A Spotless Stove
Nina. Come here.
No please. No when youre done. Just come here, like calling the dog.
She leaned the mop against the wall and stepped into the kitchen. Ian sat at the table, eyes fixed on his phone. Across from him, in her favourite spot by the window, sat Mrs. Matilda Clarkson, her mother-in-law. She was drinking tea. The room smelled of boiled cabbage and a strange tang of pills Matilda swallowed by the handful from morning till evening.
Mum says you still havent cleaned the stove properly, Ian said, not lifting his gaze.
I cleaned it yesterday.
You did a poor job.
Matilda set her cup on its saucer with a quiet click.
I was never one for filth in my home, she said, in that matter-of-fact tone people use when repeating something evident. This house has always been spotless under my care. For twenty years, I kept it myself, and there was never such disorder.
Nina was fifty-three then. She stood in the kitchen, rubber gloves on, hands wet, listening. For the umpteenth time.
Show me where its dirty, she said. Ill clean it.
Exactly, show her, Ian chimed in, still calm and gentle in tonebut with the icy precision that hit its mark every time. Cant see for yourself, can you? Or do I need to get down on my knees and point it out?
Nina looked at the stove. It gleamed. Shed scrubbed it the night before, after tea, spent half an hour scraping burnt fat. It was clean.
And then, something just happened inside her.
No explosion. No tears. She simply looked at the spotless stove, then at Ian with his phone, then at Matilda and her cupand inside, everything just… stopped. Not like the storm before something shatters. Like when its all already broken and you realise its quiet.
She took off her gloves. Set them on the counter.
Ive heard this for twenty-eight years, she said. Enough.
Ian looked up from his phone. Matilda froze, cup halfway to her lips.
What did you say? Ian asked.
I said: enough.
She left the kitchen. Went to the bedroom and pulled out a big supermarket bag from the wardrobe. She started stacking her things into it. Not much. Documents. A couple of cardigans. Clean underwear. Phone charger. Her hands were steadywhich almost surprised her. Calm, like a person whos finally made a decision thats been brewing for years.
Voices rose in the other room, first faint, then louder.
Ian, did you hear? Go after her!
Do it yourself, if you want.
Nina zipped her coat, picked up the bag, stepped into the hallway. Slipped on her shoes. Opened the door.
Nina! Matilda shouted from the kitchen. Do you even know what youre doing? Where will you go? Youre nothing without him! Nothing!
Nina closed the door behind her. Quietly. No slam.
On the stairwell there was the tang of cat litter from neighbours on the third floor and the fresh whiff of paint from the entryway downstairs. She went outside. It was a cold, wet October. Leaves stuck to the pavements in soaked clumps. Nina paused at the front door, took out her phone.
Sylvia picked up after two rings.
Sylvia, Nina said. Ive left.
A pause.
Left from where?
From Ians. For good. Ive nowhere to go.
A few seconds of silence. Then Sylvia said:
Remember the address? Twenty minutes. Ill be home. Wait by the entrance, Ill give you the code.
***
Sylvia owned a little flat on Garden Lane. Only a single, but hers; shed bought it herself seven years before, working as a hotel receptionist, saving every penny. The place overflowed with shelves and potted plants, and the kitchen wall was covered with magnets from cities up and down the country. The smell was coffee, and something sweetmaybe cinnamon.
Nina sat on the settee, a mug of hot tea clutched in her hands. Sylvia sat opposite, feet tucked under herself, listening carefully.
Tell me, Sylvia said quietly.
Theres nothing to tell, said Nina. Its always the same. Stoves dirty. Soups too bland. Floors not scrubbed well enough. And that looklike Im just… like Im a broken appliance.
Its always been like that, Nina. What happened today, then?
Nina thought for a moment.
Today I looked at the spotless stove and realisedif I didnt leave now, I never would. One day Id just lie down and not get up, and theyd say it was because I hadnt looked after myself properly.
