I’m supposed to be thinking about the apartments. But instead, I’m rolling that pink thumb drive over and over in my hand, wondering what exactly it contains. 

But…

I promised myself I wouldn’t plug it in yesterday because heaven knows if I did, I wouldn’t get to sleep until well after midnight, but now the curiosity is eating me alive.

The string it’s attached to is long enough for me to hang it around my neck like ‘the one ring,’ so sliding it over my hair and tucking it into the bodice of my dress, just to have it a little closer to my heart, I plop down onto the floor and stare at the unpainted walls, trying to daydream.

That’s the same thing as working I guess, if you’re me. But as my imagination fails me for the thousandth time, I’m starting to panic.

I’m almost starting to envy the people whose work is cut and dry and their own whimsy or mood swings can’t ever stunt it the way my stress is ruining mine.

I haven’t completed a single new painting in too long.

I’m starting to p…

There’s a ghost in shades of cocoa and purple in the corner of my living room - just the silhouette of a woman without a proper face - and I’m afraid to paint it out, or into anything realer.

That would scare me more than the phantom.

There’s a little version of me painting a more perfect version of me, like a Russian nesting doll of fantasy and confusion, trying to make sense of itself and the mysterious dirty fingerprints that can’t be properly explained.

I’m fidgeting with the thumb drive’s string again, but telling myself that it helps me focus.

I should be planning out the exhibit, but I’m not sure how to finish that either, and that’s someone else’s money I could be wasting, so I really have to give it my best.

This is getting a little nerve-wracking. 

The more I worry, the less I can create. The less I can create, the more this terrifying spiral continues, and I start to feel suffocated by my own incompetence.

If I can’t even play make-believe like a three-year-old child, then what am I good for, honestly?

I should be getting to work but I don’t want to face Mrs. Howard, period.

But especially not with the confession that I have YET to finish the exhibit concept - though the museum said I have plenty of time because they haven’t even decided where they’re going to put the exhibit yet - YET to tell myself the last lesson for the workshop is as finished as it can be though I technically have it written-

My heart is beating too quickly again.

I start teaching classes in mid-April and that feels too close. The more time goes on, the less confident I am that I’ll be able to do it at all.

I’m burned out and scared. I’m frustrated and scared. I don’t know anything - how to do anything - how to finish anything - how to fix anything - but I know that I can’t…

Keep going like this.

Maybe I CAN do this, but not this way.

I need out of my head, because the further into it I go, the more lost I become.

My living room is littered with so many unfinished canvases flecked with shades of red and gold that it looks like autumn. 

It’s spring.

I should be painting cherry blossoms and peonies and marigolds and r…

I should be painting lions because March comes in-

Goes out with my Kitty Kat’s birthday.

If I’m not careful, his prediction about my buying more apartments will come true. I’m already starting to feel like I need more space to hold all this clutter, like moving it somewhere else could put it out of my head, even for a minute. All my sketched attempts at drawing up an aesthetic design are strewn across the living room.

Along with my attempts at making something ‘perfect’ for Kattar’s birthday.

He probably doesn’t even WANT another one of my paintings. But somehow, the two presents I already have planned for him don’t feel like enough.

They’re not enough.

And somehow too impersonal.

I’m trying to go bigger and better, but how do I compete with the literal moon?

I can’t even hold a candle to her greatness.

And though I could go with something more romantic, like a fancy dinner, because we’re a real couple now, there’s a part of my conscience-

Two parts-

That don’t think…

Alicia…

I stare down at a colored pencil wash of bubbles in shades of lilac and plum lying on the floor beside me and wish I had a magic wand that could give me a little more confidence, even if it’s ungrounded, so I could just get somewhere. Answer some of these questions. Ask some of these questions I’m afraid of.

I’m not mad at you Kat…

I can’t be. My thoughts do whatever they want. Angry one day and sad the next…

I wish I could just blame it on hormones.

…But in the end, I still know that I’m more terrified than anything, and I think Kattar is too.

That’s what worries me.

In the world of things that matter…of things that matter to him.

Where will I end up if the fear is too much for him?

