Sweat gleamed on the foreheads of their' pasty faces in the candlelight, casting hollow shadows over them. But it was the swollen throats that gasped for air which told Mireille what her family had caught.
Tuberculosis.
Outside offered no more comfort than what her home did. Sparks flew against her face as she lit her used cigarette; its glow in the milky blue morning washed over the streets littered with empty bottles. A few women with clothes hanging off them like rags and empty eyes began picking themselves up from a long night's work.
I never want to sell my body like them.
Mireille sucked on the cigarette between her lips and coughed at the putrid air before something caught her eye. Amongst the flyers pinned to the wall of the brothel, a small note stuck out.
“Wanted:
A beautiful woman to sit for Pablo Picasso, money granted.
Address: 2 Rue du Chêne d’Huy, 27140 Gusors.”
-
Her breath puffed out around her face and she pulled her heavy coat to cover her chest more. She had tried so hard to look worthy to be painted, but her hair wouldn’t sit right, her cheeks too red, her clothes painfully plain. Standing on the front step she felt too out of place. She reached out and banged the ornate knocker against the solid door.
Her nose was beginning to run when the doors flung open and a short man, maybe in his fifties, stood in front of Mireille. His bare feet stood apart, hands on his hips. He didn’t sport the usual attire-- that is the tailored suits and trousers, but instead wore a black and white striped shirt with a coat many sizes too big.
“...I’m here to inquire about this pamphlet I saw”.
“Darling come inside! You must be freezing.”
There was a warmth to his voice, accompanied with a thick Spanish accent. She sunk into the burgundy armchair she was ushered into, resting a hot chocolate he had prepared for her on the worn armrest.
“Darling don’t be nervous, make yourself comfortable. We’re just here to talk- for now. What is your name?”
“... Mirielle Boucher. This is a grand home you have, monsieur”.
“Not at all, it was built out of the remnants of a burned castle, and it has enough space for my growing collection.”
“Collection?”
“I’m an artist! A creator! A God! My girl, do you not recognise my name?”.
Mireille shook her head sheepishly.
The man’s eyes clouded with a cold disdain for only a moment. But he leapt up, grabbing her by the arms and dragging her enthusiastically through the doors. The room opened up into a grand hall adorned with portraits and paintings.
“The armchair should come in here, yes…”, He tittered as he picked amongst the multitudes of busts and abstract sculptures.
Mireille gawked at the place; she’d never seen something like it.
Her eyes rested on a set of women's portraits. Distorted. Each one becoming more and more broken and manic than the last. “Will you paint me like this…?”.
“I’ll paint you how I wish, and you’ll love it.”
“I apologise, I mustn’t be very special to paint”.
“Nonsense! I can see a fire ready to ignite in those eyes, and the way your nose dips down to your lips. You have much hidden potential, you just need to let me dig furt--”
Bong! Bong! Bong!
The grandfather clock interrupted him.
Before he could continue, Mireille began gathering her coat. “Thank you for having me, monsieur, but I need to hurry home.”
A compact red taxi bubbled just outside the front door, courtesy of the old man.
“Take me to 17 Rue de Maison Bagnio.”
“Are you sure you want to go there?”. A man replied behind a thick moustache.
“Just drive.”
-
Before Mireille even opened the door she could hear the loose rattling coughs. They’re alive.
With a deep breath she entered the dim room. Her parents laid on the rickety bed all three of them had once shared. All Mireille could do was hold a rag soaked with dirty water to their waning faces and spoon old soup into their mouths.
That night Mireille laid in the crate she had pulled out. As she pulled the itchy blankets to her ears to drown their worsening coughs, she wondered.
They’re alive.
Was it relief or dread she felt?
She drew candlelight across the Normandy daily paper. Under headlines of people rioting over the growing inflation and unemployment, read:
“Barbers? Or Bloodletters? Barbers may be the cure to all your sickness.”
30 Francs. That was the cost of the bloodletting barbers.
Only a few paintings to be sat for Picasso.
-
Once again Mireille found herself in the red armchair. Picasso stood in front of her, a pallet in one hand and the other holding her face, moving it gently from side to side as he studied her features.
His eyes were intent on something she had never felt. For once he was silent, and the rich smoke of his Spanish cigarettes filled the tension between them.
For hours she sat in the armchair, free of the pressures of her sick parents, free of the burden of money and what to cook and what job she was going to apply for.
Instead there was a different kind of pressure, a burning. He was taking her away piece by piece, only to recreate her the way he wanted. Yet Mireille sat there, allowing the man to paint her like he was really a god; both a creator and destroyer of beauty.
Before Mireille was a canvas like a mirror to her soul. Each panel of her face showed a beautiful sadness. He had seen through her. Seen the weight her life had brought onto her.
