The Art Show

Del, Mac, Cheese, and Roe walked back from the recycling center in the soggy ditch next to the road. Each of them had a small pocket full of money from recycling cans. They had had an exciting trip, a new couple had moved into a trailer down the road from the recycling center, and were volunteering there when they arrived, their yard had been a source of fascination on the way, filled with bright recycled metal sculptures, and whirligigs, and murals and fences and boulders. When the man, Rye, told Mac and Roe that that was actually where he and Io lived, the Del jumped in with lots of questions about their art. Io smiled, “I’m sure you can make some just as wonderful. We taught ourselves how to make our art.”

As Del and Mac placed cans into the correct recycling containers, and Roe played with Cheese and a stick, the three discussed what kinds of things they could try making an art project with. “We should do something special for one of Mac’s zines, like a giant painting or something.” said Roe. Del nodded, maybe we could each make one of the pages something different and then bring them back together. Mac grinned happily, “I’ll choose one of my favorites! You all are great friends!”, and hugged Roe. “Lets surprise eachother and not show eachother the ones we work on until they’re finished!” Del said and they joined the hug with Cheese wiggling over too.

Mac stopped and kneeled down, digging around in his bag, then pulled out a stack of hand drawn comics and zines. “Do you want to do ‘Mermaid Sewer Races’ it’s funny because they race by walking on their hands, ‘Gregory the Cockroach Pizza Delivery Driver Destruction Derby Man! Its a biography of a roach I found’, or ‘Vampire Bat, the UFO Detective’ which is a pretty good one because I drew it after some people from the bat museum came and talked to the library about bats, so its very accurate.” Roe and Del stopped to consider the options. “I like Vampire Bat UFO detective, I read that one when you drew it, its got some really good UFOs.” Del pointed to the cover, which had two UFOs. “That one is good. I like ‘Mermaid Sewer Races’ because I like all your ones in the sewer, its like you did a series.” Roe said. “I haven’t read any of the sewer ones yet” Del said, lets do that one, I can read the new one. Mac handed the copy of ‘Mermaid Sewer Races’ to Del, “Don’t worry I have photocopies at home of the other sewer ones too if you want. I’m excited!”.

They arrived back at the junction to turn into their neighborhood. The convenience store stood on the corner. Del looked at Roe and Mac. “want to go tell Gina about the recycling center?” They both nodded. “I think I’m saving my money though” Mac said walking up, almost a little to Cheese, and Roe replied, “I’ll see if there’s anything I want before I decide.” They walked through the doors with a jingle jangle, and Gina looked up from a glossy copy of Vouge from a few months ago. “Hey y’all” she said, “how’s it been going?”. Cheese stared at Roe intently while he casually browsed the beef jerky buckets, and Mac and Del stood at the counter. “We went to the recycling center, and met these cool people Rye and Io” Mac started. “Hey Gina,” Roe called over, “How much is this nail polish again?” Gina glanced over, “It’s on sale, $.79 each.” She focused back on Mac again, “You all walked down there today? I don’t know Rye or Io, but my friends Cassie and Dusti volunteer there sometimes.” “We decided to make some art based on Mac’s comics. We’re doing ‘Mermaid Sewer Races’, have you read that one yet” Del asked. Gina nodded, “Mac showed me that one when he first finished it, I like all their different hair styles they have, it’s a good one.”

Roe walked over with a can of ice tea, a handful of nail polish colors, and a package of birthday candles. Mac had started to eye the jerky bins with Cheese. Del wandered over to the magazines, to see what newer issues of magazines were out. There was a copy of a music magazine they liked, and Popular Science, and some ones about bikes and cars and woodworking and plants that Del liked to look through. Gina’s voice floated over, “You’re gonna be trying out some fun colors, you’ll have to let me know if you like how they turn out, I haven’t tried some of these yet.” Coins jingle jangled on the counter as everyone made their purchases, or didn’t purchase, and decided to save their money, and they jingle jangled out the door again, going their separate ways home in the evening light.

That evening at home, Roe sat at the kitchen table, his younger siblings having their turn being told bedtime stories. Quiet time was upon him, and he was glad he now had a quiet project to work on. Tonight it was his dad’s turn to tell bedtime stories, and his mom had stayed in the kitchen, tidying up, and after that, making herself some tea. “Hey mom” he said, “I was gonna sit at the table too and have some tea. I got some new nail polish if you want to use any. I’m doing an art project.” She turned around from the kettle at the stove and smiled. “New nail polish? That’s nice. Maybe I’ll take a look.” Roe pushed the nail polish towards the table center to share. He poured his tea into a glass and rinsed the can out, then set it back in front of him. He looked at his copy of “Mermaid Sewer Races” and found the pages he was looking for: one that had all the racers on it, getting read to start their race. He opened one of the nail polish bottles he had gotten, and set to work painting the can.

A street or so over, Mac had tucked a snoring Cheese into his dog bed, and sat down on the couch next to his grandmother, who had come to stay with them for a little while while some friends and neighbors fixed some plumbing at her place. “Grandma, can you show me how to do that thing, I think it’s called embroidery, where you draw a picture with sewing?” Mac asked her. His grandma smiled. “Sure I can, let me see a minute if it’s alright with your mom if we dig around in her sewing basket.” His grandma got up, and poked her head out on the porch where a long haired woman was reading a book and the crickets where chirping loudly. “Kay, you mind if I get into your sewing basket? Mac wants to know how to make something.” Kay looked up. “Sure, go ahead. If it’s for Cheese, don’t use any fancy soap, he’s allergic.” His grandma looked over. “Are we making it for Cheese?” “Nope.” Mac replied, and his grandma came in. