by Kyla Stone
“Miss McKenna,” the officer says, clearing his throat. He’s slender, with pinched, water eyes and a narrow face. “I’m sorry. I must inform you that your father had a heart attack. He’s in critical condition at St. Joseph Medical Center.”
My own heart constricts. I put my hand on the processing sink to steady myself. My gaze snags on the enlarger work stations against the far wall. I would have spent my afternoon working at one of the stations, bent over the easel. Not anymore. “Thank you for telling me. I need to go home.”
The officer looks at me like he’s prepared for tears, hysteria, and now he’s got no idea what to do. But I won’t lose it. Not today. I can’t. I’ve known this was coming for years. I’ve known it like how you can sense a storm by the electric charge in the air. Still, the pain swells up inside me. I fight it down. I have to. I move to the counter to gather my things.
“Miss? That’s not all. Your sister has disappeared.”
“Disappeared?”
“Run away, is what I was told.”
Fear jolts up my spine, followed by a cold, dull anger. Not again. I stare down at the counter, at the small square faces gazing up at me from the rows of negatives. They’re all of children at a playground, an assignment for Advanced Portraiture II. They don’t matter now. Nothing here matters now. I leave the negatives, the solutions, the printed photographs drying on the rack. I take only my camera.
The officer touches my shoulder. “My condolences.” He mumbles something about the Women’s Dean collecting my father’s hospital information.
“Thank you.” My breath catches in my throat.
Everything feels far away. Things are tilting, swirling in and out of focus. I concentrate on the officer’s face. His skin is pale, almost translucent. Veins web his cheeks, a large one like a blue worm throbbing at his temple. I’d photograph his face in color, in a cool, natural light to capture the delicate netting of blue, his veins like scaffolding propping up his features, threading skin to bone.
One breath in, one breath out. Stay. In. Control. I clutch the base of my camera, the black strap wrapped around my wrist. I walk past the closed classroom doors of Berman Hall, the job openings and graduate school advertisements stapled to faded bulletin boards. I walk past posters advertising The Art Institute of Florida banquets and theatre productions and the large framed student photographs lining the walls: one the stark shadow of a chair, another a gritty close-up of an orange, another a girl with a lampshade pulled over her head.
My heart thuds in my ears, drowning out the drip of the drinking fountain, the low rumble of professors’ voices through the doors, the steady rustling of warm, restless bodies.
My legs are stiff and heavy. They’re harder and harder to control, to order one foot to lift and push forward, then the other. My mind is trapped in a thicket of fog. Is Dad okay? How bad is it this time? Where is my sister? Is she safe, just being typical wild and crazy Lux? Or has something worse happened, something my brain won’t let me even contemplate? It’s hard to think. To focus.
I stop suddenly. My advisor. He needs to know. I pivot back toward the teachers’ lounge and enter his office, knocking on the opened door. Dr. Jack Wells sits ram-rod straight in his office chair. He squints at me behind the sheen of his glasses.
I tell him what I know. The words feel alien, like they’re coming from someone else.
“When do you plan to return?”
“I don’t know,” I say, relieved he didn’t apologize or offer up empty condolences I don’t know how to respond to. Not from him, anyway. “A few days? A week maybe, I don’t really know. I have to find my sister. She’s done this before—run off. But never—never like this.”
Dr. Wells nods and scrapes a hand through his black hair. “You’ll fall behind in your studies.” His face is long and lean, his skin the color of walnuts. His eyes are quick and dark like a raven’s, absorbing everything, even light. He’s my mentor, the best professor of photography in the Southeast. “What about the competition?”
I tighten my grip on the camera strap. “I’ll be back by then.” The gallery competition for the Central Florida Metropolitan Museum of Art is huge. The finalists’ prints will be displayed next to the likes of Annie Liebowitz and Steve McCurry. The winner receives a $10,000 grant and an internship plus stipend with Photography magazine. With Dr. Wells’ guidance, I’ve made it through the preliminary rounds. I’m a semi-finalist. This can make my career.
