Page 11 of One True Loves

“Oh, hush up,” she says, squeezing my leg. She turns and reaches over to the baby-blue cabinet next to the couch, and pulls out a gift bag stuffed with a cloud of tissue paper. “And don’t get your hopes up. There ain’t no car keys in here, but you won’t need that in New York anyway.”

“Yeah, right,” I mumble as I reach into the bag and pull outa little piece of my childhood. It’s pink and gray, with a gigantic flash attached to the top. It has the same scratch on the bottom from when I dropped it at Disneyland trying to take a picture on the Dumbo ride, and there’s a chip of paint missing from the left corner.

“Is this...?”

“Your old Polaroid camera,” she finishes for me. “Yes, it is.”

“But how did... I never knew what happened to it.”

She laughs. “Oh, I’ll tell you what happened to it! You were over here taking photos of Grandpa out in the backyard. You had a whole setup—put him in a three-piece suit and made him sit all up in the jasmine bush even though his allergies were acting up. But you couldn’t get the light just right; the flash kept going off when you didn’t mean for it to. So, you threw the camera down on the lawn and declared that you were done with photography. Next day, you moved on to your watercolor phase, and that was that.”

I don’t remember that. Like, at all. I figured that I just lost the camera or something, or that Mom and Dad stopped buying me film. But I guess that’s not much of an explanation, either. Idoremember how much I loved carrying that camera everywhere around my neck, how my brain and fingers still itch to capture moments in perfect little squares. Why did I give it up so easily? And forwatercolors? I can’t even recall a watercolor phase.

I guess I was hopping around, even then. I was signed up for a photography class at Chrysalis at some point—freshmanyear?—but I didn’t like the teacher, Mr. Stabler, so I transferred to something else—printmaking, or maybe illustration. I’ve never wanted to commit to one thing, to get tied down to a specialty when it’s possible I’d be better at something else.

“So, wait, you saved it for me?” I ask. Grandma Lenore’s wide smile remains, but something flickers in her eyes.

“Your granddad did,” she says. “Put it aside in his office and wouldn’t let nobody touch it, even when we were cleaning out the place, you know, when we had to switch the room around.” When he got sick and his office became his hospital room, she means. “Said you loved this here thing and would find your way back to it... eventually.”

My throat gets tight again. Grandpa John’s been gone for six years now, but I still miss him so much. It’s almost like this is a present from him too.

“And before you say anything about me just giving you something that’s already yours for a present,” Grandma Lenore says quickly, her voice getting back some of its pep. “Your cousin Reggie helped me buy fifty-leven packs of film for this thing on the eBay, and those things weren’t cheap. So, you better not be throwing this camera on my lawn no time soon.”

“Oh, never! Grandma, it’s perfect.” I pull her into a hug, inhaling her coconut-and-lavender scent. “I’m excited to have it back. I’ve been thinking of photography a lot lately, actually.”

“Well, look at God!” she says, slapping her hands together. “Something told me this was what you needed right now. And maybe you can even take some classes again in New York. Youmama told me you’re studying art there at that university of yours.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

“Now, why are you making that stank face?” she asks, narrowing her eyes at me. “Every time someone’s mentioned New York today, you pull your lip up and scrunch your nose like you smell something funky.”

I can feel that exact expression on my face, and I rush to smooth it out.

Going away to New York seemed like the sort of thing that confident, brave, loud Lenore would do. New York is where all the big artists live at some point, after all. But now that New York will be my reality in just a few months, this place so far from everyone and everything I know... well, I’m nervous. Apparently so nervous that Grandma Lenore can see it all over my stank face.

But there’s no point in talking that through. No going back now.

“Maybe it’s your greens?” I say with a smirk. Deflecting.

“Child, you better tread carefully,” she says, giving me a stank face of her own.

“And anyway, I’m studying art, but not really,” I explain. “Not in the same way I am now. My major is art history. So less doing, more analyzing, you know.”

She looks me up and down. “That face because of my greens again?”

I cover my face and laugh. I’ve got to get that lip undercontrol. “Maybe. Maybe also because art history can be pretty boring, but I had to make a decision when I applied, and that just made sense... at the time.” Once I decided on New York, and NYU specifically, I waited until the very last day, January fifth, to submit my application because I couldn’t narrow down what I wanted to focus on. My portfolio was kind of all over the place to commit to one specialty, so this seemed like the best compromise. I got an A in AP Art History, and Ms. Ramiro told me it was something I should consider—plus I didn’t have to submit any art samples to be judged. That’s another reason why I didn’t even consider ArtCenter or CalArts, the art schools in California that Theo was deciding between. “But I don’t know,” I continue, shrugging. “I guess I see it as more of a placeholder, though, as I figure out what I really want to do.”

As I’m saying it, I hear how privileged I sound, talking about just figuring it out when my parents are basically paying a whole-ass salary to send me to this prestigious school. But I can’t help it. I jump around a lot, I think, because I thrive on that spark that something brand-new brings. The excitement of the unknown, learning something new. It’s hard to imagine committing to something for my whole life when I’m not even eighteen yet. And I need to commit, finally, right? With all this money involved. I feel guilty that I’m not more like Tessa, with her writing, or Sam, with his baking. Or even Wally. It’s boring and predictable that he’s following in our dad’s footstepsto become a lawyer, but at least he’s committed and passionate about something.

I talk a big game sometimes with my friends, but it makes me nervous that I can’t commit to any one thing. That I’m so all over the place instead of sure and steady. Maybe that’s part of the reason no one can commit to me.

“Seems to me like you’ve got time, pretty girl, and there ain’t nothing wrong with throwing things out there and seeing what sticks,” Grandma Lenore says. “You’re going to thrive whatever you do.”

When she says it, I can almost believe it. I sometimes wish I could carry her around in my pocket, when this confident and strong front of mine starts to fall. Which it’s been doing a lot lately.

“Grandma, can you just come with us on Monday?” I ask. “I’d rather share a room with you than Wally.”

“Me? On a cruise?” She slaps her thigh and lets out a loud laugh. “It’s like y’all never seenTitanic. They warned you! But let me be quiet.”

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