A Million Miles Away(46)

And she couldn’t keep going back and forth. She remembered what Davis had last thought about their breakup: For now, he had said. She shouldn’t give him any ideas.

At her locker, she could smell Gillian before she saw her. Hair spray. She turned, finding Gillian there, trying to look at anything in the surrounding hallway but Kelsey. Next to her, Ingrid froze.

“Please ask Kelsey if she wants to have the dance team meeting at four or four thirty tomorrow,” Gillian said, her eyes locked on Ingrid.

Things between Kelsey and Gillian had turned from bad to worse. Gillian had even requested to move desks in Chemistry, the only class they had together.

Ingrid, meanwhile, was trying to remain neutral, but found herself more on Gillian’s side because Gillian was the one who, literally and physically, yanked her there.

Ingrid looked at Kelsey, saying sorry with her eyes. “Did you hear that, Kels?”

“Four,” Kelsey said. “And, Gil, please, just talk directly to me. This is so immature.”

“Tell Kelsey she doesn’t know the definition of mature.”

“Forget it,” Kelsey said, unable to stop herself from rolling her eyes. “I have to get to Art History.”

“Hear that?” Ingrid said, talking to Gillian as they walked away. “Kelsey has to go to class.”

As usual, the room was already dark when she got there, and half empty now that the year was winding down. Mrs. Wallace was bathed in the light from a slide featuring a complex orange-and-pink flower shape. Below it were the words “Feminist Visual Culture.”

“Good afternoon, Kelsey,” Mrs. Wallace said. “You’re late, but I’ll let it go this time.”

“Sorry, Mrs. Wallace,” Kelsey said, smiling sheepishly, because she was late most days. But she was always there, and never fell asleep, like she would have had this been any other year, any other time.

“The first slide is of a painting by American artist Georgia O’Keeffe.”

Kelsey’s eyes followed the lines of the painting slowly, taking in every detail from top to bottom, as she had been taught.

“But before we get into that,” Mrs. Wallace continued, “we have to go back to the beginning. Well, a little after the beginning. We have to go back to 1848. Who can tell me what happened in 1848?”

“Pre-Raphaelites,” someone muttered.

“Exactly,” Mrs. Wallace said, pointing her remote to the projector with a dramatic wave, moving to the next slide. “The Brotherhood, as they say. Kelsey, read those names.”

Kelsey stumbled through the list.

“This is a list of people in Rossetti’s salon, one of the most exciting places to be if you were an artist at that time. They were rebelling against flat, conventional composition. People standing still in perfect portraits: boring! They wanted layers, asymmetry, backdrops, romance!” Then Mrs. Wallace smiled, pacing back and forth in her corduroy jumper. “And what do you not see?”

Kelsey’s eyes scanned the pale faces in the frame, burning to answer the question, but nothing popped into her head. She was stuck.

“Let me put it this way,” Mrs. Wallace said. “What does Rossetti’s salon and a boys’ locker room have in common?”

Kelsey cried out, “Oh! No women!”

“Bam. Right on the nose. And there’s your problem right there.…”

The rest of the class, Kelsey was riveted. Mrs. Wallace had a way of talking about the most minute details of what they were seeing so that they expanded into very big, important facts. The facts didn’t just relate to whatever time period they were studying, they were facts about the way a person looked at anything: a movie, a billboard, her mother’s decorating style. All of these types of seeing influenced one another, and they all found their root in the past.

Today Mrs. Wallace ended the class with a video clip, and as they watched, Kelsey felt something wash over her. The video was supposed to be an example of the way feminist art had evolved, to the point where the artists would use their own bodies as a canvas.

Kelsey didn’t know exactly what this meant. She imagined them painting on themselves.

And then, the artist danced. She danced in a way Kelsey had never seen before, but understood all the same. The dance awoke something in her, the same sort of feeling she would have if she had answered one of Mrs. Wallace’s questions correctly, but bigger than that. Better than that, because she could imagine herself in the artist’s shoes, losing herself to her limbs and torso and the music that played. It was as if the artist were answering a question Kelsey had asked since she was a little girl. The artist’s name was Maya. Maya Deren. She reminded Kelsey of her sister. She reminded Kelsey of herself.

When the video was over, Kelsey fought the urge to applaud.

The bell rang, but before she could gather her things, Mrs. Wallace put a hand on her arm.

“Forgetting something?”

Kelsey was still lost in thought. “Huh?”

“I graded the paper you handed in before break.” Mrs. Wallace looked at Kelsey, her eyebrows raised. “The paper on Cubism you handed in a day after the deadline? Remember?”

“Oh, yeah,” Kelsey said, clearing her throat. Her face burned. She was working harder, but it didn’t seem to be good enough. “Thank you. Sorry about that.”