I Wish You All the Best

by Mason Deaver

  “Sometimes it’s too much to handle. You’re still growing up, still figuring things out, and this is an extra layer of issues. It’s common for someone your age to be dealing with this sort of thing. And your situation certainly hasn’t helped that.”

  I don’t know what to say next, so I blurt out the first thing that comes to my mind. “It’s scary, Dr. Taylor.”

  “I know, Ben. I know.” She sighs. “But the medication might be an outlet worth exploring, don’t you think?”

  “Do you believe it’ll help?” I ask.

  “I truly do. With patients dealing with depression and anxiety, medication can be a godsend. We could do a trial run, see how it works for you?”

  I nod along to her words. “Okay, we can try it.”

  I crumple up the paper, tearing it right out of my sketchbook and throwing it into the bin halfway across the room. It misses.

  Of course.

  “You need to work on your free throws.” Mrs. Liu eyes the balls of paper sitting around the trash can.

  “I’ll get those in a second,” I say.

  “Stuck?” She walks over to the little workstation I’ve built myself in the corner of the back room.

  “I’ve got nothing,” I say. The ideas are there, floating around, but I can’t get them onto the paper, let alone a fucking canvas. And the medication Dr. Taylor has me trying is making me drowsy, which wouldn’t be so bad at night, but the last few days it’s been hitting me right in the afternoon.

  “What are you trying to do?” Mrs. Liu asks.

  “At this point, anything.”

  “Honestly, I think you could quit now, just not do anything. I’d still probably pass you.” She chuckles. “Have you tried painting something real?”

  “That’s what I’m doing.”

  “Okay, but like, something you know. Take from your life, Ben.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When I’m stuck, I take a photo off my phone, one that I’ve taken myself, and just start drawing that. It usually gets my creative flow going. Sometimes art needs an instruction booklet.”

  “I wish it came with one sometimes,” I mutter.

  “Hey!” Mrs. Liu shouts at one of the freshmen in the other classroom. “Put that back down. Heathens.” She whispers that last part under her breath. “Just try it. Not some photo you got online, but something you really know.”

  Maybe that’s not such a bad idea though. I take out my phone and flip through the hundreds of reference photos I’ve saved. I probably need to delete some of these soon. There’s no way I’ll need them. But what if I do?

  Then I get to this string of Nathan’s selfies, then more photos, then Nathan selfies, then photos. It’s this weird back-and-forth because every few weeks, the boy has the urge to steal my phone and take a dozen selfies. Most of them are of me and him, me trying to grab my phone. There are a few of him and Meleika, or him and Sophie too, or ones of me taken secretly, with his head barely in the frame while he takes a picture of me.

  But most are just of him. I zoom in on the picture and stare at it. He would be a good model.

  He doesn’t have to know, right? I’ve already drawn him once before.

  I sketch out the shape of his face, the angles of his cheeks and his chin, the shape of his eyes, the way his mouth is curving upward. I sort of have to combine the photos to get the right angle, but I can make it work. I don’t even know where to begin with the painting though. I want to do something different.

  My eye catches the drip painting on the wall, the controlled messiness of it, all the colors mixing together. I still want Nathan to be a part of this, but I don’t want it to be some hyperrealistic re-creation. I could try this monochromatic technique I saw online.

  When I think of Nathan, I think of warmth. Of reds, and oranges. But most of all, I think of yellow. That just seems like such a Nathan-y color. Happiness, joy, his optimism, that smile.

  I make my sketch purposefully rough, adding to the sharpness of Nathan’s face. It doesn’t take me longer than a few minutes. This is the outline, the skeleton. Details come later. It takes me a few tries to find the yellow I want to use for the majority of his face, but eventually I do.

  And I find a rhythm, painting in broad strokes, switching between different-size brushes to get in the finer details. There’s only so much I can shove into the forty-five minutes I have left, but when the bell rings, it feels like that list has only gotten longer.

  “Fuck.” I look around for Mrs. Liu. I can’t stop now.

  “Find your muse?” She walks to the back room, holding a stack of pallets decorated with watercolor paints.

