The bottom left panel shows Tanya slow-dancing with George. The image is a replica of a wedding photograph Auntie Joyce gave me when we were in South Carolina. Tanya had the fortune of finding her once-in-a-lifetime love so early in life and the cruel misfortune of losing him too soon, but she never stopped loving him. She had fourteen years with him, which seems like a drop in the bucket when you consider that she spent forty-one years without him by her side, but he was a part of her until the day she reunited with him.
The bottom right panel shows Tanya sitting in a chair with a bright smile on her face. Standing behind and all around her are me, Dani,Daria, and all of Tanya’s other mentees. In her arms lies a sleeping baby wrapped in a soft blanket. Tanya was a mother. She was a mother to Lorraine, a mother figure to all of us. We are her legacy.
“Micah,” Dani breathes. “I know I always say your work is incredible, but you’ve outdone yourself. She would lose her mind over this.”
While Dani zooms in with her camera, I look back at the portrait, trying to see it through Tanya’s eyes. I hope that she would feel seen looking at this.
Dani interviewed me throughout the course of making this painting. Now that it’s done, there’s not much else for her to ask me. Instead, she asks me if I have any final words about the painting or any more stories I want to share about Tanya.
“Not really. I think the painting speaks for itself. Tanya Holden, you will be very missed. But you will never be forgotten.”
She cuts the camera off. “And that is a wrap for Micah Wright. That was perfect.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. We got everything we need.” She looks back at the painting. “Fun fact, sometimes I find myself wanting to cry because I miss her so much, and then I imagine her calling me a nerd for crying over her. Believe it or not, it helps.”
“Bet it dries those tears right up.”
“With a quickness.”
Once we move Tanya’s portrait out of the way so it can rest and dry, Dani is in no rush to leave and I’m in no rush to let her go. She sits in my lap with her head on my chest while I rub her back. Neither of us is sleeping or even tired, we’re just existing. Existing is a thousand times better when I’m doing it with her.
I’ve fallen for this girl. Again.
The first time I fell in love with Dani, it was after we got caught in the rain on the day we met. She was soaking wet, in total shock that the rainhad come down so hard, and when she looked at me, something in me said,I could do this for the rest of my life.
The second time I fell in love with her was instantaneous. I hadn’t seen her in years since our first and last encounter. But the moment I saw her again, standing in the middle of a New York club looking like heaven on Earth, it was as if my heart had been beating irregularly until she came back into the picture to set it right.
This time, I don’t think there was a specific moment. It just was. It’s always been.
“I had an idea,” she mumbles.
I tug on her hair so she’s forced to look at me. “What is it?”
“I want you to make me into art again.”
“Okay, I can do that.”
“But.” She pauses. “I wanna turn you into art too.” She runs her hands up and down my arms, the heat from them searing my skin.
“You wanna make art together?”
“I liked how I felt when you painted me. I wanna feel that again with you.”
I’ll give her anything she asks for. “How did you feel, Storm?”
“Like me,” she says quickly. “I felt like myself.”
I ease her off my lap and take her hand in mine. I grab a tarp and a large canvas and show her my collection of body paints. She carries them over to the middle of the loft floor.
While I lay everything down, she sets up her tripod in the corner, in perfect view of the canvas.
“Let’s make art,” she says as she turns on the camera.
I pull her to the center of the loft and show her the bottles of body paint sitting there.
She crouches down to open them, revealing different shades and colors. She looks up at me from the floor. “Show me how.”
