Chapter Three

January 2015

The Los Angeles art scene was always something to get excited about. There were differences in the talent that came from the West Coast versus the East Coast. Not that one was better than the other. They just each had their own unique personality. It was the air, or people's attitudes that lived on one coast as opposed to the other that perhaps had an effect on their work. Mandy was never sure. But in her heart of hearts, she was a West Coast girl through and through.

"This is fucking unbelievable." Sophie's British accent really seem to punctuate those words even harder in Mandy's head and her palms started to sweat.

"You don't think I should've brought the smaller canvas instead of this one?" Mandy took stock of all her work hanging on the walls in the small off-the-beaten-path gallery that Friday evening. Was her work distinctive enough? Did her point of view come through clearly? Or were all these paintings just plain bad? Impostor syndrome was a powerful force.

"No. It's bloody perfect just the way it is. For fuck's sake, stop second-guessing yourself." Sophie sounded so confident. So sure. But that's how Sophie was—her entire persona had always been that of don't-fuck-with-me-I-am-who-I-am . It was one of the things Mandy found most endearing about her.

"If only it were that easy." Mandy had been working for years—years upon years, if she was being really honest—waiting for this moment. An art show, her first ever. There had been a couple of times she had a piece of hers on display here or there, but tonight it was all Amanda Dean originals. Even the way she ended up here was a fluke. One of those serendipitous moments when Mandy had been in the right place at the right time. So questions of Did I deserve this ? swirled through her head as destructively as a hurricane.

Mandy had been standing in this very gallery one month ago when it happened. Sophie had flown into town for a quick layover, and the pair made a wrong turn looking for the Thai restaurant they'd decided to try out. One of those hole-in-the-wall places you needed to know someone who knew someone to find out about. After a few blocks, they found themselves not lost, but not where they had hoped to be. They stood in front of Beyond the White Wall instead of Aroy Thai.

"Ugh. What is wrong with this stupid app?" Mandy groaned. She'd spent the morning working on a new project and completely forgot to eat—which wasn't a terrible thing since she was about to gorge herself on Thai food. "This isn't where we're supposed to be."

"Or is it?" Sophie gave Mandy a knowing glance, and instead of turning around to figure out where the scent of garlic and spices was coming from, pushed through the door of Beyond the White Wall.

Even though Mandy was starving, she followed her friend inside. The space was much larger than it had appeared from the outside—deeper than it was wide. It looked as though it was still set up from a showing with some rather…interesting pieces on display. But aside from that, the space was chic and pristine—the walls all a shade of eggshell white without a single scuff or mark.

"What even is this?" Sophie tilted her head to one side and then to the other. The wall text next to the piece read The Eye of the Beeholder. Mandy got the bee reference with what was possibly honey dripping into a strategically placed container on the floor and a plastic honeycomb attached to a canvas that looked like a preschooler's finger painting project gone wrong. "Think they were spiffed when they made this?" Sophie asked.

The artist likely had done more than just smoke a little weed, but that wasn't important. "Do you think it's supposed to be some sort of discourse about the commercialization of honeybees?" It was a reach for sure, but Mandy didn't know what else to say about it.

"No. I think they were just spiffed."

"It didn't even get close to covering the overhead!" a voice rang out from the back room. "It was a catastrophe to the highest degree!"

Mandy glanced back at the door they entered through. "Maybe we should—"

"And miss the drama? No way." Sophie took a casual step closer in the direction of the voice while trying to make herself look interested in the work on display.

The yelling continued. Mandy attempted to busy herself by studying a headshot of the gallery owner posted on the wall—Aziz Bakshi—and according to the biography below, he had quite the extensive background as an art dealer. Although her eyes followed along with the words in front of her, she couldn't help but wonder what all the yelling was about. The finer details of what was being discussed weren't clear—there was a lot of swearing—but when the owner stormed out and found Sophie and Mandy standing in the middle of his gallery, he couldn't quite turn his frown around quick enough and ended up with more shock than smile.

They totally shouldn't be there.

"I'm so sorry. I didn't realize anyone was here. I'm Aziz, pronouns he/him. Welcome to my gallery." And there he was—the man from the photograph—even more stunning in person. Aziz actually was the most fabulous man Mandy had ever laid eyes on, and she had seen some fabulous men over the years. He wore a fitted black turtleneck and a floor-length skirt that wasn't metallic, but it looked like liquid metal the way it shimmered when he moved across the room in his four-inch stilettos. And he smelled like the air after a summer's rain—that was the only way Mandy could describe the fresh air effervescing off him.

