Page 5 of Falling for my First Crush

“Who?” Gianna asks, already distracted from her earlier line of questioning.

“Joe Lawrence,” I say as casually as I can.

“What? Are you serious?” Gianna exclaims in shock. “Joe Lawrence! What a blast from the past. What’s he doing back in town? We haven’t heard from him since… gosh, I can’t even remember the last time.”

“He lives here now. He said that he works for the fire department,” I say.

“Wow,” Maia says softly. “I guess I can tell how much we meant to him.”

Something about the way she says it rubs me the wrong way. I shift on the cushion between them. Not wanting to talk to them about Joe anymore, I get up and head to the kitchen. I hug my mom, and she hugs me back.

“Did you have a good day?” she asks.

“I saw Joe Lawrence,” I say, maybe a little too nonchalantly, as I snag a green bean out of the pan in front of her.

“Joey? Oh my gosh! How is that dear boy doing? We haven’t seen him in so long! It’s been… years,” she says, with a nostalgic tone in her voice.

“He seems fine,” I say, then change the subject quickly. “Sabina didn’t wait for me today. I feel like I let her down.”

“Oh?” Mom says, now the one trying to sound unconcerned, but I notice her eyebrows and forehead narrowing. “It’s okay, dear. That’s too bad. Just… keep trying, and… maybe next time.”

“How much time until dinner is ready?” I ask.

“Another forty-five minutes or so,” Mom says.

“I think I’m going to go for a quick run, if that’s okay,” I say.

“That’s fine, dear,” she says.

I change quickly and slip out the garage door so my sisters don’t see me leave. I head toward town, lost in thoughts about Joe and the past. I don’t even notice that I’m near Violet’s studio until I’m right out front. I can see that Violet’s inside, so I open the door. I’m hesitant to bother her, but I really want to talk to someone.

She sees me, and waves. “Hi, Jackie, what brings you in?”

I cross the small space to where she is. “Just out for a run. I’m trying to get out my rage,”

“Rage, huh?” she says.

“Well…okay, let’s just say ‘just general irritation,’ ” I say, trying to laugh it off.

Violet sees through me, though. I can tell by the look on her face. “I was just getting ready to put on some music and paint; want to join me?”

“Oh, I don’t want to bother you,” I say.

“You asked me to give you painting lessons, didn’t you?” Violet says. “Consider this lesson number one.”

Without waiting for a response from me, Violet gets to work setting up another paint station, complete with easel and canvas. I stand awkwardly off to one side, feeling oddly excited by the whole thing. I’m not the most spontaneous person, so an impromptu painting session feels like something way outside my comfort zone.

“Okay, so for this exercise,” Violet begins, “I like to put on jazz music, and then I just paint my feelings.”

“Um, that sounds great,” I say. “But I have no idea what you mean. I just paint my feelings…?”

Violet laughs her light and airy infectious laugh. “Sorry. I forget myself sometimes. So, what I mean, is that basically, you just use big brush strokes or small ones, or you make shapes or dots or lines or squiggles… anything, really. Try to let the music and your feelings guide you. There is no wrong way to do this,” she says, handing me a paintbrush. “Trust me, Jaq… just give it a shot.”

I stare at the canvas in front of me. On the tiny table next to me, there is an array of paints and a jar of water. Violet turns on some jazz and sets to work on her own canvas. I watch her for a moment. It’s extraordinary to see her paint. She seems to be lost in the movement of her brush, as she literally brings sound to life in vivid color on her canvas. I don’t think I’m going to be able to do that. But doggone it, I’m going to try it anyway. Who cares if I’m actually lousy at painting? Violet won’t judge my effort.

I dip my brush in some red paint. That seems fitting for my mood right now. There is a trumpet that seems to be wailing over all the other sounds. It feels like the scream that I’ve had stuck in my throat since Joe asked about Maia. I paint a big red squiggly slash across the canvas, and it feels like the trumpet music is spilling out of my hand through my paint brush, releasing my scream.

Some kind of power surges through me. I feel…I don’t know… good. I let myself get lost in the music and in the splashes of color that I dash across the canvas. I add a midnight blue color to the red. Then some purple. The effect is that of a bruise. Something about the image strikes me as poetic. Not that anyone else would be able to see what I see, but I don’t care. This isn’t for anyone else; this is for me.

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