Radiant (3 page)

Inside, Mary
saw a man at the counter cutting open a cardboard box. He looked up and smiled. "Hey there, Mary."

"Hey
Ben," she greeted.

Ben
was, for lack of a better description, a beautiful man. He was in his mid-thirties and a bit on the short side. But he had toned arms and great hair. For a while, Mary hadn't understood why his shop wasn't called "Ben's," since he was the only one there. Then once, he told her about his wife, Anna. She used to run the store with him. Their friends jokingly called them "Banana," since that's what their names sounded like when you said them together fast. Ben said that's what he wanted to name the store, but Anna said it was cheesy. So, they stuck with naming it after her.

About seven years ago
, Anna went to the bank to make a routine deposit. A guy with a gun came in and tried robbing it. He didn't get out before the cops got there, and he took everyone inside as hostages. Mary remembered watching the standoff on the news with Ba. The police brought in a negotiator and everything. Then Mom got home from work, and she turned off the TV and said no one could turn it back on until the next day. Mom had just started working in the ER at the time, so she must've wanted it quiet so that she could rest. But Mary heard at school what happened the next day. The stand off lasted for hours, but eventually the bank robber shot two people before trying to shoot himself. The police got to him first, though, and he lived. One of the people he shot survived, but the other didn't. The one who died was Anna.

Ben
, still wearing his wedding band after seven years, opened the cardboard box and pulled out little tin boxes of mints. He put them on a wire display rack that was sitting on the counter next to the register. "Help you find anything?"

"Ju
st getting a sketchbook and a tube of primary red," Mary said as she made her way through the narrow aisles to get what she needed. "What's new with you?"

"
Not much," he said. "Same old, same old. Got some cool projects going on in the back."

"Really?
Can I see?" she asked. Ben rented out studio space in the back of his shop to other local artists, and Mary always liked to see the works-in-progress of professionals.

"Sure," Ben said. "Come on."

She followed him through a back door to the studio. It was a little messy, but the hand tools were properly stowed in the tool cage and the table saw was clear and unplugged. A sign that read, "The most dangerous tool in this shop is the one you're using," hung over the large shipping door in the back.

At the center
of the room stood a magnificent sculpture made of metal and colored glass. It looked like a cluster of flames with a stunning bird rising from the center.

"
Wow
," she said breathlessly.

"Like it?" he asked.

"Yeah," she said. "Whose is it?"

Ben smiled.

Mary looked at him. "This is
yours
? You're making art again!" After Anna died, Ben hadn't made anything new. Until now, at least.

Ben
chuckled. "I figured it was time. Try walking around it."

Mary
did so and saw he had arranged the flames to make them look like they were moving. The bird also looked like it was flapping its wings.

"This is
awesome," she said.

"
Glad you like it," he said. "It's in an art show coming soon."

"When is it?" Mary asked. Then she added, "Do you have to pay to get in?"

"If you want to come, I'll get you tickets," he said. "You can bring your grandmother and maybe your mom, too."

"
That would be awesome." She looked at the sculpture again. "I would love to do something big like this."

"What would you make?" he asked.

Mary thought for a moment. "Maybe a mobile of the planets. Kinda like this sketch I did for a painting that never got made." She pulled out her old sketchbook and showed him the page.

"
That
would be awesome," Ben said. "It would make a much better mobile than a painting. You should do it."

"You think
so?" she asked. "Well, I can't at home. There's no room. And my art teacher doesn't have power tools and stuff like that."

"You can
use my workspace and tools at no charge," he offered. "And I can get you the same discount I use on my own supplies."

"Really?" she
said. "You would do that?"

He chuckled. "Sure
. I know things are tight when you're reusing sketch paper." He flipped through a couple pages of her old book with the telltale eraser marks.

She
smiled. "Thanks. I'll ask my mom."

Mary paid for the
new sketchbook and red paint before going to catch the next bus. She got off a couple blocks later and walked to a pleasant building with a sign that said "Agape Retirement Home."

A
tiny Filipino woman behind the front desk smiled when she came in. "Hi, Mary."

"
Hi, Ms. Nancy," she said as she signed the visitor's log. "Do you know where my grandmother is?"

"
She's in the courtyard painting and waiting for you."

Mary
thanked her. In a sunny corner of the courtyard, Ba sat before a canvas propped up on a tabletop easel. Her black and gray hair was pinned into a bun behind her head.

Good, Mary thought.
That was a sign that Ba was feeling well today. Still, she made sure to walk around to the front so that Ba could see her. Mary learned a long time ago not to approach her from behind. "Hi Ba."

Ba looked up and smiled.
"Hi Con," she answered, using the Vietnamese word for "child." "How was school today?"

"
It's Saturday. I didn't go to school." She kissed her on the cheek before settling into the next chair.

Ba looked at her curiously.
"What happened to your hands?"

Mary had tried to cover her
injuries with a long sleeve shirt, but it didn't reach the bandages on her hands. She and Mom had agreed not to tell Ba about the accident. They didn't know how she would react. "I fell down in the street on the way to school."

Ba
added some paint onto her brush. "The way you just said that sounded like you were hiding something."

