You Know Me Well(32)

On the way to my locker I take a detour through the C hall where Mark’s locker is, but there’s no sign of him. No sign of Ryan, either. I’m on my way to my hall when two junior girls stop me.

“We can’t wait for your show tonight,” one of them says.

“Yeah,” says the other. “I heard all your paintings already sold. That’s so impressive. Congratulations!”

“Wow,” I say. “Thanks.”

With everything happening with Violet and Lehna and Mark, I haven’t quite processed my new status in the spotlight. It is bewildering. And I can’t exactly revel in it now, because if these girls I barely know are already privy to the information that someone bought all my paintings, Lehna must know, too.

But Lehna is actually nice to me when I get to our lockers.

“Big night,” she says.

“And to think it all started as a lie,” I say. “I keep waiting for something to go wrong. I don’t think lies are meant to come true.”

“It wasn’t a lie. It was wishful thinking. Or magical thinking? Something like that.”

I shrug. I don’t know what it was to her, but to me it just felt like deception. Like trying to make myself into something greater than myself. And now I guess it’s all come true, but I still feel less than worthy of this.

“So, I’m driving June and Uma tonight. I’d be happy to drive you, too. Like, in case you might want to have champagne? I heard there’s usually champagne at these things.…”

“Oh,” I say. “I haven’t even thought about how I’ll get there yet.”

She nods, like it’s casual, like this isn’t a peace offering. Or a test.

“You can just let me know if you want me to pick you up.” She clicks shut her lock and adds, “Even at the last minute.”

“Thank you.”

“No problem.”

She smiles, about to walk away, but I don’t want her to go. She’s being so nice and I am so undeserving. There’s so much I haven’t told her about yesterday.

“Hey,” I ask her. “Is Candace going?”

She nods and smiles.

“That’s great. I really want to get to know her better.”

“Violet’s going to be there, too, you know,” she says. “Are you going to be okay with that? It’s a lot of pressure for one night. And we both know how you are under pressure.”

I need to tell her, but the hall is almost empty. We’re going to be late for class.

“Maybe we can talk at lunch,” I say.

“Yeah, of course. See you then.”

And then she strides past me toward her class, and I should be headed to mine, too. But instead I keep standing until the bell has rung and the doors along the corridor have shut and silence has descended. Until I am alone with myself.

*

Each period brings me closer to lunch and further from the certainty that Mark’s day is being spent in post-hookup bliss. It didn’t help that when I saw Ryan in the hall he told me he’d see me later at my show.

“AntlerThorn, right?” he said. “Ha.”

“You know it.”

“No, but, come on. AntlerThorn?”

“I don’t get it. But wait, where’s Mark?”

He didn’t answer, just looked embarrassed and muttered something about getting back to the lit mag, even though we both know the last issue is finished and distributed and all that’s left to do in that class is hang out.

I check my phone as soon as I’m back in the gym locker room after volleyball. Still nothing from Mark, but there’s a message from a 415 number.

“Kate! Doll. I have good news and I have more good news disguised as bad news. First, your paintings are hung and they look just, how should I say it? Quaint. They are positively quaint. Now, the other piece of news might send you into a bit of a tizzy, but I promise you, there is nothing you can’t pull off in two hours. You are a remarkable little girl. Here it goes: It slipped my mind yesterday that all of the members of this show donated a piece to be auctioned off for programming at the Angel Project. I figured you would donate a piece that didn’t sell—because really, we never would have imagined that they would all sell—but then that collector girl surprised us! I had to pick my jaw up off the floor! And in the process I forgot all about the auction. We need a new piece from you and we need it before the show so it can be photographed for the online bidding. I have a courier scheduled to be in front of your school at two p.m. sharp. I know you can do this. Don’t you dare let me down.”

It’s a nearly impossible undertaking, but it’s also the perfect excuse to avoid Lehna. Instead of heading to the senior deck, I go to the art studio, thankful to find my teacher eating lunch in her classroom while browsing the Internet.

Have to spend lunch in the studio, I text Lehna. Just found out I have to give another painting.

Whaaat? she writes back. Because she knows better than anyone that my paintings take days. All the layers of paint that need to dry. All the details I like to add. All the colors I devote hours to mixing as I search for the perfect shade or hue. But as I set a blank canvas onto my easel and open the lid to my box of paints, I think about what Violet said. Art is about creation.

So I create.

I’m making good progress, working faster and looser than usual, not worried about getting anything right. But the lunch period is still too short. I call across the room to Ms. Gao. I tell her that it’s an emergency. “Any chance you could get me out of Ms. Rivera’s class?” Everyone knows that Ms. Gao and Ms. Rivera are friends. We’ve even seen pictures of them on Facebook in normal clothes, drinking cocktails on the weekends.