You're Welcome, Universe

by Whitney Gardner

  On the real inside there are holsters for six loaded cannons. Though after what happened at Kingston, I never carry more than three cans on me. The elastic holsters ensure the cans don’t jostle around if I have to run. It’s hard enough running with a backpack, let alone one with a bunch of junk bouncing around inside.

  I have a speckled notebook in the front compartment, and a few school flyers. Nothing heavy. That’s all I bring. I’ve debated wearing my old hearing aids so I could better sense someone approaching, but I refuse. I get through every day without them; I’m not going to “cheat” and put them on when it’s convenient.

  The sky darkens and the chill in the air intensifies. I’m not freezing, but I’m hardly comfortable. I wish I had a heavier coat instead of just the hoodie, but the cold air will force me to work quickly. Get in, get out, get back to my nice warm Lee.

  What am I gonna say? What goes into this throwie? My last tag was for Donovan; what should this one remind me of? I never throw up a meaningless piece. It’s always attached to a memory, something I’ll recall every time I see it. It isn’t about seeing my art on a wall. It’s about putting a feeling out into the world. It’s communication, a release.

  Maybe I’ll paint my new tag, my new name, my new place in this hood. All done up nice and clean and big. Big. I can’t stop thinking about YP. About big beautiful things.

  What did she mean, “nothing big is beautiful”? I pull the cords in my hood taut. What a dumb thing to say. People will always be jerks. Always. Doesn’t mean mountains aren’t beautiful. Or redwood trees, or oceans, or—

  I’ve made it up to the waist-high chain-link fence in the outfield and suddenly I’m not so cold. The kindling catches; the fire’s coming.

  I thought the back of the scoreboard would be a slam, too public, standing right in the middle of the field. But it casts a large shadow in my direction, and shadows are a lifesaver. Stepping into its dusky protection, I disappear. I slide my bag around to my chest and open the inner compartment. The new latex gloves don’t keep my fingers warm, but I’ll be sweating in no time. I grab the first can. Bruised Gray, a faded purple color. It looks handsome against the dark green of the scoreboard.

  I start outlining the basic shape first. My arm works diligently. It must have had these plans for a while, filed away somewhere deep, because the shape almost draws itself.

  I move as quickly as I can. I’ve practiced these techniques so many times, they’re second nature. As soon as I finish the outline I start filling it in with the same color. It’s important to be fast, but how you fill in shapes distinguishes the toys from the real writers.

  It’s getting even darker out, so I don’t hesitate moving on to the next step. My heart races along with the passing minutes; beads of moisture form and drip down my spine. I holster the gray back in my bag. Next up: Cyanide Blue outlines. Normally, the outline stage moves the quickest for me. It’s pretty much a repeat of step one, except this time I add more detail. This isn’t just letters, though; it needs more volume, texture. I want to make this big thing beautiful.

  Capped and holstered, I’m ready for the last step. I unsheathe Siamese Sesame from the bag and get to it. I wish I had another color for this bit. Some bright white would really make it stand out, but the dusty beige will have to work. It’s all I have. I need a really tight stream of paint to do the final details. I dig through my bag in the dark, trying to find my stencil cap. My fingers wrap around the little piece of plastic when the lights around the perimeter of the field flicker on.

  I slam my body into the scoreboard, grateful only for the longer shadow it’s casting. Shit shit shit. I was so close to finishing. A car or two passes. I go from flames to frozen stiff. I should be running to my car. I should be driving home. Legs! Why aren’t you running?!

  No one’s coming. I peer around the board onto the diamond: empty. Maybe the lights are on a timer, I reason. Finish it, finish it. You’re so close.

  I take in a deep breath and hold it. It’s up to my lungs how much time I have left. It’s my own timer system. I snap the stencil cap in place. Final touches demand the finest lines. My arm flies across the board. A tan mist trails behind my hand. Each puff adds a detail, a little touch that brings the whole thing to life.

  My lungs are shredding. Tension rips through my chest. I run my gloved finger through the wet paint on the last little beige circle. My work looks right back at me. It’s the biggest, most beautiful piece I’ve ever done. My gift to Greenlawn. You’re welcome, Universe.

