“I’ll email everyone, Mini, and cc you,” Vinnie said. “Can you make sure they’re okay with it?” She yawned and stretched. “I’m sooo sleepy. Such a long day at the hospital, but we had some really interesting cases. You see a bit of everything in the ER and it’s go time all the time. It’s really satisfying to finally get to help people, though. Sometimes I can’t believe I’m actually a doctor.”
“You are going to be an amazing doctor.” I was so fiercely proud of her.
“Not yet.” She shook her head tiredly. “But I’m getting there.”
“Go to bed!” I ordered. “I’ll email them!”
“No, Mini, you’re already doing so much!” Vinnie said. “I’ll email them tomorrow. I’m sorry the lehenga Masi sent didn’t fit you. Why didn’t you send measurements?”
“Because I thought she was sending me a sari when she didn’t ask for more measurements!” I said. “I’ve been thinking, though.…I can let down the hem to fix the length and change it from a full-circle skirt to a three-quarter-circle skirt. I’ll just have to see if Amy can let me use the sewing machine at the store—mine can’t sew such thick fabric.”
“Maybe you should send it back,” Vinnie said. “What if you ruin it?”
I folded my arms and tilted my head at her. “I won’t.”
“Okay, I believe you.”
“You should.”
“How’s Vir?” Vinnie asked. “Did he end up DJ’ing Jason’s Bar Mitzvah?”
“Uh-huh.” My heart did a backflip, and I’m pretty sure a “YMCA” as well. “He did great. But you do need to go over the schedule and the songs and the announcements with him, now that he’s definitely doing your wedding. That way it will be just how you want, okay?”
I spread out the lehenga fabric into a perfect circle on the living room floor. I had already unpicked the hem, and thankfully even the fabric that had been turned in was embroidered, so it lengthened seamlessly. It looked like a pool of blue silk spangled with gold and silver.
Then I raised my best pair of scissors.
Normally I’d be petrified to cut through one-of-a-kind hand-embroidered silk of this quality, but I was mad. Mad enough not to care how it would turn out, if I did end up ruining it. In fact, I was sure that cutting the lehenga up was going to be positively therapeutic.
With steady hands, I cut out a quarter slice of firoza-blue silk like a piece of a giant pie chart.
There, done.
Amy had said I could stitch the skirt on the Turnabout Shop sewing machine—the store’s machine is industrial-strength, and they have an overlocker and serger and everything. Even though I usually prefer using my twenty-year-old low-end Singer that used to belong to Mom for my personal alterations, I was taking NO more risks with this fabric.
It would work, I knew it would.
In a bid to shake off the blues (no pun intended), I packed my watercolors, bottle of water, and brushes into my French easel and headed to Fellsway with the dog. Painting en plein air always helped me slay whatever was bothering me. Besides, I had to add to the portfolio that I’d been neglecting for weeks. Now that I wasn’t retaking the SAT and Vinnie’s wedding planning was off to a good start, it was time to focus on college app stuff. My portfolio was exactly where it had been when junior year wound down and I finished submitting everything for AP Studio Art. It would be good to paint something that wasn’t going to be graded and evaluated!
I set up the easel by the small stone bridge at the far end of the lake. The water lilies were blooming in the creek below, and if I was lucky a few of the lake’s resident swans would visit to inspire me. Yogi flopped down on the ground and watched the ducks sailing by, resigned to his fate. He knew what to expect after I set up the easel—hours of sitting around for him, while I messed around with paint and ignored him.
An hour later I stepped back and surveyed my work.
Not bad! I always did my best work when I had something to get out of my system. My low spirits were gone too. I wiped my hands on a rag and decided to let the paint dry before doing more with the scene.
“Hey, that’s awesome!” Vir had somehow materialized next to me and was examining the painting with interest. “Is that for your art supplement?”
“It is,” I said, trying to play it cool. “Do you like it?”
“You had better not give this up when you go to uni, that’s all,” he said. “Did you decide which design schools you’re applying to?”
I smiled. Was he a college counselor too, as well as a DJ? He pushed back the damp strands of hair that had flopped onto his forehead and fixed me with a stern look. Something about it made me forget to inhale.
Through strategic breathing—short, shallow breaths worked well, I found—I was able to get enough oxygen to my brain to actually function.
“No,” I said. “I don’t want to go out of state.”
“But you’re selling yourself short,” he said. “Seriously!”
“My dad won’t even consider it. Do you want me to move away or something?” I meant it as a light comment, but his eyes warmed in a way that sent a shiver tingling down my spine.
“No,” he said. “I don’t want you to move, actually.” Before he could say more, Yogi started a low warning growl that made me jump.
“NO!” A bolt of black fur dashed toward Yogi. It was that danged black poodle again.
I moved to block the poodle’s path and she swerved to get around me, with a laser focus on Yogi,
