Chapter Text
POV: AGOTT
“She has to be valedictorian.”
“My mom wishes I was more like her.”
“I bet she doesn’t even need to study, she just remembers everything.”
They’re snide comments before difficult tests, quiet points through the library windows while she studies, murmurs exchanged just loud enough for her to hear. She ignores all of them. Admiration was never her goal. Anything outside of success was noise—loud or quiet.
She was halfway down the hallway when someone stepped into her path. “Agott?” Custas, from her elective, exclaims. He’s also a Sophomore. His grades were… acceptable. He wasn’t in any honors classes, and paint from the art room stained his dark sleeves more often than not. They’d hardly exchanged more than a few words.
“Yes?”
He swallowed. Behind him, two of his friends pretended not to watch by the vending machines. “I was wondering if you might… want to go out with me sometime?”
Agott blinked, “Why?”
“Um..” Custas’ cheeks turned bright red. “Cus’ I like you?”
“You don’t know me.”
He offered her a little smile, “I’d like to.”
Custas spent most of his time painting. In Art Appreciation, he was always the most eager student. He entered art competitions every year, and won some. While unexceptional, he had passion.
“Sorry.” Agott adjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder. “I don’t have time for dating.”
“That’s ok.”
“And even if I did…” She hesitated. “I doubt we’d have much in common.”
His smile faded slightly. “Right.”
Agott stepped around him. “I’m sure you’ll find someone.” She continued down the hallway, heading toward calculus.
By the time she left calculus that afternoon, she had nearly forgotten about him.
Suddenly, something slammed into her shoulder. “Wha—”
A long blue canvas bag swung wildly as its owner sprinted down the hallway. “Sorry!” The girl barely slowed down before disappearing around the corner, a flash of pink hair vanishing with her.
“Tetia!” another girl called after her. “Slow down!” The second student hurried, short pale green hair whipping around with her.
Neither of them noticed Agott rubbing her shoulder. “Art kids,” she muttered. They’re all strange.
Five minutes later, art appreciation began. Agott slipped into her usual stool near the back. The classroom was brighter than most. Student sketches littered the walls, and paintings leaned on top of them. On Agott’s right were giant rectangular windows, illuminating all of the work in pale lime light. She wondered how they might look later in the afternoon, when through the blinds long bands of gold might wrap around them.
Qifrey stood at the front of the room, an apron wrapped around him from a real art class the period prior. It was smeared with a tasteful purple.
“Good afternoon, everyone!” He smiled. Tired greetings answered him. “Today we’ll be starting a collaborative analysis project.”
Agott sighed inwardly. Group work. Of course. She scanned the classroom quickly. She didn’t know anyone well enough to work with them, and Custas wasn’t an option anymore.
“You’ll be working in pairs.” Qifrey grabbed his clipboard, pushing his small glasses back up on his face, “Ok-“
“Megan and Will”
“Coco and Tartah”
“Tammy and Laura”
“Agott and Custas.”
Wonderful.
Custas sat down across from her with an awkward smile. He leaned his crutches up against the white brick wall. “…Hi.”
“Hello.”
He scratched the back of his neck. “So…”
“So.” She hated how one interaction could ruin everything afterward. Every future conversation, every class, every hallway encounter would now carry the memory of him asking her out.
Before, art appreciation had been peaceful. It was the one class every afternoon where no one expected her to try. She could sit through lectures about color and composition, take her notes, and wait for the bell. Nothing more was required of her. Now every class would be awkward. Custas had ruined something that had been perfectly comfortable. She frowned. They probably could have been friends.
Qifrey placed a reproduction of an old landscape painting on their table. “For this assignment,” he explained, “I don’t want historical facts, or technical observations.” Agott sighed. “I want you to tell me how this painting makes you feel.”
“Feel?” She exclaimed, louder than she meant to.
Qifrey pointed at her. “Yes.”
She looked back at the painting. “What if that’s subjective?”
“It is.”
“Then how are we graded?”
A few students laughed. Qifrey laughed too. “That’s exactly why we’re doing this assignment.”
Agott was unconvinced. Custas, meanwhile, was already scribbling in his notebook. She watched as he leaned a centimeter from his paper, with his elbow locked on the desk. “What are you writing?”
“First thing I noticed.”
“We haven't even began analyzing it yet.”
“I know.”
“Shouldn’t you?”
“I’ll analyze it later.”
To her, observations came after analysis. You studied something, broke it down, understood it, and then decided what you thought of it. That was the only logical way to go about things. That’s why she hated group projects. She couldn’t trust anybody but herself to write anything meaningful. Their assignment was dumb anyway.
