Chapter 60
Mila
Four weeks later
“ This is shit,” Camilla grunts, her lips puckering so tight they look like the knot tying a balloon closed.
“ This is the best I can do.” Actually, I think it ’ s good. It looks exactly like our model. I ’ m impressed with myself.
“ What ’ s wrong with it?” I throw my hands up. In the past, I would have dipped my chin and nodded.
“ It looks dead.”
I look at my drawing and then the model.
“ Where is her soul?” Camilla slaps the paper. “ Capture it here. Take it out of her eyes and trap it on the paper.” She flips her hair as she turns. “ Try again, American.”
◆◆◆
“ How is it possible that you ’ re getting worse?” Camilla tilts her head, studying my drawing as if it ’ s a great offense for which she is going to launch a massive attack.
The other students ignore her critique of my work. I pray the rest don ’ t know English so they can ’ t hear my level of failure. I know she ’ s just as harsh with them. I think Camilla likes to fight. She likes to push and pull and see what ’ s inside.
Good thing she took to art and not a profession with a blade, or I ’ d be learning from the next serial killer.
“ I can ’ t.” I kick my legs out. “ I ’ m an abstract artist. You feel no passion because I have no passion to draw people!”
“ Abstract artists are cowards; they lack discipline and control. Instead of using technique, they throw fits and make shit on the canvas, then sell it to the world.”
“ Shit that is sold for millions.”
“ You can market it however you want. It ’ s still shit and an insult to the meaning of art. Look where you are. Italian art is art.” She touches her heart. “ It ’ s memories and moments captured, not mediums that can be interpreted numerous ways.”
A ripple of anger washes over my skin. “ Art is expressive. It doesn ’ t have to be a detailed portrait.”
She looks down her nose at me. “ Says a coward. Art is clear and precise. It ’ s history, a memory. It ’ s a story! Tell me a story, American. Tell me your story.” she walks away and returns with a mirror that she clips onto my easel. “ Look in the mirror and paint me a self-portrait, Mila.”
“ No.” I grimace, eyeing that mirror like a giant spider clinging to the walls of my mind.
“ Why? You have the skill. I know it, I see it, but as soon as you start to make a shape that resembles a person, you scurry away and scribble over the lines, filling the canvas with marks to hide it.”
“ That ’ s not what I do!” It is . I make scars. I did them on myself once, and now I do them in my art.
“ It is,” she shrugs and smirks. I curl my fingers in so they don ’ t reach out and smack her.
“ You will paint a portrait in my class or nothing at all.”
What the fuck is her problem?
I ’ m paying her to take this class! No wonder it is nearly empty. Only someone insane would pay to endure this.
“ This is bullshit.” I spit.
“ What ’ s bullshit is you refusing to paint a self-portrait. Why?”
“ Because I hate myself!” I shout. The sound of pencils halting on the paper fills the silence after my outburst. But I can ’ t stop, neither can the tears coming down my eyes. “ I don ’ t want to look in the mirror.” I smack it off the easel like a child lashing out.
Shatter! It breaks beneath my feet.
Unphased, Camilla kicks pieces away with the tip of her black leather heels. “ I didn ’ t say the class was over.” She barks at the others.
“ I still want my portrait, American.”
Fuck this shit! Standing, I grab my charcoal so hard it snaps. I press it deep into the paper, making a question mark. “ I don ’ t know who I am!” I scribble over it until the paper is nearly black. “ There!” I throw the charcoal down. “ There ’ s your stupid self-portrait.” I grab my backpack, leaving behind all my art supplies, and rush towards the door.
“ I ’ ll see you tomorrow.” Camilla ’ s voice is teaming with pride.
“ Fuck off!”
◆◆◆
Two weeks later.
“ It takes one second, one moment of hesitation, for your attacker to gain the advantage.” Ouch! I look down and see my thumb curled into my fist. I quickly correct it.
“ When you strike, you have to be committed! You can not self-doubt. Don ’ t let fear take hold of you. You will be no better than a leaf brushing against a slab of granite. Hit! Hit strong. Be a hammer, not a leaf! Now go! One, two jabs, jab, uppercut!”
I mimic the instruction on the screen, punching the air with all my might. Oops! I lose my balance and gracefully spin around to face the computer screen. I ’ ve been taking self-defense classes, which I find for free online. I look like a fool punching the air, but it makes me…optimistic.
For the first time since I ran, I ’ m happy. I ’ m still scared, but I realized I don ’ t need to rid myself of fear; anxiety makes you alert and allows you to cherish the safe moments you are gifted with.
