They Left Me Out Of The Picture So I Created My Own Chapter 10
Professor Dunn slid a letter with the Chelsea gallery’s logo across the table toward me.
The Young Artists Support Program was formally inviting me to join. They would provide me with a studio, pay an advance, and host a solo exhibition for me the following summer.
I had to read the letter twice before I could look up.
“You’ve earned this, Avery,” Professor Dunn said. “You have a way of seeing things that other people just don’t.”
Downstairs, after I told him the news, Leo stepped back and gave me an exaggerated, formal bow.
“Master, may I have the honor of doing grunt work for your exhibition next summer?”
“Sure,” I said. “But there’s no pay.”
“That’s cold. At least buy me dinner.”
We made plans to celebrate that night, and plans to finish our senior projects together someday.
These six months in Providence felt like the first time I had ever truly pressed the shutter for myself.
Here, people respected my choices, listened when I spoke, and took my work seriously.
With the gallery’s first advance, I rented an apartment with its own small darkroom. When I signed my name on the lease, I knew with absolute clarity that I was going to put down roots here.
Not long after the new semester started, an old classmate from Chicago sent me a message on social media.
She said my father had shown up at our high school, asking for me.
In the principal’s office, he had asked only one question: “Did Avery Brooks get into a college on the East Coast?”
The school refused to release any information, citing privacy policies. He left his phone number and walked out.
He hadn’t called the police. He hadn’t contacted Ms. Ruiz. He hadn’t reached out to anyone who might actually know where I was.
It sounded less like he was searching for a missing daughter and more like he was tracking a lost package.