that at the lawyer's, too. She went in the hospice Sunday afternoon, I talked with her for a couple of hours that night and she died overnight."

"Wow. What's it like having a new sister like that?"

"It's a trip. She's very loving and lovable and she's extremely smart." I looked up as Jack came in. "Jack, this is Nicky. She's on the team."

"I remember. Come on in the kitchen and we'll talk."

"I'll see you later. I'm going to go talk with Mary and Charlie."

"Good. Take this with you." He tossed me a big roll of tape.

I went downstairs and talked with them and they were glad to do it. I kept waiting for one of them to say something about watching Laurie with no pay. I knew Daddy would do right by her on Thanksgiving when they all came over but I hoped Mary wouldn't start feeling taken advantage of in the meantime.

We went out into the garage and Charlie looked around for a way to make it work. He spotted a sheet of plywood and laid it out in the middle of the garage. It gave him a surface to work on. He found some scrap two by fours to put underneath it, bringing it up off the floor a bit.

"When does Jack want this finished? It may take a couple of nights."

"Do you think you can do the bottom edge of both murals tonight?"

"I think so."

"That will at least protect the part that's near the floor."

Mary said, "There's something I don't get."

"What?"

"I see how this side with the stick keeps it neat and lets you roll it out and back. How do you keep the other end from falling over once you have it unrolled?"

"You know, I don't think anyone even thought of that. I'm going to have to ask Jack about that. Can I tell him you'll get the bottom of both of them done tonight?"

Charley said, "Sure. I'm assuming we don't have to use a continuous eight foot piece."

"No. Jack's more interested in it not drawing attention. It should be as even as you can do it, no creases, no fingerprints or other stuff on the tape. He'd rather have two pieces of tape overlap a bit than have a half inch with no tape."