  I can’t hold it anymore. I exhale, coughing and dizzy. The paint goes back into my bag. I zip the inside zipper and then the outer one. I’m an action hero, walking away from an explosion. I’m so awesome I don’t even look back.

  I ditch the used gloves in a garbage can and walk a few more blocks over to the Walgreens parking lot. They have these big clothing donation bins there. All I’m wearing underneath the hoodie is my ratty old Wonder Woman T-shirt. I didn’t think about the weather. What a day to go braless. Doesn’t matter; I’ll freeze for a few more blocks. I finished my piece and it was worth it. One day I’ll go to L.A. and paint huge murals with Retna and never freeze again.

  Of course Donovan noticed my paint-stained hoodie, but it doesn’t explain how he knew I had paint in my bag. I keep my locker locked my whole shift. How could he go snooping through my stuff? My black bag doesn’t have a single drip on the outside. He’ll forget about it. A few more make-out sessions with Jordyn, and Donovan won’t even remember I exist. He won’t get to see this hoodie again as a reminder, that’s for sure.

  I pull the handle on the donation bin and the hinged drawer swings opens with no resistance. I squeeze the hoodie close to me, the chemical smell of fresh paint lingering. I drop it into the drawer, and it slides into the bin like it can’t wait to get away from me. I hope it keeps someone else warm and safe. The thing is full of good juju, as Mee would say. I stand by the bin for a moment and sign, “Thank you.” My chest feels tight again, but I’m not out of breath. I’m not going to cry. It’s a piece of clothing. No crying over clothes.

  A crack of light shines from the doorway onto my bed. After a moment or two it grows wider and Mee stands there, silhouetted. She holds out a tub of coconut oil for me to take as she sits on the edge of my bed. I slide to the floor and sit at her feet. She reaches into the jar and warms up a chunk of the oil between her palms. I swivel around to face her so we can talk. Mee has this perfect smell about her. Maybe it’s biology and we’re all programmed to love the way our moms smell. Sandalwood and sage: she’s always burning something in little trays or pots. Her acupuncture studio is full of these smells, too. They cling to her, following her from room to room. But above all, she smells like sweet coconut oil, and it’s my favorite smell in the whole world.

  “Wanna talk?” she signs slowly, hands glistening with oil. I stiffen and sit up. She saves this phrase for when I’ve messed up.

  “What happened?” I throw my pointer fingers down.

  “Nothing, nothing. Nothing bad.” She rubs the oil into my hair, starting at the scalp and working her way to the ends. “Things calming down yet?” she asks.

  “A little. It’s fine.” I tell her what she wants to hear.

  “Come on, really?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I’m—” She looks over my head at the door. “I’m proud of you. I know it hasn’t been easy.” Mee braids my hair once it’s saturated. I can treat my own hair, but there’s something about the way she does it. My hair is glossy for a whole week afterwards. When I do it myself, I just end up staining all of my clothes.

  I want to wrap my arms around her. I’ve been waiting for her to come back, for the wall to crumble down. It’s getting chipped away, but I don’t know what’s doing the chipping. She isn’t stubborn like me or Ma. Can’t hold a grudge, always ready to move on. To forgive. All I manage is a shrug.

  “Having to give up your art, that must be the worst of it.” Gulp. “We should lo
ok into something for you to work on. Is there an art club? What about sets for a play? Or—”

  “Yeah, maybe.” I cut her off.

  “Chin up, my jewel, this is only a valley.” She drapes a towel across my pillow before she goes, knowing I would forget and stain the pillowcase when I sleep. Mee tells me to get some rest, kisses her finger, and touches it to my forehead. I fall back onto my pillow as she shuts the door. Taking her smell and the light with her.

  —

  I can’t sleep. I want to sleep, but my eyes won’t stay closed. They adjust to the darkness slowly, making it twice as hard to turn off my mind. My room seems so different in the dark. Cloaked in shadow, everything appears colorless and dull. I want to run down to my car, get my black bag from under the seat, and spray over every surface with the colors from my whale piece.

