Sandy Yellow
I take the long way home, walking past all the murals I can find. They’re reaching towers, Mama’s eyes as a child watching the skyline of New York. People pose in front of them, others taking pictures from every angle, and I wish I could see them the way everyone else in this city does.
I can’t believe something I painted has people stopping to admire it.
It’s not just buildings, but it’s also on benches, on the ground in parks, over billboards.
When it’s not the entire mural, it’s pieces of it.
Mama’s eyes on the exterior of the subway, studying the passengers.
The jellyfish peppered along a staircase.
Waves of the ocean swirling around lampposts. She is everywhere and nowhere.
Back home, I open my sketchbook, the one I’m sending to Opus, leafing through the pages until I come to an empty one.
I draw a body, the insides decayed, flowers growing along veins and the heart now wilted. There is a vast emptiness inside, memories fading away. It’s an abandoned shell. This body was once a home—its owner loved it. Grew in it.
There’s no pain inside me. The frustration I felt at school is gone. Nothing they can do to me is worse than what happened. They can’t hurt me more than I’ve already been hurt. Now, here with this realization, my hands are steadier.
I fish out Mama’s sketchbook and close my eyes.
The blank page glances at me eagerly, waiting.
I draw Mama. Only now she isn’t ten years old, but in her teens.
Eighteen with hair that rivaled mine. I make her magical, an ethereal version of herself.
I draw the sea in her hair, the waves folding over one another.
Half her face calm, the other solemn. Life overtaking dreams. I draw the jellyfish weakly wrapping their tentacles around her ankles, urging her to come back, but she’s leaving.
Color leeches away from the solemn part, the realities of the world erasing it.
She promises she’ll come back with a hand stretched behind her, open-palmed, even though she’s looking away.
She wants to see the world and to tell the jellyfish about it, just as they tell her about their travels.
She’ll keep her promise. She’ll come back. But she doesn’t know it will be for the last time.
“Oh my God, as soon as I saw it, I started crying,” one girl narrates over a video of my mural. The video pans over several buildings across Fifth Avenue, showcasing my painting of Mama from every angle.
The murals are now all over New York and New Jersey.
I’m trending again the next morning, and there are iterations of my art from other artists posting it on their feeds.
A few news websites have picked up on it, and the comments are either filled with support or people accusing me of being an attention seeker.
One video with over fifty thousand views has gone into a deep analysis of the colors used, the type of jellyfish, and theories of how this could be an unveiling of an even bigger mural or an ad by a PR company for an art show.
The girl recording the mural on Fifth Avenue pans the camera to the crowd of spectators. Apparently, there’s now a group of people who have taken it upon themselves to hunt for all the murals, checking them off their list. Looking for new ones.
The enormity of what is happening still hasn’t fully sunk in. I can’t watch more than a couple of videos before the select few negative comments start to bang around my head. But clearer than that is the genuine awe of the larger number of people who find beauty in them, who see the story.
“Something about it is so haunting,” continues the young woman on Fifth Avenue.
“I know that’s the same girl from before with the jellyfish.
And it feels like she’s leaving, but I have no idea where from.
Is someone forcing her? Did someone find out she can speak to jellyfish and she’s leaving to protect them?
It’s filling me with such melancholy, you guys.
Whoever drew this is a genius. The emotions are so intense.
Also, absolutely in love with the sea turtle in her hair. ”
I exit the video, refreshing my messages, hoping for one from Alexis to pop up.
I haven’t heard from her for three days now, and the messages I sent her last night have all been delivered.
I’m not sure what it means, but I think Nicole must have told her I tricked her.
I tried explaining it in the messages, but I don’t know if Alexis believes me.
It doesn’t surprise me I don’t have any messages from Jamie. I was confused when he sent me the school notes from yesterday, but I think this just has become something he does—keeping a promise.
Nerves weigh me down when I get to school, and I strain my ears, looking over my shoulder.
I make it to my locker and, to my shock, find it fixed.
The lock is back in its place, and if it weren’t for the small dent in the door, I wouldn’t have known it was ever broken.
Someone must have washed it as well because compared with the others, it’s gleaming.
I stare at it for a long moment and move to open it only to take my hand back.
This could be a trap.
I could open the locker and be splashed with expired fish soup.
I step back and head to class.
Alexis’s friends firmly ignore me, as does the rest of the class, which is all the better for me.
I lower my guard a fraction and am able to focus on the lesson and take notes.
But then Alexis glances over and gives me an apologetic grimace, to which I give her a shoulder shrug.
A second later, I get a message from her.
Lexi: let’s talk after class.
I glance at it, typing out now you want to talk? before backspacing.
Me: ok
Lexi: art studio?
Me: sure
Lexi: ok I’ll see you there
When the period ends, I hang back to let everyone walk out and make my way to the art studio.
Alexis is already there, biting on her nails and tapping her foot on the floor.
“Hey,” I say, and she straightens up. The door closes behind me with a quiet thud.
“Hey.” For a while we just stare at each other.
“So I—” she begins, and I say, “What are—” at the same time.
We fall silent.
Something has changed between us. It might have been gradual, but it feels so sudden.
Our usual relationship has vanished. Talking doesn’t feel easy anymore.
I fidget with my hands, staring beside her head.
I’m too embarrassed to talk about the bullying, about Nicole, and she doesn’t seem to want to bring them up either.
“You okay?” she finally asks, and I think that’s the closest we’ll get to talking about it.
I snort. “Yeah, I guess.”
She stretches her fingers, running her teeth over her lips. The air is heavy like a humid day, the perspiration beading on my skin.
“I can see some of the colors now,” I say, trying to salvage something.
She nods absently, and heat rushes to my cheeks.
