“So let me ask you something.” Ridge was adding his own touch with geometric shapes and patterns in one corner of the mural.

“Shoot,” Wes said from where he worked with a boy on either side of him.

“So I wanna ask Mia out, but I don’t know what she would say.” Ridge looked up expectantly at Wes.

“Just ask her,” I answered and all three heads whipped in my direction. Oops. I guess I wasn’t supposed to be a part of this conversation.

“Girls aren’t that simple, Miss Capri.” Ridge shook his head at me.

“Women are very complicated creatures,” Wes agreed.

“Creatures?” I asked but was ignored. The boys were paying rapt attention to Wes. The three stood in a huddle with lowered voices as Wes explained to them about the species of women with exaggerated hand gestures.

As angry and confused as I was about us, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from him. His unwavering attention toward the boys, and his enthusiasm for the questions they appeared to be asking nearly enchanted the hurt from my heart. At one point, Wes must have felt me watching because he looked up to me mid-sentence, smirked, and winked. My heart leaped clear to the heavens.

“Hey, Miss Capri?” Ridge asked and all three turned, opening up their secret circle to me.

“Ridge?” I asked warily.

“How can I show Mia that…ya know…” Ridge stuffed his hands deep into his pockets… “that she’s cool. Ya know?” He winced at me.

“Are you asking me what you should do to show Mia that she’s special?”

“That’s what he wants to know, C.” Wes stood behind him, hands stuffed deep into his pockets.

“So, he wants to know how to show Mia that she isn’t just another girl to him?” I asked propping my hands onto my hips.

All three guys nodded.

“Well, first,” I said, cocking my head to one side, “you call her.” I stared straight at Wes who hung his head and mouthed a silent ‘fuck.’ Did he really think I’d ignore it? Well, actually, he was probably used to not worrying about whether he made a girl unhappy with missed calls or not. In fact, I didn’t think I’d ever seen him with the same girl twice. “If you want her to stick around, then you should call her and let her know she’s on your mind.”

“That’s true.” Wes looked at Ridge and nodded. “You should call her.” My eyes widened. “Not calling her would be a huge mistake.” He set his eyes on me and stepped through the boys, making his way toward me.

The boys stood firmly planted in their places with confusion spread across their faces. I held my hand up to keep Wes from getting too close. I knew if I could see into his eyes, I’d be more forgiving than I was feeling, but he ignored my protests and continued his long, purposeful strides toward me.

When he stopped directly in front of me, he carefully reached up, touching his fingers to my chin. When I didn’t pull away, his timid touch relaxed, and he slid his fingers to the base of my head, cradling my neck in his hand. He rubbed his thumb along my jawline, and his eyes darted around my face. Searching. Searching. Searching. Then cut to my eyes. My breath stopped in my throat at the sincerity that pooled in those eyes below his thick lashes. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

I nodded.

“Dayuuum.” Jordan’s voice echoed through the gym, and Wes pulled his hand away with his eyes following. “Wes has got skills.” He barked out a laugh, and Ridge joined in.

He smiled shyly and dropped his head in a slow shake. “Okay, boys,” he said walking back to them. “Time’s up here. How are you getting home?”

“Bus,” Jordan said leaning down to pick up his backpack.

“Not today. I’ll drive you guys home.” He held the door open as the boys passed through then turned and gave me one last soft and meaningful look. “Lock up behind me, ‘kay?” he asked. I nodded and waited for him to come back and say something more. But he didn’t.

I knew he was watching me. I didn’t hear when he came in, but I felt it. I felt his eyes on me like a person felt the sun when it wrapped the fingers of its rays around their skin.

“I know you’re there,” I said wiping the brush on a towel.

“It’s past closing time, so I made sure to lock up.” The sound of his voice rolled through the empty space. “I see you took some artistic liberty while I was gone.” Wes said, and I cocked my eyebrow over at him before surveying my work. All I’d done was continue on the same wave pattern he’d been working on that morning.

“Well, I guess my brushstrokes loosened up as the day went on,” I said thinking maybe my exhaustion was showing through the paint. Wes stood next to me now, testing my inner strength because I wanted so badly to grab his hand and wrap it around my neck to finish where we had left off.

“Brushstrokes, my ass.” Wes rolled his eyes and nudged my shoulder with his. “It does look tight though, C. I like how the red complements the teal of the lower wave.” Red? Red. RED?

“Red?” the word burst from my lips in the same manner as my heart had just exploded.

“Yeah.” Wes looked down at me confused, furrowed his eyebrows, but then nodded back to the apparently red wave. “This looks pretty badass. I see those two inspired you.” He winked at me, all the while I stared at him.

“But I used the cans of teal…” The name of the green color trailed off my lips when I realized my mistake. “I gave Jordan the can of teal this morning,” I said touching my fingers to my lips. I’d been so obsessive about putting the paint cans strategically around the room so that even when the color covered the labels, I’d still know what shade it was. Having the boys here this morning threw my routine, and my mind had been completely devoted to all things Wes.

This couldn’t be happening. I tried to swallow, but my throat had dried up. The large space surrounding me suddenly began to feel incredibly small. I turned to walk toward the back of the gym to gain some space from the noxious scent of paint. Red paint.

“Capri?” Wes asked from behind me, but I could barely hear him through the fumes. My body floated toward the back of the room with the floor blurring below me. A thick cloud of the stench closed in on me rapidly. It was everywhere. Taunting me.

What did I do? Stupid.

How could I have let this happen? Stupid.

I’d always been so careful, so hidden. Then I agreed to this. Stupid.

Stupid.

“Stupid.”

“Please tell me you just called me stupid and not yourself.” The timber of Wes’ voice dissipated the suffocating vapor.

I shook my head. “I’m so stupid.” This was all too familiar. I hadn’t slipped up since tenth grade when I’d turned in my realism portrait. My teacher had instructed us specifically to paint the bowl of fruit exactly as we had seen it. So, I did. I’d turned in a painting of yellow, blue, and brown. That was how I saw it. That was how I saw the world; yellow, blue, brown, and shades of white and gray. That was realism for me.

When my teacher returned our projects after grading, mine had a note on the back. He’d said that while he appreciated the rebellious nature of artists, he did not approve of my resistance to authority in not following the specific instructions of the assignment. He awarded me an F. To make things worse, he didn’t give me the letter, he wrote FAIL on my artwork.

“So stupid,” I repeated.

Wes’ hands were on my shoulders immediately, and he crouched down in front of me looking up into my eyes. “I don’t know what’s going on right now, but you are not stupid,” he commanded. He stood, and my head followed his upward movement.

He’d told me those exact words that day when he found me ripping apart my painting and stuffing it into the trashcan by the lunch quad. He had asked me why I was destroying it, so I told him honestly that I was stupid. He told me more earnestly than I had ever seen Wes up until that point that I was not stupid. He said I was brilliant, and talented, and beautiful, and that the piece of art I had just destroyed reflected all of that because when an artist created, they produced a part of their soul. Then he turned around and walked away, hopping the fence to ditch.