He frowns. “The committee needs to see your submission by March 10th. That’s only two months away. If you make it as a finalist, the gallery is April 8th. You must be present to win. Are your prints prepared?”
“They will be.”
“Do you have a ticket yet?”
My heart stutters. No, of course I don’t. How much is it going to cost? I try to remember my bank account balance. It won’t be enough.
The hard lines of his face soften. “You can reimburse me later. Just get back as soon as you can.”
I nod. It’s all I can do.
“I’ll call the dean with the ticket details. I hope your father is okay. I truly do,” he says with a rare kindness.
It’s going to undo me. I grit my teeth, shoving back the emotions hovering at the edges of everything, the grief creeping up my throat. “Thank you.”
I get to the Dean’s office somehow, obtain my father’s hospital information, and hurriedly pack a few bags. My roommate, Sarah, is still in theatre practice. I send her a quick text to let her know where I’m going. There’s no one else to tell.
I take an Uber to the airport. I don’t look back at the Art Institute of Florida’s Tampa campus rapidly fading from view, its square, squat buildings casting long shadows in the brilliant white sunshine, the palm trees rustling in the breeze. If I did, I might not have the strength to leave.
On the plane, I try to read my book, Gregory Heisler’s 50 Portraits, but the sentences keep jerking on the page. My gaze won’t settle on more than two or three words before sputtering off in some other direction. I can’t find a comfortable position because I’m stuck in a middle seat. On one side, an overly muscular WWF wannabe keeps slinging his bulk across my armrest, and on the other side, a snoring business-type pokes me in the ear with the zippered end of his giant-sized pillow. The air is hot and stuffy and smells like salted peanuts. The grinding drone of the plane’s engine bores into my brain.
I stare out the oval window across snoring Pillow Guy, into the cold blackness and the wheeling fleet of stars. How am I going to do this? How can I keep things together, take care of everything? At school, it’s simple. Everything is easier. The scholarships, the grades, the friends (acquaintances, really). I imagine all the things I’d normally be doing now, dinner in the cafeteria with my roommate Sarah, a meeting with the photo editor of the university newspaper. Then more studio time in the darkroom or maybe Sarah would drag me out with her theater friends. I can see her so clearly, slouched on her bed with a script in her hands, chewing a pen while she practices her lines.
It’s all frivolous, meaningless. The only things that matter are already gone or almost gone. Already put aside in my safe, tidy compartment of lost things.
Except they aren’t gone, not even all that lost: my father may be dying in a hospital bed, my sister roaming the streets, ribbons of smoke trailing behind her, stalking circles of lamp light like an alley cat. And then the house I grew up in, crouching silently, empty but breathing, rattled with tremors, the shivers of guilt, of loneliness, of secrets. Like a living thing.
* * *
Like what you’ve read so far? Buy Who We Are Instead on Amazon.
Preview: Beneath The Skin
By Kyla Stone
For 18-year-old Sidney Shaw, life pretty much sucks. Her mom’s a drunk. Her dad's worse. At school, she's bullied by her ex-best friend.
* * *
But when Sidney is forced into group counseling with perfect, popular Arianna, she just might have a friend—if Sidney can l
et her guard down. Then there’s Lucas, the sweet and funny new guy who sees straight through her tough, snarky façade.
* * *
But Sidney’s wounds go deeper than anyone knows. When her secrets threaten to unravel, Sidney must choose. How far is she willing to go to protect her family? And who can she turn to when the unthinkable happens?
Chapter One
“Sidney Shaw, please come to the principal’s office.” The intercom hiccups with static. “Sidney Shaw, you are needed immediately in the principal’s office.”
The whole AP Spanish III class stops mid verb conjugation and turns to stare at me.
My heart jolts in my chest. I didn’t really expect to get away with it, but I guess hope springs eternal, even for a diehard cynic. Until now, anyway. I stuff my book and papers into my backpack as Mr. Primero orders everyone to refocus.
