While You Were Gone

by Amy K. Nichols

  It takes us forever to get back to our side of town. Too bad we don’t have our own driver. All we have is a lot of walking and the light-rail. Upside is, it gives us time to talk.

  “So that was the first time you met M in person?”

  “Yep.” Germ shifts the bag on his shoulder. “First time you met him, too.”

  “Too bad the other Danny missed out.”

  Germ smirks. “He’ll be pissed. We’ve been doing deals with M for years, but always through a third party. We never could get close to him. He’s super secretive. Impossible to find unless he wants to be found.”

  We cross a street and walk into a park. Early-morning joggers and dog walkers pass by. “Wanna hear something crazy?” It’s a risk, but trusting Germ has only been a good thing so far. “I know him from my other life.”

  “Shut. Up.” He turns around and walks backward to face me. “You’re friends with Mastermind, but not me?”

  “He’s not much of a mastermind there. And I’m not friends with him. Probably safe to say he hates my guts.”

  “Why?”

  I look out across the park so I don’t have to look him in the eye. “I sort of…bullied him. Bad.”

  His mouth falls open, which makes me feel like crap. “If you did that here, you’d end up wearing concrete shoes in the harbor.”

  I try to imagine either version of Warren being some kind of Mafia lord. It’s weird how things are the same here, but different. Like a game with all the right pieces but a different set of rules. “In my world, he’s a scrawny nerd.”

  Germ laughs. “Well, here M’s got connections up the wazoo. Mess with Mastermind and you can kiss your ass goodbye.”

  We leave the park and walk into a neighborhood. The sun is starting to rise, and the clouds don’t seem as heavy. A leaf scoots by on the breeze. I stomp on it, then pick it up and twirl it by the stem. “You know what else is crazy?”

  “You know her, too.” He sees my face and laughs. “Not like it’s some huge surprise. You guys couldn’t keep your hands off each other. I figured there had to be some kind of history.”

  The thought of her arms around me short-circuits my brain. I clear my throat. “The weird part is, we’re not together in my world. She sits next to me in English, but we never talk. Also, I think she’s friends with M.”

  “Hang on.” He stops. “The other Danny, my best friend, has a thing going with the governor’s daughter here, and he doesn’t even tell me?”

  “Governor’s daughter?”

  “That’s Eevee Solomon, Governor Solomon’s daughter.” He starts walking again. “She’s totally swank, dude. Wonder what she sees in a punk like you.”

  I swing but he dodges, laughing. “Seriously, though. Good thing she was there. That raid was insane.”

  “Yeah, we were lucky.” The question I’d wanted to ask him up on the mountain pops into my head. “Hey, what are Bounders?”

  “Crazy people,” he says. “Ultimate survivalists. They’d rather live down in the DMZ than under the government’s rules.”

  “DMZ?”

  He gawks at me, then shakes his head. “Let me guess. In your world, there’s no war with Mexico.”

  “No,” I say, wondering if he’s pulling my leg. “Not since a really long time ago. Like, before we were a country.”

  “Well, here we have a truce and a demilitarized zone to enforce it. It’s been like that forever. Forty years or something. Anyway, Bounders go live off the land out in the middle of nowhere.” He moves his finger in a circle by his head. “Like I said, loco.”

  “Why doesn’t the government just go round them up?”

  “And break the truce with Mexico? Too risky.”

  Seems like a lot of things in this world are risky. “Think we should sign on for M’s plan?”

  “We don’t have much of a choice,” Germ says. “Once you know something, you can’t unknow it, you know? Besides, we owe him.” He rattles the bag.

  “And if we get caught?”

  He shrugs. “We’ll just call your girlfriend for help.”

  This time I swing and get him.

  “Come on,” he says, laughing. “We’re gonna be late to school.”

  I stop home, thinking I’ll just grab my stuff and go. Germ waits while I run inside. I’m barely through the front door, though, when I freeze in my tracks.

  Mom sits on the loveseat in the front room, her cane resting against her leg, a piece of paper in her hand. She looks wiped out, like she’s been up all night.

