Painless (51 page)

“Kamiko!” I hissed.

The guy looked at the pictures thoughtfully. “You drew this?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said sheepishly, “the one on the toilet. I didn’t draw the one with the baseball bat.”

“Oh,” he nodded, examining the drawings. He chuckled, “I love that he’s stoned while he’s taking a shit. That’s awesome.”

Kamiko nudged me, “Sign it!”

“Yeah,” the guy said, “will you sign it for me? I’m hanging this in our bathroom in the dorms.”

I couldn’t decide if that was a compliment or an insult.

He smiled, admiring my art, “The guys are going to love this.”

So I signed it. I mean, a lot of people read when they were on the toilet. Sure, a bathroom stall in the dorms wasn’t exactly Charboneau Gallery, but it was the next best thing, right?

===

Kamiko and I went to her dorm room in Paiute Hall.

“I’m trying something totally different,” she said, sliding a big black portfolio out from under her bed. She unzipped it and handed me a stack of paintings on 1/8” thick illustration board. “These are all done with pen and ink, and acrylics.”

They were drawings with washes of transparent color over the ink lines, and touches of opaque acrylic here and there on some, and more thickly applied acrylics on others.

“What happened to all your oils?”

“They’re in the closet,” she nodded toward the wheeled wardrobe next to her bed. “Since Brandumb didn’t want them for the show, I put them all away. Maybe I’ll try to sell them later. But for now, I’m doing this,” she pointed her chin toward the stacks of paintings in my lap.

I sat down on the bed and flipped through them. There was a half dozen of them, all in totally different styles. One showed a dolphin jumping out of waves made of blue human hands and arms. Another showed a beautiful woman in a giant Victorian gown with hands that snaked out in looping coils that ended in bouquets of roses. Another showed three identical young girls with black pigtails and kimonos standing on a Japanese garden bridge over a pond filled with koi that had human faces. “Are these kimono triplets supposed to be you?” I asked.

Kamiko nodded. “And those faces on the koi are supposed to be Brandumb, but I don’t think he’ll notice. I had to work from memory.”

“What is it supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know,” Kamiko grinned, “that I’m three times more awesome than Brandumb, who is so un-evolved he hasn’t yet crawled out of the ocean with the other fishes that turned into humans a billion years ago?”

“You’re not still angry at him, are you?”

“I was when I did that one,” she smiled. “Now? Not so much.”

The rest of her paintings were equally bizarre and amazing. “Did you do all of these? It looks like six different artists painted them.”

She smiled and nodded, her eyes beaming with excitement. “I did my homework. I went through that catalog from the last show that you gave me until I had some direction, then I dove in.”

I could still remember how Kamiko’s confidence had been shattered by Brandon when he’d rejected her art, and hit on me right in front of her. For two weeks afterward, I had been afraid she’d never climb out of her funk. But her confidence was now back in full force.

“Well, they’re all awesome, Kamiko.” I handed the stack back to her. “I’m blown away.”

She took them and slid them back into the big black portfolio. “Are you going to submit anything, Sam?”

“What, to Brandon’s show?”

“Yeah.”

“I hadn’t really thought about it. I guess I’ve been too busy.”

“Considering you’re on the front cover of The Wombat, I think you probably should.”

“Do you have that show catalog of Brandon’s?”

Kamiko pulled it off the bookcase on her desk and handed it to me.

I flipped through it. The first thing I noticed was that Kamiko’s new paintings would totally fit right in. “I don’t know, Kamiko. These are all really good. I can see you did a lot of research. I don’t know if I’ll have time to come up with something before the show.”
 

“You’ll think of something,” she smiled.

As much as I’d improved while studying art with the help of Christos, Spiridon, Kamiko, and all my art teachers, the paintings in the catalog were probably better than I could do at the moment, especially on short notice.

“You have tons of great ideas, Sam,” Kamiko said. “I bet you’ll come up with something awesome.”

Once again, I was super grateful that all of my San Diego friends were so supportive of me. Their confidence bolstered my own.

“You’re right,” I grinned confidently, “I will.”

===

Madison and I were studying in the Main Library in our favorite private study room on the fifth floor, which had the best view of the ocean.

My laptop was open and my email program chimed when a new email came in. It was from the SDU Registrar’s Office. Subject: A date has been set for your appeal.

