A Different Blue(69)

“Tiffa..please, can you just fall asleep already?” Wilson groaned, sounding a lot like one of his students.

“Alice had just turned eighteen – done with school, wanting an exciting holiday. I wasn't even living at home then. I was twenty-two and working at a little art gallery in London, but every year we had a family holiday. We would go somewhere for a couple of weeks, usually somewhere sunny and warm where Dad could unwind a little. Alice and I wanted to go to the south of France, and Dad was on board. However, little Darcy had gotten a wee bee in his bonnet. He wanted to go to Ireland – cold, wet, and WINDY just like Manchester was that time of year. Why? Because the precocious lad had just read a book about Saint Patrick. Mum, of course, thought that was wonderful, and we all ended up traipsing all over a bloody hill in sloshy boots, reading pamphlets.”

I giggled and tossed a look at poor Wilson. “St. Patrick was fascinating.” He shrugged, grinning.

“Oh, Cor! Here we go!” Tiffa groaned theatrically.

“He was kidnapped from his home at fourteen, chained, marched onto a boat, and kept as a slave in Ireland until he was twenty years old. Then he managed to walk across Ireland, get on a boat, with nothing more than the clothes on his back, and make it back to England, a miracle in itself. His family was overjoyed at his return. Patrick's family was wealthy and educated, and Patrick would have had a comfortable life. But he couldn't get Ireland out of his head. He dreamed about it. In his dreams, he claimed God told him to go back to Ireland to serve the people there. He went back . . . and ended up serving the people in Ireland for the rest of his life!” Wilson shook his head in wonder, as if the story still moved him.

I thought St. Patrick was just an Irish leprechaun. I'd never even thought about him as an actual person. Or an actual saint. It was just a holiday.

“So, how old were you when you discovered St. Patrick?” I teased.

“Twelve! He was bloody twelve!” Tiffa bellowed from the backseat, making everyone laugh. “When Darcy was born, he was wearing a tiny little bow tie and braces.”

“Braces?” I giggled.

“Suspenders,” Wilson supplied dryly.

“He has always been an absolute geek,” Tiffa chortled. “That, my dear Blue, is why he's brilliant. And wonderful.”

“Don't try to be nice to me now, Tiff,” Wilson smiled, catching her gaze in his rear view mirror.

“All right. I won't. Did you know he was going to be a doctor, Blue?”

“Tiffa!” Wilson moaned.

“Yes . . . actually. I did know that.” I patted Wilson's shoulder.

“He wasn't cut out for it. He would have been completely miserable. Dad saw how brilliant Darcy was and just assumed that meant he should be a 'man of medicine' like he was, and his father before him, and his father before him. But Darcy was brilliant in all the ways that had nothing to do with science, right luv?”

Wilson just sighed and shook his head.

“Darcy always had his nose in a book. He used enormous words and used them correctly . . . at least I think he did. He loved history, literature, poetry.”

“Have you heard him quote Dante?” I interrupted.

Wilson's eyes shot to mine.

“What was that lovely poem you shared with us . . . about harpies?” I questioned.

Wilson chuckled at the memory and quoted the lines obediently.

Tiffa moaned, “That's awful!”

“I thought so, too,” I laughed. “I couldn't forget it, though. I ended up carving 'Bird Woman' as a result.”

“That's what inspired 'Bird Woman?'” Wilson asked, astonishment coloring his voice.

“Your history lessons seemed to find their way into my carvings more often than not.”

“How many? How many carvings were inspired by my history class?”

“Counting 'The Arc?'” I counted them in my head. “Ten. Tiffa bought a couple of them the first time she came to the cafe.”

Tiffa and Wilson seemed stunned, and the car was quiet for the first time since we'd set out. I fidgeted uncomfortably, not sure what the silence meant.

“Blue!” I should have known Tiffa would find her tongue first. “Blue, I have to see all of them. We should do something big, a big display with all of the pieces together. It would be brilliant!”

My cheeks flushed and I looked down at my hands, not wanting to get excited over something that hadn't even happened. “Some of them I sold at the cafe, but you are welcome to see the rest.”

“Darcy can die a happy man now,” Tiffa added after a moment. “His teaching has inspired art.” She leaned up and hoisted herself over the seat and kissed Wilson's cheek with a loud smack of her lips.