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“I’m going to win,” Sousuke tells herself. She shifts on the stool, steadying her balance to reach down into her art box (a little shoebox covered in colorful sea creature stickers) and pull out the black crayon. Sousuke draws in the black, running the crayon up and down rapidly until she filled in the hair. She scrambles off the stool, then, and takes a few apprehensive steps back. “It looks great!” the little girl thinks, giving her empty room a private grin.
Self-portrait finally finished, her parents drive her down to the library. The burst of cool air that comes from the automatic door surprises her and makes her skin erupt in goosebumps. Pulse rushing, Sousuke waits in line with the other kids until her turn comes and the woman at the counter smiles at her encouragingly.
“You’re here to enter the contest, sweetie?”
“No, Ma’am. I’m here to win.”
The woman examines Sousuke’s deadpan face and thinks she’s just as weird as the little redhead from a few minutes ago. What she didn’t know was that, while Sousuke’s face revealed no emotion, inside the girl was a bundle of nerves and excitement. “When I win, my art will be on display with a fancy frame,” she thinks, and her eyes roam the library, looking for the perfect spot to put it up.
It’s by happenstance that her eyes stop at a girl about her age, with blazing red hair and pointed teeth like a piranha. Sousuke’s eyes bug out. She quickly scribbles her information down onto the sign-up sheet, carefully hands over her precious drawing, and returns to her parents. That girl had given her a thought: there were other kids entering the contest. Kids potentially better than herself.
Sousuke needed to assess the enemies. Despite her parents insisting they need to go home, she went up to every person in the vicinity and asked: “Are you part of the contest?” and “Which one did you make?” followed by a gesture towards the long wall where all the entries were hung. The other contestants had nothing on her, she silently gloated. There was only one person left to ask, at least from the ones who were still in the library.
The little artist strutted across the maroon carpet all the way to Piranha Girl, chest proudly puffed out and radiating cockiness from every pore. “I’m Sousuke,” she said, extending her drawing hand to shake. The red-haired girl introduced herself as Rin. “You look like a piranha,” Sousuke blurted out, in that unflinching but innocent way children have.
Rin scrunched up her nose, managing to look down at Sousuke despite her height. “But I don’t like piranhas. Sharks are waaay cooler.” There was a moment of understanding between them. Sharks were universally known to be cooler than piranhas.
“I drew this one,” Rin declares, pointing at a picture in the right corner. Sousuke didn’t reply. There was no way she could. Any words she’d thought of saying lodged in her throat, leaving her an incoherent mess. Even her hands shook, so she jammed them in the pockets of her sporty dress. Rin was grinning expectantly up at Sousuke, unaware that they were rivals for the prize.
“I-it’s good,” choked Sousuke while experiencing a terrible chest pain. No, it was so much better than that! The paper, painted coal-black, made the electric green and loud red pop. Rin’s picture was high-energy abstract, shapes and lines of neon colors with zigzags, dots, spirals! She’d never seen anything like it, and compared her own bland self-portrait with the masterpiece before her.
“Thanks, Sousuke!” Rin said something else, mentioning “boy name” and “friends” but it went over Sousuke’s head. When the shock wore off, she became irrationally angry. At Rin, at her own art, at the contest.
“I’ve gotta go,” she said, face deadpan, and staggered towards her parents like a wounded soldier. “Critical hit,” was her rasped reply to her parents when they asked if they could leave.
If only this had been the last time Rin burst into her life.
+
Today the results would be announced! Sousuke wasted no time in getting ready to accept her victory, pulling on rain boots and a coat to combat the rain. “We’ve got to go!” she hurried her parents, trying things like pulling on her mom’s pant leg and staring intently at her father as he shaved. This didn’t really make them move any faster.
Still, they arrived at the library a few minutes earlier than the announcement. A kind librarian passed out tiny gift bags to all the children who participated, but Sousuke’s eyes remained on the true prize (even while she sucked on a lollipop from the goody bag). She caught a glimpse of red hair amongst the sea of sitting children, and felt the uncomfortable jealousy well up in her chest again. Pushing it deep down, she convinced herself that she’d win. Rin’s art wouldn’t win.
It couldn’t.
“I want to see my art hung up on the library wall so, so, bad! And to have a cool medal!” she thinks excitedly. This is what Sousuke’s wanted most in her entire life since the contest was first announced a month ago.