  And that’s when I realize. She has been up all night. She slept there. On the couch. I was out, and she sat here waiting for me.

  That’s what parents do.

  She exhales, relief written all over her face, and uses her cane to push herself up.

  “Mom—”

  She hands me the paper and walks out of the room. The corners are curled from her working her worry out on them. Inside, in angry caps, is Dad’s writing.

  WHAT ARE YOU THINKING?

  I refold the paper and pinch the crease tight between my thumb and finger. I wasn’t thinking, of course. Why would I? No one’s ever cared about what time I got home. No one’s ever cared if I even came home.

  I stick my head out the door, where Germ is waiting. “You better go on without me.”

  “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah,” I lie. “Just some stuff I need to take care of.”

  Thursday passes in a blur. I’m both tired and exhilarated, and all I can think about is seeing him again on Saturday, like we planned.

  After we said goodbye, I went back to my room and dove into a new painting. My mind raced with ideas as my brush returned again and again to the canvas. I walked through most of the day with a paint smudge over my right eyebrow, and when someone brought it to my attention, I didn’t even care.

  After my last class, I hurry back to my room to work on it some more. Setting an alarm so I’m not late for evening open studio, I flip all of my paintings over to their outlaw sides and sit down in front of the easel.

  So far the painting is varying shades of black, spackled on with the palette knife. It looks like an angry storm. Cool, but not quite the effect I’m hoping for. I load up a brush with blue and work to lighten the center of the dark. Instead of a storm, it begins to look more like night. I use gray and ocher to pull the hint of a face from the shadows, eyes closed, mouth open in a silent scream. Two hands with palms flat, one at either side of the unseen body. White highlights to sharpen the pain and contrast the dark. In the blackness you can almost see her body, but it’s kind of like looking at a star—the more you look right at it, the less you can see. It’s a pretty cool effect. I’m surprised I could pull it off. The work I’ve done imitating Klee’s Melancholic Child must be helping. The details of the face are surprising. Dark hair and eyes. She looks a lot like me. The alarm sounds. Forty minutes have passed by in a blink. I set her aside to dry, clean up my brushes and head out.

  The evening is cool, and the breeze skitters leaves along the sidewalks. Students hang out in the open areas around campus and lounge in the grass beneath the towering trees. Seeing them makes me think of Danny, the feeling of his hand in mine. I wish he were here.

  The door of the Fine Arts Building is heavy and creaks open. Inside, I’m met with the roar of the furnaces in the glassblowing shop. I tie my cardigan around my waist and maneuver through the hallways. Snatches of opera mingle with student voices and far-off footfalls. Pavarotti this time. Vincerò. Vincerò.

  When I open the studio door, reality hits me. Scraps of canvas cover the worktable in the far corner. My paintings are still ruined. Belford is further away than ever.

  Vivian is set up at her canvas under the window, working on her jury paintings, no doubt. I ignore her, pulling on my apron and making my way over to the corner that’s been cordoned off like a crime scene.

  The pieces of Confidante are now labeled like puzzle pieces and stacked inside a clear plastic bag. I’ve
found some bits of what I think is Virtue, and more that I’m pretty sure are Reading by Candlelight, but not enough to try to piece either back together. Candlelight is the easier of the two to find, given the bright yellow hues, so I start sifting through the pieces again, my back to the room.

  It doesn’t take long before I’m knee-deep in hopelessness.

  Bosca must sense it. He appears at my left, one hand on his chin, shaking his head at the mess on the table. “Come,” he says. “Take a break. Paint something new.” He leads me away from the table toward an easel he’s set up.

  “But you said I should try to find—”

  He walks to the supply closet and pulls out a fresh canvas. “Now I say paint. See what happens.”

  I sigh, frustrated yet relieved. Painting is what I love and what makes me feel like me, so yes, of course, please let me paint. But—

  “There’s no way I can get new work done in time for the jury,” I say, pulling my brushes from the cubby.