  “Mmh” is all I can say. I’m too distracted.

  “Oh, wow, Ben.” I don’t know if she means the mess or the painting.

  “Sorry, got into it. I’ll clean up.”

  “No, no, no.” She puts a hand on my shoulder. “Keep going. I love it.”

  “Really??”

  “It’s fantastic. I’ll call Thomas, let him know you’re working.”

  “You don’t mind me staying?”

  “Pssh, I’ve got assignments to grade anyway, so I’ll be here for a while.”

  “You don’t think it’s … like …” I stammer. “Creepy to paint him, do you?”

  She cackles. “I don’t think Nathan’s ego is so fragile. But I’d definitely let him know.” Then she pauses. “I do want to ask, why him?”

  I shrug. “He stole my phone and took a bunch of selfies.” I show her the screen.

  “An odd form of payback if I’ve ever seen one, but hey. You do you, kid.” Mrs. Liu pats me on the shoulder. “I did want to talk to you about something.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, every year I do a student art show here at the school. I was wondering if you’d want to participate.”

  I pause and set my brush down. “Why me?”

  Mrs. Liu scoffs. “You’re joking, right?” Then she starts looking at the walls. “You’re one of my best students.”

  I look at my paintings, but all I really see is how they don’t hold up to the ones around them. I don’t know any of Mrs. Liu’s other students, besides a few of the freshmen in the other room.

  But I do know for certain that they’re better artists than me. The portraits and the landscapes, the abstract concepts, the sculptures. I doubt I could ever really pull that stuff off the way they do.

  “It won’t be until May, but I like to plan early. Just think about it, okay?”

  I nod.

  “Thanks, I’ll let you get back to work.”

  And I do; I get so lost in it, each stroke of my brushes. I have to make sure the yellows won’t blend together in some mess of color, so I move from one end of the canvas to the other, letting things dry a bit before I get to work on the smaller details.

  “Ben?” I see Thomas out of the corner of my eye, walking down the short hallway between the rooms.

  “Here.” I wave without looking at him.

  “Almost done?”

  “Almost.” I glance at my phone. Holy shit. It’s past five. “Sorry, didn’t realize it was so late.”

  “No, it’s cool. I was just getting next week’s test ready.” Thomas walks to a spot behind me, seeing the painting in all its yellowish glory. “Oh.”

  Thomas stops short, and I watch his face.

  “That’s Nathan.” He points to the canvas.

  “Yeah.” I stare at the nearly finished thing, eyeing the spots I’ve missed, or where I think I’ve used the wrong shade. “I’m not done yet, but I can quit for today.”

  “Hannah wants us home. Apparently she’s cooking dinner tonight.”

  I grab my paints and brushes and start rinsing them off in the sink. Hopefully I’ll be able to find something close to the right shade tomorrow. When I look over my shoulder, Thomas is still staring at the painting.

  “Is something wrong?” I ask.

  “No, just looking,” Thomas says with a smile. “I like the
yellows. For some reason,” he starts to say, but then he pauses. “I don’t know, it just screams Nathan.”

  “That was kind of the idea.” I put my brushes on the drying rack and rinse off my hands.

  “Ready to go?” Thomas grabs my bag for me.

  “Yeah,” I say, taking one last look at the painting before I turn the lights off.

  “Did y’all hear about the party Steph’s having on Friday?” Sophie asks. We’re back in the cafeteria, which was wild enough before the Spring Fling game, but with only a few days left until spring break, everyone’s “give a shit” levels are at an all-time low. Even the teachers don’t care, which has led to Mrs. Liu calling me to her room during other classes to “help out with a project.”

  Which really just ends up being code for letting me finish my painting of Nathan. I still don’t know exactly how or when I’m going to tell him about it. I’ve gone through about a dozen different ways in my head and none of them seem quite right.

  “Why on earth would we want to go to a party at Steph’s place?” Meleika props her head on her hands.

  Nathan sips some bright red sports drink. “The girl’s been wound tight the last few weeks, she deserves a break.”

