Page 49 of Smile for the Camera

Suddenly, Aprilette FaceTimes us through my dad’s phone.

“Kumusta!” Though her navy scrubs are wrinkled, my Atè’s hair still has the kind of volume that looks professionally styled.

“Neneng!” My dad brightens with a smile.

My mom waves at virtual Aprilette, inclining towards my dad’s phone enough that it looks like she’s about to dive through the screen and into my Atè’s apartment.

“How was work?” my mom asks.

“Great! Diane is assigning me more work!”

My mom claps in her signature way, excitedly tapping her fingertips against her palm, and cheers, “Galing mo, neneng! She really trusts you.”

I shovel in a heap full of pinakbet, biting down on the soft squash, rubbery green beans, and tender pork. Though I already know the reason, I find myself wondering why my mom didn’t clap or say “Galing mo” when I showed her my portfolio.

As Aprilette tells us about her new responsibilities, I stuff myself with pinakbet and plaster on a smile. It’s not fair. Why do my parents pepper my Atè with so many questions but only give me generic, dismissive compliments about a project I’d stayed up late creating?

My mind drifts the entire time Aprilette talks. Still, I say, “Great job, Atè!”

“Salamat, Emi!”

After we give our rounds of mahal kitas, virtual Aprilette signing off, and finish dinner, I have my nightly practice quizzes with my dad. It’s hard pasting on a smile when he only asks me questions he already knows the answers to.

“Galing mo, anak,” my dad says, patting my shoulder proudly.

But I don’t feel proud of myself. Shouldn’t I feel a little happy my dad is proud of me?

I lie on my bed and, for the nth time, flip through my portfolio. Galing mo, galing mo! My eyes lock on each photo as my parents’ voices echo with the words I hope to hear. If they echo enough, maybe, just maybe, it’ll feel like they’re praising my photos. But imagination can only do so much until reality hits again.

I glance at my phone, lying beside me with the screen still black, then shift my eyes back to my portfolio. Am I ready? I pick up my phone and, on Instagram, send a message before I can change my mind.

Me: Now I feel like it.

Chapter Seventeen

As Jase studies the cover of my portfolio, I ask myself the same question I’ve left unanswered in every scenario since submitting my sign-up sheet. What did I get myself into?

Blossoms is filled with that coffee-and-watercolor aroma I find strangely pleasing. Within an hour of sitting here, I’ve told Jase that I prefer mornings because I like how the light glow of the sun flares across everything, that I enjoy reading YA Fantasy because it’s fun escaping into a whole new world, and that I’ve never had a pet because I don’t think I can take care of anything since, as the youngest, I’m used to people taking care of me. Jase has told me that he prefers nights because he thinks everything exciting happens in the dark, that he enjoys reading comic books because the drawings make the story more fun for him, and that he’s also never had a pet because he doesn’t think he can give it the care it deserves. We’ve learned all this from the SAT questions I wrote for him today (he still received a 2/10, though it would’ve been 3 had he not second-guessed himself). Jase always manages to strike up an exchange of icebreakers every time we review a question.

Since I present at Blossoms anyway, I’m practicing my presentations inside to get used to the designated location, along with the strangers who’ll inevitably listen. At first, I stumble and stop at every line, starting over even when Jase tells me it’s not all that bad. I use hand gestures and, to my surprise, project, though that may have been because I was trying to speak over everyone around me. In the end, Jase is impressed by my progress, and I now feel more prepared for tomorrow. Despite him telling me that I did perfectly, I still ask for advice. He suggests that I keep talking even if I mess up.

“Whenever I play, I can’t just stop, or else it ruins the show,” he explains. “Play it off like it was supposed to happen that way, even if it’s obvious that it’s not. You’d be surprised by how easily people move on from mistakes.”

I never thought about this last part. Guess I dwell on my mistakes so much I don’t realize others can forget they ever happened.

Now, as Jase opens the front flap of my portfolio, I wonder if I want to show him this side of me. Our icebreakers are just fun facts about ourselves. But my portfolio is personal, all my work, along with my words, pasted there on the pages I cut from construction paper. If he thinks any of my photos are weird, it’ll hurt, especially since in no way would I ever change these photographs now. I like them as they are.

He studies my photo of the fence, the faded paint and cracks zoomed in and framed in a gloss photograph, pasted against black construction paper.

“Look,” I begin, wanting this torture to end, “I know they’re odd, so you can—”

“How did you get the cracks to look like that?” Jase asks.

I’m not entirely sure what I was expecting him to say, but I definitely wasn’t expecting a question about my creative process. Nora and all our friends, who are at least a year older than us, simply say my photos look cool. Guess I’m so used to one-worded compliments that I’m taken aback by Jase’s sudden question.

I must still look surprised because Jase adds, “I’ve never paid much attention to cracks on fences, and here, I can’t stop looking at them. So, how did you get them to pop out and look so cool?”

I explain my editing process to him, feeling this excitement I can’t quite describe. On the captions, Ms. Choi only wanted us to explain why we chose a main subject and setting for our prompt. She preferred interpreting the editing part herself.