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I sit rigid beside Ms Coleridge who sighs as the brakes crunch and her ancient Panda stops outside Dad’s house. I guess the teacher’s no more than seven years older than me. But I’ve gone and done it this time. Her mouth kind of dips down at the side, as if she’s disappointed rather than angry.

The seeds from the China berry trees crunch under my feet as I follow her up the stairs cut into the rock face above the ravine.

Inside, the stone walls are thick. Our footsteps echo on the Spanish blue and white floor tiles that seem so unfamiliar yet so vivid.  Mum and Gary’s bland, cream carpets back in Chichester flash into my mind. If Dad decides he’s had enough, I’ll have to go back to worrying about spilling paints on those carpets again. 

Dad’s at his easel by the floor-length arched window in the turret. Yes, you got me – Dad lives in a tower. Whenever I see him, I see the red halo hovering around his head.( Ms Coleridge’s is pale blue by the way.) He stares down at the cormorant drying its wings in the river and being him, Dad’s turning it into some kind of crucified  bird. He’s all about the crucifixion is Dad.

Mind you, his paintings make for a pretty impressive bank account. The reviewer’s words in ArtReview run through my mind. A bold, new imagining of El Greco… If I don’t make a sound sometimes he tolerates me watching him work.

Ms Coleridge looks at me now, raises an eyebrow, her halo more a lime green now. But Dad’ll be mad if we disturb him while he’s working. The sunset turns the gorge outside a russet colour, the river lilac and pink. Focus on the colours, not on disturbing Dad. His warnings circle round my head. More trouble and you’ll be back to Mama and Gary.

Ms Coleridge taps her foot, waiting. His brushstrokes on canvas are ridiculously loud. He glances over his shoulder. But, typical, just turns back to the layering of permanent rose and ultramarine. Though the river’s got white in it too. Maybe he’s going to add that later.

            “Excuse me, Mr Martinez, a word please?”

            Dad holds up his hand. “Sshh.”

Ms Coleridge’s voice hums low as a refrigerator. “Your daughter has been suspended.”

Dad mixes the blues. Ms Coleridge’s face flushes, the way it does when she’s holding in her temper. Her halo is emerald now and a jolt runs through me as, in a cat-like move, she slips the palette from his hand and swipes the paintbrush away from his paw.

            “Nooo,” his voice is like a cornered bear.

His ebony eyes flash at her. He’s mad. Only yesterday he said he might let me mix the oils for him this evening. I’ve blown that as well.  Please don’t let him send me back to cringing in the front room while Gary pulls Mum close. Gary’s halo is so bland it blends in with his cream painted walls. His voice echoes in my head: The best place to concentrate on your homework is in your own room.

Ms Coleridge’s voice is studiously calm. “Mr Martinez. I’d like you to accompany me to the underpass by the school.”

Nausea rises in me. Just as I was getting used to the place too. Toledo International School beats Chi High anyday. Search me why I had to go bunking off and messing everything up. Search me why I do any of it.

Dad’s red halo spreads around his whole body now. “What are you talking? What underpass?”

            “On the ring road, by the school.”

            Dad tugs one of his curls, pulls it straight, it twangs back up again. I’ve really gone and done it now.

“I have work. Your work is to look after my daughter. What kind of school is this? In Spanish schools teachers know a man has to work. I cannot be disturbed by a puff of air, by nothings.” His voice is a growl when he turns to me. “Loretta, your Mama can deal with you.”

“But…”

My throat tightens. I won’t let him see me cry.

He holds up his hand. “Enough.”

Ms Coleridge gestures towards the door, taps her foot.

“Only half an hour of your time, Mr Martinez.”

Dad’s head brushes the Panda’s roof as the old car rattles over the cracked tarmac on what’s supposedly the new bridge. Out the window, the ancient stone bridge leads into the town with its fairy-tale arches and towers.  

Evening is dove grey in the underpass. The mural before us cost me all my savings on spray cans.

