Luster(57)

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When she doesn’t protest, I arrange her into the position I want, one limb at a time, until she is taut. There is no coy, lingering touch, though I can feel her expectation of me when I press an arch into her back, and I am struck by the soft knots of her spine, the way her body feels mutable, her age a vivid, enviable thing. I feel her commitment as she rises up onto her toes, and I have made the pose demanding on purpose, but as I collect my palette and take my place on the floor, it feels overly punitive, and I am not sure if after all of this, I will even be able to paint it faithfully. But then I see her seriousness, the way she remains as she was arranged, and the work begins on its own, her nakedness gorgeous data that in translation does not feel salacious. As we work, the light changes in the room, and the painting becomes a composite of contradictory shadows. When I turn it around to show her, she comes down onto her heels and puts a hand up to her mouth. Oh, she says, and then she takes a while to put on her clothes. I look away to give her privacy, but also because it is suddenly hard to watch, the indulgence so close to the aftermath that it feels indecent to watch her tie her shoes. But when this is done, there is no ceremony. There are no words, and she lets herself out.

When she is gone, I stow the painting in a place I am unlikely to notice it regularly, and for a moment, I feel like I’ve forgotten how to be alone. It is not that I want company, but that I want to be affirmed by another pair of eyes. The acceptable interval for which I can be embarrassed for what I said to the doctors has passed, but I still think about it for weeks, what I meant when I said I was an artist. I think about the painting in the clinic and the canvas fibers curled beneath the oil. All the raw materials that are gathered and processed into shadow and light. The pigments drawn from sand and Canterbury bells, the carbon black drawn from fire and spread onto slick cave walls. A way is always made to document how we manage to survive, or in some cases, how we don’t. So I’ve tried to reproduce an inscrutable thing. I’ve made my own hunger into a practice, made everyone who passes through my life subject to a close and inappropriate reading that occasionally finds its way, often insufficiently, into paint. And when I am alone with myself, this is what I am waiting for someone to do to me, with merciless, deliberate hands, to put me down onto the canvas so that when I’m gone, there will be a record, proof that I was here.





ACKNOWLEDGMENTS


This book wouldn’t have been possible without the support of my family and friends. Thank you to Mom, Dad, and Sam for your light and encouragement. To Doug, for giving me the first book I ever loved. To Daimion, for giving me my first sketchbook. To Evan, for being an incredible partner and friend. Every day I am in awe of your kindness. To the literary journals who championed my work when I was just beginning to write. To New York University’s MFA Program, where I met friends and mentors who lifted me up and helped me keep going. To the people in my cohort who became family and made me a better writer and person. To Katie, Zadie, Jonathan, Deborah, Hannah, and John for seeing me and pushing me. To Ellen and Martha for your care and advocacy. To my fantastic editor Jenna, who whipped this book into shape. To Na Kim for this beautiful cover. To the whole FSG team for their brilliance and enthusiasm. Thank you all for helping me make this dream a reality.





A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR


Raven Leilani’s work has been published in Granta, The Yale Review, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, Conjunctions, The Cut, and New England Review, among other publications. Leilani received her MFA from NYU and was an Axinn Foundation Writer-in-Residence. Luster is her first novel. You can sign up for email updates here.