Her Own Table

Tressa’s former colleague looked at the painting of the washing-machine part and said it was an improvement on the pears.

“You don’t know what it is,” Tressa said.

“Neither do you. It’s given you freedom.”

They were sitting at Tressa’s kitchen table on Thursday morning, before the lunch they had arranged weeks ago. Her friend had arrived early with a bag of apples from a tree she complained about every autumn and refused to have cut down. They had worked together for sixteen years and retained the useful habit of disagreeing without issuing a warning first.

Tressa turned the paper towards herself. She had painted from Selwyn’s drawing on Wednesday, adding colour where knowledge failed. The result resembled a machine designed by a person who believed machines should be blue.

“I like it,” her friend said. “You don’t have to earn that by telling me everything wrong with it.”

“I’m…