𝐏𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐚 𝐆𝐢𝐫𝐥

I was a winter’s touch

I did not think you would petrify so suddenly

Your hands gently laid atop mine as you guide.

Your hands that had never felt this warm before.

When the finishing brushstroke hit you examined the finished work, alleviated, then turned to me. 

I remember the first time I saw you, cheeks pallid and your face slack with apathy. Were you taking in the surroundings that you felt so detached from? Were you in deep thought or dissociation? 

English architecture is always trying so hard to retain it’s old roots, I remember thinking entering through the over the top, dark double doors. I was also late on my first day, my mother wouldn’t stop smothering me at the dorms. I looked around, hoping to see a staff member, but I found someone better. 

You.

When you turned to face me that first time I thought you would look down on me. I thought you’d show me no remorse when casting the cold judgement of a deity. However I did find not the piercing eyes of Athena but the inquisitive glint of Daedelus, examining me. 

She’s beautiful.

*

“You’re new aren’t you?” A tall girl leaned on a wall with her arms crossed, head tilted to one side. 

“Oui, I just started today, I’m Helene.” I nodded at her.

“Oh,” Her eyes widened a little and she readjusted her lean against the wall, “You heard me?”

“Sorry, was it not directed at me?” 

“Yes and no?” She smiled and ran a hand through her short, dark locks of hair. “Welcome, I’m Mina.”

“Could you help me?” I scampered up to her, pulling my paper out of my bag. “I’m late and I need to find...” I pointed to my first period class. 

“Definitely, I can be of service, follow me.” Lifting herself from the wall, she began her long strides down the hall and I followed. I looked at my outfit, then hers and had a slight panic. 

“Your uniform looks…” I struggled to find the word, “Different.” I worried that maybe my mother had somehow bought the wrong uniform for me. “And should I have a jacket?”

She paused and played with the ruffles on her blouse.“It’s a hand me down, nobody bugs me about it. The uniforms only got changed a few years ago, and,” She hugged her torso. “It keeps me cozy.” 

“It’s pretty nice today though, non?” It was the middle of May, and almost always warm out. 

“Well this jacket is always nice, non?” She teased my accent and I wasn’t sure if it was malicious or light-hearted. Maybe she could read my expression and followed with, “It’s just banter.” It was enough to ease me until we found my class. 

*

“My mom works here so I don’t really get in trouble for skipping. You however, Missy, should probably be more careful.” She tapped my nose.

We lay next to each other on a balcony. It was her secret spot she told me, nobody else dared to come up here and claim her land. I never enjoyed talking to someone so much, I loved her happiness and I loved her bitterness.I mean have you ever been able to complain about a color with someone for an hour? No matter what it was she always had the biggest grin, any topic was a delight.

“You eh,” I tried to think of how to explain it in English. “You always look like the banana?” 

“The what?” She giggled until she laughed until she had to hold her stomach. “I look like, I look like the what again?”

“You look like the banana, like,” I tried to do the motion, a banana shape over the mouth. “You always smile.” When her laughing fit was over she exhaled and had her body face mine.

“God, you’re lovely.” She beamed at me and my stomach fluttered. I never thought an English voice could sound so melodic. 

Mama always warned me of young love.   

*

A couple weeks later Mina was asking me about art, what kind of things I was talented in. I had told her I was already somewhat familiar with painting. It was a pastime I had shared with my father who was trained in the classical arts. I told her about one time he painted my mother as the Mona Lisa, and she decried, “Why must I have no eyebrows as well?” I was little at the time so I took a large marker and gave my mama eyebrows. My mother still holds it as a fond memory kept in her closet or in an attic somewhere, the calm Mona Lisa and her aggressive brows. My father said after that, teaching me art became a much higher priority.

Mina giggled and demanded I draw something for her. I took my red folder and sketchbook out of my bag and asked her to pick something for me. 

“Me of course!” She struck a dramatic pose, the back of her hand against her forehead as she looked up. Her face was frozen in exaggerated shock. “The inspiration for this one is there is a cute girl I like, and oh!” She whined out a fake cry. “I have just found out she doesn’t like me back!”

I blushed a little, knowing she couldn't mean me and began the base lines for her frame. I adored the shape of her jaw and her collarbones.

Is this what having a muse is?

I showed her the rough sketch. 

“You should really try when you draw in art class. I think the teacher would like a student who’s a little more experienced.” She suggested. 

“I don’t know, I don’t think she’d notice, I’m not really that much better than average.”

“Helene.” She sneered at my words, like they were an affront to her senses. “I have seen your drawing, and I know she would like to see something like this.”