The rest of class passed awkwardly. Custas tried making conversation twice. Agott answered politely. Neither of them mentioned the hallway. She didn’t know how to act around him anymore. Before, he’d been nice. Now, she can only think about how he sees her, and how different the two of them really are.
When the bell rang, both packed their things with obvious relief.
Halfway through the parking lot, Agott froze. “My phone. Shit.”
She turned around immediately, and began winding through the cars and back to the entrance of the school. That feeling of agitation she festered only grew in her gut as she stomped into the building and had to make her way through the people going in the opposite direction to her.
The art hallway was nearly empty. Only the soft sound of music drifted from the open classroom. It’s a soft guitar, a man hums underneath it. Agott’s never heard a song like this before. She wonders if Qifrey turned on the radio, or if this was his own playlist.
“Forget something?” Qifrey asks her as she stands anxiously by the door.
“My phone.”
“It should still be where you left it.”
She walked toward her desk. Her phone lay beside the empty paper she’d used during class. She reached for it—then stopped.
An enormous canvas stood on an easel near the windows. It showed rolling hills beneath a cloudy evening sky. At least… she thought it did. The hills were painted with streaks of lavender, the shadows emerald green. Deep blues melted into orange across the horizon. The clouds were made out of earth, island lands floating in the sky.
None of the colors were realistic. Some brushstrokes wandered outside their forms. The perspective wasn’t accurate. Technically…It wasn’t an especially advanced painting.
And yet Agott couldn’t move. The longer she looked, the more the landscape seemed to breathe. It smelled like damp grass after rain. The aimlessness of standing somewhere vast with nobody else around.
“It’s unfinished.” Qifrey’s voice startled her. She hadn’t heard him come up from behind her.
“It doesn’t look unfinished.”
“The artist would disagree.” He chuckled.
She stepped closer. “The colors are wrong.”
“You could say that.”
“The perspective isn’t consistent.”
“It isn’t.” Qifrey folded his arms. “Technique is something you learn.” His eyes drifted toward the painting. “Seeing is much harder. You cannot apply proper technique without seeing.”
Agott looked back at the canvas. “Who painted it?”
“Coco.”
“Who?”
Qifrey pointed to a paper sat on the stool by the painting. It was the same assignment Agott had been working on, only it was totally finished in only one class period. At the top of the paper Coco had written her name in neat cursive pen.
”The one in my class?”
“The very one.”
Coco always sat by the windows. She answered questions only when called on. She never seemed to be paying attention. Agott had never given her much thought before. She certainly hadn’t imagined Coco had been doing this.
“She’s only been in my art classes for a short time.” Qifrey continued. “But she notices things most people walk right past.”
Agott slipped her phone into her back pocket. If this was a piece in a museum, she’d take a picture. However somehow it felt improper to do the same thing to a painting made by a stranger in her school. She’d like to, though. Every time she looked at it she noticed something new, the way the brushstrokes curved with the hills—the strokes in the sky directly juxtaposing them. Agott had never understood a painting like this one.
By the time she finally left the school, the sun had begun to sink. Her house was only a fifteen-minute walk away. Agott missed the six thirty bus just barely. In the end, she wasn’t terribly late. Ten minutes, maybe.
Still, she could already imagine her mother looking at the clock with a scowl. Her hair would be slicked back, strands of grey poking through. Small diamonds would be dangling from her ears, taunting her.
When Agott opened the front door, the smell of dinner greeted her. Her mother looked up from the kitchen. “There you are.”
“I had to go back for my phone.”
Her mother glanced toward the clock. “You could have called.”
“My phone was at school.”
Her mother paused. Then she sighed, but there was no anger in it. “Right. Sorry. That was stupid.” Her mother turned back toward the stove. “Go wash your hands. Your father’s almost home.”
Agott did as she was told. Her parents weren’t the sort of people other students imagined when Agott talked about them. They didn’t scream when she got a bad grade. They didn’t punish her for staying up too late studying.
Her mother sometimes brought her favorite pastries home from the bakery without being asked. Her father sent her pictures of interesting things he saw during business trips. On weekends, they watched movies together when everyone’s schedules allowed it. They loved her.
That was what made it difficult to explain why she always felt like she was falling behind. She's lucky to have them as parents.
Dinner was already on the table when her father arrived.
“I heard you were late,” he said, though his tone was gentler than her mother’s had been.
“I had to go back for my phone.”