Sylvia nodded. Didnt say anything, just topped up her tea.
That night, Nina lay awake on Sylvias sofa, wrapped in a warm blanket, listening to the silence. The real kind. No TV muffled through the wall. No Matildas cough next door. No sense that she should leap up at any moment and see to something.
She didnt sleep until nearly three. Not from worryjust because shed never known what it was like, to simply lie there, responsible for nothing.
Eventually, though, she drifted off.
***
Her phone was silent for two days. On the third, Ian sent a message: When will you be back? Not Im sorry. Not We need to talk. Just when will you be back, as if shed gone on a business trip.
Nina read it and slid the phone back in her pocket.
Quite right, said Sylvia, who was nearby and had seen the message. Dont reply. Let him wonder.
Hes not wondering, Nina said. He thinks Ill change my mind and come home. He always did. He doesnt believe Id actually go.
Will you go back?
Nina looked out the window. The garden was drab, soaking wet, lined with bare trees and cars beaded with rain.
Im gone, she said. I just dont know where to, yet.
Those first weeks were strange. Nina didnt know how to fill her time. Her whole life, shed been up at sevenmake breakfast, tidy, wash, run out for Matildas tablets, nip to the shops, cook again, clean again. The whole day. And still it was not enough or not right.
Now she woke to emptiness. Nothing needed doing. It was almost unbearable.
Sylvia, she said one morning as her friend pulled on her coat for work, I need something to do. Or Ill go mad.
Find a job.
Doing what? I havent worked in twenty-eight years.
Youre an artist.
Nina laughed. Short. Flat.
I was. Once. Did two years in a publishing house after art college, then married Ian, and he said there was no need, that he could provide. His mother added that respectable women minded the home, not office jobs.
And you agreed?
I did. I was twenty-five, I thought that was what love looked likesomeone caring for you.
Sylvia paused, hunting for her gloves.
Nina, theres a box of watercolours in my cupboard. My niece left them. And some paper, I think. Try them out.
What for?
Because your hands will remember. Just try.
***
The paints were right at the bottom of the wardrobe, wrapped in old newspaper. Cheap childrens ones, plastic, with a cartoon squirrel on the lid. There was paper too, heavy and thick, half-used. Nina sat at the kitchen table, staring at a blank sheet for a long Minute.
Then she picked up the brush.
At first, nothing worked. The paint flowed wrong, her hand shook, proportions askew. She ripped up three attempts. Then calmed and just started pushing colour aroundno plan, no design. Just colour. Just shape.
After an hour, there was a small watercolour sheet in front of her: an autumn backyard, just like what she saw from Sylvias window. Wet trees, a grey sky tinged with a splash of pink at the horizon.
She looked at it and thought: this. I made this.
Not soup. Not a spotless stove. This.
That evening, when Sylvia returned from her shift and saw the painting on the kitchen table, she stopped short.
Nina, you painted this?
I did.
Its beautiful, really. Alive, somehow.
Its all wrong, Sylvia, all crooked.
But it feels real, said Sylvia. Ive seen dozens of gardens, but this one feels true. You can sense it.
Nina said nothing. But she didnt throw the painting away.
***
Meanwhile, over at Ians flat on Kings Road, things took a turn he hadnt counted on.
For three days, he waited for Nina to return. It seemed certainwhere could she possibly go? She wasnt capable. No money, no work, no home. Of course shed come back, eventually.
But she didnt.
On the fourth day, he opened the fridge and found it empty. Completelyexcept for a lonely bottle of milk. He went to work hungry.
That evening, Matilda sat at the kitchen table, her expression that of someone who always knew how things would turn out, but had held her tongue out of courtesy.
Had anything to eat? she asked.
No.
I havent either. Did you bring anything back from the shop?
No, I didnt have time.
So, you didnt buy and you didnt eat, said Matilda. In seventy-eight years, I never thought Id see the day when there wasnt a crumb of bread in my house.
Mum, go to the shop yourself.