I walk through the empty halls to the principal’s office, my stomach curdling with dread. The only sounds are the rustle and murmur of voices behind closed classroom doors and my sneakers scuffing the worn floor. The secretary buzzes me through the locked door into the office suite. She’s in her twenties but wears old lady glasses. She peers at me over her cat eye frames like she knows everything, as if she’s already formulating the gossip she’s going to spread in the teacher’s lounge during her next coffee break.
“Have a seat, Miss Shaw.” She pops her gum and gestures at the parallel waiting room sofas covered in some swirly, floral pattern from the 90s. A frizzy-haired freshman curls up on one of the couches, her face an unfortunate shade of green.
I sit down on the cushion closest to the principal’s office. I’m twitchy, jumpy. My fists clench and unclench in my lap.
Voices echo through the wooden door. Apparently, the meeting started without me.
“Honestly, I don’t know that another suspension is even going to get through to her,” the high-pitched voice of the principal, Mrs. Rittenburg, echoes through the door.
“Clearly, something must be done,” says the vice-principal, Mr. Adeyemi, in his deep baritone.
There’s a new voice, muffled, edgy, irate. “I’ve had enough! That girl is a menace to society. The seriousness of this offense warrants an arrest. I want her expelled.”
Mrs. Rittenburg clears her throat. “Yes, Mr. Cole. We’ll take your concern under advisement. Rest assured, we will take appropriate disciplinary action.”
I stare at my rings. Red splotches fleck the cheap metal and plastic. My knuckles still sting. It hurt more than I thought it would, the shock waves traveling all the way up my arm. And the sound of it, the soft squelch of my fist hitting flesh. I wince.
I try not to think about expulsion, a possibility that grows stronger with every passing moment. I’ve had plenty of detentions and a few suspensions. Frank will go nuclear if I get expelled. He’ll do more than that. Acid coats the back of my throat. I swallow hard.
My knee starts shaking. You can’t exactly put expulsion on your college applications. And I can’t stay here in this pathetic, Podunk town full of cornfields and morons. I can’t.
There’s a pause in the ranting through the door. I can barely hear a fourth voice. I tilt my head without overtly looking like I’m listening.
“. . . calm down for a second.”
“Calm down for a second?” Mr. Cole bellows.
“. . . heat of the moment . . . overreacting . . . look at this from another angle.”
The fourth voice belongs to the guidance counselor, Dr. Yang. I’ve had weekly appointments with him since October of junior year, when I decided to take a stand for feminism. I may have flipped off the P.E. teacher for forcing me to wear my too-short and too-tight uniform. I may have also suggested Coach Taylor was a pervert for insisting on required activewear for adolescent minors that showcased the female form. While I’ve been stuck with Dr. Yang for a year, I’m also allowed to wear my uniform sweatpants permanently.
I don’t think I’m getting my way this time. My knee shakes harder. Green-faced girl opens her eyes, glares at me for a second, then flips on her side and turns her back.
Dr. Yang is still talking. I’ve missed a large chunk of it. “. . . gifted student . . . shame to lose . . .”
“How dare you?” Mr. Cole cuts in. “What about the malicious assault of my son?”
“. . . not technically on school grounds . . . extenuating circumstances.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me!”
Mrs. Rittenburg says something too softly for me to hear, something about, “your responsibility.”
Mr. Cole slams opens the door and storms out. It’s been four years since I last saw him, since I hung out with his step-daughter and my ex-best friend, Jasmine Cole. He looks at me and curls his upper lip in a snarl of rage, but he keeps on walking.
Mrs. Rittenburg calls me in. She stands behind her massive desk, all five feet, two inches of her, hands fisted on her hips. Vice Principal Adeyemi towers next to her.
“Sidney, I’m sure we don’t need to tell you how upset Mr. Cole is.” Mrs. Rittenburg proceeds to lecture me, her voice grating my ears. “We have a zero-tolerance bullying policy, do you understand? You need to seriously consider your future, young lady.”
“Yes ma’am.” I nod, acting concerned and adequately contrite. My pulse pounds in my ears. The lights are too bright. I’m dizzy and sick to my stomach.
Then it comes.
