They Left Me Out Of The Picture So I Created My Own Chapter 02
I wrote the awards ceremony on the family calendar a full week in advance.
In red marker. Circled twice.
Illinois Youth Arts Awards, 6:00 p.m., Chicago Cultural Center.
I reminded them at dinner on Monday.
My father said, “I know.”
I reminded them again on Wednesday morning.
Lauren was helping Sadie go over a summer program checklist and didn’t look up.
“We’ll make it work.”
But when I got home from school on Friday, the garage was empty.
The house was silent.
A note was taped to the fridge.
Sadie’s been so stressed with exams, so we took her to Wisconsin to relax for the weekend. Owen came too. Dinner’s in the fridge.
A smiley face was drawn at the bottom.
I pulled out my phone and only then saw the message in the family group chat, sent two hours earlier.
My father had posted a photo of the open road.
Long weekend starts now!
Sadie had replied with three cheering emojis.
No one mentioned my ceremony.
There was half a container of leftover pasta in the fridge, condensation beaded under the plastic wrap. I didn’t bother heating it up. I took the note down, folded it carefully, and tucked it into the innermost pocket of my backpack.
I changed into the nicest dress I owned.
I’d bought it for last year’s school dance. It was black, the hem slightly wrinkled. I steamed it smooth in the bathroom, then stood before the mirror and pinned up my hair.
Before I left, I paused in the entryway.
Whenever the family went out together, my father always asked Sadie if she had a coat and reminded Owen not to forget his water bottle.
This time, no one had asked how I was getting there or what time I’d be home.
I walked to the Metra station alone and bought a ticket downtown.
The train car was hot. The window reflected my face—and the mother and daughter sitting beside me.
The girl wore the same award-winner’s badge that was pinned to my dress.
Her mother kept fussing with her hair, pulling out her phone to take pictures.
“When you go on stage later, don’t be nervous. We’ll all be right there in the audience.”
The girl laughed. “Mom, you’ve already said that five times.”
By the time I reached the Cultural Center, the auditorium was full.
Fathers roamed the aisles with cameras, searching for the best angle. Mothers held bouquets. Younger siblings crowded around the winners, clamoring to see their medals.
At the check-in table, a teacher asked, “How many family members with you? We’re holding front-row seats for the winners’ families.”
“None.”
She hesitated.
“It’s just me.”
I took my seat card and walked to an empty chair in the back row.
“Avery.”
Someone called my name.
Elena Ruiz was making her way through the crowd toward me, car keys still in her hand.
“I almost missed the parking garage entrance.”
She glanced behind me.
“Where are your dad and the others?”
“They went to Wisconsin,” I said, my voice even. “Sadie needed to relax.”
Ms. Ruiz was silent for a second, then opened her arms and hugged me.
“Well, then I’ll be your emergency contact for tonight.”
She patted my back.
“You shouldn’t be here alone today.”
My eyes suddenly stung. I ducked my head, staring at the fabric of her shoulder until the feeling passed.
When the ceremony started, I listened as name after name was called.
Each time a student walked on stage, a pocket of impossibly loud cheering erupted from the audience.
When it was my turn, Ms. Ruiz stood up.
Her applause was just one person’s, but it cut through the noise of the entire room.
I accepted the trophy and the certificate. The host announced that my work had been selected from more than seventeen hundred submissions statewide and had automatically qualified for the National Student Art Competition.
Flashbulbs went off across the audience.
Not one of them belonged to my family.
After the ceremony, Ms. Ruiz took a picture of me on the front steps of the building.
“Send that to me?” I asked.
“Of course.”
Then she offered, “Do you want a ride home?”
I shook my head.
“The last train is still running.”
While I waited on the platform, I opened the family group chat.
There were over forty new messages.
Sadie was wrapped in a blanket, making faces in front of a fireplace at their vacation house. Owen was chasing her with a bag of marshmallows. Lauren had posted a video, and in the background, I could hear my father laughing. “Now this is what a real family weekend looks like,” he said.
The photos were flooded with heart reactions.
No one asked how my awards ceremony went.
They came home Sunday night, loaded down with souvenirs.
I put my trophy in the middle of the dining table.
My father walked past with his luggage, paused, and glanced at it.
“Oh, nice.”
Then he turned to Lauren. “Is Sadie’s bag still in the car?”
“Dad,” I said, stopping him. “The state award automatically advanced me to the national competition.”
“That’s great.”
“It costs five hundred dollars to enter. For printing, mounting, and shipping the work. The fee is due Friday.”
The smile on his face vanished.
“Doesn’t the award come with prize money?”
“Two hundred dollars.”
“So you’re short three hundred?”
I nodded.
My father frowned.
“We just spent a lot on Sadie’s summer program. Why are you only bringing this up now?”
“I just got the competition packet today.”
Lauren folded one of Sadie’s scarves, her voice taking on the gentle, reasonable tone she used to end arguments.
“Avery, there are so many top students in a national competition. Why waste the money? A state award already looks great on your record. You don’t have to submit to every single thing.”
I looked at my father.
He was already bending to pick up another suitcase.
“Your mother has a point. There will be other art competitions. You can always enter next time.”
My mother had been dead for ten years.
He didn’t even notice he’d called the wrong woman by her name.
The next day, I brought the two-hundred-dollar prize check to school.
After I explained the situation, Ms. Ruiz asked only one question.
“What’s the deadline?”
“Friday.”
She opened her computer and pulled up an application form.
“The Emerging Artists Fund provides grants for materials, up to three hundred dollars. Send me your award certificate and an artist statement.”
“Can we make it in time?”
“If we submit it today, yes.”
The approval email arrived on Thursday afternoon.
Three hundred dollars. Exactly.
On Friday, I packed the prints, artist statement, and application documents into a hard-sided portfolio case and sealed it with packing tape, layer by layer.
No one was home to see me off.
My father was at work, Lauren had taken Sadie shopping for her summer program, and Owen was at a friend’s birthday party.
I carried the portfolio out the front door. I didn’t post a picture in the family group chat.
Wind swept across the empty tracks.
The digital sign announced the next Metra train would arrive in three minutes.
I was heading to the downtown post office to mail my work before the deadline.
Alone on the platform, bound for Chicago, I held a one-way ticket in my hand.