The next time I was in Mrs. Turner’s class we were drawing trees. I tried to remember the towering pines in France and turned it in. She said to me after, “You could have just asked for a different assignment.” More amused than hostile. She helped me flesh out my father’s teaching of anatomy, where my father’s work was the skeleton, she laid the muscles and skin. 

Sketches of Mina laying in the sun improved, but I could never quite get the hang of the tuft of hair that hung near her eyes. My work began on the project Mrs. Turner gave me, first sketching the balcony in the mid-June sun that provided superb lighting.

“Do you spend a lot of time on the balcony?” She asked me.

“Oui, I enjoy the sun up there.” My mind steered towards Mina and her glimmering smile.

“You should,” Mrs. Turner inhaled deeply and her brow furrowed, making the crinkle deeper. She exhaled. “You should be sure to be careful up there.”

Mrs. Turner asked me to begin the base sketch for a portrait that I would like to turn into a full painting. Mina was more than happy to model for me on the balcony. She’d drive me crazy by walking on the railing with her arms out, like she was a circus performer. 

"Please don't do that." 

She responded by sticking her tongue at me. 

"Please! What if you fall?"

"A little late for that I think." She threw herself forward, catching herself on her hands then landed on her feet with the poise of a dancer. 

"What do you mean?"

Her lips pursed for a second and her brow furrowed. "I fell off one time," She blinked a few times, thinking, then turned back to me, like the playfulness never left. "I drove my mom crazy trying to look for me. In her little huff and puff," Mina filled her cheeks with air then exhaled with a laugh. “I wasn’t paying attention so when she,” Mina cupped her hands then clapped them together. “Opened the door nice and loud and I fell right off.”

I peered down over the balcony, several stories high. 

“Did it hurt?”

“Oh yeah, left me in really bad shape. Scared me to death as well.”

*

Mina was expressing her grievances to me about the oboe. She told me she’d never met a nice person who played the oboe, alongside some more colorful language. 

“Que je suis amoureuse de toi.”

“What does that mean?” Her attention was now only on me.

I’ve fallen in love with you.

“It’s not um,” I stammered, “It doesn’t matter, it's stupid.”

“Well I don’t know French,” She shifted her weight onto her right arm and turned to me, making her advance, coming ever so close to me. My breath hitched. “So you’ll have to tell me.”

My lungs felt constricted and my head was light, like it was going to float off of my neck. I felt her fingertips brush against my collarbone, my neck, my cheek, and I abandoned all hope of my lungs ever working again. Her ever inquisitive eyes gazed at me softly, and my heart swam in those honeyed pools. 

Mina brought her face closer to mine. I closed my eyes and my first kiss was with the loveliest girl I’d ever laid eyes on. I could have died then and been happy.  

“Miss Tollere.” A stern, older woman’s tone, broke my haze.

“Uh I um-” My head was fuzzy, I didn’t even hear Mrs. Turner open the door.

“Here. Now.” She snapped her fingers and pointed to the door.

“But-” I tried to motion over to Mina but the teacher quickly cut me off. 

“Now, Miss Tollere.” She strode up to me and grabbed my forearm. As she yanked me towards the door my feet stumbled and I waggled my arm at Mina in a panic. She mouthed, "Sorry," before drawing her lips back to give me a toothy sympathetic smile. The sight of her waving goodbye disappeared with the closing of the door. 

Mrs. Turner's feet clogged heavily against the floor. The reverberations of our violent pitter-patter rolled across the hallway walls and became the metronome for my ever-increasing heart rate. She dragged me back to the art room, my red folder lying on her desk still. I could see my best sketch of Mina yet lying atop it, that I titled, The Girl on the Balcony. 

“Mrs. Turner? Did you need me?” She unhanded me and opened my folder. She groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose before putting it back down.

“Did you think I'd give you more time on your coursework? Or did you think it would be funny to see my reaction? Is this funny to you?” One hand lay on my drawing and the other at her side, knuckles white and shaking.

"No, not at all ma'am,” I tried to swallow down the rising panic. “I'm sorry, did I do something wrong?" 

"Your drawing, Miss Tollere." Her voice shook.

"What was wrong with-"

"Where did you get her picture? Did you stalk me? Steal from my purse?!" Each question's tenacity grew and with each she took a step until I was backed into a desk. I felt small under her glare, she stood over me like a wave about to crash down.

"I just drew a friend of mine,” My nose began to run and I desperately sniffled as to not be crying and dripping snot everywhere. “I'm really sorry ma'am!" My throat felt tight, my face hot, and my stomach felt like it was retracting against my spine. 

She let out one huff more and pointed to the door. I needed no further instruction and ran out. 

When I returned to my dorm I found my phone ringing and the bright caller ID, Mama, flashed before I answered it. She assaulted my hearing. 