I groaned.

“What?” Madison asked, looking up from her gigantic Marketing textbook.

Not only had the subject line of the email been a spoiler for the content of the message, it had also spoiled my mood. I clicked on it to get it over with.
 

The message read, “A date has been assigned for you to appear before the administrative tribunal of San Diego University to discuss the grievance(s) pending against you, at which time your standing as a student at SDU will be reviewed. In addition to the initial claim of theft leveled against you by Tiffany Kingston-Whitehouse (plaintiff), an additional charge of assault has been brought against you, Samantha Smith (defendant)…”

Tiffany and her stupid stolen credit card.

And my stupid slap.

I never should’ve smacked her.

According to the rest of the letter, Tiffany had gone to the SDU police to report my “attack” on her. At least the letter made it sound like my slapping her wasn’t a federal offense with the death penalty attached. But for a second, I imagined the cops showing up in their police cars with the red and blue lights flashing so they could cuff me and haul me to jail for committing Assault and Slappery.

Wow, I suddenly felt like my situation and Christos’ had been reversed. Or he was having a bad influence on me like my mom had warned. No, that was crazy because my cheating mom was crazy.

“Bad news?” Madison asked.

“Huh?”

“You look like you swallowed a poisoned pie.”

“Poisoned pie?”

“Like one of those blackbird pies with twenty four birds inside? You look like they’re flapping around in your belly right now, trying to get out,” she smirked.

“I’d rather have that than this,” I scowled.

“What is it?”

“My date for the Tiffany thing.”

“Oh,” Madison said morosely. She already knew the whole story. “I’ve told you before, give me the word, and I’ll cut a bitch.”

“Which bitch?” I snickered.

Her eyes went crazy, “Any bitch! Just give me the word!” She stood and waved her highlighter marker around like a knife. “Watch out bitches! I’m cuttin’ mad!” she shouted.

“Don’t you mean, Cuttin’ Mads?”

She sat down and giggled.

I joined her and we shared a good laugh.

As always, we sat in one of the glass walled private study rooms. I’m sure the kids studying outside who were glaring at us thought we were goofing off. Some of them probably wanted to use our study room so they could goof off.

Well, me and Mads had gotten here first.

A moment later, a random girl stood up from one of the study carrels outside and walked up to our door. She had imitation blonde hair and wore a Delta Pi Delta T shirt, which was Tiffany’s sorority.

Greatballs.

Sororiwhore opened the door to our study room and popped the gum in her mouth. She said, “Like, do you guys know when you’re going to be finished in here? Other people are wait—”

Madison jumped out of her chair, which clattered loudly behind her, and thrust her highlighter toward Sororiwhore, who was six feet away. “Stay back!” Madison hissed.
 

Sororiwhore flinched. Then she popped her gum and scowled, trying to play it off like she was above it all.

Madison lunged forward again, now two feet from the girl. “Back!”

I turned to Sororiwhore and said in a casual, bland voice, “Be careful what you say next. She’s Cuttin’ Mads and she’ll cut a bitch.”

Sororiwhore’s eyes goggled as she slowly withdrew from the doorframe.

The pneumatic door clicked shut gently.

Madison and I broke into laughter.

===

Later, Madison and I walked to our cars in the north parking lot.

“Oh my god, there’s Tiffany!” Madison pointed. “Let’s hide in the bushes and jump her!”

Tiffany was by herself and hadn’t noticed us coming toward her.

“Gag,” I groaned. “We should go the other way.”

“We have a right to walk here just like she does,” Madison growled.

“Yeah, but between Slappin’ Sam and Cuttin’ Mads,” I joked, “Tiffany is likely to get murdered.”

“I’ve got your back either way, girlfriend.” Madison fished her highlighter out of her book bag and waved it around like a knife.

“Thanks, Mads. But please sheathe your highlighter. I don’t want you drawing blood.”

“Okay,” Madison giggled and stuffed her pen in her bag as we neared Tiffany.

Tiffany’s lip curled when she saw us. “You’re still here? Shouldn’t you have gone back home to Washington by now?”

How did she know where I lived? Or was she talking about going home to see my parents because of the problems they were having? No, there was no way Tiffany could know that, was there? Unless Christos had told her? No, that was impossible.

Tiffany rolled her eyes as she passed us, “See you at the tribunal, bitch.”

