What a wonderful world

Through Mercy’s (protagonist) artistic and introspective lens, this story explores identity, belonging, and connection in a world that often feels isolating.

There was always something about those puffy white objects floating in the sky. Be it their unique shapes, colour, or allure. Something always intrigued me about those ‘soft mountains’.

 

Growing up, while other kids my age spent their weekends watching cartoons, riding their bikes, or just goofing around, I spent mine observing the sky. From drawing to counting, and even having a conversation with them, they were my one true obsession.

 

A Toronto, Canada native and the only child from a rocky marriage, I found it hard to fit in anywhere. Even the misfits in my school shunned me. My only friends were the 'mountains' in the sky and my drawing book.

 

Mum bought me my first book and crayons for my eighth birthday. Being a music teacher herself, she always believed in having something that kept the mind not only busy but also creative.  My portraits lacked fancy details, but I poured my heart into everything I drew, mostly clouds.

  “If you’re going to draw things all day, you might as well make them worthwhile,” Mrs. Roselyn, my grade five class teacher said, after catching me several times trying to draw God-knows-what. Under her advice, I joined the school’s art class, and thus, my journey as an artist began.

 

That was roughly fifteen years ago, now aged twenty-four, and in my sophomore year at York University, I still gazed up from time to time for inspiration.

  “Twenty minutes to go, Miss Riley. You better hurry up.” Our lecturer’s voice broke me from my trip down memory lane. With a surgeon’s precision, I quickly smoothed out the edges with a piece of tissue to give the illusion of a shadow.

 

It was our last class before we broke up for the Christmas holidays. The task required one to, ‘Use your imagination to bring the holidays to life. Your canvas should tell a story, not just a mere picture.’ My artwork told the story of travellers arriving from a long voyage. The cruise vessel, ‘Cloud 9’, was docked near a coastal line while the crew and passengers alighted.

 

On the harbour, there were hundreds if not thousands of people, some rushing through the crowd, some embracing family and friends who had come to meet them, some waiting while others boarded taxis, and just for the fun of it, I had included a few rotten eggs pick-pocketing some passengers. Even without the addition of the clear blue sky and the partial sun in the background, the raising skirts and shirtless chests of some of the passengers gave an illusion of a hot and windy day.

 

  “Wow talk about intense you planning on going on a voyage any time soon?” that voice, that all too familiar voice that made my heart skip a beat or two.

  “Nothing much, you know, just letting my imagination run wild,”

  “That’s one heck of an imagination, Mercy…I wish I had half of your intellect,”

  “Well, we can’t all have everything. I have the imagination, and you have the…physic,”

  “At least someone has been paying attention. Talk to my coach, please. He thinks I'm adding weight,”

  “Well, come to think of it…you do look a little chubby around the edges,”

  “Really? OK, Michelangelo, any ideas on sculpting the perfect athlete's body?”

  “Well, you could reduce your visits to MacDonald’s and KFC, attend fewer parties, and try to eat more vegetables,”

  “I would probably drop dead if I tried to do that.”

 

We both started giggling, much to the dismay of our lecturer. “For those of you done with your projects, kindly hand them over and quietly exist.”

 

  “Merry Christmas, Mr. Morgan,” Jet said, handing over his and my canvas.

  “Merry Christmas, Mr. Shaw. Do try to minimize the number of burgers you eat over the holiday, son. The captain of the basketball team should always be in tip-top shape.”

 

Mr. Morgan quickly pointed towards the exit before Jet could mount a defence.

 

  “What so funny?” he asked once we were outside 

  “What was that about you adding weight?”

  “It’s the holidays, Mercy. I need to rest and recuperate if I want to return as the same beast in the second half of the season.”

  “You rest and recuperate by doing yoga and getting a massage not by stuffing doughnuts and parting till 3 a.m.” I instantly regretted that comment, the look on Jet’s face said it all. What was I thinking? I was neither his girlfriend, coach, nor mother, and here I was giving him a pep talk.

  “I’m so sorry, Jet, I didn’t mean it that way. I just…”

  “Relax, jeez you are way too serious…I know what you mean and trust me, I already set up a training guide.”

  “I hope you follow it, it would be a shame if you couldn’t play. Do you know how many hearts you would break if you were on the bench?”

  “The only heart that I care about is yours.” 

 

I went numb.

 

  “Gotcha,” he said as a smile flashed across his lips. I tried my best to laugh along, but my body was just a mixture of emotions.

  “Care to share the joke?” Rebecca said appearing from nowhere.

  “Oh hey, we didn’t see you coming. How’s your day going?” Jet asked, hugging her, I could feel my blood boiling.

  “Not as good as yours, shouldn’t we be going? The club isn’t going to shut itself down, you know.”

