Pieces of Me

by Amber Kizer

  “Now isn’t the time to joke around, son.”

  I felt him trying to push back, to hold his ground, without losing his temper. “It’s my life.” He wanted them to hear him, listen to him.

  “And you don’t want to play professional football anymore? Is that it? Wanna sell me ice in winter, dumbass?” His dad knocked over his chair when he stood.

  He’s trying to appear bigger, more intimidating. Stop bullying your son!

  “John!” Leif’s mom sounded appalled, but ruined it by continuing. “Leif, we are athletes. That is who we are. You can’t waste your talent. We won’t let you.”

  “Let me?” Leif pushed back from the table and thrust away from them. I prayed his knee wouldn’t buckle and suck the drama out of it.

  His dad isn’t taller anymore—does he know?

  “Leif!” Dad yelled.

  “Son!” Mom added at top volume.

  “Let me?” he repeated, shaking. He’d never disobeyed them. Ever. Their expressions said it all. They didn’t know how to deal. Their perfect son stomped from the room and slammed the front door. He broke into a jog that quickly turned into a full-out sprint. He ignored the shooting pain, the crackling of scar tissue, the pop of a joint still healing.

  I wish I could stay behind and listen to his parents. But then again, they probably didn’t speak for hours. The shock was that epic.

  The knock on the glass door of Art and Soul jerked Vivian out of her thoughts, but she ignored whoever was out there. Closed meant closed. She’d been staring at the eyes for the last hour. Eyes made up of tiny butterflies of cream (Pantone 9180) and songbirds in chocolate (Pantone 732). But they weren’t quite right. The richness of the brown mellowed the cream, but didn’t pop. They seemed sad. She frowned when she heard the door rattle again.

  Then pounding started.

  Someone knew she was inside.

  She put down her paint and tubes and rolled her head around her shoulders. It was late. After dinner and the store was closed on Sunday nights. No missed calls on her phone and no messages.

  She crept toward the front of the store, wondering if one of the street’s nighttime residents was looking for a place to sleep. It wouldn’t be the first time. When she saw Leif’s hair, the top of his head haloed under the entrance’s light, she slowed her step. Relief surged, followed by anger, glazed with another emotion she couldn’t name, but made her giddy.

  “He hasn’t called,” she whispered to herself, hoping to hang on to a little of the mad. She hadn’t heard from him since pizza at her house. She thought … she thought he’d decided he didn’t want to be her friend. It wouldn’t be the first time her reality wasn’t the pleasant picture most envisioned. He wouldn’t be the first to run in the opposite direction.

  Leif’s hair was wet, not from sweat, but from the steady fall of rain outside. When had it started to rain? His expression broke her heart and made her fingers fumble with the keys. She hurried to unlock the door and step back. But she didn’t know what to say.

  He hesitated, dripping at the threshold.

  “Coffee?” she asked.

  He nodded. A shiver racked his shoulders.

  Broad, muscular, sexy shoulders. I wasn’t the only one thinking objectified thoughts.

  Leif followed Vivian back into the darkened workroom; spotlights from single flood bulbs illuminated her easel and area, but left the rest of the studio plunged into shadow. The light washed out the color and softened the edges of the room. It made it easier for her to focus on the canvas.

  “Sugar? Milk?” she asked, heading toward the break room.

  Leif’s arms were crossed and she saw the little muscle on his jaw clench and unclench as if out of habit. “Lots of each.”

  “Don’t look, okay?” Vivian pointed to her easel when she reached the doorway. She didn’t want to leave him alone if he’d peek.

  “Is it me?” Leif grinned.

  “No.”

  “Fine.” Leif shrugged, as if it wasn’t a difficult request to accommodate.

  Curiosity is not his vice. Personally, I’d have snuck over and taken a gander at it, especially since she told him it was a secret. He stayed exactly where she left him. His entire brain was focused on the future, and choosing to goof off like guys at school. About becoming the very thing his parents feared most. A loser.