They’re not going to expel me.
Relief floods through me, almost enough to wash the nausea away. Almost. I murmur, “Yes ma’am,” whenever the principal pauses, keeping my gaze glued to the faded orange carpet. If I let myself meet her gaze, she’ll realize I’m not sorry. I’m not sorry at all.
Dr. Yang taps my shoulder. “My office. Now.”
I follow him out of the principal’s office and down the hall without speaking. The counseling office is small and crowded with a laminate desk, some puke-green file cabinets, and a bulletin board stuffed with inspirational clichés like, “Genius is 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration,” and, “Everyone is a Winner.” There’s a photo on his desk of a pretty Asian lady with a wide, laughing smile.
I sink into the navy blue La-Z-Boy across from his desk and cross my arms over my chest. "That guy has a major case of male PMS. Am I right?"
Dr. Yang clears his throat and smooths his slightly rumpled gray suit. He’s Korean and somewhere north of 40, the first strands of gray threading through the black hair combed across his forehead. He rests his elbows on his desk and steeples his fingers under his chin. One finger taps against his jaw.
“Are you ready to talk?”
“What for?”
“You do realize you are teetering on the edge, don’t you?” He pauses as if I’m supposed to reply. “You were almost expelled today. Mr. Cole wanted to file an assault report. He still might.”
My breath hitches in my throat. “Yeah, I got that.”
He adjusts his glasses, squinting at me like he’s trying to analyze some foreign object for the first time. “Sidney. What in the world were you thinking, beating up a twelve-year-old boy?”
“I didn’t beat him up. I was clearing up a misunderstanding.”
“You still have blood on your rings!”
I glance down at my hands, surprised he noticed. “Okay, fine. I might have hit him.”
“Whatever for?”
“I’m pretty sure he’s a demon spawn out to steal the souls of the impressionable young students of Brokewater Elementary.”
“And I’m pretty sure he’s not. Try again.”
I twirl my gold ring with the blue flower around my middle finger. “Okay, fine. He’s an alien in child-form sent to earth to gather intelligence on us. He must be destroyed before the mother ship returns.”
“Sidney, I’m on your side. When are you going to start believing that?”
I snort. No one’s on my side. I’m on my own. Always have been, always will be. “I couldn’t help myself. He has a punchable face.�
�
Dr. Yang’s finger keeps tapping his jaw. “What do you have to lose by telling me the truth?”
That one gets me. I don’t have anything to lose. And Dr. Yang saved my ass just now, whether I want to admit it or not. He’s been trying to save me for over a year. The fact that I’m beyond saving hasn’t registered on his radar yet. “Okay, fine. Look, this isn’t some adorable little kid we’re talking about here, okay? That prick is a sociopath in training. He torments my little brother constantly.”
Every day since school started three weeks ago, eight-year-old Aaron came home with red finger marks on his arms, bruised knees, rips in his shirt, and tiny pinpricks in his skin from the sharp jab of a mechanical pencil. Yesterday, a deep purple bruise pooled around his right eye. He finally admitted the bully is Jackson Cole, Jasmine’s younger brother. When he spoke Jackson’s name, something cold and dark slithered into my brain. There’s no way in hell I was letting another Cole mess with this family. Not again.
“Okay.” Dr. Yang nods emphatically. “I think I get it, but there are other ways to handle bullying.”
“You don’t understand. Aaron is—different. He can’t defend himself. Someone has to.” I tried to get Aaron to stand up for himself, but he couldn’t. He’s weak, soft in all the wrong places. He never fights back. Never. The world stomps all over him and he just lets it happen. He’s going to be someone’s prey his entire life. I can’t let that happen. I won’t. He’s good—innocent and pure in a way no one else is. I want him to stay that way.
“If bullying is an issue, one of your parents should contact the teacher or the elementary school administration.”
I snort again. In what fantasy world would that ever happen? Ma and Frank don’t even put food on the table half the time. They’re either drunk or fighting or gone. It’s my job to protect my brothers. No one else will. “Are you even serious right now?”
