sixteen

It’s one of those dumb days where nothing’s really wrong but nothing’s really right either and the sky can’t even choose to be white or gray. It’s a Monday, of course, which also makes everything stupid. And I don’t know why, but I just have this feeling of dread, or depression, or some other word that starts with a D that makes you want to just crawl back in bed and pull your pillow over your head.

There are some positives. For instance, I have managed to avoid Becky all morning. I got an A on my biology test. And, according to the cafeteria menu, there will be cupcakes.

But other than that, the whole thing is just drab and pointless.

Also, Logan doesn’t pass by at his usual time for us to pretend we totally don’t know each other and aren’t secret spies who are maybe madly in love or something.

Kind of annoying.

Right now I’m in the only cool room in the school, which is where we have art class. They built this annex way after they built the school with someone who actually seemed to care about what things looked like . . . natural light, the way the ceiling slopes, and, generally, creating an environment where a bunch of artistic teenagers wouldn’t want to throw themselves off the nearest bridge.

To their credit, it worked. You do get the feeling when you walk in the room that something vaguely interesting could possibly happen here.

But that also might be because our teacher is stoned.

Did you know there’s something called marijuana? Yeah, you smoke it and all of a sudden you grow long hair, eat Cheetos, and listen to Pink Floyd till your mother knocks on the door to tell you to clean your room, or at least wash your hair, or possibly consider doing something with your life.

There’s no question in my mind that Stoner Art Teacher had other plans.

I know I should probably know his name by now but I can’t remember his name and that is probably because he can’t remember his name.

I bet he thought by now he’d be riding a motorcycle across the country like Che Guevara or Jack Kerouac or something but so far his stoner habit has only led him to teach a bunch of sulky teenagers how to paint trees.

That’s what the sixties were for, I think. To turn everybody into losers. Also, to make sure everybody wore socks with sandals.

Whenever old people tell you “you had to be there” and the “sixties were groovy” or whatever, just listen to the words of my mother: “Oh, honey, most of those people were just idiots. Sheep, following along. Remember that. Whenever you see everybody clamoring in one direction, do yourself a favor, go the other.”

But right now we’re in class, learning about legendary Pop Art icon Andy Warhol. I am creating a masterpiece involving a series of identical ice-cream cones in a perfect pattern, with different ice-cream colors. Stoner Art Teacher is impressed so it is clear I will be running off to New York after graduation in a beret.

All this hot art action is brought to a screeching halt by the fact that the fire alarm goes off and next thing you know we are all scuttling out the door.

Outside on the lawn we’re the only class huddled together because our little architectural outpost is set off from the rest of the school. It’s freezing but everybody seems elated by the novelty of being outside. OUTSIDE! IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY! Never mind that we were just outside, like, two hours ago.

After about fifteen minutes of elation leading to amusement leading to boredom, we are dutifully hustled back in and there is nothing really to report.

Except.

Remember my ice-cream Pop Art I was telling you about?

Well, that’s been replaced.

Well, it hasn’t been replaced, actually, just set aside.

For a greater work.

I know. You’re dying to know what it is.

You and everybody else in the class. Including Stoner Art Teacher who I do believe is freshly stoned.

This is what is currently gracing my easel: Imagine, if you will, a painting made of white, oil, glass, mirror shards, more glass, more white, even some newspaper and magazine scraps painted over white. All of this stuff is on the canvas. And so, when you first look at it, it kind of just looks like a bunch of white stuff that catches the light and sparkles and is sorta kinda dazzling.

But then, look closer, now you see what the picture actually makes. The shards and the glass and the painted newspaper and the oil all come together to make an image, a very faint image, of a girl. Of a girl with jagged cheekbones and a square boy-jaw and purple raccoon eyes with white-blonde hair and gray-blue eyes who looks kinda sorta like . . .

“It’s you!”

It comes out from the hesher section of the mob.

“Hey, Anika! That’s you!”

“It totally is!”

“Did you make that?”

And now everybody’s looking at me. And now I’m just shaking my head. I mean, what am I supposed to say? (1) I’m not that talented, and (2) Yeah, I just made that when we were all standing outside together freezing our faces off—with my mind.

Now comes Stoner Art Teacher.

“Hm. This is actually kind of interesting . . . Mixed Media. Monochromatic. Yet, there’s something almost frenetic about it, kind of like a Jean Dubuffet . . .”

Wow. I guess Stoner Art Teacher actually read some books along the way between bong hits.

And now he turns to me.

“Well, Anika, looks like you’ve got yourself a secret admirer . . . A very talented one, at that.”

I say a silent prayer in which I thank God Becky’s not here. If she were there would be swift and immediate punishment. Both for being the subject of this tribute and for the tribute being, I’m certain, made of trash in Becky’s eyes.

But it isn’t trash.

And when I think of the diabolical way in which its author ensured its delivery, I feel that magic in the air. Electric. Like there is a live wire nearby.

No one knows the artist’s name.

But I know the artist’s name.

I smile.

Logan.