  He waves off my concern. “Just paint. See what happens.” He walks over to Vivian.

  It’s a little canvas. Maybe that’s his thinking: create some small paintings that are good enough to represent what I’ve learned in the last two years studying under him. I guess it’s worth a shot.

  As I stare into the whiteness of the canvas, I hear Warren’s words: You know what you should do? Paint mash-ups of art and science. I see his hands moving in slo-mo like an implosion. My own hands move instinctively, adding paint to my palette, choosing the right brush.

  “Good,” Bosca says, looking over Vivian’s work. A female voice comes on the radio, spreading an aria through the room. I push the sounds away and focus. Using the same strokes I did for the night portrait back in my room, I build up a base of grays and blues before loading my brush with magenta. I lean in close so that paint is all I see, and try to imagine the space between atoms, the ninety-nine percent nothingness of electron shells, and touching without really touching. The bright purple swirls through the murky background. The color is powerful. The effect is dizzying. My body sways with the motion of the brush.

  “What is this?”

  Antonio’s voice breaks the spell. My brush stops midstroke, purple paint seeping up through the bristles.

  “This is…” He waves his hand at the canvas. “This is not you. This is like child’s painting.”

  I pull the brush back.

  “I thought—” I look at the black globe on the ceiling, the Spectrum camera inside. I press the brush into the canvas and swish it around, smearing the colors, destroying what I created. “This is just…a base coat.”

  He shakes his head and walks off muttering, then halfway across the room stops and puts a finger in the air. “Ah!” He turns back, a smile on his face.

  He points at Vivian. “You.” And he points at me. “And you.” He motions both of us over.

  Vivian and I make uneasy eyes at each other as we walk from our opposite corners to the center. She gets there first and crosses her arms, an annoyed look on her face.

  “I have brilliant idea.” Bosca grins, his fingers entwined and resting at the top of his stomach. “You will be partners. Work together.”

  I gasp at the same time Vivian says, “What?” We launch into reasons against his “brilliant” idea, but Bosca holds up his hands to silence us.

  “Who is in charge? Yes. Me. Vivian, you help her with subjects. Eevee, you help Vivian with technique. Go.”

  Neither of us moves until he shoos us away. “Go. Be brilliant.”

  Brilliant.

  Vivian crosses her arms again and stands with one hip sticking out. “There’s more light where I’m set up.”

  I roll my eyes. “Fine.” I walk back over to my station, pack up my stuff and move to the other side of the room, dumping the art-science mash-up in the garbage and grabbing a new canvas along the way.

  She scoots her easel over. The tension between us is thick. As I set up my stuff again, I glance at the table where I sorted through my ruined paintings. Even sifting through my despair would be better than this.

  The light on this side of the room emphasizes how empty my canvas is. The idea of painting anything on it right now is about as appealing as going to the Governor’s Gala with Chad. After fidgeting with my brushes for too long, I try to glance at Vivian’s work. She’s turned it so I can’t see. “What are you working on?”

  She takes so long to answer I think maybe she’s going to ignore me. “The old house over on Lone Mountain.”

  I step around to look. She bristles like a porcupine.

  Her painting is fine, actually. The manor house is set back in the trees, with a blue sky above. It’s nice. She’s added fine details around the door and the walk leading to it. The foxgloves are pretty.

  She sighs. “Bosca says it’s missing something.”

  He’s right. It’s missing warmth. Emotional connection. Soul. If it were my painting, I know how I’d fix it, but do I tell her? Do I help her chances with the jury? My own defenses go up. “I think it’s good.”

  She dabs more green into the trees. “Thanks. What are you going to paint?”

  “No idea.” I go back to my stool and stare at the canvas. “Any brilliant suggestions?”

  She touches her brush to her palette and returns it to the canvas. “Nope.”

  I close my eyes and let my mind wander. Was the rave really only a few hours ago? I take a deep breath, imagining I’m breathing in the dusty night air. Imagining I’m weaving through a sea of cars, through a chain-link fence, through an archway of stone. Lights strobe behind my eyelids. Opera fades to a droning that begins soft but grows until all I hear is the beat all around me. My mind searches for him among the writhing bodies.