I see flashes of us falling apart - uncompleted, half-prepared, and nearly beautiful - like these unpainted walls I think I need - but don’t know how to make livable - right - or even good.

I should ask him for some advice or suggestions on decorating this place... 

I could ask Melissa…

But I know I just want to go see him again. 

And I could just say that, but I prefer to make excuses.

‘Hey, are you free this evening?’ I text him quickly before I can psyche myself out. His text comes through faster than usual - or I guess this is becoming the new ‘usual.’

‘I’m free anytime after 4. The cleaning personnel are here today, and that takes up the whole morning and afternoon.’

I purse my lips.

‘Do you want to have dinner with me afterward?’

‘Of course.’

I don’t know why that makes my throat feel a little thick.

It’s just not the best day…

There’s a song about that isn’t there? One Kattar listens to…featuring someone from one of those bands he plays to death…

‘Aren’t you supposed to be getting to work though?’ a new text asks out of the blue. ‘You’re not texting and driving are you?’

‘Noooo. No work! Work bad!’ I text like I’m whining, trying to smile though he can’t see me.

‘Come on. You have to get to work, Lise.’ I imagine I can feel his sympathy, but his best attempt at comfort is just business. 'You know we have to follow through with the things we agreed to, and you agreed to work with The Foundation, so you have to at least show up. And it’s unprofessional to arrive late.'

I want to sigh, but he’s right. Still, I argue, though I know I’m going to listen to his common sense anyway.

‘I don’t want to be professional today. I want to lay on the couch in dirty pajamas, doom-scrolling and eating beñuelos.”

There’s a pause, and I imagine I can see that wry smile on his face as his reply comes through teasingly, “If you go to work like a good girl you can have beñuelos later.

I sigh audibly this time while I type out ‘*exasperated sigh*’ and hit send, but I follow it up quickly with the weary promise, ‘Fine, I’ll go.’

‘Yay! I’m so proud of you.’

‘No sarcasm.’

‘It’s not sarcasm.’

I w…

I don’t know what to say, so I don’t reply, watching the end of his statement appear on the screen a few seconds after the first bubble.

‘...I’m gonna be brave like you when I grow up.’

It almost feels like a joke, but I take it, running my fingertips slowly along the screen, wishing…

‘Thank you.’

If I don’t stop myself, I’ll change my mind, and skip out on work just to drive around waiting to be able to go over and see him again.

But I force myself to breathe and just…

Take today a step at a time.

Mustering up some teasing energy I text back to him cheerily -

I have to change the subject…

‘Btw, Mr. Dracula, I’m expecting you to actually get some sun today. You’re starting to look like the frontman of an emo rock band.’

‘Yeah, cuz it’s like 9 degrees outside! Are you trying to kill me?’

‘Hustle. You’ll live. If you don’t start getting out more, I’ll buy you a recumbent bike.’

I wasn’t really joking, but as soon as I say the words I want to take them back. 

Fortunately for me, he doesn’t seem to get upset, just replying lightly.

‘You’d waste your hard-earned money because I’ll never use it.’

I force myself to laugh.

‘Maybe not, but I’ll leave it in your living room and ruin the feng shui.’

Pause. 

Oh, that gets through to him.

‘Fine! Fine! I give!’ 

I imagine I can see him frowning and laughing at the same time.

‘I’ll see the sun for five minutes today if you manage to make it to work on time.’

‘Done. I hope you have a heavy coat. And I expect you to take pictures to prove you really went out.’

‘Sheesh, you’re such a distrustful girlfriend,’ he teases, and my brain seems to pause.

He’s one to talk about being…

But then I think about yesterday’s note, and the thumb drive still hanging from my neck and decide to force that bitter train of thought into its box.

Sometime soon, I’ll be able to throw it away altogether.

So help us…

We’re going to reach the other side of this insanity intertwined- not just two pretty shades side by side on the muddled, messy canvas of burning reds.

‘I guess it’s just because I worry about everything I love,’ I reply, with a slight smile that feels like a sigh - quiet, sweet, sad, and warm at the same time.

Kattar doesn’t say anything else, just sends me a text sticker of a scarlet beating heart scrawled with the words ‘Te amo’ in shades of gold.

*

For some reason, I feel okay.