"I'm Sophia Esme Zepeda, she/her, and this is my friend, Amanda Dean, also she/her." Sophie spoke like this was the most natural way of introducing oneself, and maybe it was in the elite artist circle Aziz lived inside—a circle Mandy could only dream of being a part of since she had no connections.

"Amanda Dean," Aziz said. "You're an artist too, aren't you?"

Mandy sucked in a breath. How could he tell? But then it dawned on her that there was paint still stuck to her nails and spots on her shoes. She was dressed for Thai food, not for going to a gallery, and definitely not for speaking to an actual gallery owner. Her stomach tightened.

But before Mandy could reply with something like, Well, I hope to be someday , Sophie stepped forward. "The most amazing artist. And better than this." She gestured around to the… paintings wasn't really the right word for what hung on the walls.

Mandy's heart stopped beating. What was Sophie thinking? For all either of them knew, this was Aziz's brother's show and she had just insulted him. Mandy was a nobody in the art world, and at this rate, she'd be staying that way.

Aziz threw back his head, his ink-black hair falling behind him like a dark shimmering waterfall, and laughed. "He is shit, isn't he?" He tucked his hair behind his ear. "That's what happens when you do your cousin's friend a favor. Never again. But that also means I'm left scrambling to find someone to fill the spot next month. You wouldn't know anyone with a collection ready to go, would you?" He laughed as though he knew what he said was absurd. Even the most talented artists needed months upon months to prepare for a showing. No one could possibly pull a collection together that quickly.

"Mandy can do it," Sophie said, pulling her phone from her back pocket. "Look at this." Before anyone could say anything, Sophie had shoved her cell into Aziz's hands and began flipping through the photos she had of Mandy's work.

Mandy's face was hotter than the depths of hell. "He doesn't want to—"

"You are exceptionally talented, Amanda Dean." Aziz said the words with surprise. Which was fair. He'd probably heard that line from friends and family many times and was then forced to look at work that wouldn't even pass for a first-year art student's. Mandy wasn't anyone important, and she had been privy to that same ritual—her mom sending her work to review from a friend at the gym or whatever, saying, if you could just look at this and let me know what you think—so she had had some incredibly interesting work to critique even with her limited experience.

Mandy wanted to say, I'm sure Aziz is just being polite . But the thing was, people like him—gallery owners—weren't ever polite to people like Mandy. To artists with name recognition, sure; to buyers with money to spare, of course. But not a lowly artist whose friend just shoved a bunch of terrible cell phone pictures in their faces—no. So Mandy didn't rebuff his compliment. Praise from people like Aziz did not come often or freely. Mandy's insides grew as warm as her face. She hoped her cheeks wouldn't give her euphoria away. Because even though compliments weren't given often, no one needed to know this was the very first one Mandy had gotten from someone who wasn't a mentor, professor, or one of her friends. She needed Aziz to think she had those kinds of things said about her all the time.

She also needed to remind herself to breathe.

Aziz broke into a long speech about what he needed, and what would work in the space and wouldn't, and what the house commission rate was and how that could change depending on if Mandy needed him to cover all of the marketing and opening night catering or not. Numbers swam inside Mandy's head, crashing against one another like bumper cars as she tried to keep up with everything that came out of his mouth. And then it was quiet.

Too quiet.

Shit. What did Mandy miss?

"She'll do it," Sophie answered for her.

"Amanda Dean. I'm gonna make you a star." Aziz spun with a swish of his skirt. "Let me just draw up the papers."

That moment four weeks ago had seemed like a dream. Or a nightmare, depending on Mandy's mood. But as she stood in the gallery that night surrounded by her work on pristine white walls, where caterers dressed all in black hustled around her, it seemed surreal.

"You are the fucking star tonight." Sophie squeezed Mandy's hands and brought her back to the present. "I've gotta jet, but anytime you start losing your nerve, I want you to say that to yourself. You got me?"

"I'm the fucking star tonight." Mandy's words didn't quite hold the same conviction that Sophie's did.

"Damn right you are." Sophie's dark curls with a pop of purple brushed against Mandy's face as Sophie kissed each of Mandy's cheeks.

"I wish you could stay," Mandy said. It was a low blow—Sophie absolutely would stay if possible, but it had been lucky she could be there to see this even if it was before the event truly started.

"You don't need me. You've got this. What was that again?"

"I'm the fucking star tonight."

Sophie winked and then she was gone—off to catch her flight and take the world by storm.

Tonight, Mandy's parents and friends said they would be there. And Edmund would of course show up as soon as his meeting wrapped. But until then Mandy was on her own.