“They’re superb,” he says, but he’s still frowning.
I tap my pencil against the edge of the sketchbook, anticipating a “but.”
He motions his finger over the faces. “Where does this image come from?”
“My head?” I answer like it’s a question.
“Yes, but where? Why did you decide on this exact face over any other?”
I look back down at the drawing, rotating his questions in my mind like I’m searching for their hidden agenda. “I don’t understand,” I say at last. And then I blink. “I just thought it looked good.”
“So this is the face you decided would be beautiful. This is the face that made sense to you.” He nods.
I shrug. “I guess. Yeah.” It’s the face I’ve always drawn—it’s just become more detailed over the years.
“But why? Who told you this was beautiful?”
I stop holding back. “Magazines. TV shows. Everyone at school.” I set my pencil down and shove my hands between my knees.
“So beauty to you is what’s palatable to everyone else? You’re drawing what you think everyone wants to see?” he asks gently.
In a tiny voice, I say, “I guess it never occurred to me to draw them any other way.”
I look around the room. Hiroshi’s paintings are everywhere, all of them with different faces, all of them with unique faces. They have such varying degrees of color and shape and style. They represent the whole world.
My eyes fall back down to my sketchbook. The faces I draw rarely change, like they come from cookie-cutter molds. None of them ever look like me.
“Beauty isn’t a single thing. Beauty is dreaming—it’s different for everyone, and there are so many versions of it that you mostly have no control over how you see it. Do you understand what I’m saying?” Hiroshi smiles, pats the table, and walks back to his own canvas.
Everything about him is stylish and cool and otherworldly—the way he speaks, the way he walks, the way he paints. Sometimes I can’t believe Hiroshi Matsumoto is a real person. He’s so comfortable in his own skin. Even if I lived to be three hundred years old, I still wouldn’t have his confidence. It’s his gift—a gift he’s trying to share with me through art.
I stare at the faces for a long time, and when I’m sick of them I shut my eyes tight and let my imagination take over. I think of so many faces—Emery and Susan Chang and Francis from the tattoo parlor and Akane and Mom—and then I let everything blur together until I’m daydreaming about beautiful quirky strangers I’ve never met before. They have freckles and tans, light hair and dark, crooked features and curves, and they are all exactly as they are meant to be.
I open my eyes, find a blank page, and leave the cookie cutters behind.
? ? ?
I draw face after face after face after face . . .
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Mom’s voice is weird today. She’s talking to me the way she talks to strangers—with her nice voice.
I look at Jamie and point upstairs. I don’t like talking on the phone in front of people—it makes me uncomfortable, and I feel like everyone is listening.
He smiles and points to the TV. He and Brandon are watching a cop drama I’ve never heard of.
“Have you heard anything back from the school?” Mom asks. She’s trying to sound nonchalant, but I can tell she wants to know the answer. She’s rarely interested in me; it’s not hard for me to tell the difference when she actually is.
I close the guest bedroom door and lean against it. “Not yet. Their website said it usually takes four weeks to respond, so it will probably be a while.”
“I see.” She pauses. “Is anyone there? I thought I could hear someone in the background.”
“Not anymore. I’m upstairs.”
“Do they have a nice house?”
I perk up. “Yeah, really nice.”
“Is everyone nice to you? Do you guys talk a lot?”
“Just a normal amount, I guess. Why?”
“Can’t I be curious? They’re taking care of my only daughter. I have a right to know.” She sighs dismissively. “It’s so hot here. I should be getting some sun, but I’m so busy with work and my website.”
“Mmm,” I grunt into the phone.
“So, what do you guys talk about?”
I move around the room anxiously. She’s leading into a question—I can feel it. “I don’t know, Mom. Normal stuff.”
“Like what?”
“The weather. Food. If the water pressure is too high.”
“Do you talk about me?”
And there it is.
“No.”
“I find that hard to believe.”
“Why?”
“Because I know you tell everyone about how horrible you think I am. You know, I hope you at least keep some things private.”
Anger swells in my throat. Hurt floods my chest. “That’s not true—I don’t talk about you. And if you’re talking about Uncle Max—”
She tuts into the phone, interrupting me. “You mean to tell me you drove all the way to California without telling Jamie how miserable you think your life is?”
It’s hard to hold the phone up to my ear because my hands are trembling like it’s below freezing in this room. “Actually, yeah. I haven’t talked to Jamie about you at all. I didn’t even tell him about Uncle—”
“God, Kiko.” Mom groans. “Enough about Max and the money.”
My palms sweat. “I’m not talking about the money.”
She ignores me. “Well, I don’t trust you. I have this gut feeling you guys have been trying to drag my name through the dirt over in Cal-i-for-nia.”
“Why do you keep saying it like that?” I snap.
“I’m saying it completely normally. Stop being so sensitive.”
“I have to go to the studio.” My knees feel like they’re made of jelly. It’s impossible to stand still.
“Okay. Well, I love you, even if you hate me.”
Normally I’d correct her. Normally I’d convince her that I don’t hate her. But I’m too angry and I don’t care if she thinks I hate her. She’s probably only saying it because she wants me to fall back under her spell anyway.
“Bye.” I hang up the phone.
When I reach the bottom of the stairs, I see Brandon’s head pop up from the other side of the couch.
“Was that your mom?” When I nod, he asks, “How’s everything at home? Your brothers okay?”
“They’re fine.” At least I think they are—Mom doesn’t usually talk about them unless she’s complaining, but that’s normal, so I just assume everything is normal with my brothers, too. I walk closer to Jamie, who pushes his body forward suddenly so he’s leaning away from the couch. “I’m going to head over to the studio.”
“Okay,” he says, his fingers flexing.
Brandon is staring at the television screen, but he’s still talking to me. “I heard your dad got remarried.”
I’m sure Jamie’s jaw clenches.
“He did,” I say. “They had twins a little while ago. Two girls.”
Brandon’s eyes find mine. “Oh, really? Wow. That’s great. Good for him.”