Ariella dragged the paint in a gentle, deliberate arc, softening the line of her mother's hair as it blew in an unseen breeze. The figure on the canvas stood half-turned on the old bridge, one arm reaching back, fingers stretched toward a small hand—her hand.
The brush paused again at the edge of her mother's face. She stared at it, swallowed hard, then blurred it with a fresh sweep of white. Not because she couldn't paint it. But because she couldn't remember it, at least not clearly.
That day when her mother sacrificed everything for them was like a fleeting memory. No matter how much Ariella tried to remember that night and every time she gets close to remembering, it slips between her fingers, no matter how hard she tried to hold on.
Ariella leaned back on the stool and exhaled through her nose, biting the inside of her cheek. Her knuckles were streaked in red, the knees of her overalls smeared with charcoal and cerulean blue. The late afternoon sun filtered through the high loft window, draping golden light across the floorboards and casting the long shadows of easels and drying canvases.