By the time I ’ m done punching the invisible attacker, I take a shower, jump onto my squeaky bed, and grab my sketchbook.
I haven ’ t returned to Camilla ’ s class, and I know why.
She was right. I used abstract art as a deflection. Portrait drawing requires you to not just look at your subject, but in order to really capture them, you have to dig deeper. Like painting the secretive smirk the Mona Lisa has or those wide piercing eyes like the Lady with the Pearl Earring possesses, it ’ s about taking a moment of honesty, a truth, a secret, a soul and forever sealing it onto the canvas.
I knew if I looked at the people surrounding me, my canvas would be dark.
Maybe that ’ s what the world needs. More light shining in the darkness.
I ’ ve been trying to outrun my darkness, but it ’ s a part of me. I ’ m ready to accept that. My world isn ’ t the same as Nonnina ’ s. I was born to be a black swan; I need to stop trying to change my feathers and embrace my colors. I ’ m ready to look people in the eye.
My inhale is hot, perfectly carved out of my lungs like a newly printed coin hitting the fresh air. I open the door to the art studio with my shoulders back and head held high.
Camilla ’ s eyes find mine. She nods towards my waiting corner chair and easel. A new mirror is resting on the stand. I drop my bag and slowly set up my supplies.
Italian heels click off the tile as Camilla comes to stand in front of me.
“ I ’ m sorry.” I confess.
“ I ’ m not. Never apologize for passion.”
Reaching out, I touch the mirror. “ How did you know I would come back?”
“ Americans are stubborn. They don ’ t like to lose.”
My lip tugs up.
“ I know I ’ m hard on you. I am on all my students. I had a sister once.” Camilla ’ s nose tilts up, as do her eyes. “She had so many secrets. She bottled them up tighter than a vintage wine. She would watch me paint and continuously question me about my subjects. I asked her why she didn ’ t paint if she was so interested.”
Her eyes connect with a minuscule dot on the ceiling. “ She said it was best if her ideas never left her mind.”
I lick my dry lips. Camilla finally looks down at me and taps my head, “ Bottled up things tend to explode, American. That ’ s why I ’ m hard on my students. I ’ d rather you paint and draw than be nothing but shattered ashes tossed into the ocean or bones placed in a box.”
Shattered ashes, bones in a box. Her sister died. The image she paints is so tragically visual. My swallow sticks to my throat. “ I ’ m sorry you lost her.”
“She lost herself, long before I lost her.” Camilla’s brown eyes twitch as she reaches up and pats down her long thick black hair.
I feel the need to be as open with her. “ The only time I loved myself was when I saw my reflection in the eyes of the man I loved,” I mutter.
“ So draw me that.” Her eyes shift to the blank canvas as her face beams with pride.
I do draw that. For days and days, I come back to the corner seat and draw Dash ’ s face to the finest of detail. It ’ s up close, cropped to his sharp cheekbones and angelic illusionist eyes; between the streaks of his iris is me, my face captured by my hand for the first time. I ’ m not smiling; I ’ m just looking back at him, but there is something in my eyes that suggests I ’ m happy, a relaxed pose of my lips that shows the viewer I ’ m in love.
“ Now,” Camilla ’ s voice startles me as she sets down a new canvas, leaning it against my stool. Her eyes are on my hands, or maybe it ’ s my wedding band that catches her attention. I curl my fingers in hiding my ring. Protecting it from prying eyes. “ Draw me someone or something through your eyes, American.”
White, blank, and empty. The canvas calls to me as dread and excitement churn in my belly. I remove the canvas with Dash ’ s point of view and replace it with the one waiting for me to draw on it. I start from the beginning, drawing myself, close up again so it ’ s my entire eye filling the frame; in the reflection of the eye is my mother center stage; I ’ m tiny, so I ’ m looking up at her. The stage lights are blinding, making her appear as a silhouette, nothing more than a black shadow, an old memory now that glides across the stage. She appears as a monumental figure to be idolized and praised. My eyes are watching with…guilt that I never lived up to her image. Guilt that I wasted years trying.
My eyes snap to my left hand, on my ring again, at my reflection shining back in the gold. I spin it around my finger, sinking my teeth into my lip, but then I feel a weight pressing into me. Looking up, I see Camilla watching me as I spin the ring around my finger. Her sharp eyes are clouded, lost in a fog, as her lips press into a thin line. But her attention keeps lingering on my ring and not the art she so desperately wanted a few moments ago.
That ’ s strange.