  I blink my eyes and I see it, swimming in space, watching over me like some sort of spray-painted spirit. I sit up. There’s no way I’m getting to sleep right now. I have to draw, I have to make something, to keep going. I don’t want this moment to end. And who knows when I’ll get to do something this big again?

  Luckily, I have plenty of sketching supplies in my room. I just have to find them. I slip out of bed and a jolt of pain shoots up my leg. The culprit gleams in the moonlight: Jordyn’s selfie stick. Her stupid fucking selfie stick that she insisted we buy from Chinatown. She spent all day waving it around, taking picture after picture, as if we didn’t grow up in the city. I hate looking like a tourist.

  Afterwards, she came over and binge-watched a bajillion hours of Gossip Girl reruns while I sketched in my B-book. I guess the novelty of the selfie stick wore off quickly, considering it’s still here, lying in wait for the right moment to sneak up on me and bite. Well, this is the last time she hurts me.

  I shuffle around in the dark, looking for any trace of Jordyn’s presence. Anything left over from when I thought having a best friend meant something. Something big. But now I know better. It’s better to keep to myself, not to trust anyone, not to care. Jordyn was only thinking of herself when she got me expelled, and now it’s time for me to be the selfish one.

  I find a pair of her hoop earrings and the old phone case that I tagged for her before she upgraded. I take those and the selfie stick and stuff them all in my empty Doc Martens shoe box. I remember her hoodie out there in my car, and I can’t stand the thought of it being with Lee one more second. The hallway is dark and my parents are asleep, so I seize the opportunity to go and get it. I don’t even bother putting shoes on. I want this finished.

  On the way back up the stairs I spot one last friendship artifact, a photo-booth strip we took in the lobby of a movie theater. I don’t even remember what movie we saw, but we were so excited to try out those fancy new closed-caption glasses. It was incredible. The glasses made us feel like we had a superpower: finally we could go to any movie, at any time, and not have to worry about whether they were going to use captions or subtitles. We looked like futuristic sci-fi nerd-bots, but it was amazing. We just had to take some pictures with the glasses on before we returned them. I swipe the strip and head upstairs.

  Everything goes into the box. I take a charcoal pencil from my dresser and mark every side with a giant X. All my ex–best friend junk goes into the X-box. I place the lid on top and it feels like I can finally put her out of my mind. She’s just some girl now, like anyone else. It’s done. We’re over. No more besties, no more friends.

  Finley dominates the horizon as I pull onto Taylor Street. The auditorium is unmissable. It looks a lot like a whale, huge and blue, with the right side angling upward like a tail. I tried to capture a hint of it in my mural.

  All the little fishy cars pull into the parking lot for another day of sink-or-swim. I can’t tell which I’m doing anymore.

  I didn’t have time to do my history homework last night, so I decide to nap in my car until 9:15, when second period starts. I’ll tell Casey I had car trouble, hit traffic, anything. I recline the seat and catch a glimpse of YP in my rearview, crying across the parking lot. It makes me feel nervous. I don’t want to see her this upset, but I’m not trying to butt in. It’s not my business. I can see her shoulders heave forward. Some other girl walks right past YP, not even bothering to stop and see what’s wrong. YP doesn’t let up, and my stomach turns. Fine. I lace up my boots, grab my stuff, and head over.

  She’s in some sort of argument with Kyle Fucking Stokers. Shocker. I hang back and try to get a feel for what’s going on, but they’re talking too fast and I can only see their profiles. I walk around the next row of cars to get a better angle. There’s a lamppost there that I “casually” stand behind.

  Snow starts to fall and creates a little halo around YP’s blond crown. Her legs must be freezing in her signature yoga pants, but her feet are probably toasty in those sheepskin-lined boots. How could anyone fight with someone crying so cutely? But there he is, face red and scowling.

  “…not my problem,” I catch him saying. She stares up at him with glossy cheeks, and he doesn’t even blink.

  “You said you——-———-——I got back.” Snow and spit obscure her lips. She tries to say something more, but KFS cuts her off.