  “It’s technically for spring break,” Sophie adds. “But it’s not like she needs a reason.”

  “All she gets is PBR and vodka. Not even the good kind of vodka,” Meleika says.

  Nathan laughs. “This one is BYOB apparently. Maybe she heard the complaints.”

  “Great, so the only way we get something good is if we bring it ourselves?” Meleika rolls her eyes. “No, thank you.”

  “I heard Todd’s going,” Sophie says.

  “Oh, never mind, count me in.” Meleika chuckles to herself. “He always brings something good. Like, flat-out-wasted-in-three-sips good stuff.”

  “Todd’s a dick,” Nathan says.

  “Yeah, but a dick with a dad who doesn’t keep an eye on his liquor cabinet,” Sophie sings.

  Nathan nudges me. “You want to go?”

  “Where?”

  He’s still smiling. “To the party.”

  “I wasn’t invited?”

  “You’re so cute, Ben.” Sophie types something into her phone, and my face gets hot.

  “Come on, you didn’t dress up for Spirit Week.” Meleika counts off. “You didn’t go to the game, or the dance after. You should at least come to a party. Unwind a little bit, let yourself get loose.”

  “You don’t really have to be invited, you just show up,” Nathan adds.

  I tuck my hands under the table. “I don’t even know any of these people.”

  “Well, Todd’s a douche-canoe, so count yourself lucky. And you’ve already had the pleasure of meeting Stephanie.” Meleika laughs a little too loudly. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”

  “It’s one night,” Sophie keeps going.

  “Just come with us. We’ll hang out for half an hour, and then if you want to, we’ll leave?” Nathan tries his best to reassure me.

  “I’ve never been to a party before,” I say.

  “It’s basically a cheap and easy way for us to get drunk and make fun of white people who think they have rhythm.” Meleika chuckles.

  Nathan rolls his eyes before he adds, “She’s right though. It’s the sort of secondhand embarrassment you only get from watching people drunkenly grind against one another.”

  “Remember when Megan and Adam started dancing, and he puked all over her?” Sophie starts laughing so hard that I hardly catch the end of what she’s trying to say.

  “Oh God, yes.” Meleika covers her mouth. “Ben, you have to come, at least to see what sort of embarrassing shit goes on.”

  “Come on.” Nathan nudges me. “Half an hour, that’s it.”

  “Fine,” I finally say, knowing there’s really no way I’m going to get out of this one. I’ll have to lie to Hannah, I guess. I doubt she’ll want me going to a party where there’s a bunch of underage drinking going on.

  “Excellent.” Meleika rubs her hands together. “We’ll corrupt you yet.”

  Part of me sort of hopes Nathan, Sophie, and Meleika will have forgotten about me agreeing to go to the party by Friday, since they’ve pretty much spent the last week discussing their spring break plans.

  Sophie actually sounds like she’s going to have the most fun. She and her parents are going to visit her grandparents in Busan, South Korea. Meleika’s going up to the mountains with her family, and Nathan isn’t really doing anything apparently.

  But they definitely don’t forget about the party. Clearly, I’m not that lucky. Fortunately it’s a half day at school, so I have plenty of time to work myself into a ball of anxiety. And I’m at a total loss when it comes to picking out what to wear.

  I mean, the shirt’s easy, but all my jeans feel too baggy, my shoes feel too dirty, and I don’t even know what’s appropriate for this kind of party anyway. What would Nathan wear? Probably tight pants and a button-up shirt or something.

  Of course, there isn’t much he doesn’t look good in. He’s totally one of those kinds of people. Who could wear the absolute ugliest thing in the world and make it some fashion statement.

  I really need to talk to Hannah about new clothes. For now, I’ll have to settle with the usual; at least I still have a few shirts that don’t have dried paint on them.

  “Do you need my debit card?” Hannah asks. I almost blow my cover before I remember I told her I’m hanging out with Nathan tonight. So not a total lie.

  “No, we’re just going over to his house.” I scratch at my nose, bending over to pick up my shoes.

  “Okay.” Hannah leans against the doorframe. “Where are you really going?”