“Hey!” Madison shouted.

I muttered a warning to Madison, “Keep your cap on your highlighter, I’ll handle this.” I stopped and turned to face Tiffany as she walked away. “Tiffany! Can I talk to you for a second?”

Tiffany stopped, turned, and cocked her hip. As always, she looked like the cover of a fashion magazine with her immaculate blond hair, flawless makeup, and expensive clothes. “Why? Are you going to attack me? If you are, do me a favor and let me know if I need to call the campus police before you hit me this time,” she said sarcastically.

I shook my head, “No, I’m not going to touch you.”

She raised an expectant eyebrow. “Well? I don’t have all day.”

“Look, about the credit card thing.”

Tiffany smiled merrily, “You mean the one you stole?”

“You know I didn’t steal it. You put it in my wallet.”

“I know no such thing,” Tiffany shook her head while wrinkling her nose petulantly. “But I do know it was in your wallet. Gosh, Scumantha, how did it get there?” she gasped sarcastically.
 

“Please don’t call me Scumantha,” I said softly. Was she trying to get me to hit her again?

I noticed Madison was snarling beside me.

“Did the credit card fairy take it out of my wallet and drop it into yours?” Tiffany sneered.

I rolled my eyes, frustrated. The “let’s talk this out” approach wasn’t working. “Tiffany, are you still mad about your yacht painting?”

Tiffany rolled her eyes back at me.

Since talking sense didn’t seem to be working, I was going to hit her where it hurt. I was tired of her bullshit. “Or are you still mad that I’m with Christos and you aren’t?”
 

Tiffany started gnawing on her lower lip like a rabid chipmunk.

Yeah, that had hurt her.

“Tiffany,” I said calmly, “nothing you do is going to break me and Christos apart. I’m not going back home to D.C. Even if you manage to get me kicked out of SDU, I’m here to stay. You need to accept that. So why don’t you save us both a bunch of trouble and let it go?” I sounded way more confident than I felt. The last thing I wanted was to get kicked out of SDU. I loved taking classes with Madison and Kamiko and Romeo. I loved my art professors. I couldn’t imagine giving all that up. It would break my heart to say goodbye to SDU. But I wasn’t backing down, I wasn’t letting Tiffany get away with framing me. “Tell the tribunal the truth. Tell them you put your credit card in my wallet. Oh, and I’m sorry for slapping you. I never should’ve done that.”

Tiffany’s face burned bright red. Words spat from her mouth, “FUCK YOU, YOU STUPID BITCH!!!!” She had to take another breath before she screamed again, “I’M GOING TO RUIN YOU, YOU FUCKING CUNT!!!”

===

A gigantic fiery phoenix burst from the clouds of a flaming sunset. Its long, trailing tail feathers blazed behind it like the train of a glowing gown as it swooped across the sky. The phoenix was part eagle, part woman.

That woman was me.

“That looks awesome, Sam!” Kamiko said, standing over my shoulder, looking at my rough sketch.

“You think it’ll work for Brandon’s show?” I asked. It was still just a small pen and ink drawing in my sketchbook colored with markers.

Romeo was sitting and doing homework at one of the work tables against the wall in Christos’ studio. He slid his chair out and walked over to take a look. “Wow,” he smiled, “I love it, Sam.”

I crinkled my nose. “Thanks.” I still wasn’t used to all the praise I’d been getting lately.

“Okay, now I have to take a look,” Christos said. He was sitting in a reclining desk chair with his feet propped on a window sill, sketching in his own sketchbook. He was trying to work up ideas for the rest of the paintings he needed to do for his upcoming solo show, which would be hosted at Charboneau sometime after the Contemporary Artists Show closed.

Christos rested a hand on my shoulder and leaned over me to get a better look.

Romeo blurted, “Red alert! Red alert! Boo-EEEP! Boo-EEEP! Christos is putting the moves on Sam! Abandon ship before Christos fires his torpedo into her!”

“Must everything come down to sex for you, Romeo?” I asked.

“Yes,” he grinned unapologetically.

Kamiko giggled. “Romeo, you are so wonky kong.”

“Wonky kong?” Romeo said, “I’ll show you wonky kong.” He started jumping frantically in the air. Every time he did, he said, “Boing!” His monocle danced chaotically at the end of the string attached to a button on his steampunk coat.