  Vivian’s heart sped up, my heart thumped, and she quickly inhaled a breath for calm before she stepped back into the studio. I’d have done the same thing.

  “It’s late for a workout, isn’t it?” Vivian handed him a mug, and sipped her hot chocolate.

  “Skipping family dinner,” he replied.

  “You do that a lot?”

  He squinted. “What?”

  “Skip out on things?”

  Leif chuckled, almost spilling his drink with surprise.

  It’s a fair question.

  “What’d I say?” Vivian asked.

  Leif huffed disbelief. “I don’t skip out on anything. I am the guy who understands obligation and commitment.” He lowered his gaze. “I even went to extra physical therapy and doctors to make my parents happy. The sports medicine doc didn’t know why we were there. So, no, I don’t quit anything. This is only the second time I’ve walked out.”

  She hemmed, thinking, then asked, “The first was the award thing?”

  “Yeah.”

  Silence of palest blue (Pantone 9044) with edges of soft pink (Pantone 677) drifted between them.

  Leif opened and closed his mouth several times. She waited for him to find the words, sensing that he needed to share, but in his own time. “Three hours after I woke up in the hospital, my dad told me that the lap record was twenty-three.”

  “Laps around what? The hospital floor?” she asked.

  “Yep. He expected me to double that.”

  “How’d he even know there was a record?”

  “He probably asked. ‘There are records all around, son. We only have to know them to break them.’ ” Leif deepened his voice and added a layer of bitter to his tone.

  Curious, Vivian asked, “So did you? Break the record?”

  “Of course.” Leif answered as if it was a given.

  “He sounds harsh.”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. I didn’t used to think so.”

  “Why’d you leave dinner tonight?” Vivian’s thoughts wandered to Leif’s eye color, wondering if the color came in a tube, or if she’d have to custom mix it.

  “Promise you won’t laugh?” He finished his coffee in a gulp.

  “Promise.” Vivian said the word with the fullest possible intent behind each letter. She promised with all of her.

  “I’ve been playing with the guitar. Writing songs.”

  “Really? That’s awesome.” And so not what she expected to hear.

  You don’t want to hear.

  “You think?”

  She nodded vigorously. “Way hard to write a good song.”

  “That’s just it. I don’t think they’re any good.” Lamenting, he shook his head.

  “And you know how?”

  He’s a genius.

  “I don’t.” Leif laughed, his glance darting toward her easel. “Did you always know you wanted to paint? I mean, once you started—is it what you were meant to do?”

  “I think I’ve always seen the world in colors.”

  “Like those Pantimi—”

  “Pantone.” She smiled.

  “Sorry, it doesn’t stick.”

  “That’s okay. I don’t know the first thing about breaking records. I’m more a middle-of-the-pack girl.”

  “That’s not true.” The intensity of Leif’s gaze made Vivian turn twelve shades of red on the inside. So many hues, she couldn’t even begin to name them.

  He continued. “You paint people, right? But they’re different than usual. What do you call it?”

  “I paint the parts of people no one sees. All the pieces, all the miracles that go into making them who they are.” />
  “You sound like this guy I know. Everything is a miracle.”

  “It’s true, though. Most people take time for granted.”

  Leif agreed. “That’s what I’m trying to avoid.”

  “What did you say to your parents when you walked out?”

  He ignored her question and countered with his own. “Where do you see yourself in five years? College? Painting? What?”

  Where did Vivian see herself? The only place Vivian knew for sure she’d be was in the cemetery, and even then she didn’t know if that was tomorrow, or next week, or ten years from now. “I don’t know.”

  She really doesn’t.

  “You must have an idea.”

  “I don’t. I try not to think too far ahead.” She shrugged, returning his gesture.

  He sighed. “And I can’t stop.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My whole life has been a schedule. My parents decided I played football in the fall, then ran track in the spring to keep in shape for football. That I will win the Heisman and be drafted in the first round.”