  “What?” There’s no way she can tell I’m lying.

  “Please, I’m your sister. Now, where are you really going?”

  “I told you—”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Trust me, I lied enough to Mom and Dad to know.” She takes a seat next to me on the bed. “So spill.”

  “There’s a party.”

  “Alcohol? Don’t lie to me.”

  “Yes.” I stare at the floor.

  “Oh, Ben.”

  “I’m sorry. Don’t be mad.”

  Hannah lets out this low laugh, which seems weird for her. “Please, I’m not mad. I’m your sister. I did a lot worse shit when I was your age.”

  I stop myself from saying I know.

  “Are you actually going to drink anything?” she asks.

  “Don’t know. I hadn’t really planned on it.”

  “Is Nathan?”

  “I don’t think so, he’s supposed to drive us.”

  Hannah looks me over from head to toe. “Oh, hon. I’m not letting you go to a party dressed like that, come on.” She grabs my hand and leads me down the hall to her room. “I know you’re taller than I am, but my pants should fit you better than whatever those are.” She points to my jeans.

  “You bought them,” I argue.

  “Well, if I’d known you’d be going to parties we would’ve gone shopping sooner. You have to look good tonight!” Hannah leaves me standing at the foot of her bed and opens the sliding doors of her closet. “I remember my first party.”

  “How do you know this is my first?” I ask.

  Then Hannah gives me a look. The raised eyebrow, sideways smile sort. And I can’t help but feel insulted. Don’t get me wrong, this is my first party. But her lack of confidence feels sort of like a slap to the face.

  “The shirt’s fine, but yeah, the pants need to go.” She turns on her heels and digs around in her closet for a few seconds. “Haven’t worn these in years.” She tosses a pair of dark black jeans onto the bed. “Or these.” Another pair on the bed.

  When she’s done, there are five pairs for me to try on. “I don’t know about this, Hannah.” She shoves the pile into my hands and pushes me toward the bathroom.

  “Come on, can’t be any worse than what you’ve got on.”

  I
would argue, but I have a sinking suspicion she’s right. I go for the black pair first, since those seem the nicest and most “party appropriate.” I try not to think about the fact that I’m nearly the same size as my sister, or that her old jeans apparently fit me really well, even if I do feel them sliding off my hips a bit. I eye myself in the mirror, focusing on the way they hug my legs. I turn, trying to see how the back fits me.

  “Hannah?” I call for her.

  She opens the door slowly, her eyes covered. “You’re not naked, right?”

  “Right.”

  Her mouth drops open. “Holy shit, Ben, you’ve got an ass. When did that happen?”

  I turn to try and look in the mirror but can’t get the angle quite right. Never thought my sister would be telling me I have a nice butt.

  “Seriously, man—” Her face goes cold. “Sorry. I’m sorry.”

  I stare at her. At least she knows she’s wrong, right? “It’s okay.”

  “No, it’s not. I’m sorry.”

  I shrug. Now isn’t the moment to get angry with her. “Do you think these look good?”

  “Yeah, with the shirt too, it’s nice. Just make sure your phone fits in. I can’t remember if that’s the pair with the fake pockets or not.” She bends over and picks up the folded stack of her other pairs. “See the wonders a decent pair of pants can do?”

  “Thank you.”

  “No problem. And, Ben, I’m begging you not to drink tonight, okay? The medication is new and I don’t want you to take any risks.”

  “I promise.” I wasn’t planning on drinking anyway. I’d read over the tiny orange bottle probably a hundred times, googling what different things meant. According to most sources it isn’t the end of the world to have a beer with the kind of dosage I’m on, but still, I’d rather not risk it.

  Especially if it could make me feel worse than I already do.

  “Good, I just want you to be safe.”

  I nodded. “We will.”

  “Okay.” She pulls me into a hug, which seems like a weird move, and it’s awkward with the pile of clothes between us, but I hug her back as best I can. “Now go have fun. And use a condom,” she teases.

  “That’s really gross.”

  She ruffles a hand through my hair. “Whatever, kid.”