He smiled. “At least you found it.”
Agott nodded.
Her father sat down and opened his laptop while they waited for her mother to bring the last dish to the table.
“Okay,” her mother said, finally sitting down. “Now we can eat.”
Her father closed the laptop. “How was school?”
“Fine.”
“Anything interesting happen?”
Agott hesitated. She thought of the painting. The lavender hills. Flying islands. The impossible colors. She pushed the thought away. The way the lines mixed with the color to seemingly amalgamate a brand new hue. “No. Just the usual.”
Her father smiled. “Quiet day, then.”
Agott nodded and began eating.
“Any grades back?”
“Ninety-eight on my chemistry quiz.”
Her mother’s chopsticks paused. “That’s good.” Agott waited. Her mother looked at her. “What did you miss?”
“A careless mistake.”
“Do you know what happened?”
“I misread the question.” Her mother nodded.
“Then you’ll know what to look for next time.”
“I will.”
Her father smiled. “That’s still a ninety-eight, Agott.”
“I know.”
“You should be proud.”
She looked down at her plate. “I am.”
Her mother reached across the table and gently straightened the collar of Agott’s shirt that hid under her hair.
“You work very hard. We know that.” Agott looked up. Her mother’s expression softened. “You don’t have to be perfect.” Her mother continued. “But you have to be consistent.” Agott’s shoulders tightened. “You’ve dropped to second in chemistry.”
“I know.”
“The email said Tammy is only two points behind you now.”
“I know.”
Her father gave her mother a look, raising his eyebrows. “She knows.”
“I’m not criticizing her.”
“I know.” He said, a smile at the corner of his lips.
Her mother looked back at Agott. “I just don’t want you to lose your momentum now. You’re so close.”
So close to the future where Agott would never have to struggle for anything. Her parents had worked hard to give her opportunities they hadn’t always had themselves. They wanted her to have choices. She will have choices. Soon enough. If she just keeps this up for a few more years.
They wanted her to be successful because they believed success meant freedom. And Agott had learned, somewhere along the way, that the easiest way to make them proud was to never give them a reason to worry. Her father reached over and squeezed her shoulder.
Upstairs, her planner was waiting for her. Calculus. Micro Biology. Government.
Everything neatly divided into blocks. Everything already scheduled. Everything was already decided for her so it was as practical as possible.
After dinner, she sat at her desk and opened her calculus notebook. But the numbers wouldn’t stay on the page. Her mind kept returning to the art room. To a painting that wasn’t technically perfect. To a girl who had looked at an ordinary landscape and somehow seen something Agott hadn’t even known was there.
POV: COCO
Coco, Tartah, and Tetia always sat in the commons just outside the cafeteria. The rounded table overlooked the central hallway through wide glass windows, making it the perfect place to people-watch.
Tetia loved to sit in the back for the best view. She claimed it was “better than reality TV.” Today, she was probably right.
Tartah slammed his lunch tray onto the table. “I cannot believe him!”
Coco looked up from the drawing she was working on in her sketchbook. “What happened?”
Tetia snorted into her drink, a sly smile creeping onto her face. “You seriously haven’t heard by now?”
“Heard what?”
Tetia exchanged a look with Tartah. “Custas asked Agott Arklaum out.” They said at once.
“WHAT?!”
She looked through the windows instinctively. Agott sat alone in her usual seat in the library across the courtyard, a textbook open beside her lunch. Her hair was tied back into a sheer plastic claw clip.
“She said no?” Coco guessed.
Tetia finally burst into laughter. “I’d be more surprised if she’d said yes!” Several nearby students glanced over. Tetia lowered her voice, though she was still grinning. “What was he expecting? Honestly?!”
“Tetia…”
“No, seriously.” She pointed toward the library window where Agott perched. “My name's Agott. I’ve eaten lunch alone since kindergarten-“
“Tetia!”
“I’ve never seen Agott smile at another person before.” She added.
“That’s not true,” Coco exclaimed, “Agott’s a real person, you know.”
Tartah let out a long sigh. “It isn’t funny.”
The smile disappeared from Tetia’s face immediately at Tartah’s sullenness. “…Sorry.”
He picked at his sandwich without taking a bite. “I just…” His voice became quiet. “I knew she was going to reject him, but it still hurts.”
Tetia reached over and patted his shoulder dramatically. “For what it’s worth, I think you treat him much better than she could.”
Tartah laughed weakly. “I’d hope so.”
He looked across the commons. Custas had just walked into the hallway, talking animatedly with Euini from the art club.