There was a long pause.
Im seventy-eight, Ian. My knees are bad, my blood pressures bad, I walk with a stick. And youre telling me to fetch the groceries.
I didnt have time, Mum, I was working.
And Nina wasnt? Nina did everything for you, ran herself raggedand you drove her out.
Ian looked up.
Drove her out? She left herself!
Because you made her! How many times have I saidlearn to watch your tongue. But no, always cleverer than everyone.
You were at her every day! The stove is dirty, the soups off, the floors a mess!
I was pointing out what needed doing. Its my house!
My flat, Mum! My mortgage!
They stared at each other. For the first time in years. There was no Nina between them now, no one to absorb the blows and keep them from clashing directly.
Ian stood, shrugged on his coat, and stormed out. The door slammed.
Matilda was left alone in the kitchen. Night pressed against the window. She stood, switched on the light, opened the fridge. Looked at the bottle of milk. Closed the fridge.
Sat back down.
It was quieter than it had ever been since Nina had lived there.
***
November brought the first frosts and the first snow. By then, Nina had been at Sylvias for three weeks, slowly coming back to lifelike someone kept too long in a dark room, suddenly let into the open air, eyes smarting and dazzled, but growing used to it.
She painted every day. Bought herself proper paints, not the childrens ones. Sylvia spotted an ad online: a tiny studio available to rent on Riverside Street, near the park. Bare and drafty, with battered floors and cracked plaster, but cheapunrenovated.
Nina went to look. Instantly knew: this was her place.
Are you taking it? the landlady, a kindly old woman with a knitted cap, asked.
I am.
Money was tight. Nina sold the gold hoops her parents had given her on her wedding day. Not without a tremorfor the memories, perhaps. But then she thought: what memories? Of what?
The studio became her domain. Shed go in every morning, push the window open and let the sharp, cold air from the river roll in. It smelled of turpentine, wood, and paint. She set up her jars and paper, or stretched a canvas, and simply worked. For hours. Sometimes, she forgot to eat.
She painted whatever was at hand: city gardens, a bowl, an apple, an old slipper. Her hands remembered, growing steadier and surer after twenty-eight years of silence.
In December, Sylvia rang the studio:
Nina, the hotel wants to hold a local arts exhibition in the foyer. I mentioned you. Can you bring a few pieces?
Sylvia, Im not an artist. I only just started up again.
You are an artist. Ive seen your work.
Its amateur hour.
Nina, Sylvia said, with the patience of a mother to a stubborn child. Youve spent thirty years telling yourself that. Enough. Will you send the pictures?
Nina hesitated.
All right, she said. Ill send them.
***
It was at that exhibition she met Alexander.
He came to the opening, though not for arts sakehed just checked in for a work trip and found himself in the foyer at the right moment. Tall, plaid shirt, pepper-grey hair at the temples, steady grey eyes. He stood before one of Ninas paintings: a park in winter, a bench, footprints leading to and away from it.
Nina came over to straighten the frame. She heard him muttering softly,
Thats how it goes, I suppose. Sit together awhile, then away you go.
About the footprints? she asked.
He turned. Didnt seem embarrassed shed overheard him talking to the painting.
Yes. I look and think: two people came, sat, left in different directions. Were they happy, did they quarrel? Who knows.
I pictured one person, said Nina. Came, sat, walked home.
One person doesnt zigzag like that, he said gravely. Lookthe prints double back. It was two.
She peered at her own painting anew.
Perhaps it was, she agreed.
They talked another twenty minutes. Hed come up from a town nearby to help his brother fix up the house. He was a proper tradesmanjoinery, electrics, plumbing, the lot. Widower, two grown sons. He didnt chatter, but he listened closelythat Nina noticed. He didnt interrupt. Didnt check his phone. Simply listened.
It was so unfamiliar, she didnt know how to take it.
As he was leaving, he asked,
Have you got a card?
No, she admitted, flustered. I never had any made.