“That’s great, but I think we need to focus on the whole Jamie thing.”
I straighten my back, hiding my hands in my pockets. Her eyes trace every part of me, and I suddenly see myself the way she sees me.
Poor little girl who lost her mother. A burden she has to carry in her senior year.
Making apologies for me to her friends. Asking them to give me chance after chance even though I wear the boys’ uniform and rarely smile.
Her friend who still believes in magic, but she humors me because she doesn’t want to hurt my feelings.
Irritation pricks like tiny needles all over me.
“Why are we friends, Alexis?” I ask, and she’s taken aback.
“What?”
“Why are we friends? Why do you put up with all of this?”
“Because you know me,” she says in a clear voice, eyes fierce. “And I know you. We’ve known each other for thirteen years. Why are you asking this now?”
“You know what happened to me yesterday?”
She blinks, closing her mouth and looking away.
“And you didn’t even call me. You didn’t even check up on me.” I feel like a child who’s throwing a tantrum. I hate how needy I sound to my ears. I groan, pressing a hand to my forehead. “Forget it. Forget what I said. I don’t care what Nicole thinks. She’s horrible.”
“No, she’s not,” Alexis exclaims. “Really. She’s just being jealous, but you can tell her you don’t date. She’ll believe you.”
“I don’t want to explain myself to her.”
“Why not?”
“Because she’s racist,” I snap, and Alexis flinches. “Not just Nicole, but Jenny and Hayley too.”
“What?” she breathes.
“You heard me.” My heart is racing, my stomach clenches, and I think I might throw up, but there’s a lightness on my tongue. Like I’ve been holding on to these words for so long.
She holds up her hands like she’s trying to calm me down.
“Okay. I’m with you on how mean they’re being.
But you can’t jump to racism as a conclusion.
I wouldn’t be friends with racists. And I swear, the girls had nothing to do with what happened to you yesterday.
Nicole was upset, so we all went out for coffee right after the bell rang.
You think I’d let them do something like that to you? ”
It hurts to be excluded. It still hurts, and I hate myself for it.
“I’m sorry I didn’t answer your texts. I was really busy this weekend,” she continues.
“Right.” I try to swallow, but my throat has swollen to double its size. There will always be excuses.
“I’m sorry someone did that to you.”
“Me too,” I whisper.
We stay quiet for a while, the awkwardness creeping in again. The light filtering through washes away the gray, and I can see her colors in a lighter shade. Like the contrast has been put on low.
“I’ll talk to Nicole and the girls,” Alexis says. “I’m really tired of all of this. I did not see this happening.”
My jaw feels heavy. “Okay.”
“Your locker is fixed, right? Like, is it okay now?”
I nod. “Yeah… did you do that?”
She hesitates before giving me a small smile. “You’re still my best friend.”
“Thank you,” I say, meaning it. Maybe I was wrong about how she sees me.
She shoulders her bag. “Of course. I have to go, though. I told the girls I’m going to the restroom, and I don’t want them to think I have diarrhea or something.”
I manage to smile. She squeezes my hand when she passes by and waves before leaving.
I stare at the door, basking in the silence and the muffled conversations outside, wishing I could stay in here forever.
I haven’t seen Jamie all day. I think he’s hiding from me, although I’m not sure why. Maybe Nicole asked him if we’re together. But everywhere I go, I hear bits of conversations.
“…Jamie…”
“… told me they made out…”
“… she’s never been with anyone so she’s dying…”
It’s enough to make my nerves clench, and I barely make it to my next class. Jamie isn’t there, and I’m starting to think he didn’t come to school today.
Maybe I shouldn’t have either.
Later, I hide in the bathroom until I’m sure everyone has gone to their next class and then sneak out. I get reprimanded by the teachers, but I don’t care. My nerves are frayed, like they’ve been zapped with too many electrical currents and are now blackened and withered.
I don’t go to lunch and choose to sit in the art room.
I’m aware the number of days is dwindling until Amal leaves for Qatar. And the fact that she’s leaving makes me want to escape all of this even more. I eat my labneh sandwich and pull up my application for the Opus School of Art.
My sketchbook is nearly finished. I think it’ll be my ticket in.
It’s my manifesto, a collection of all the snippets of my life.
I hope it’s like nothing they’ve seen before.
While the sketchbook can come off as chaotic, every line, color, and sketch was done with feeling.
I know this sketchbook has a soul. Amal had tears in her eyes when I showed it to her.
I’m applying on a prayer because on top of that, I’m submitting a request for a scholarship.
One of their major funds is for underrepresented artists who require financial help, but I don’t know whom I’m competing with.
I let myself imagine that life for one second.
The ocean is my backyard, and there I’d learn to speak to the jellyfish or maybe even to the whales.
Maybe there I can find out if Mama’s stories were true or not.
I’d live in a small apartment with a roommate I’d have inside jokes with, and we’d bake desserts passed down from our families.
It would be easier to smile, to paint. It would be far away from Baba and even farther from Amal, but that’s okay because we’d make it work.
Loud conversations outside the door bring me down to earth.
To get there, to make that dream come true, Braxton is a means to an end. A necessary hell I have to survive. I cannot let all this pain and effort go to waste. They won’t win.
Sighing, I pull myself to my feet.
But before I walk out, the door is flung open and my heart shoots up to my throat. I debate fighting for my life or leaping from the window.
Jamie stands there, panting, chest heaving up and down. He’s not in his uniform but in simple jeans and a shirt. His face is flushed, and his hair is plastered to his forehead. He must have been running.
He relaxes a fraction when he sees me and marches in, closing the door behind him.
I’m so surprised, I forget I’ve given up on him.
“What are—” I begin.
“You’re the one behind the murals, aren’t you?” he interrupts, voice breathless.