“I just…” His smile faded. “I hate seeing him embarrassed.” Coco followed his gaze. “He deserves someone who gets excited when he talks about paintings. And who’s actually nice, and listens.”
Coco glanced back toward the library. Agott still hadn’t moved. She was reading. Completely unaware that half the sophomore class had been discussing her all morning.
“I doubt she meant to hurt him,” Coco said quietly.
“I know. He’s probably fine. He’s not like me—fucking losing it over some girl I don’t know.”
“She was just being Agott.” Tetia added.
Art Appreciation was louder than usual. Quifrey had assigned everyone a worksheet analyzing different landscape paintings. Most groups were already halfway through. Tartah and Coco had long since finished.
“We’re stuck.” Custas appeared beside Coco’s table.
Agott followed quietly a few steps behind, notebook tucked neatly against her chest, long black pieces of hair hanging over her shoulders.
Tartah immediately straightened in his chair. “Oh, hi.”
“Hey,” Custas said, smiling brightly.
“Coco, do you think you could help us?”
She quirked an eyebrow, pointing to herself “Me?”
“You always notice stuff I don’t.” Custas laid the worksheet on the table. “We can’t figure out what we’re supposed to write for the emotional atmosphere.”
Agott folded her arms. “I understand the composition.” She said quickly, like she was explaining herself.
Coco looked at the worksheet. Then at the painting printed beside it.
“Oh.” She smiled. “I think…” She tilted her head. “Maybe it feels lonely.”
“Why?”
“The horizon’s really low.” She pointed at it. “And there’s so much empty sky.”
“Oh.”
“And everything’s kind of blue.”
Agott glanced between the paper and Coco. “Blue means lonely?”
Coco laughed softly. “Sometimes.”
“Then why here?”
“I don’t know.” She smiled sheepishly. “It just feels that way.”
Agott was quiet. She looked at the painting for another moment before writing something onto the worksheet in her clipboard.
“Coco.”
Coco looked up immediately. “Yeah?” Agott was looking over at her under her bangs. “The landscape.. of the painting.. in the art room.
“Mine?”
“Yes, yours.”
“You saw it?”
“I did.”
Coco felt her heart swell, smiling brightly. “What’d you think of it?”
“It wasn’t technically advanced.”
Custas sighed. “Agott…”
“But I couldn’t stop looking at it.”
“Really?!”
“The colors.” Agott frowned thoughtfully. “Why are the shadows green?”
“Oh!” Coco leaned over the table excitedly. “Because they weren’t really green.”
“They weren’t?”
“No.”
“They looked cold.”
Coco gestured with her hands as she searched for the words. “And green felt colder than gray!”
Agott stared at her. “You painted temperature.”
“I guess?” Coco laughed. “I don’t really think about it. I just paint what feels right.”
Agott looked back down at the worksheet. “I see.”
Custas beckoned Agott over. “We should probably finish before Qifrey comes over.”
Agott nodded once. “Thank you, Coco.” Then the two of them walked back to their table.
Coco turned around quickly to see that Tartah had done the same thing, both equally stunned by the other group.
The last bell echoed through the school, and the hallways emptied quickly. Within minutes, the building had become quiet.
Qifrey called to her, “Will you go see if you can find someone to help clean, Coco? This is more than we can handle!”
Coco stood in the doorway of the art room, peeking out. She’d hoped to find Tetia coming out from dance, or even quiet Euini from English, but instead she spotted Agott walking past. “Agott!” Coco called.
She turned, her long black hair flowing down over her shoulder. “Yes?”
Coco sucked in a breath. It wasn’t like she had a choice. Qifrey would probably come out and invite Agott to help them anyway if she didn’t. So, she mustered up all her confidence and said, “We’re cleaning the art room today.”
“Congratulations?”
“I meant…” She shifted awkwardly. “Would you maybe want to help? If you’re not too busy, of course.”
“Why me?”
Coco searched for an answer. “Because you’re here?”
Agott looked down the hallway. Then she looked back at Coco with this annoyed look, her eyebrows and lips all scrunched up. “…Fine.”
“It will only take a few minutes. Promise!”
Before Agott could reconsider, Coco gently took her wrist and led her into the classroom.
Tartah and Custas whispered to each other in the back while organizing paint tubes. Qifrey wiped down every surface in his wake while humming along to every song on the radio, even if he didn’t know them.
“Good afternoon, Agott!”
Both Tartah and Custas turned around.
“Mr. Qifrey.”
