Free Down Among the Gods by Kate Thompson Page A

better, I suppose.’
    ‘Nothing too bad, I hope,’ says Jessie, with a concern that appears genuine to both of them. There is nothing Hera loves better than a man who is all at sea with himself.
    ‘No,’ says Patrick. ‘Nothing I can’t take care of.’
    The teacher calls the class to order and the model takes up a pose. Jessie has bought a new charcoal pencil in the hope that it might make her a better artist. For the first few minutes she does a great deal of loose sketching and rubbing, then eventually screws up the paper and starts again. The teacher gives her a dirty look. She, in turn, looks over at Patrick for support but he is, to all intents and purposes, engrossed in his own drawing.
    But it’s not going well at all. His attention is being pulled again towards Jessie and there is nothing he can do to stop it. He feels like a foolish teenager, aware of Jessie’s every movement even when he is looking elsewhere.
    And Dionysus is getting angry. He has been, perhaps, a little over-confident about his hold on Patrick, who is clearly wavering. If Hera gets her claws into him, there is a chance, just a chance, that Dionysus will lose him. He shoves Patrick’s focus as hard as he can towards the paper in front of him but it isn’t working. The drawing makes no sense to him at all. He looks up and meets Jessie’s eyes. She behaves in a way that would drive Lydia frantic, and herself, too, if she could gain any degree of objectivity. She doesn’t quite flutter her eyelashes but she looks up from beneath them in an engaging manner. Patrick responds with charming smiles and quick, sneaking glances.
    The atmosphere between these two is so thick that it is permeating the room. There is no one in the class who is not aware that something very powerful is going on.
    At the break, Jessie comes over to look at Patrick’s drawings, but he turns them round before she gets there. She tries to turn them back but he resists, stands in her way, and on a sudden impulse, puts his black hat on to her head.
    Afterwards he can’t imagine why he has done it. Something has gone beyond his control. The model is posing again and he starts to draw, but he is becoming paralysed by conflict.
    One of the Zen masters once said, ‘When walking, walk. When sitting, sit. Above all, don’t wobble.’ Patrick is wobbling now, torn between the desire to go along with Jessie in anything and everything she might propose and the opposing desire to flee.
    But he draws. And the next time he stands back to look at his work, he turns numb with shock. The body he has drawn is a good representation of the model. But the face belongs to Jessie.
    He is suddenly afraid that he is cracking up. As quietly as he can, he rolls up his drawings and slides out of the door without a backward glance.
    Women. They ruin everything, and they always have done, right through his life. No matter how hard he tries to steer clear of them, they just can’t seem to leave him alone.
    As he passes the Red Lion, the door opens and a sweet waft of warm, beer-scented air slips into the street. He almost follows it, is on the point of turning into the doorway and making a fool of himself when he remembers that he’s broke. He catches himself in the nick of time.
    At the next corner there is a litter bin strapped to a lamppost. Patrick shoves the roll of drawings into it in rising anger. The twenty-five quid is the worst of it. It has been wasted but it’s the last time it’ll happen to him. He won’t take any more foolish gambles like that. It was just a crazy dream to think that he could ever get going as any kind of an artist. And why the hell should he want to, anyway? He has a perfectly good life, a good job, a comfortable place to live. Above all, he is his own man, a free agent. There is no one to tell him when to come in at night or when to get up in the morning. If he wants to work, he works. If he doesn’t, he doesn’t. Why sacrifice all that for the sake of some