“Then take me to her.”
Tracy caught my wrist. “Tanya, slow down.”
“No.” I pulled free. “Nova painted Lily on that wall, and I need to know why.”
Andrea’s brows lifted slightly. “You know Nova?”
“Yes. Well, I know of her,” I said. “My daughter talked about her after weekends at her dad’s house. I knew Patrick had a stepdaughter. I didn’t know she could paint my child from memory.”
I had met Nova a few times, though Elaine had forbidden her to come to our house.
“Tanya, slow down.”
Andrea nodded carefully and led us down a side hallway.
“Did Nova use a photo?” I asked.
“I can’t answer that,” Andrea said. “The students submit their own artist statements.”
“Then she can explain it herself.”
***
We stopped outside a small room where a teenage girl stood by a table of name tags, picking dried paint from her sleeve.
Andrea softened her voice. “Nova?”
The girl turned.
For a second, grief blurred her.
“Did Nova use a photo?”
Then I saw the dark curls and the careful posture.
It was Nova, Patrick’s stepdaughter.
She was Lily’s “Supernova.”
She was taller now. Nothing about her face matched Lily’s.
But the painting did.
Every inch of it matched.
Nova saw me and went pale. “You’re Lily’s mom.”
She was taller now.
“And you’re Nova,” I said. “Lily told me a lot of stories.”
Her eyes filled. “She talked about me?”
“All the time, sweetheart,” I said. “But not like this. I didn’t know you two were this close.”
Nova looked toward the gallery like she wanted to run.
I stepped closer. “Why did you paint my daughter and call it a self-portrait, Nova?”
Her fingers tightened around her sleeves. “Because she was my sister too.”
The words hit harder than I expected.
“She talked about me?”
***
I’d known Lily liked her. She came home talking about “Supernova,” their made-up songs, and the time they put glitter in Elaine’s shampoo.
But sister?
Lily had never said it that plainly.
Maybe she’d been afraid it would hurt me.
Nova wiped her cheek with her sleeve. “Even if nobody wanted us to say it.”
“Tanya,” my sister whispered.
I held up a hand. “Tracy, I need to see this through.”
Lily had never said it that plainly.
I looked at Nova. “Who didn’t want you to say it?”
Nova swallowed. “My mom.”
“Elaine didn’t want you to be close?”
She nodded.
My stomach tightened. “Why?”
“She said it confused things. She said Lily already had a mom, and I already had one, and Dad didn’t need more family drama. She said I didn’t need a sister. I could be enough by myself for Dad.”
“Who didn’t want you to say it?”
I looked back toward the gallery, toward the impossible painting. “That still doesn’t explain how you got every detail right.”
“I remembered her.”
“That perfectly?”
Nova’s chin trembled. “I loved her, Aunt Tanya. She was special to me.”
I gripped the strap of my purse.
“Nova,” I said quietly. “Who told you to keep this from me?”
“I remembered her.”