“My darling, the school e-mailed me. It is not true is it?” Ever panicked she was. 

“Mama, please,”

“I can tell,” She sniffled and clutched her metaphoric pearls. “C'est inacceptable! Pourquoi ne pas laisser les morts en paix?”

“Quoi?”

“Her daughter is dead, ma chérie!”

“Mama,” My stomach dropped. “I didn’t… I’m sorry.”

“It’s the school isn’t it? Ma chérie, I’m sorry, I thought this would be good for you. I’ll tell them I’m taking you out.”

“Mama, no, please.”

“I love you so much, I cannot have you start down this path. The skipping I could live with but this? I would have never let you go there if I would have known. I am a fool, oh God am I a bad mother?”

“You’re not a bad mother, please Mama, can I finish this semester? Please Mama.” I begged. 

She sighed deeply and her sniffling ceased.

“We’ll see.”

*

The next time I saw Mina I tried to act like what my mother had said did not bother me, and I did not tell her. She led me away from the balcony that day, to a storage room, and I opened the door as I now know, she could not. She followed me making idle commentary and the occasional joke but it really wasn’t landing right now. She strolled in her carefree way to a stack of canvases, and an easel covered in cobwebs. The paint was cracked on some. 

“If you look behind that panel there,” She motioned her foot to a scuffed panel of wainscoting. I pushed it in and pulled out an unfinished painting. Two women, one bearing some of Mina’s features, albeit, unfinished. The other led a shudder of guilt through me. It was a younger, much happier, Mrs. Turner. 

“Why didn’t you tell me Mina?” 

“Pardon?” She was bouncing happily next to me.

“How long have you been dead for Mina?” Her bounce left. “How long have you lied to me? Did you just need me to help you move on? Is that all this was? Am I nothing to you? Am I just someone for you to use? My heart for a picture of you and your mother?”

“No! Of course not, no, don’t even suggest that! Please can I just-”

“J’en ai marre!” I cut her off.

“Darling, I don’t know what that could-” Her hands timidly reached towards mine and I stepped back.

“Enough!” I turned and began my march to the door. “I don’t want to see you anymore!” 

Open.

Shut.  

I tried to keep her out of my mind, but I always had a gnawing feeling in my stomach. When I skipped class I no longer went to the balcony but instead lay restless in my bed. Her essence tainted my memories and thinking of her would send me into abhorrent sobbing. 

I had not cried that much since Papa’s passing.

It was almost the end of June before I spoke to her again. When I went to find her, this time I went for the old storage. I found her there, staring longingly at the painting and I wondered if she had suffered there my entire absence. 

“Mina.”

“Helene I’ve thought about it for a long time, and I care so much about you, you have given me so much more than you know these past weeks.” I tried to focus on the painting and not her face. It would surely break my heart. “I didn't think I could still feel as much as I did when I was with you.” Her voice was breaking. “I don’t know exactly why I can’t leave but I know,” Her hand rested on the painting. “I was going to give this to mum for her birthday, I thought… I really thought she’d like it. I needed to finish it” 

“Mina, I-”

“If it makes you feel like I never cared for you I’d rather have it rot in here forever.” I couldn’t resist looking at her face any longer, I desperately wished I could wipe her tears. “Because more than anything I-”

“I’ll help you finish it.” My feet traveled with my chest and I touched the painting next to her. 

We worked as one, her hands tender with mine as we mixed paints and laid them on the relic of her departed life. I thought surely with how sturdily I held my wooden palette, my father would smile with pride.  

“Will you give this to my mother after we’re done?”

“I don’t know if she’ll be happy with me, but I’ll try.” I grimaced.

“Just say, sorry with cherries on top, she always liked that.” Mina let her lips curl slightly. 

I nodded and we continued until the last brushstroke. This room had no windows and was only lit by unnatural light, so I don't know how long our stretch of time was. My head was swimming, enraptured by her returned presence. 

I placed the brush down and we both studied the portrait of a young girl and her mother, in a happier time.

Her hands caressed my cheeks and she pressed her forehead against mine as well as she could. Her warmth radiated all through me. She cried again and I thought this time, surely the world should weep with her.

“I fell for you too.”

My eyes closed and I tried to relish in her warmth that was like soft rays of sun dancing on your skin. It felt like we were the only two in existence. I wanted to remember every detail of you, every moment I shared with you, any remarkable bit of your essence that I forget begs eternally for your forgiveness. Your warmth began to die from my lips, and subsequently the rest of my face and body began to feel cold. I tried not to sniffle and the tightness in my chest beget tears down my cheeks.

I know this will always be our fragment of eternity, and I was so happy to share it with you. 

You were a summers kiss

I did not think I would melt so quickly