I shiver, wishing I had a jacket, my thin black dress doing little to offer me shelter. There just isn’t shelter I can find anywhere. My grip tightens on the umbrella I’m holding, which someone gave me. I don’t know who. I don’t even remember how it got into my hand. I just keep remembering the moments before my mother had died. The speech and time ticks on for what feels like an eternity, while time has now ended for my mother and my father. I’m alone in this world, and as the rain begins to fall with a fierceness rarely rivaled, the crowd scatters, a few people try to speak to me, but soon, I am alone here now, too.
Everyone is gone, and I walk to the casket and just stare at it. I go back to then, to those moments in time, reliving the fight with my mother, the moment she’d tumbled forward. My knees are weak and so is my arm and I can’t seem to hold onto it. I don’t want to hold it anymore so I don’t. I just can’t. I drop to the ground and let the force of the rain hit me, my black dress instantly wet, my hair…
“Faith.”
At the sound of my name I turn and Josh stands there. “Josh? How are you here?”
“I wanted to be here for you.”
“Where’s Macom?”
“I’m sorry, Faith. He’s not coming.”
“Good,” I say, “I told him not to come. I don’t want him here.” And knowing how he operates all too well, I add, “Being my agent doesn’t require that you do funeral duty. I don’t like that kind of plastic friendship and I don’t want it in my life or career.”
“Faith—”
“Go home, Josh,” I say and needing to escape the obligatory sympathy from him and everyone else, I start to run toward my car.
My cellphone rings, jerking me back to the present, and I grab it to ironically discover Macom’s number on caller ID, feeling as if I’ve willed a ghost of my past into the present. I hit decline, noting this as his third call and I really want to block the number. I’m about to do just that when my cell rings in my hand and this time it’s Josh’s number. I answer immediately, “Why is my agent calling me on a Sunday?”
“To tell you not to answer Macom’s call.”
“You’re a little late since he’s called three times.”
“Holy hell. Please tell me he didn’t get in your head about the L.A. Forum show.”
“I didn’t talk to him,” I say, well aware of why he is concerned, since Macom pretty much declared my work an embarrassment the last time I wanted to submit. To protect me, of course. “And even if I had, I’m in the show.”
“And I’d prefer you get there feeling confident.”
“Why exactly is Macom calling me?”
“To give you advice you don’t need.”
My mind goes back two years, to me standing in my workspace, in the home I’d shared with Macom, while I’d proudly revealed new paintings. Certain that my work on the three pieces would finally capture the L.A. Forum’s attention.
“Stunning,” Josh had said, motioning to a Sonoma mountain shot I’d so loved. “This one,” he’d said. “It’s one of your best yet.”
“Absolutely not,” Macom had said, shoving his hand through his spiky dark brown hair before motioning to the three paintings. “These are not what they’re looking for. None of them. You’ll look like a fool.”
The words had been like knives in my heart, and I’d instantly doubted myself, questioning why I was even picking up a paintbrush any longer.
“I respectfully disagree,” Josh had argued, daring to go against his moneymaker Macom.
Macom’s gray eyes had flashed. “Who is the star of that show for the second year running? Not my fucking agent, I’ll tell you that. I’ll help Faith pick her submission.”
“Faith?”
At the sound of Josh’s voice, I snap back to the present. “He doesn’t get to shove me back down a rabbit hole, Josh,” I say vehemently. “I’m not that girl anymore. I was never that girl. I was simply lost in Macom’s translation.”
“Yet you let him choose your show submissions over and over, and you received a rejection in response over and over.”
I think back to every rejection I’d gotten and Macom’s replayed response:It doesn’t matter, baby. Paint for you, not them. I pay the bills. You don’t need them. You have me.Like I didn’t need my own success because I had his.
“That man shuts you down,” Josh adds. “You didn’t paint after you left him. Not until a few days ago.”
“Because I wasn’t going to paint until it was for me again,” I say.