  “What about concussions and stuff? Don’t you have to worry about that now?”

  “According to my dad, bell ringing is part of the game.”

  “You believe that?”

  “No, but they do, and that’s all that matters.”

  “I don’t get it. Why can’t you stop?” The idea of planning anything, let alone a life like Leif’s, was a foreign concept to Vivian.

  “If I don’t work out hard this summer, I probably won’t get my starting spot back. If I don’t get a starting spot, the scouts won’t come, which means I’ll have to go to whatever college wants me, which means that affects my Heisman hopes, and the draft and what team I get or if I even get drafted, and—”

  “Stop! I get it. I get it.” Vivian set her cocoa down. “You really think about all that?”

  “How can you not? With painting or whatever?”

  Why didn’t she? The answers were easy. “What’s the point? God laughs at our plans. Why not take everything one day at a time?”

  Leif frowned. “How do you not set goals?”

  “I have goals.” Did she? Vivian paused. Didn’t she?

  “Like what?” he pressed.

  “What everybody wants—a family, a house, a job I like.”

  Sure, those sound good. Pull something else generic out of your happy rainbow ass, please.

  “Is that what everyone wants? ’Cause this last year none of those things were on my list of goals,” Leif replied.

  Vivian didn’t know. Most days she thought about the next meal, the next dose of pills, the next physical-therapy torture session. Not amorphous future wishes. No one got guarantees; why be disappointed in something she couldn’t control? “What do you want? Really? Don’t you want to play football?”

  “It’s what I’m known for. It’s what my parents think I’ll do.”

  What was she known for? For coughing in the middle of videos so loudly the teachers paused until she left the room. For missing events because she was hospitalized for treatments, or blockages, or infections. For being the weird short girl who looked as though she belonged in the elementary school no matter what grade she was in. “Right, but what do you want?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to figure out. See what else might be out there. What do you really want?”

  “I told you. I take life one day at a time.”

  “That’s good. But then what?”

  “What do you mean?” Frustration sizzled and popped (Pantone 166).

  Slow down, Leif, you’re pushing her too hard. She’s going to snap.

  “What career do you want? Where are you going? Do you want to live here or move somewhere else? What’s on your bucket list?” Leif stood and paced. He rattled off questions in a rapid-fire, no-nonsense way that made Vivian cringe.

  She stared back at him, unable to even begin to answer.

  He broke it down into single bites. “Do you want to go to college?”

  “Sure.” Her tone suggested he change the subject.

  “Where?”

  “Uh—” Vivian shifted in her seat. She wanted him to stop. Needed him to stop.

  He plowed on, oblivious to her agitation. “Get married? Have kids?”

  “Sure. Maybe.” Her expression dimmed; she, too, stood and crossed the room away from him. She gave him her back and waited for the stinging knife of reality to ease.

  “What’d I say? Don’t all girls want kids?” Leif asked with utter sincerity.

  Seriously? Is he a Neanderthal? Me have womb, must have baby.

  “Um, no, they don’t.” Vivian wasn’t about to tell him that her CF and antirejection meds made being a mom something she really couldn’t think about. It went into the column of things she shouldn’t think about. Didn’t think about. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

  “Oh, sorry.” He stopped.

  “It’s okay. I should get back to work. I need to go home soon.” Vivian randomly picked up paint and held it up for him to see, like a prop.

  No, it’s not okay.

  His expression tortured, he knew he’d wrecked their fragile trust, hurt her, and made her angry. But he had no idea how to begin fixing it.

  Boys.

  “Really. Can you go?” she insisted.

  “I’ll see you later?” he asked.

  “Sure,” she answered, but her breath held until the front door smacked shut behind him. He didn’t mean to be insensitive. She knew.

  I knew she wouldn’t sleep tonight. Not with thoughts of Leif and her impossible future racing in her mind.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “Vivian, baby, we need to talk,” her mom called out as Vivian came down the stairs the next morning.