The head librarian, a woman with orange hair and a cheesy smile, stood behind the table all the tiny chairs faced. The kids in the audience began quieting down, nervous and excited to hear the results.
“While you’ve all done very, very well-“(Sousuke didn’t catch much of the speech, she stared at Rin’s head the entire time, aware that her parents would let her know when her victory would be announced.)
“Sousuke,” whispered her mom, fingers clamping down on her daughter’s shoulder to shake her gently. Said little girl’s head snapped forward and she shot up. The children clapped politely when Sousuke went up to the winner’s table. The librarian’s earrings jangled noisily when she leaned down to give Sousuke her prize: a shiny-!
Pencil? And bookmark?
“Where’s my medal?” Sousuke asked, frown deepening. The Librarian’s eyes widened and her breath caught, unprepared for that question.
“But, Miss Yamazaki, that medal is for the first place winner. You got second place!” Sousuke bowed her head and stared at her shoes stiffly.
“Oh, okay. Sorry, I got confused.” The mass of parents and kids all watched her curiously as she sat back down on her chair. Rin’s name was called soon after. Rin got the shiny gold medal, Rin got her art framed in the Children’s section of the books, and Rin got a cooler pencil and bookmark than Sousuke.
Matsuoka Rin, child artist extraordinaire, approached a miserable and furious Sousuke after the contest had ended. Around her neck was the precious medal made of plastic and painted yellow. Sousuke’s eyes followed every swinging movement it made as Rin spoke, babbling and congratulating and generally being perfect.
Finally Rin’s speech slowed and Sousuke slid off her dad’s lap. He’d comforted her enough, she decided. It was time to do what had been on her mind. “I’m quitting art,” Sousuke said, almost triumphantly.
“What? Why?” Rin’s smile drooped at the edges and looked like she’s just lost a friend or been punched in the stomach.
“If I’m not an artist, I can’t lose to you.” What sound, undisputable logic.
Now Rin was mad too. “That’s so stupid! How can you just give up like that?” She didn’t tell Sousuke that the self-portrait she drew was incredible, and that it had made her doubt her own work. Made her stay up late at night whispering to her little brother to get the worry out of her system.
Both girls were angry and frustrated, staring at each other like opponents at a MMA match. Sousuke’s father scooped her into his arms before she could land a punch. “We’re leaving,” he said. “Say goodbye to your friend.” He stressed “friend”.
Sousuke remained silent. Rin remained silent. This was an unsatisfying win for the both of them.
+
Red hair and shark teeth appeared before Sousuke’s house a few days later. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry for getting mad. You can choose to quit art if you really want to. I can’t tell you what to do.” Rin’s arms are struggling to hold a box. As she tilts the box slightly, something rolls around inside.
Sousuke leaned on the doorframe and narrowed her eyes at Rin. “How did you find out where I live?”
Sheepishly, Rin says, “My mom talked to your mom at the library. They caught wind of the almost-fight.” She watches Rin for a moment, seeing the real apology written on her face as flushed cheeks of vibrant red.
Sousuke lets her in.
And then Rin drops the box on the floor, takes a pack of crayons out of it, and hands a gray crayon to Sousuke. “Draw the library on the front,” she says.
Confused but intrigued, she follows Rin’s instructions to the letter. Pretty soon the box looks just like the public library, with even the teens that hang out in front of it (except as hastily drawn stick-people). Sousuke’s part of the work done, Rin commands her to shut her eyes.
The moments of darkness were worth it, Sousuke realizes, once she’s given the all clear. The top of the box was open, exposing the little recreation of Sousuke’s entry, framed by a fancy construction paper border. In Rin’s hand is a cardboard medal, painted gold beforehand, with strips of paper taped to the bottom to make it look like a wearable ribbon.
There’s silence. More silence. Until, slowly, the sound of Sousuke sniffling gets louder and louder and she’s flat out sobbing, throwing her arms around perfect, absolutely perfect, Rin. “Are we friends now?” awkwardly asks Rin, and Sousuke tries to pull herself together without letting go.
“Uh huh,” she says. And she continues once her feelings are under control again, “Without you, how could I have accomplished my dream?”
Rin smiles, eyes a little wet too.
“It wasn’t me, Sousuke. You know you can do anything! Just because you lose once doesn’t mean your life stops there.”
And Sousuke realizes that there will be so many more contests. So many more medals. And she knows what she wants to do with the rest of her life: be by Rin’s side, and beat her at art contests!