My breath swells inside as if it’s a balloon as Dad leans in, inspecting the image of his own face on the wall. His long fingers hold a paintbrush. Then he studies the shrunken me beside him, all wild curls, a red halo around me too, the shadow of a cross falling on my image.

A shiver runs through me though the evening is warm. He’s going to think it’s crap. Suddenly it matters so much.

Then Dad’s dodging the cars across the laneways. Head on one side he studies it from a distance.

Returning, his voice is soft. “It’s good,” he says, “though perspective not quite right. Adjustment here,” His long finger points to the tip of the paintbrush, “and here…” His face lights up when he looks at me. “You stay now.”

Ms Coleridge sighs again. “Mr Martinez perhaps you need to think about what your daughter is trying to express here.”

But all I can do is smile at him.

How it came about:

This story came to me while we were in Spain’s Toledo. I was blown away by the town’s position, perched above the River Tajo’s gorge. Again, the importance of rambling to my creative process is clear. I watched the cormorants dry their wings and thought they looked like crucifixes.

Toledo is full of ancient convents, churches, palaces, former synagogues and mosques. Towers, castellated walls, cobbled alleys are filled with romance for me.

Walking around Toledo, all I kept wishing was that I could paint it. But, I was the girl who came 33^rd out of 33 girls at school in Art. Even with my current art lessons, I can’t produce a painting without Anthea, my patient teacher, standing over me.

So, this ambition to paint triggered my I wish game. Almost as important for my writing as the What if game, the I wish game allows me to be anything I want, albeit vicariously, through my story telling. In this case an artistic teenage girl. Day-dreaming is a very large element in my writing. An inexpensive form of entertainment, I can watch a film in my head anywhere at any time with no mobile connectivity needed at all.

In this case the Montalbano TV productions of the Camilieri light crime fiction are also a visual influence. Although set in Sicily, they so beautifully capture the heat, the sun-scorched limestone cliffs, the alleyways, the cypress trees touching the sky, the lemon groves, so that imagery is vivid in my mind.

Toledo is also where the Renaissance painter El Greco set up his successful studio. My visit to his house captured the imagination, with its lushly planted patio garden and the exhibition of his paintings in the perfect example of a 16^th Century nobleman’s house.

On the outskirts of Toledo, El Greco’s ‘Fifth Seal’ really captured my imagination, with the elongated figures, the naked people reaching towards the heavens, being destined to fall short of heaven in their physicality. The sky too is a sweeping mixture of blues, greens, whites, but most striking is the russet woven through it, with its suggestion of dried blood. It is this striking use of colour which influenced the paints I had Loretta’s father use on his canvas, though I was not fully aware of this at the time.

Loretta’s synaesthesia became a crucial element of the narrative, informed by the fact that colour is the most affecting element of any painting or garden for me. Again, autobiography tends to become intertwined with fiction for me, as my daughter sees people as particular colours and always has done since childhood.

This piece required a good deal of editing. On workshopping it with a fellow writer, I followed her advice to remove sections about school in both Spain and England and to increase Loretta’s motivation for wanting to stay with her father.

This is when the synaesthesia idea came to me so it added another layer to Loretta’s character. A young woman who sees everything and everyone in colour would want to stay with her brilliant artist father, I figured.

In many ways, I think characters can grow and develop with each new edit, with each new focus on their motivations. Why do they do what they do? What is their quest, their drive?

If you want to have a go:

• Choose an artist that interests you. Explore their paintings and biography.
• Think of two characters which come to your mind from your study of the paintings or biography. They could be figures depicted in the paintings or characters from the biographical details. It’s perfectly fine if the connection in your head is very loose indeed.
• Play the I wish game. Day dream about your characters’ qualities a little. Perhaps endow them with a personality trait, motivation, or skill that you wish you had.
• Produce a first draft, as always, with as much gusto as possible – you can edit it later. Don’t worry if it feels difficult, or takes you out of your comfort zone. Some of the stories that I’ve struggled to create the most have gained the best responses from readers.
• If possible, workshop your story with another writer or an avid reader.