But Mireille did not have the luxury of feeling this sadness.
“I’ll come back in a day's time if that suits you?”
“Yes darling I cannot wait until then.”
“And you will have my money ready?”.
But Picasso had already lit another cigarette as he walked away.
-
Now Mireille didn’t quite know what she was looking at. Staring back at her were gaunt eyes, a jarring nose, and a snarky grin covering the pale face. The worst part were the tormented fingers reaching towards the eye of the beholder, searching for something. Picasso stood proudly staring up at the monstrosity he had painted.
“I thought it was quite clever. You always get around to the money side of things, don’t you, little cochina.” Picasso snickered.
Unaware of what it meant, Mireille ignored him.
“Will it sell?” She said.
Picasso spun around. “What are you trying to say?”.
“It’s just… You’ll pay me for this piece right?”.
“Why should I pay you, you ungrateful little--”.
“Even prostitutes get paid.”
“Too bad you’re too ugly to even be a prostitute.”
“I’ll just have to find a better artist who will actually pay me.”
“A better artist? Darling you’re mine. My property. Plus, who would want you?”
“What’s all the ruckus?” A faint voice interrupted.
From the stairs stood an elegant lady dressed in black. Even from where Mireille was sitting she could see this woman wasn’t well.
“Go back to bed, cariño”.
The woman leaned on the railing for a moment before vacantly trailing off through the hallways again.
“Shouldn’t you check on her?”
“She’s being dramatic. Oh, and you thought your portrait was bad?”, he said as he gestured to a large painting, one Mireille had seen the first time she had entered the studio.
A beautiful woman, poised on the same armchair she had been on. One hand gliding over the back of the chair, the other clutching a delicate fan. Her face serene and lost in thought.
It was much different than Picasso’s other paintings. This captured light and forms as if staring at a real woman, as if she would soon speak words aloud in a precious sing-song voice. It was the woman who had just been on the railing.
“She’s beautiful.”
“It must be awful for a woman to look at the way I paint her and see that she's about to be replaced.” He replied.
“What do you mean?”
Again, he gestured to another smaller painting beside the one she had been staring at.
A small canvas with a naked woman sprawled out like a childs painting, too many limbs spilling out of a pink body, her soulless eyes turned towards the sky, sharp teeth like that of a wild beast. She sat in the same armchair.
He spoke, hiding his laughter with a gnarled hand as if telling a secret only he could find amusing.
“They’re the same woman.”
-
“Lana, letto, latte!”.
The words banged around Mireille’s mind as she watched the barber hold a small scalpel to her mothers frail arm.
“Warmth, rest, and good food”, I don’t have those luxuries to give my parents, Picasso.
Blood began to seep from the cut, yet her mother didn’t stir. Her father, slumped next to her, spoke to her in a hoarse rattling breath.
“We’ll feel better once this sickness is drained out, ma fille.”
Next was his turn, but Mireille couldn’t bear to watch.
-
Mireille tiptoed down the hallway, rehearsing the words over and over.
“No matter what, you must pay me. No matter what, I will get my francs.”
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of giggles coming from the studio.
The first thing she noticed about the girl was the array of colourful fingerprints buried in the folds of her skirt and around her tight waist. She held herself with a graceful naivety only a ballerina could pull off, poised on that comfy armchair before the easel.
She was everything Picasso’s wife was not: Young. Flouncy. Cute.
Her golden ponytail was pulled so taut that her eyes cut daggers into Mireille, like she was interrupting something. But there was also a secretive weariness to them. The last thing Mireille noticed about her were the subtle eye bags which caressed those weary eyes, the sweat that gathered around her hairline; the shaky rise and fall of her exposed chest. Things only someone who had experienced them could notice.
Yet she beamed at Picasso, catching his remarks and twisting them in a way that made them feel more bearable to hear from an old man.
A man above you.
-
Mireille stared down at her parents. They laid there, their sparse breathing broken up by rattled coughs that used the last of their energy.
A crushing desperation filled her, the feeling of love and hatred, but worst of all: loneliness.
They brought me into this world. What right do they have to leave me here alone?
More money. She would be able to take her parents to a real doctor. They could cure her parents. Rid them of this disease. But how would Mireille get the money?
If he thinks he can use a woman until she breaks; until she’s no longer of use to him, then will God punish me for cleaning one more sin away from this world?
No.
If God is already taking away Mama and Papa, then it’s only fair I take away one more burden from this world.
That night as Mireille descended the dank bricks that led to her doorway, she found herself studying the way the prostitutes posed in the filthy streets, readying themselves for another night of labour. Breasts exposed, lips agape.
She waited for the coughing of her parents to penetrate through the rotting wood.
But no sound ever came.