  “What——-—————about it?”

  “Everyone will—-” She covers her face with her hands and sobs.

  “Jesus, stop crying….” He looks around, embarrassed. His plea doesn’t help: YP heaves even harder into her mittens. Enough’s enough.

  I walk quickly. The falling snowflakes prickle at my nose, and I blink furiously to keep the flurries out of my eyes. I aim straight for his back and “accidentally” slam into him. He hits the ground with what I imagine is a gratifying thud.

  “Oh! Sorry! I didn’t see you!” I sign to him, neither caring that he doesn’t understand me nor offering to help him off the ground. I take YP’s arm and I lead her into the mouth of the whale, leaving Kyle Fucking Stokers for the sharks.

  —

  “T H A N K S,” she fingerspells. I show her how to sign it.

  “What was that?” I point back to the entrance of the school as we make our way to history class.

  “Long story,” she mimes. I’m getting tired of this answer.

  “Well?” I prod.

  “Not now.” She looks down at the floor when she signs the words. She doesn’t turn down the hall with me for class.

  “Come on!” I wave.

  “-——-my locker,” she mumbles. Making excuses to leave me behind. “Thanks——-Julia, it——-a lot.” She looks into my eyes, hoping I’ll get it and leave her alone. She doesn’t actually need me. “Go, go! I’ll be right there,” she says as the bell rings. Of course she wasn’t.

  —

  “You haven’t seen her? She wasn’t in gym, either,” I sign one-handed, munching on a deli pickle.

  “No, maybe she went home early.” Casey unwraps her sandwich and folds up the foil into a perfect square.

  “Before first period is way early.”

  “It is.” Casey tries not to smile. Seeing me get along with someone else has her almost giddy. I don’t know what she’s over the moon about; she had nothing to do with it. Obviously, YP and I aren’t close enough for her to tell me what’s really going on with her. Considering she just vanished without a good-bye after I got her away from KFS this morning.

  “Whatever. She can do what she wants.” It’s not like we’re real friends or anything. I ball up my own foil and napkin and stuff them into the brown paper bag.

  “I’d tell you to bring her her history homework, but I’m not sure she’d receive it,” she says.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You’ve been kind of a slacker lately, haven’t you?” she says in that joking-but-not-really-joking way. I give her the side-eye on my way to the trash bin. Get your own life.

  When I’m back at my seat, Mr. Katz is there, talking to Casey.

  “Good news!” she signs.

  “Hi,”
he waves. “I…uh…” He looks over to Casey and back at me.

  “You’re fine,” I sign to him. “What’s up?” Casey might be interpreting behind him but he looks at me when he talks. I love this.

  “A spot opened up in my class.”

  It’s the middle of November and I can’t believe how the snow is piling up. I love when it flurries; there’s something magical about it, like little stars falling all around you, getting caught in everything. Anyone who says otherwise is a bore. The only thing I hate about the snow is the cold. I’m amazed I didn’t freeze to death out at the baseball diamond last night. I almost put on two bras this morning to make up for it.

  Despite the day’s drama, it ended perfectly, so I drive the long way home to get a celebratory sighting of my whale piece. I wonder how many people have driven past it today; if I keep this going, I’ll be getting up in Greenlawn in no time. My rep will skyrocket. My hands get sweaty when I turn onto Cobblestone Avenue with the field up ahead. The snow fades the grass a minty green. I drive slowly: I want a nice long look at my piece. But there’s something off about it. I only used what I had left: gray, blue, tan. So what is that big pink—

  What. The. Hell.

  I squint. It must be the snow playing tricks. I need glasses, right? No, it’s there, almost winking at me as I drive past. This couldn’t be the same poser from before, that scribble skeleton. This? This took planning. Those bones could have been cut from a textbook and pasted up, they’re so precision-perfect.

  Whoever it is must be freakin’ fast as lightning. They had time to spot it, grab their gear, and bomb my piece all in the same damn night. I never would have pegged Greenlawn as having throw-down streets. It’s all white-picket, seasonal-flag, Prius territory.