Page 25 of Brooklyn Cupid

It’s the first time she’s offered, though I’ve seen some of her stuff online.

“Can I?” I ask, trying not to sound too eager.

She laughs, comes out of her room, and takes me by the wrist. “I insist!”

With a playful spark in her eyes, she starts pulling me toward her room.

Her hand holding mine is smudged with blue paint. And so is a strand of her blond hair.

Touching. See? Her body language around others is very informal. Around me it’s intimate. At least, in my head.

“You keep asking me what sort of art I do,” she says as she pulls me into her room. “Ta-da!”

Her room is a mess. The carpet is rolled up against one wall. A wardrobe is pushed into one corner, and a big bed is against the window. Clear plastic covers most of the floor like she’s about to dispose of a dead body. Cans, bottles, and jars of paint are everywhere. Mixing pallets litter the floor. Canvases, small and large, are stacked against the walls—Lu has no sense of order.

I take it all in, trying to think about anything but her hand still wrapped around my wrist.

Then she lets go, and I take a deep breath.

“I’m preparing for an exhibit at a gallery on Broad Street. It’ll be my first solo exhibition,” she says proudly.

She pulls a drape off a five-by-four feet canvas against the wall, and I come face to face with a giant blindfolded teddy bear.

Huh…

“What’s this?”

“The theme is Childhood Interrupted, teddy bears in a social context—war, hunger, child labor, trafficking. This one is calledMarred.” I notice dirty hands creeping up to the bear from all sides. “And this”—she takes her phone from a nightstand and shows me another canvas—a teddy bear sitting among—

“Grass?” I murmur.

“Sugar cane,” she corrects. There are chocolate wrappers everywhere. Children in torn clothes curiously crouch around the toy. “Child labor in Africa, used by chocolate corporations.”

Wow, she is not all bubbles and pink.

“These are already at the gallery,” she says and shows me another one.

It’s a teddy bear in a dilapidated building, dust and gray rubble in the background, a sniper’s target on its head.

“War zones,” she says.

I don’t like this one. A nasty feeling gathers in my stomach.

No women or children…

The teddy bears in Lu’s paintings are all in bright colors while the background and other objects are in dark pastels outlined with black ink.

It’s another flashback to my life overseas, and my smile fades.

“I get occasional orders for styled portraits,” Lu continues.

“What’s that?”

“When people want their portraits but, say, dressed like royals, or in luxury setting, or superhero-themed, or Da Vinci style. Like this one.”

She points at the giant canvas with barely any paint but sketched in details—dramatic sky and ravens over a gothic castle, a couple in lavish outfits at the front.

“Modern Gothic,” she announces. “It’s a play on Wood’sAmerican Gothic.”

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