Then your phonewhich is it?
She gave it, wondering afterwardswhy? Perhaps he wanted to buy a painting.
Three days later, he messaged: Good evening. Its Alexander, we spoke about the footprints in the snow. Id like to buy that picture, if its not sold.
It wasnt. He arrived, picked up the painting, carefully wrapped in his own carrier bag. He asked if she had other works to see.
They went to Ninas studio. He took his time, looking in thoughtful silence. In the end, he bought two more small landscapes.
You paint well, he said.
I didnt, for a long time, she answered.
Why?
She shrugged. Didnt explainnot now.
Life, she said.
He nodded, accepting that, asking no more.
***
Ian rang in January. Nina had been living between Sylvias place and the studio for months. On paper, they were still married; she hadnt filed yet.
He called in the evening, just as she was finishing a big canvas winter still-life: fir branches in a jug, pinecones, a candle.
Nina, he said.
Yes.
So how are things there?
Fine.
A silence.
Mum is ill, he said finally.
Im sorry Matildas unwell.
Couldnt you come over? Just once a week. Help out.
Nina set her brush down.
Ian, Ive left. I live separately. I wont be coming back to help round the house.
Youre still my wife.
For now. But not for long.
Dont be like this, Nina. Youre better off coming home. We need to talk, all of us.
We never talked, Ian. For twenty-eight years. You and your mother talkedI listened and did as I was told.
You always exaggerate.
Maybe, she said flatly. But Im not coming back.
She hung up. Her hands didnt shake. She almost marvelled at herself.
And she thought: from outside, my story is simplea wife leaves her husband. Happens every day. But inside, it was like learning to walk anew. Every day.
***
Ninas finances came together gradually. Her pictures sold, though only from time to time, and never for much. There were postcard commissions, and landscapes as gifts. With Sylvias help, she set up a little online page, put up her paintings, and slowly a trickle of interest began.
There was just enough to live on. Studio, food, clothesno cushioning, but enough.
She hadnt thought itd feel like riches. But it did.
Alexander would come by every few weekson jobs to his brother, and always stopped to see her. They had coffee at the café near the park, or strolled the frozen pavements, talking. He told stories about work, about his sonsone, married now, expecting a child. She talked about painting, about wanting to try oils.
Alexander never hurried her. Never pressed. One day, Nina knew she looked forward to his visits. That, when he left, her studio felt quieter for a while.
Sylvia, she said one day, Alexander… I dont quite understand.
What?
Hes very kind. It frightens me a bit.
Why should kindness frighten you?
Because Im used to kindness turning out to be something else. That bad follows good.
Sylvia looked at her a long moment.
Nina, maybe its not like that for everyone.
Nina chewed on that for days.
At last, she was the one who messaged Alexander: Would you like to visit Saturday? Ive started a new, larger piece and would like to show you.
He did. He looked at her painting. Said it was good. Then they drifted to the café again. There, he asked,
Nina, would you care for a day out this weekend? Theres an old priory about an hour awaysupposedly beautiful in the winter.
She said she would.
***
As for the flat on Kings Road, Nina heard snippets. Sometimes, Mrs. Agnes Dawson, an elderly neighbour from upstairs, phonedNina had often lingered to chat on the landing.
Nina, how are you, dear? Mrs. Dawson would say. Its chaos over there. You can hear them bickering through the walls. Matilda gives Ian an earful for driving you out. He snaps back. Yesterday, I nearly rang the police, the row was so bad.
Nina listened, thinking it was odd: she felt only distant, absent sadness. No schadenfreude. No satisfaction. Only: this is how it sometimes goes.
It wasnt that they missed Nina herself. It was having nothing left to deflect their blows. Their whole lives had fired in the same direction; when that wall walked away, their hurt landed on each other.
In February, Mrs. Dawson rang to say Matilda had been taken to hospitalher heart. Ian stayed by her bedside, dark as a raincloud.