  “Jeez, I almost forgot. Hey, Mercy, do you wanna come?”

  “Oh, Mercy, hi, I didn’t see you there,” Rebecca added, feigning remorse

  “No, I’ll pass, I have some parking to do,”

  “Well if you change your mind, we’ll be at the…”

  “C’mon, Jet, don’t force the issue. We both know ‘fun’ doesn’t exist in her vocabulary. Besides, she probably has some clouds to sketch.”

It took all my might not to lunge at her neck. Instead, we just locked dagger eyes.

  “Well…we better get going then…I guess we’ll see each other after the holidays M.” From the look of his eyes, I could tell he didn’t want to escalate things any further.

  “Happy Holidays, and good luck with your training,” I said, trying to contain my growing rage.

  “What training?” Rebecca asked, but before she could raise another fuss Jet quickly whisked her away. In the distance, I could hear both of them arguing, something about ‘him not telling her of any training plan’ and ‘she not having to be disrespectful to others’.

  “What Jet sees in that snake, I’ll never know,” Kimberly said, sliding her arm around my waist.

 

Kim and I had met on the very first day of college, two renegades from different walks of life, but somehow we hit it off. We shared everything, from a room to our love of jazz music to our dreams and hopes for the future. She became the sister I never had. We even found a way to merge our two classes into one. She was a design student and had dreams of working for Louis Vuitton one day, and although she had a plethora of creative ideas and designs, her sketches were always wanting.

 

We spent hours in our room creating designs. Kim described how she wanted a particular garment to look, and I sketched it out. Those hours paid off handsomely for both of us; she always received the envisioned design, and my drawing skills improved significantly thanks to her crazy ideas. We formed the perfect dynamic duo.

 

  “You know, if I were you, sweetheart, I would just take him from her.” She said, giving me a mischievous wink.

  “Easier said than done. Do you see what I see? Her face, her hair, her legs, her body shape, she’s practically a Goddess.”

  “Trust me, sweetheart, I know. She’s the top model on campus, something she reminds us daily, I swear one of these days I might tamper with her dress before she goes on the runway. A malfunction is something that should put in her place.”

  “I thought working with Miss Campus was your dream?”

  “Yeah, Stacy Hughes, not this she-goat Rebecca Thompson, let me tell you something M, if I knew being the top student would force me to work with pampered kids, I would have intentionally failed some of those tests.”

 

My hands were on my thighs from exhaustion. I had never laughed so hard.

 

  “It’s not funny…it feels like I’m working with a psycho, ‘Kim, that stich is too tight’, ‘Kim, this dress isn’t showing my posterior well enough’, ‘Kim, make sure I have towels to dry my face once I exit the runway’, ‘Where is my glass of orange juice Kim, you know I need to keep hydrated.”

  “Well, look on the bright side. Now you know how the real world works. You’re bound to run into more ‘Rebeccas’ once you join Louie.”

  “I guess you’re right. Anyways, back to Jet, are you…”

  “Nothing is happening, Kim,” I said, leaving her behind.

  “Come on, sweetheart, all it takes is just one kiss,”

  “Kiss this,” I said, showing her the middle finger. I turned around to see her expression, only to be met with a snowball to the face.

  “Sorry, I’m so sorry, Mercy, I was aiming for your back. I didn’t know you were going to turn around.”

 

Toronto was typically a cold place, but from December to February, Mother Nature threatened to rephrase the word freezing. Today’s temperature had dropped to minus zero degrees. Despite having a hot shower, a steamy mug of tea, and being covered with layers of clothes for protection, I was still shaking.

  “I’m sorry,” Kim said, half-giggling, half-backing off. The venom in my eyes said it all.

  “Kimberly Tessa Rogers, I’m gonna kill you.” 

 

***

 

Christmas Eve was one of those days that held a special place in my heart. Honestly, the entire Christmas period was. For as long as I can remember, my home, if I can even call it that, was a war zone. It got so bad that my mum not only moved out but also filed for a restraining order against my dad. 

 

As a toddler, I never knew what the issue between my parents was. Whenever something broke out, my mum would pick me up and lock me in my room, bringing me out only when things calmed down. The broken crockery, smashed chairs, cuts and bruises on my parents’ faces, were all I got for an explanation.

 

As such, I never went out clubbing or listened to any loud music as it reminded me of being locked in my room while objects banged on walls and people shouted from the other side.

 

One night, when I was about nine or ten years old, I snuck out during one of those episodes. A little girl walking by herself in the middle of the night was asking for trouble, but I didn’t care.

 

That’s when I heard it. A sound so soothing it could calm a storm, so complex yet so harmonic. Raised by a music teacher, I knew the ‘rules’ of music, but this sound defied them all. It almost seemed entirely improvised. Don’t get me wrong; it was still music. At times, it could get loud and fast, but there was something unique about it.