“I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”
“I wasn’t either.” Agott settled her bag on the floor by Qifrey’s desk.
“She’s here to help.”
“Yes.” Qifrey smiled. “Will you both work on sweeping the floor? Especially under the tables. I really don’t think the custodian does it.”
Coco came back to them with two brooms from the closet. She handed Agott one, and they got to work. Under each table were hordes of pencil shavings, wrappers, and dirt.
After some time, a tall senior named Casandra walked inside carrying a portfolio. She had a cream knitted vest on with straight black hair at her waist.
The seniors worked very hard to prepare for art school exams. She wondered if, when she applied to RISD, she’d be as put together as Casandra. Coco felt secondhand pressure just by looking at her.
It was as if the aura of the room spiked. Every one of them, including Agott, looked over to see what their upperclassman Casandra had to say.
“Finished your application?” Quifrey asked, throwing a dirty paper towel in the trash.
“Almost.” The senior smiled nervously. “I’m sending it to RISD tonight.”
“Oh?” Quifrey’s eyes lit up. “That’s exciting.”
“I hope they like my portfolio.”
“They’d be lucky to.”
Agott stopped sweeping. “You’re applying to art school?”
Coco caught Tartah’s stare from the other side of the room. His look read: Why would you bring her here? Coco shot back an apologetic frown.
Casandra nodded. “I am.”
“Isn’t that…” Everyone looked at her now. “…Risky?”
“Well—” Quifrey started.
She continued anyway. “I mean, most artists struggle financially. It doesn’t seem like a practical decision. How would you pay off debt? Hell, it’s not like you could make a living with a degree in the arts.”
Quifrey ran an exhausted hand over his face as the room became noticeably quieter.
Casandera’s smile faded slightly. “I’ve thought about that.”
“I’m sure.” Agott set aside her broom. “I just don’t understand investing years into something without stable prospects.”
“Agott,” Quifrey said gently, “may I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“Why do you study so hard?”
“To get into a good university.”
“And why?”
“So I can build a stable future.”
“And after that?”
She paused. “A career.”
“And after that?”
She frowned. “I don’t know. Retire?”
Quifrey looked toward Casandra. “Everyone has different ideas of what makes a life worthwhile.” Then back to Agott. “Stability matters, and so does fulfillment. They’re just different priorities. And might I add, I went to art school and I have a stable job.”
Agott looked down, gritting her teeth. “I wasn’t trying to insult anyone.”
“I know.”
Coco watched Agott carefully, and suddenly felt sad.
About twenty minutes later Casandra had left and Coco stayed out of Tartah’s way to avoid the conversation that was imminent. How could she think bringing Agott in here would be a good idea?
Nevertheless, the room was clean, and Tartah and Custas seemed to be hitting it off in the corner.
“We finished.” Agott muttered.
“We did.” Coco picked up an Expo marker. Bored, she drew a tiny smiley face on the whiteboard beside them.
Agott stared at her. “What are you doing?”
“I dunno.” Coco laughed. She drew a little cat beside it, like the one she had as a child. Then another, like the one her grandma had.
Agott sighed. “Is this what you guys do after school every day?”
“Sometimes. Twice a week there’s art club, though.” Coco handed her a marker. “Your turn.”
“Oh, I don’t draw.”
“Oh, come on. Everyone draws.”
Agott hesitated, her eyes focused on the purple Expo marker in Coco’s palm.
Coco grinned. “You scared?”
Agott immediately snatched the marker. “I am not!”
“Then draw.”
Agott uncapped it. She carefully sketched an incredibly detailed little bird. However symmetrical it was, the legs were veiny and the body looked like a tumor.
“That’s adorable!” Coco mused.
“It isn’t adorable.”
“It is!” She clasped her hands together. Then, she grabbed a green Expo marker and quickly drew a tiny party hat on the bird.
Agott gasped. “What did you just do to my creation?”
“It was lonely.”
“You vandalized it!” Agott reached over and added angry eyebrows to the party hat.
Coco laughed. Then she drew a balloon.
Agott added another bird. Coco gave that one sunglasses.
“No!” Agott tried to erase them. Coco drew them back hastily.
They ran over to each other again and again, drawing more and more. Within minutes, the entire corner of the whiteboard had become a ridiculous scene of tiny birds wearing hats, holding balloons, and chasing an oddly realistic squirrel. On top of it stood Coco’s cats.
Coco climbed off the chair they had grabbed from one of the tables, adding another bird flying high through the sky on a hang glider despite having wings.