  For a heartbeat, she wondered if they’d received a phone call from the doctor.

  Which one? Why?

  Both of her parents sat in the living room wearing the same weary expression (Pantone 19-6110), but their gazes seemed tinged with anger.

  Disappointment? Frustration?

  Vivian braced herself, and automatically I did too. There was a universal gleam in parental stares of negativity.

  “Your teacher called.”

  Vivian nodded. Which one?

  Any of them. All of them.

  “You’re failing history,” her mom offered.

  And soon Spanish, and math, and chemistry. Should have studied for that test instead of painting. Instead of watching classic ESPN to try to learn football terminology. Instead of daydreaming about Leif even though you’re mad at him.

  Her dad reprimanded her gently. “We’ve always been so proud of you. You’ve kept up your studies and your grades. Even in, and out of, the hospital. All these years you’ve done so well.”

  “What’s going on?” her mom added, as if there must be an explanation, a reasonable one, like a misunderstanding, or a prank phone call.

  They spoke to her as if she might break every time they discussed anything serious. As if they were afraid she’d die with their last interaction one of anger. They tiptoed. Her parents meant well. My mother would have lectured me on how it looked to fail. Appearances were not at the top of Vivian’s family motto. I envied her that. But only that. They watched her as if their lives depended on it, not hers.

  She cleared her throat. “Nothing’s going on.”

  “Something’s changed.” Her dad shook his head.

  “Is it that boy?” her mom asked.

  “No.” Vivian didn’t sit down. “I’ve been busy.”

  “Too busy for school?”

  I saw them share a glance and I wondered if they’d discussed a strategy before we got there. They seemed more united and more willing to upset Vivian than I’d ever witnessed.

  “Then we need to clear your calendar.”

  “Mom.” Vivian shook her head.

  “If you can’t work at the store, and paint, and do your school-work, then we have a problem.” Her mom’s wor
ds and expression pushed with the strength of steel (Pantone 18-4005 TCX).

  “You need to paint less, or quit your job,” her dad added.

  “School is not the part of your commitments that should lapse.”

  For Vivian, the idea of not being around her paints, her colors, or the studio filled her with a searing heartbreak of swirled emotions. Part fiery pain (Pantone 1797) and part suffocating blackness (Pantone 19-4305).

  “My painting pays the bills,” Vivian reminded them, with a hint of her own anger. Her medical bills were astonishing, but ever since her career took off, the money from the paintings she sold paid for more than only her medical expenses. They couldn’t mean give up painting—not really.

  I think they might.

  “And is your college fund,” her mother reminded her.

  “But we’ve discussed this, you don’t have to pay—” Clearly uncomfortable discussing money, her dad backpedaled.

  “Yes, I do.” Vivian trembled. She refused to listen to her parents pace or sit at the dining room table with piles of bills and a calculator late into the night like they had when she was little. Not ever again.

  “We would figure it out,” her mom stated.

  “How?” She turned toward her mom. “And I don’t need a college fund.”

  They gaped and spoke over each other. “Why not?” and “You don’t want to go?”

  She gave them a bland stare. “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t have to work for minimum wage.”

  “I love working at Art and Soul.”

  “Well, you can’t love everything.” Her mother’s exasperation gained momentum.

  “I don’t love school!” Vivian shouted.

  I blanched at her tone, but for the first time heard self-confidence in her voice. This is new. Maybe the last time the kids made fun of her ate at her.

  “Vivian!” her dad shouted.

  Her mom stood. “You don’t have to love school. It’s necessary.”

  “Why is it necessary?” Vivian enunciated each word, a hammer to a nail.

  “Because it is.”

  “That’s a good reason.” Vivian rolled her eyes.

  “Don’t do that, young lady.”

  “You need to graduate so you can go to college.”

  “And get a good job.”

  They were so agitated, none of them noticed they shouted, hoarse and raspy.