 

I cautiously made my way toward the open-air band. It was the best thing I had ever experienced in my young life. The band played tune after tune, blending them like a well-programmed machine. I had no idea what songs they were sampling or who they were, but one thing was for sure. It was simply magical. I stayed there the whole night, and even though my mum lectured me when I returned, nothing, and I mean nothing, could dampen my mood. From then on, Christmas held a new meaning for me.

 

Jazz became part and parcel of my life, I listened to it while on the subway, while in the gym, and while doing chores. In junior high my love for it drove me to piano classes; it wasn’t hard to convince my mum, seeing as she was also a music teacher. Art, Jazz and the clouds became my world. When everyone around me, especially girls, were concerned with the latest fashion trends or the hottest guy in the yard, I was more content with my cords, pencils, and brushes. All done under the shade of the white, sometimes grey, ‘mountains’ in the sky.

 

Like many other days, after painting for about two hours, I opted to recline on the snow, watching the clouds drift by as smooth Jazz wafted around me. A slow brush on my shoulder sent me jolting up with a small scream.

 

  “Sorry, I tried calling you. I thought you had passed out,” Jet said, his earth-like eyes scanning me like a bar code.

  “You shouldn’t creep up on people like that, Jesus,” I said, trying to catch my breath…from a feeling of fear or infatuation, I couldn’t tell.

  “Sorry, why are you in the snow? It’s freezing out here,”

  “I was painting and decided to take a break. Besides, if you dressed properly, you'd realize that it’s not that cold.”

  “I’m from the gym, and I do have a coat.” He said, opening his bag to show me. He then proceeded to lock eyes with me. “It’s funny, we’ve known each other for almost two years, but this is the first time we have been together…I mean alone, you know…without anyone around us.” 

 

All the extra hours at the gym had paid off. It had only been two weeks since we closed but, he looked leaner. For a brief moment, my imagination wandered off to places it had no right to be. I needed to break this tension before my hormones hijacked control.

 

  “Shouldn’t you be off at some party?” I muttered, nervously rubbing my palms against my thighs.

  “I decided to take your advice…less eating more working,” he put up a happy facade, but I could tell something wrong.

  “What happened? You look different, and I'm not talking physically.”

He paused, perhaps searching for the right words.

  “Rebecca and I broke up,” my heart pounded as I tried to suppress a smile.

  “I’m sorry,”

  “Don’t be, I knew what I was getting myself into. Guess I was just being dumb.”

  “Hey, don’t say that. You’re not dumb, you just made a mistake, happens to the best of us,”

  “Happens to the best of us huh? How would you know? I’ve never seen you with anyone,”

  “Trust me there’s someone his six foot six, brown eyes, plays basketball, and believe it or not, he’s even the captain.” 

 

Jet locked eyes with me.

 

  “You’re stupid you know that,”

  “Takes one to know.”

 

We both started laughing. A moment passed, and I noticed Jet staring at me again.

  “Do I have snow on my face?”

  “No…it’s just…I’ve never heard you laugh like that before,”

  “Don’t get any thoughts, playboy.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Hot basketball player breaks up with a girlfriend and jumps on the next thing just like that, save the rebound catches for the court.”

  “I would never do that to you…I mean, you are the only person who sees me as a human rather than an NBA prospect. That’s hard to find nowadays. Trust me when I tell you, I’m not going to mess it up just because I want to get back at my ex.”

 

Those words were said without a trace of insincerity nearly bringing tears to my eyes. To avoid this, I looked up, trying to find something else to occupy my mind.

 

  “How long have you been a nephophilia?” Jet asked

  “A what?”

  “Someone who has an obsession with clouds. I’ve noticed that most of your sketches include clouds and whenever we’re in class your attention is usually outside. You even paid a classmate so you could trade sitting positions with her, giving you a proper view of the sky.”

  “Being captain requires a lot of elements other than being the best player. Attention to detail is one of them.” He added, noting my dazed look.

  “Ever since I was a child. I never seemed to fit in on earth so I carved a space on the clouds.”

  “Figures, you do look like an angel.” My cheeks began reddening from this. “So what?”

  “I don’t know…you tell me,” I said absent-mindedly.

  “No…Miles Davis. The song you’re listening to, so what. It’s a classic. I listen to jazz before going to the court…other than being my favourite genre, it helps calm the nerves” He added after another dazed look on my part.

 

I turned up the volume on the small Bluetooth speaker, as Jet proceeded to hum along to the song.

  “How long do you intend to stay here?” He asked

  “Till dusk”

  “Then I guess we have all the time in the world.” He added, putting on his coat and lying on the snow as Louis Armstrong’s, ‘What a Wonderful World’ cued on.

Author's Note

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