“Vivian. You’re not in trouble. I don’t care where you got the sketchbook, I just need to know these things so I can get Vic out of trouble.”
She sighs, then points to the boxes stacked up in our kitchen. “From there. You were outside talking to the neighbors that one time and I took it. That’s how I knew about the place across the street from the Pancake House. You drew the sign.”
I actually gasp with a hand over my mouth. “Holy fucking shit.” Then I look Vivi straight in the eyes. “Describe this sketchbook to me, Viv. What did it look like?”
She shrugs. “It had a spiral at the top. And lots of stickers.”
“Daisies.” We both say it at the same time.
“And ladybugs,” Vivi adds.
My sketchbook. From that last semester before I quit school. And Lucille. My art class TA who graded every single one of my assignments inside. “Vivi. Do you remember what the art building lady’s name was?”
She crinkles her nose and shakes her head.
“Was it… Lucille?”
She giggles. “Yes! That was it. How did you know?”
“Where is this sketchbook?”
“Vicious still has it. It’s in my pink backpack.”
“But there was a picture of a man in there, wasn’t there?”
She nods her head. “It was Vicious. I didn’t know at first. But I took the sketchbook out while I was waiting for him to notice me on the couch, and compared.” She nods again, quicker this time. “It was him.”
It was him. I drew him. Because even though I was the one who walked out that night, I didn’t forget about him.
In fact, before I realized I was pregnant, I was plotting a way to get back into his life. I was even going to get a tattoo from him, just so I could do that. I did that drawing from memory, so it wasn’t very good. But. Good enough that my six-year-old daughter recognized him.
“Why are you making that face?” Vivi asks.
“Give Mommy one second. I need to look something up.” I grab my laptop, sit down on the couch, and open up my email. When I came back to school, I already had a student ID and a university email account. They archive them for seven years, then they are deleted. But I was inside that deadline so every email from when I was in school before Vivi was born was still in my account.
I type into the search bar and bite my lip as the results are pulled up.
And there it is.
From one Lucille Lancaster.
We were arguing over the grade she gave me for that Vic portrait. In that class our sketchbooks assignments were graded from one to four. One is terrible. Four is great.
She gave me a one for the Vic portrait. And fine, I get it. I’m not an artist, so it wasn’t exactly realistic. But Vivian even recognized Vic, so it wasn’t terrible, either. I emailed her to complain. I was getting a B minus until that last round of sketchbook grades. Then I was getting a C plus. I figured this was a battle worth fighting.
And she went on a rant—not about my lack of effort or talent—but about my subject.
I read it silently, seven years later. Because it’s still here.
I saw you with him on Halloween. Be careful, Daisy. He’s not a good man. And this was not your assignment. You are not an art major. Don’t try to act like one by handing in a terrible portrait of the town trash.
Town. Trash.
She knew him.
Of course she knew him. He was in her office when I met him. He was waiting for her.
Holy fucking shit. She thinks I stole him.
My bad grade wasn’t about my sketch. It was about her jealousy. And then she and I had another talk. It was after the final exam, which was sketching a still life. We handed in our papers and then we were supposed to pick up our sketchbooks.
But mine was missing. And I wanted it back.
She tried to keep it and we ended up arguing about it in her office.
She finally gave it back, but she gave me a warning too. Stay away from him, Daisy. He’s already back with me. You were just a one-night stand and nothing more.
This was middle of December and I was well on my way to a new-pregnancy depression at this point. I was moving out of the dorm that day. My parents were coming with the truck to haul my shit back to the farm for break.
So I maybe didn’t think clearly about what she was saying. I maybe took it too seriously.
I… believed her.
And that’s the real reason I didn’t come back to school.
Vivi wasn’t born until August. It was perfect timing, really. I could finish spring semester, take the fall off, and then start up again in the winter. My parents even encouraged this.