When You Are Gone

Chapter 10

"Roman!" my art teacher, Mrs. Braun called my name. My mind was clustered. The siren had sounded and everyone was filing out of the exam hall – I had just written my second physics exam.

"A word," she called out. Every feature on Mrs. Braun was exaggerated, even her hair – it was golden and thick, curled up to the top, with some falling to her face, she usually wore her Dolly Varden hat on top. Thick lashes, bright red lipstick, a multicolored ankle length frock. Everything plus-sized except her height, she was extremely short, I had to look down at her when she spoke, it felt uncomfortable. You didn't need to be told she was an artist to know, it was written all around her.

"I wanted to talk to you about the project." She'd finally caught up.

"Yes."

"It's just that everyone else has brought in theirs for approval and tips but I haven't heard from you." She spoke trying to catch her breath between the words.

"I've been busy. But I'll bring it," I said frankly.

We were now standing out, the corridor was deserted.

"You said you were doing the weather elements choice, right."

I nodded.

"I know you are a smart boy, Roman," she said whispering slowly as if she was disclosing some top-class secret she wasn't supposed to. "You are by far my best student. I want the best for you." We were only seven in her Art class. She talked like I was an Andy Warhol, like I was a marble in a sea of charcoal, like I was special.

"Thank you." My mind was with Francie at the hospital.

"Hey," she called out as I walked away, "are you okay?"

I nodded.

"At home, is everything fine?" she asked.

I nodded again.

I swear she would've put her hand on my face and kissed my cheek if she could. I could see the sympathy in her eyes, I even felt sorry for making her feel this way.



I took the bus into town. I tried to draw Francie on the way, Mrs. Braun had planted the idea in my head. I only drew her eyes – it was the furthest I could go. There was a girl in the bus who had looked a lot like Francie, from the back, I could've sworn it was her. Even the hair and how it flowed over her shoulders.

I ended at the front door of the hospital. Her nurse aid even saw me outside and she smiled. I couldn't convince myself to get in, not to face her cold shoulder again or be told how beautiful orchids are. So I went home instead.

I laid awake for most of the evening thinking about her. Not the ill-disposed, cold Francie now, but the one I saw in my living room that night, the one I fell in love with. She talked too much but I never got tired of her voice. She was too loud, too self-confident, she took me out of my comfort zone at times, made me think with her smart questions like 'what's your deal?' or 'forever is a long time, are you sure?' or 'why do they call it a knight when it's shaped like a horse?' she was a piece of art – a flawless Picasso, ripped at every edge but still a masterpiece.

I wanted her to come to life again, so I closed my eyes. She came back to me. I took my brushes, tubes of paint and a canvas. I played Green Day on my stereo – it could as well be just called Francie now because it was all I listened to when I missed her, so pretty much every time.

It was 3.46 when I looked at the clock. I had been up all night working on this painting I realized. There she was, driving me crazy again, losing my head in the name of love. Francesca stared back at me with that smile, her broad, traffic stopping smile. The painting was so vivid, I felt her presence in the room.

"You didn't sleep," said Gina walking through my bedroom door.

I turned my head to face her, my eyes still adjusting to the orange light that lit the room but I was not attentive enough to notice the whole time till now. "How long have you been standing there?"

"Long enough to know you haven't slept."

I began washing my hands with the water in one of the paint jars. The stubborn paint wouldn't come off. She noticed the painting and froze. I wanted to cover it up or face it the other direction but I couldn't, any attempt to touch it would smudge the still fresh acrylic paint.

"Are you okay?" she asked dumbfounded by the painting.

If I got a dollar for every time someone asked me that question imagine how rich I'd be. Literally.

She walked up to the painting, "What's this for?"

"Nothing." I replied halfheartedly.

She furrowed her brow and then walked to the side of my bed.

"Everything is so impossible with you, Roman. I don't get you," she said disappearing down one side of my bed. She was seated cross-legged leaning on the side of my bed.

"I just want to know if you are okay. I'm worried about you." She sighed, "Say something."

I flopped onto my bed helplessly.

"You're not going to say anything?" she said. I was pulling a Francie.

"Just go and sleep, Gina it's late."

"No." she said candidly, "I won't leave until I get my brother back." Eight year old Gina came back. Those hot summer afternoons at our grandparent's house eating cherry flavored popsicles in the front-yard, drawing hopscotch lines on the driveway flashed right before me like we had taken a trip in an invisible time machine.

She slept on the rug on the side of my bed for the rest of the night.

I had two options: it was either the ice on ice painting I had dedicated my whole senior year to perfect and complete but then deprive this bright, all-of-a-sudden acrylic portrait of Francie to ever see the light or I was going to hand in this portrait of Francie to Mrs. Braun as my project. She would ask me, 'I thought you were doing weather elements' and I would say, 'Yes. I still am. She is my storm, my hurricane, my summer and my snow. She is my everything.'

So I took the ice painting instead. It felt cold – like what it stood for, cold like Francie.