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Seth barely contains his eye roll.
“It was... great,” I say. “Lots of excellent pieces and... I won a prize, actually.”
Mom gasps with excitement. “You did?”
“You did?” Seth asks, annoyed.
“I thought you weren’t going to enter this year,” Mom says.
“I wasn’t,” I say. “But somebody entered one of my pieces by mistake.”
“I thought you pulled it,” Seth says.
“I did,” I say. “But, as it turns out, the Audience Award is a write-in ballot open to all Chicago North students and, because of an inexplicable surge in the piece’s popularity on campus, it won in a historic landslide, according to Professor Wilson. So, yeah. I won a prize.”
Seth glares at me across the table in disbelief.
“That’s wonderful, honey!” Mom says. “I’d love to see it.”
“Well, I destroyed it, so... it’s gone now,” I say with my eyes still locked on Seth.
He sits back a bit and looks at his plate. I’d think he was ashamed… if I believed he was even capable of it.
“Oh.” Mom tilts her head, confused. “Well, that’s unfortunate.”
“For the best, I’m sure,” Dad pipes in, bored and lifeless as always. “No use in getting too attached to art, I say.”
Mom fixes her smile on him. “Harold...”
“Maybe next semester you can fill your schedule with something more practical,” he says, ignoring her scolding tone. “The world already has enough homeless waitresses. It doesn’t need one more.”
I exhale quietly. It’s not like I haven’t heard that one before. Art is stupid. I’ll make nothing of myself. I’ll live starving and penniless forever if I don’t grow up and get an actual career. And... you know what? Maybe he’s right. I didn’t even have the confidence to enter the piece into the Art Fest myself. How am I ever going to support myself with my art if I couldn’t even do that?
“Heidi’s great, actually.”
I turn my head up in surprise.
“She’s talented,” Seth continues, his sharp eyes pointed at Dad. “You should support her instead of tearing her down.”
I blink twice, staying quiet.
“It’s a hobby,” Dad says. “Not a career.”
“She won a prize at the Chicago North Art Fest as a first semester freshman. Do you know how impressive that is? No one’s done that since 1993. She kicked some serious ass and I’m really proud of her.”
What the crap?
Seth looks at me with the same pride in his eyes as there is in his words. “And she’ll never be homeless,” he adds. “If she ever needs someplace to go, she knows my door is always open.”
I don’t react. Hell, I’m not even sure how.
“Oh, Sethy.” Mom smiles. “That’s so sweet! I’m so glad the two of you have been looking out for each other here. Chicago is such a big city…”
Dad hums, his way of acknowledging he’s outnumbered. “Well, I just think a few courses or a minor in academia will be beneficial in the long run. As a safety net.”
I nod. “There’s actually a great internship with the Art Institute for art history students. I thought about looking into that for next summer, possibly. I have to knock out a few prerequisites first.”
Dad perks up, though it’s hardly noticeable to the untrained eye. “That sounds promising,” he muses. “I’d love to hear more about it.”
