What will my father see when he looks at my representation of his face? Will he see the anger and disapproval always looking back at me? Or will it do something to his heart, break the stone wall around it? Or will he only see what he sees every day in the mirror? Are disappointment and frustration how he views the world?
The heavy brown cover opens, and his expression doesn’t change as he studies the lines and shading, the positive and negative space.
My clasped hands squeeze tighter. I don’t want him digging deeper, turning the page and seeing my attempts at copying Klimt or Degas.
The truth is, I agree with Ms. Hughes. I’m so proud of my art. The portrait of my father is an amazing likeness, even if it is distant and cold. When I’m drawing, I feel like I’m alive, and the harder I work, the more it turns out exactly as I’d hoped.
It’s exciting and fulfilling…
I don’t want him to take what I love and kill it.
He closes the cover and tosses it aside. “A useless degree.”
“I told her I wasn’t interested.” I speak quietly, submissively.
He hates that.
His eyes don’t leave his plate. I watch as he slices a sticky dumpling with a knife and fork and puts the piece in his mouth. My father refuses to use chopsticks.
“That is all.”
I’m dismissed, and my artistic dreams fall away, like the portrait inside that folder.
Like the letter, which is never returned.
1
Ruby
12 Years Later
“I’ve hit rock bottom.” I flop on the couch in Drew’s office at the Friends Care clinic where we both work.
Yep, I’m a licensed therapist… with two clients, both shared with Drew, who has like twenty.
So I’m not the resounding success I’d expected, but Drew keeps telling me it takes time to build my practice, especially in a town the size of Oakville…
Trust me, based on the dating scene alone, I get it.
“What’s wrong now?” She stands and walks to the closet at the back of the room.
“HookUp4Luv matched me with Ralph Stern.”
“The Almond King!” My best friend laughs for the first time in a week. “Did you know he has a plan for revolutionizing Oakville’s economy?”
Clutching my forehead, I groan. “Gah—yes! He’s told me his plan five hundred times.”
“Almonds are the fruit of the future.” She pauses. “Are they fruits or nuts?”
“Who knows? They grow on trees…”
“I’ll tell you who knows.”
“Don’t say his name.”
“The future king of your little almond patch.”
“If you’re referring to my vagina, that’s just gross.” She laughs more, and I feel a twinge of guilt. “Am I being a bitch?”