Nina put the kettle on, thinking she ought to call. After all, twenty-eight years. Still, a person.
But after a while, she decided: no. No more doing what one ought. Shed spent her life on ought. Let him manage for himself now.
***
March melted the last of the snow and brought the smell of thawed earth. Nina was walking round the Saturday market, string bag in hand, choosing something for breakfast. She stopped at the greengrocers stall, picking through early tomatoes, thinking how shed like to paint thisspring colours, bustle, people.
Then she saw Ian.
He wandered the stalls, bag in hand, peering at his phone, not seeing her. He looked older now, she thought. Or perhaps she simply saw him differentlyshoulders rounded, jacket wrinkled, his face grey.
She stood, waiting for her feelings: fear? anger? The urge to escape before he spotted her?
Nothing.
Ian looked up, saw her. Stopped dead.
They looked at each other across three market stalls.
Nina, he said at last.
His voice was quiet as everbut there was something new in it. Uncertainty, maybe.
Ian.
He came closer. The woman at the next stall busied herself with her apples.
How are you? he asked.
Fine.
You look thinner.
Perhaps.
Mums still in hospital. Her heart.
I know. Im sorry.
He shifted his bag, glanced at his shoes.
You really wont come back?
Nina met his eyes. Calm. Without hate, without pity. Just looking.
No, Ian. I shant return.
But we have to go on, somehow
You do. I already am.
He had no answer. She picked up her tomatoes, paid, and walked on.
Her heart beat evenly. That was her victorynot leaving, not staying away. It was standing before him unafraid. Not shrinking. Not telling herself to be nicer, not second-guessing, not wondering if shed been too much. Just talking to another person. Almost a stranger now.
She bought some herbs, a crusty loaf, and headed home. Home was, and had been for a while, the studio on Riverside Street.
***
She filed for divorce in April. Handled it herselfno solicitor, turned up in the registry, filled out the forms. Ian didnt contest. They met the once before a clerk, signed the papers, walked out.
She had no claim to the flat; it was in Ians name. Sylvia said she should fight for her share, but Nina only shook her head.
I dont want that place, Sylvia. I want to get on with my life.
You could use the money.
Therell be other money, Nina replied. My own.
By summer, she and Alexander were meeting each week. Sometimes she visited him in his town, sometimes he came down. He had a small house in a leafy cornercurrants and a wizened apple tree in the garden. The first May she arrived, she stood among the pétals, gazing at the apple blossom.
Lovely, she said softly.
My wife planted it, Alexander replied, without pain. Shes been gone eight years. But the tree blooms still.
They stood together, looking.
Alexanderdont you worry, Nina said, about being close to someone again?
He considered.
I do, he said. But thats not a reason not to live. I rather like you, you see.
Nina laughed, surprised at herself.
Wisdom?
No, just a habit of hammering things straight in, no faffing about.
***
That autumn, a year to the very day since Nina had packed her bag and left Kings Road, she and Alexander sat late in his kitchen. He was fixing a drawer that stuck; she with her coffee and sketchbook beside him.
It was warm and quiet, smelling of wood and coffee.
Nina, he said, bending over the drawer, will you move in?
She looked up from her sketch.
Move where?
Here. With me.
There was a pause. He kept tinkering.
My studios there, she said.
I know. Theres a whole spare room here, with a big east window. Sun in the morningsdid I tell you?
You did.
Well?
Nina stared at her drawing. On the page: a kitchen; a man with a screwdriver; a woman with a cup. Window. Outside, a garden.
I need to think, she said.
All right.
You wont rush me?
No.
Why not?
Alexander checked the drawer. It slid closed.
Because Ive all the time I need, he said. No sense in rushing a grown woman.
Nina looked again at the sketch.
All right, she replied.
All right youll think, or all right youll come?
All right, Ill come.
He nodded. Sat by her with his tea. The silence was pleasant.
***
Six months on.