That was one
annoying thing about Ba. When she was in her right mind, you couldn't hide anything from her at all.

"
Are you okay?" Ba asked.

"
I'm fine." But of course Mary was fine. Carter was the one who wasn't okay. She started getting depressed just thinking about him again, so she quickly opened her portfolio to get her mind on something else. "I brought my nebula. You remember I told you about the picture I found on the NASA website?" She took out a canvas and placed it on the table. It wasn't finished yet, but this was Ba. She'd seen pretty much all of Mary's projects before they were finished.

"
That's coming along wonderfully!" Ba said. "It's just like looking through your telescope on the roof."

Mary laughed. "I don't think the telescope is strong enough for that.
"

"
Are you entering it in the school contest?" Ba asked. "You should also enter the one you did of the Northern Lights."

Mary
unrolled her brush bag and took out a round brush. "I'd never win."

"
You don't know that until you've tried," Ba said. "Paintings are meant to be seen, Con. You should let the world see the beautiful things you make."

Mary took the new
tube of red paint and squeezed some onto an empty spot of Ba's palette. She mixed in a touch of black to make crimson. As the paint came together, she realized it was the same shade of blood she had seen on Carter's body at the accident.

No matter what she did, she couldn't get away from him.

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Reflections

"Are you sure you don't want to take another day off?" Mom asked on Monday morning.

"
If I stay home any longer, I'll jump out the window," Mary said.

"
Don't do that," Mom said. "Think of the property value. Rent is already a killer here."

Mary laughed.
Her mother kinda had a messed up sense of humor. "Hey Mom? Can I make a large sculpture?"

"Is it for school?"

Mary shook her head. "I was talking to Ben at the art store. He just finished this cool phoenix that he's going to exhibit at an art show. He invited you, Ba, and me to it, actually. You wanna go?"

Mom
took a slow sip of coffee. "I'll have to check. I might need to work."

"Okay," Mary said. "
But if you can't, can I take Ba?"

Mom took another slow sip. "I
don't see a problem with that. Just as long as you get her back in time for her curfew."

Mary nodded. "Anyway, about this sculpture. I'll need a big s
pace and some tools. Ben said I could use his workshop and he can get me the materials at a discount."

Mom set her cup on the table. "I
don't think that's a good idea. I don't feel comfortable with you going over to a stranger's for hours."

Mary wrinkled her brow. "Ba and I have been buying stuff at his shop for years. He's not a stranger. Maybe it's because you've never met him. You shoul
d go there with me one day."

"There's also the matter of money," Mom said. "You remember how Ba was recently switched to a stronger medication? It's almost double the cost as before. I don't know if
we can afford it, even at a discount."

"Oh," Mary said.
She thought for a moment. "Mom? Do you ever think that maybe I should just go to public school?"

Mom looked at her. "Why do you ask that?"

"Well, we'd have more money," Mary said. "We could live in a nicer place. Maybe Ba could come live with us again and we could hire one of those home care people so that she wouldn't have to be at the retirement home all the time."

"Perhaps," Mom said. "But you're forgetting about something important in all of that."

"What?" Mary asked.

"Your future," Mom said. "Your school is one of a ha
ndful in the whole state where a hundred percent of the graduates go to college."

"I know," Mary said. "But
lots of people who go to public school go to college, too."

Mom chuckled. "Yes, but most of them don't get into the colleges that you will be
able to. Remember, Ba went to Agape because she wanted to. She has friends there and she sees us regularly. And she knows that by doing things this way, you'll have a better shot at being successful."

Mary poked at her cereal. "You're successful."

Mom smirked. "Only after I did things the hard way. I'm sorry, Sweetie. I wish you could do your art project."

Mary
shook her head. "It's all right. I understand." She got up from the kitchen table and hung her bag on her opposite shoulder. Her bruised side was still not ready to bear the burden of her schoolwork. "I need to go to the library after school. But I'll see you tonight."

"
Don't be late. It's
bánh cuốn
with Ba tonight," Mom said.

She kissed her mother
. "I'll be there. Love-you-buh-bye."

"Love-you-buh
-bye," Mom said.

Mary headed
out. On the first floor, Bruce was fixing a cracked tile.

"
Hi Bruce," she said.

"
Hm," he mumbled.

And that was the exte
nt of their conversations, except when he yelled at her for running down the stairs. Sometimes Mary thought about talking back to him, but Mom told her not to. Otherwise, their maintenance requests would definitely be ignored.

Mary paid u
nusual attention to the things around her today. The convenience store on the corner. The newsstand near the bus stop. The fire hydrant with chipped paint, showing the years of dog piss it had endured. The bus noises were sharp again. At school, people in the halls said hi and asked how she was. She answered truthfully, "Fine," but never went into details. Mary didn't normally talk much to anyone at school.

She stopped by the girls
' restroom before heading to Pre-Calculus. After finishing at the toilet, she set her books by the sinks and began washing her hands. She glanced up at the mirror.

A
boy was standing behind her. It was Carter.

Mary g
asped and spun around. Her heart raced as she scanned the room quickly, but she only saw the plain tiled walls and the puke-green stall doors. For a school that cost an arm and a spleen to go to, you'd think it could afford to change those doors out.