She looked over at Agott, who had a smile on her face, her eyes wide with wonder as she gazed at the board.
Agott turned around to face her. Suddenly, she realized everyone was staring. The smile disappeared so quickly Coco almost wondered if she’d imagined it.
Agott immediately stepped back and capped the marker. “I should go,” she exclaimed with her back turned. “My parents were probably expecting me an hour ago.”
“Oh, okay.”
She picked up her bag. “Thank you for letting me help.”
“It was fun,” Coco said.
“Hmpff.” Agott huffed, walking out with both hands clasped on the straps of her backpack.
“I’ll invite you again!”
Agott didn’t answer. The room stayed quiet for a moment as Coco turned back around.
Tartah and Custas burst out into laughter. “Oh my God!” Tartah gasped. “OH!” He held his ribs tightly. “I wish Tetia could’ve seen that!”
Custas giggled, his hand clasped over his mouth. He pointed to the door where Agott had left. “She is not coming back. No way.”
“Can you believe what she said to Casandra?”
“Cut it out, you guys.” Coco puffed. “I finally got her to have fun, and then you guys had to go and freak her out!”
“Agott Arklaum doesn’t know how to have fun.”
Custas shrugged. “Well, Agott seems to have more fun with Coco than me.”
Tartah slapped him upside the head.
That afternoon, once everyone had left, Coco unlocked the front door to her house.
“Mom?” She called, stepping inside quietly. All the lights in the house were off, the only lights coming from the cracks in the blinds. Her backpack slid from her shoulder and landed softly on the floor. She kicked off her shoes hastily.
“I’m home!” She announced, louder this time. Usually, her mother would call from the bedroom.
Sometimes she’d ask how school was before Coco had even taken her shoes off. Sometimes she’d complain that Coco had been gone too long. Sometimes she’d simply ask for a hug. Today, there was nothing.
Coco’s smile disappeared. “Mom?” She hurried down the hallway.
Her mother’s bedroom door was open. She was lying in bed, propped up against several pillows. The curtains were half drawn, leaving the room dim despite the late afternoon sunlight outside. Her mother looked impossibly tired. Her hair was tied up, her long brown flowing pony tail rested next to her on the pillow.
She had been living with advanced heart failure for years, but lately things had gotten worse. Her heart simply couldn’t keep up with what her body needed anymore. Some days she could get around the house. Other days, she couldn’t get out of bed at all. Today was one of those days, apparently.
Her mother turned her head when she heard Coco. “There you are.” Her voice was soft, but kind.
Coco immediately walked over. “Hey.”
“Hi, sweetheart.”
Coco sat on the edge of the bed. “How are you feeling?”
Her mother gave her the same smile she always did whenever Coco asked that question. “I’m okay.”
Coco raised an eyebrow. “You’re a God-awful liar.”
Her mother laughed quietly. “I learned from you.”
“I don’t lie! Never ever!”
“You told me you finished your math homework yesterday.”
“I did finish it.”
“After midnight.”
“Tomato potato.” Coco climbed up further and leaned against her.
Her mother wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “You have a good day?”
“Yeah.”
“Just yeah?”
Coco smiled. “We got this girl to help clean the art room.”
“Oh?”
“Her name’s Agott.”
“Is she nice?”
Coco thought about the tiny birds covering the whiteboard. “She has her moments.”
Her mother smiled. “Those are usually the interesting ones.”
Coco laughed. “She drew a bird.”
“A bird?”
“Yeah. It was really weird-looking.”
Her mother laughed again, and Coco grinned. “And then we spent like twenty minutes drawing all over the whiteboard. We made this whole scene with birds and balloons and cats and—”
She stopped. Her mother was looking at her very strangely. “You’re happy,” she said.
Coco blinked. “Yeah.”
“That makes me so glad.”
“Mom.”
She said it in this tone. They’d had the conversation before, about where Coco would go if something ever were to happen. Tartah’s parents were glad to have Coco as long as she needed. But Coco never let her mom explain that far. She didn’t want to hear it.
“Hmm?”
“Don’t do that.”
Her mother tilted her head. “Do what?”
“Talk like that.”
Her mother was quiet for a moment. Then she smiled. “Okay.”
Coco leaned against her again. Neither of them said anything.
Outside, a car passed on the street. The refrigerator hummed in the kitchen. Somewhere in the house, her late grandma’s grandfather’s clock ticked. Coco closed her eyes. For a little while, she let herself pretend this was normal. Just her and her mom. Like it had always been.