I don’t understand it. As I kick closed the car door. As I walk up to Emelia’s office door.

I think about Kattar.

And I’m so used to it being the other way around - the bad always outweighing the good.

This week has been a really horrible week, I know.

Yesterday didn’t un-happen. 

But today happened.

I kiss the little thumb drive hanging from my neck before I open the door and I feel like I have enough breath in my lungs to push back the suffocating for the first time in ages.

But Emelia seems to frown more overtly than I’ve ever seen her frown before when she notices my placid expression.

I’m practically beaming, and I feel radiant - I don’t even care if I look radiant - I might just look crazy - but for some reason that thought just makes me want to laugh as I push back my untamed hair, and then my suit jacket, sitting down in the chair and crossing my chilly legs so energetically that my high heel nearly falls off.

“What are you in such a good mood about?” she asks sarcastically, “50% off sale on all tequila?”

I open my mouth but then close it again.

You know what?

No.

I’m not going to let her ruin my mood today. I’m just fine.

“I’ve had a lovely morning,” I smile at her, swinging my crossed leg cheerily, and at the same time I say it, it’s true. 

It hasn’t been perfect, but it’s still good. 

She frowns deeper.

“I shouldn’t be surprised. You look like you just barely made it back from the club. Pick someone up did you?”

I feel a slight twinge of annoyance and wonder what part of my appearance looks rakish to her today, maybe all of it, but I wave that off too.

“I’m not sure what the club aesthetics look like these days,” I shrug casually, “Clara Moon bought me this jacket. I believe she has one similar that she wore in a recent interview.’

Now she just looks like she sucked a lemon, and suddenly she’s not interested in any more ‘small talk,’ opening up her laptop quickly with agitated fury simmering just below the surface.

“We have quite the assortment of random publications today,” she frowns curtly, pushing her glasses up with two fingers. “A dozen or so magazines have been spamming my inboxes, all tripping over themselves for a chance to work with you.” She sighs with irritation as she clicks two things and seems to drag one to the middle of her screen. “Boa Magazine is the only one really worth noting. They want to buy permission to use your painting of the peonies as the cover for their Mother’s Day issue and do a little interview…”

“No.” 

I say it before I can think, and Emelia looks up at me with real, genuine dismay, so dumbstruck that it takes her a moment to speak.

“N…,” she blinks. “What?” 

I start to open my mouth but she just blinks again quickly in bafflement.

“You should at least think about it. Boa may not be an art magazine but it’s still a huge publication and they're willing to pay quite a lot,” Emelia...laughs...slightly, like she’s almost scared of the expression - the infuriated redness she sees seeping into my face in shades of morbid, bloody, bitter.

“I don’t need to think about it,” I say firmly, trying my best to keep my voice steady. “I thank you very much for finding me the opportunity, but I’m not going to do it.”

Emelia’s lips are pressed into a line and she stares at me for a long time with that same bewildered, worried expression in her eyes before she’s willing to look down and mark something off of the list on her desk, putting her hand to her forehead like she has a sudden headache or is trying to shade her eyes.

“Al…right then. About the exhibit at the museum…they...,” she stops and pushes up her glasses again, this time a little unsteadily, and she shakes her head once before she finds her voice again. “They’re pretty sure they want you in the second-floor gallery so they’d like to give you a walk-through of the space sometime next week, say…Monday?”

“Not Monday.”

“Thursday then?”

“Thursday works.”

Emelia marks something down on her list, and then glances up at me quickly, her head tilted, but she looks back down again when I meet her look with the same stubborn, unwavering expression.

This silence feels almost ironic in its discomfort.

I smooth my hand along the desk as I get a taste of Emelia’s nervousness for the first time…

Of all the bitter things I’ve imagined…

I’m above or below caring about anything that has to do with her right now.

My pinky finger rustles against a printout of Boa Magazine’s covers throughout the last 12 months that Emelia must have collected to give me a point of reference, and I scan it hurriedly - find the one for last May. There’s a faceless woman there, like the figurines people will keep in their houses or put on wedding cakes, and in her arms is a little, faceless infant just like herself.

They’re both just ghosts. 

They’re the ghosts in the corner.