She puts her mug of tea on the coffee table and claps her hands together. “All right, time to eat!”
For dinner, she’s prepped a tarte she learned to make in her French cooking course, and we eat our way through quite a few of the cheeses she brought back.
“Okay, this one smells like an old dirty sock”—I laugh—“but it tastes like…I don’t know what—but it’s delicious,” I say,scooping up another piece of the offending goop with some baguette. “Maddy’s going to love stuff like this.”
“That seems to be the trick—the stinkier, the better,” Iris says. “You’ll be well prepared to find the good stuff when you go.” She winks. “Your application is in, right?”
I sigh and feel the tears rise up. I let them. Iris scoots her chair closer to me at the kitchen table, a concerned look in her eyes. “It is, and I do want to go,” I start, wiping my eyes, “but—”
“You’ll get in! I know it. I’ve already submitted my reference and showed the photos of your work to one of the directors, and she loved it.” She reaches across the table and squeezes my hand, and I place my other one on top of hers, steadying us both as I finally tell her the truth.
“It’s not that,” I say. “Iris…I’m sick. My donated heart is failing, and my treatment options have run out. All that’s left is a new heart, which…well, it can take years to get off the heart transplant list. I probably won’t be able to go next year. If I’m even still around.”
Iris tries to hold it together, but like everyone in my life she’s shocked, heartbroken, and all the things I feel too but am perhaps just used to. I let her dissolve into tears for a few minutes. I hug her and assure her how grateful I am for the job, her mentorship, and the great memories she helped me make this summer. When she gets ahold of herself, I ask her if she’ll critique my application paintings in person.
“Might make you feel better,” I say, with a sad smile.
“Looking at your art always makes me feel better,” she says. “Show me.” She blots the last of her tears away with her cloth napkin.
I get my pieces and set them up on easels she brings in from her studio.
“This one is my favorite at the moment.” I put the future me painting in the center.
“It’s beautiful, Sera. The underwater theme is so interesting to look at. You have such a good eye. And your technique has really improved. Maybe you can defer if you get in but can’t go next year.”
I nod, wiping my own tears away, and we switch to talking about the kids and who might have some real talent and should stick with it.
“I always saw it in you, and Luke too, when you were younger. There was something advanced about the way you both saw things. I thought it might be because you went through something so big when you were infants, that it maybe gave you a broader perspective, an ability most of us have to wait a lifetime to access. Now I’m sure that’s true.”
“I don’t want my art to be seen as good or more valuable just because I might die young,” I say slowly. “And Luke’s work blows me away and he doesn’t even practice much. I hope he picks it up again.”
“Tell him,” Iris says. “Sometimes it just takes someone we love telling us what they see in us for us to take a chance on ourselves.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sera
On Monday, Luke asks if I want to go out to his soon-to-be part-time campus with him. He needs to drop off some paperwork he finally got back from his dad, and he says he wants me to see it.
“I know you’re mad at me for not reaching,” he says as we drive, “but it’s a great school, really.”
“I’m not mad at you,” I insist. “I just wish you would admit you have real talent that’s worth exploring.” Thinking about what Iris said, I add, “I think you could be an amazing artistandwhatever else you want. You don’t have to be one or the other.”
“That sounds like a lot,” he admits as he pulls off the highway.
“And baseball, work, your family, school, friends, andgirlsweren’t?” I tease.
He blushes and laughs a little. “I guess you have a point.”
“Of course I do.” I poke him in the shoulder. “I know you.” Igently poke him in the ribs and he smiles his gorgeous unfiltered smile. He parks the car in a very empty parking lot, then unbuckles and slides to the middle of the bench seat, reaching for me. I’m in his lap in seconds, unable to keep my hands to myself. He hasn’t shaved in a couple days, and his cheeks are a little scratchy, his chin chafing mine as I capture his mouth in a kiss. His hands make their way across all the sharp points of me, shoulder blades, elbows, wrists, and then he pulls me closer, his tongue moving over mine, liquid and slow. I’m instantly flushed with want.
“You do know me,” he murmurs as he takes a breath. I groan a little too loud as his hands tense against my hips when I shift against him. He takes another long, slow breath, holding me still. “We shouldn’t. Not here.” But he doesn’t let go right away, and I take the chance to press my chest to his and kiss him one more time before I ease off his lap.
“Serious business to attend to,” I joke, once my heart rate is calm and my skin has stopped buzzing. I sneak a sip of his mostly melted iced coffee. “Shall we?”
Luke grabs his backpack, and we head to the main building. The campus is nice. Green and open, even if it is small. Luke drops his paperwork off in the administration office, and they hand him a thick folder and tell him he can start registering for classes as soon as today.
“Can we walk around?” I ask, and the secretary nods, sliding visitor badges over.
