Page 61 of Possibly Texas

I breathed out. “Okay. I’ll do my best.”

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“That’s all you gotta do, sugar.” Lilly squeezed my shoulder.

What I had expected was for Lilly to step back, give me a little room, and just observe while I started painting. Maybe give a tip here or there. Or, I don’t know, give me some idea of how to start. Instead, she turned on her heels and walked back to the student she had been helping when I approached her. Her leaving didn’t make me more or less nervous because I wasn’t sure how to feel. I’d just been given the means to paint and no instruction.

For a moment, I considered quietly setting down the provided painting supplies and sneaking out of The Pueblo. That would probably get the message across about how confident I was in my ability to just make art on the fly. And I knew how to run like hell. What was Lilly going to do? Chase me down and drag me back to my easel until I produced art?

You make art now!

After watching Lilly out of the corner of my eye for a moment, I realized that chasing me down was exactly what she’d do. Possibly wasn’t Memphis or New Orleans, either. Even if I could outrun Lilly—which was fairly likely—she’d still find me. Sooner or later, she’d show up on Jack’s doorstep with her arms crossed over her chest.

Jack would hand me over, too. If just for the shits and grins.

So, with a deep sigh, I looked around the room. I was supposed to paint what I saw. Or, rather, how I saw it. I realized I had to figure out what I saw and how I saw it. Though every part of my brain was telling me that I was wasting my time—you’re not even an artist—I forced myself to take in the atrium around me.

Brown walls. No. Rusty, sandy brown walls. Made of…bricks? Stones? Possibly hand-carved blocks of some kind? Maybe it was clay that was hand-packed and molded? I didn’t know how old The Pueblo was, so I could only guess the technology available when it was built.

Stone columns, slightly less brown than the walls—definitely sandy brown—rose from the stone floor to hold the dome above us aloft. The dome, brownish-red—burnt sienna, maybe?—from the outside, was sparkling white on the inside.

The skylight above, only visible from inside The Pueblo or if you were high enough above the building to see it, let in that golden Possibilian sunlight. Was the inside of the dome sparkling white, or was it off white, or tan, or light brown, but the sunlight that nourished Possibly bleached it white? The sun didn’t hit every corner on the inside of the dome due to the skylight’s positioning and shape. If the sun was responsible for the blindingly white color, it would have happened in stages. Parts of the dome would be less white than others. Then again, I had no idea when Possibly was founded—it hadn’t been on the town sign—so I didn’t know how long the sun had been working on the dome.

Below the dome, in a perfect circle, edged by stone, was the lush green grass that seemed to cover every inch of Possibly that wasn’t paved or worn down into a trail. The sunlight made it sparkle like thinly sliced blades of emerald, nearly giving it a cartoonish look. It just never seemed real. If I hadn’t spent so many afternoons lounging in the grass around Possibly with Auggie, I would have thought it was Astroturf or some other synthetic grass.

The other students around me, under Lilly’s watch, were creating their art. Some sculpted or molded, others painted and drew. Some seemed perfectly content to stand by their work and think. Maybe they were trying to figure out how they saw things, too. Everyone was smiling, or, at the least, not unhappy. They were content. Lilly would laugh with a student she’d stop to check on from time to time, but always quietly so as to not disturb anyone more than necessary.

Breathing deeply through my nose, I let my eyes fall shut. And I listened to the sounds of The Pueblo.

Murmurs of students exchanging pleasantries or questions. Lilly talking softly to someone when they had a question or observation. The swish swish swish tap tap tap clink clink clink of brushes being rinsed in jars and tapped dry. Soles of shoes scraping against well-worn stone.

A smile came to my face as a breeze whistled down from the skylight in the dome, carrying the sound of birdsong with it. If I really concentrated, I could almost hear the gurgling of Susurrus Creek. Even though The Pueblo was a good one hundred yards from the creek, the breeze still managed to help it deliver its message.

Next door, Starbuck had made blueberry muffins. Along with the sounds of the birds and the creek, the breeze carried the scent of Possibly. Soft and cakey, light, yet dense and filling where it mattered, gooey and sticky from all of the berries. Crunchy and crumbly on top from the sugar and cinnamon crumble topping. Down, through the center of the softball sized muffins, was that sweet cream cheese icing filling. Almost like cheesecake, but softer. Crunchy, gooey, cakey. My mouth watered thinking of the muffins.

It dawned on me why Possibilians would enjoy having The Pueblo as their “church.” It had all the sights, sounds, and smells of their happy, quirky, little town. It was an oasis. It was safe. Going to high school in The Pueblo didn’t seem like such a bad idea. To do my studies while listening to the sounds of Possibly, while smelling Starbuck’s creations each day, would be heaven.

I opened my eyes.

The room wasn’t brown.

Copper.

Bronze.

Dark amber.

It wasn’t brown.

It was the color of a golden park statue, well-worn, dulled, and smoothed by fingers that had loved it over its lifetime. Because it had seen life. It had life.

The circle of emerald shavings at the center of the room proved it.

I didn’t know how to make those colors with the dozen or so different colors of acrylic Lilly had squirted onto my palette, but I’d have fun figuring it out. I gripped my brush. Maybe, even if I couldn’t paint the room in a way that would be representative of the room itself, I could at least express how I saw the room. Just as Lilly had instructed. I’d do that.

Hours ticked by and the coppers and bronzes and dark ambers took on new dimension. I did my best. Other students finished their work and left in a daze of contentment. Or they moved on to other art projects. Lilly continued moving about the room, checking in on this student here, checking in on that student there.