Page 46 of Tethered Fates

Later, I’ll feel so much pride from the amazement in his voice. It’ll glow warm in my chest, and I’ll replay each word with the stupidest smile spread across my face. In this moment, all I do is jerk up my shoulders in a lazy response as I reach for my supplies. Grabbing a can, I use a rusted screwdriver to pry off the lid with a satisfying pop, then tip the white contents out in a well-used tray.

“You could become rich.”

“From what?” I ask absentmindedly.

“From your art, of course. I might know little about such things, but I have a good enough eye to know your talent is something that doesn’t come around often.”

I grab a clean brush so I can screw it onto a long handle. “I hadn’t really thought about it.”

Without hesitation, I dip the brush in white paint, then proceed to cover the smooshed cartoon faces.

“Wait, Teagan.” Sen’s feet rush towards me. “This is incredible. Why would you cover it?”

I shrug again, enjoying the feel of my muscles working.

“This ain’t me anymore,” I say, focused on my task. “It used to be me. For a bit. But now I’m this me, and I gotta…show that.”

I wait for the disbelief, or the anger that—in his mind—I’m ruining something, even though it belongs to me.

I’ve heard it all before.

So when Sen says, “If that’s what you want,” I’m so shocked I nearly stop.

I don’t smile. But a few rays of light pierce a section of my raging storm, and isn’t that so much better?

Once my previous art is covered, I throw my hand in the vague direction of the industrial-sized fan I keep shoved in the corner next to a collection of mannequins. Without being asked, I hear Sen pull it over, then the snick as it’s plugged in.

I march to a different corner and throw off a tarp covering all the pink I’ve been hiding from. Not today.

I turn the fan on, and while the wall dries, I carry over can after can, the heat of Sen’s watchful gaze on my back, waiting to be asked for help. But this shit I gotta do alone.

It takes time to get all my supplies cleaned and ready, to clear the space of empty cans and mannequin body parts. Carefully, I collect Erica’s head and hold it up for Sen, not looking at him but the back of her matted hair.

“This is Erica, she helps me with ideas,” I mumble while kicking some plastic hands out of the way.

“Out of all the decapitated heads I’ve met, she has to be the loveliest.”

“And how many is that?” I ask, a little smile playing at the corner of my mouth.

“Far too many,” Sen replies, his own grin in his voice.

It takes time to get ready and for the paint to dry. At one point, Sen walks off to take a call, then comes back to find all my paint cans open and lids tossed into a pile. Then I snap on my black facemask and toss an identical one to Sen.

“Paint fumes will have little effect on me.”

“I put on the seatbelt,” I counter.

“That you did.”

I still haven’t looked at him, but a knot of unease loosens when I hear him pull on the straps.

Standing in front of the now dry wall—well, dryish—I hold a clean brush like it’s more a part of me than my hand. This will show me how I feel. Explain each emotion to me, to the world. To Sen.

I dip my brush into the can of pink paint. Just red, green, and blue all mixed. That’s all it is.

“I used to be scared of pink,” I tell Sen, watching hypnotised as paint strings drip from the brush, creating waves as I carefully scrape off the excess on the side of the silver rim. “It made me feel fucking small.”

I channel all of myself onto the white, giving the absence of colour—colour. Slashing, sweeping arcs. Smaller, deliberate movements.