Nina lived with Alexander now, though she kept the Riverside Street studioworking there three times a week. The east-facing spare room at his house had become her breakfast art corner, early sketches before he left for work.
Her paintings now sold a little more oftennot a renowned artist, but hers, with regulars seeking her work. It wasnt grand or loud, but it was her very own.
She still heard news of Ian sometimesAgnes Dawson would ring. Matilda, after hospital, rarely left her room. Ian had hired a carer; he commuted to work, came home evenings. Life carried on.
Nina listened, musing how once that man had eclipsed her whole sky. His mood was her weather. His words were law. A womans life that looked, from outside, like a good marriage, but inside had been a small prison without locksthe worst sort, whose door you hold shut yourself.
Now her sky was her own.
One December Tuesday, Nina arrived at her studio before dawn. She flipped on the light, set the kettle boiling. Outside, snow was falling in slow, billowy flakesthe courtyard below already wiped clean as parchment.
Her phone rang. Sylvia.
Nina, hi. How are you?
Good. At work.
Listen, Ive got some newsnot sure how youll feel. An acquaintance says theres a gallery in the centre looking for artists for their spring exhibitiona real gallery, not just a café. Shes seen your work online, wants to talk. Heres her number.
Nina took a pen, scribbled it down.
Sylvia, she said, theyll expect real credentials. Im nobody. No degree, no accolades.
Nina, you barely painted for five years, then started again. Now youve a hundred and fifty works. Isnt that serious?
Well
Call. Just call and see.
All right.
Nina hung up. She stared at the number shed written, then at the blankness outsidethe town washed white, like a new paper.
She poured her tea and picked up her brush. Shed call. Later. First, she wanted to capture that snow before it changed.
***
That evening, Alexander came to walk her home from the studio. He knocked quietly, poked his head in, finding her at her easel.
Ready?
Give me five minutes.
He sat on a stool by the wall, never making her hurry. Just watched her work. Sometimes, she was aware of his gaze: patient, intent, as though watching something precious.
After five minutes, she laid down her brush, closed the paints.
There.
Looks good, he said, nodding at the painting.
I dont know. Snow is tough. Seems white, but its really blue, grey, roseevery colour but white.
Thats funny, he said, dead serious. Never wouldve guessed.
Exactly. You look, and you miss it.
They left together. It was cold and clear, the snow had stopped, the air so crisp that she filled her lungs and felt all new.
Alexander, she said, crossing the shadowed street, theres been a call about an exhibitiona gallery in the centre.
And?
Im not sure, should I?
Do you want to?
She hesitated.
I do. But Im scared.
Of what?
That theyll say its no good. That Im not a true artist. That its all a sham.
Alexander walked on, hands in pockets, looking forward.
Ninayou know, theres nothing to be scared of left.
What do you mean?
I mean, youve already lived through the hard bit. You spent twenty-eight years in a place where you were told you were nothing. Every day. And you left that, with just a bag. Thats the hard part. A gallery exhibitionso what, they say no, and what?
She stopped.
You always hit the nail straight on the head, she murmured.
I do my best.
She laughed, and he smiled, faintly, the lamp-light catching his face.
Come on, he said. Its freezing.
They walked on. Snow crunched underfoot, puddles glazed with ice reflected the lamps. Ahead, their homes windows glowed.
Alexander, she said.
Yes?
Thank you.
For what?
For never telling me what I ought or must do.
He was silent a moment.
Adults know their own mind, he said. All the rest is just remindingat most.
They reached the house. He opened the door, letting her in first. Hallway warm, the faint scent of applesthey had a stash in the cellar from autumn.
Nina went into the kitchen, took off her boots, flicked on the light.
Everything was as it should be: wood table, two chairs, window on the garden. Her sketchbook lay on the windowsill, left there that morning.
She opened it, found yesterdays drawing: kitchen, man with screwdriver, woman with cup. Window. Garden beyond.
Now it was time to lay in the snow.
She picked up her pencil.