  “What are you doing?”

  My eyes fly open. Vivian is staring at me. “You’re, like, dancing or something.”

  “Oh.” My face feels hot. “Sorry.”

  “It’s distracting.”

  “I said I was sorry.” I move my stool away and try not to think about how stupid that must have looked. Focus, Eevee. What do I paint? The castle’s rock towers? The lasers? The people dancing? A zing of panic rushes over me as images of the DPC guards storming into the courtyard flash through my mind. No, no, no. All of those things could trace me to last night. I need to find something else. Something safe, but not safe. Something that looks innocent, but isn’t.

  And then the answer is there. I don’t even need to close my eyes to see it. I add new colors to my palette, choose a brush and get to work. My hands move with the same instinctiveness they had when I painted the portrait of the girl emerging from the dark. Inside, I have the same feeling of confidence. It’s like a voice whispering, This is right.

  “Is that grass?”

  My hand jolts back from the canvas and I almost jump down Vivian’s throat, but instead I take a breath and answer, “Yes.”

  “Huh.”

  She broke my groove. “How’s your house coming along? Do you want help?”

  She doesn’t answer, but I can tell from her face she hasn’t figured out how to make the painting work. I set my palette down and stand beside her. She’s been working since we got here, but the painting looks exactly the same. And it still has no soul.

  Her shoulders droop.

  “You know what you should try?” I glance over at Antonio. He’s humming and painting away. “A kitten.”

  She looks at me with her eyebrows furrowed.

  “I’m serious.” I’m not serious. “Kittens are a symbol of everything that is right in the world. What’s better than a kitten? The jury will love it.” Maybe I’m laying it on too thick.

  “Really?”

  She looks intrigued. Maybe I’m laying it on just right.

  “Think about it.” I give her an enthusiastic, and completely fake, smile.

  It isn’t a total lie. If she thought about it, she’d realize putting a kitten in her painting would make it the equivalent of hotel art. Hesita
ntly, Vivian returns my smile.

  “See?” Antonio’s voice carries across the studio. “Working together is so much better!” He launches into a crazy rendition of The Barber of Seville. I sit back on my stool and pick up my brushes, ignoring the guilt inside.

  When I leave the studio, the guilt still nags me. That was maybe the jerkiest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Even if she deserved it. I didn’t get another look at her painting, so I don’t know if she put a kitten in or not.

  On my way back to my room, I stop to inspect the grass where Danny and I walked. I study how all the different shades of green create a seamless image. Kind of like a Seurat or a Monet. From a distance, it just looks green, but up close, there’s a whole range of colors.

  Satisfied, I cross the street toward my dorm. A girl stops me. “Are you Eevee?”

  I’ve never seen her before. “Yes…?”

  She hands me a piece of paper and walks away. I watch her disappear around the corner before unfolding the note.

  At least this time I know how to read it.

  Warren’s room must be in McKinley Hall, and apparently I’m meeting him there on Saturday. What’s it going to be this time, a house party?

  Dad carries a dish from the kitchen counter to the table. He hasn’t said a word since he got home from work. Mom hasn’t said much either. I tried talking to her before I left late for school, but she never came out of her room. After school, she busied herself around the house, moving away from wherever I was. I walked into the living room, and as soon as I said “Mom,” she closed her book and went to the kitchen. I followed her in there but she turned the faucet on full blast and rattled the dishes. When I tapped her on the shoulder, she shut the water off and left, saying, “I’m tired. We’ll talk later.”

  This whole caring thing? It’s hard.

  “Help your mother,” Dad says, setting the bowl of potatoes on a hot pad. I jump out of my seat and rush into the kitchen to carry whatever’s left that needs carrying. Mom takes two glasses of milk. I grab the third and a plate of roasted chicken and follow her back to the table. Classical music from the stereo in the living room fills the silence between us.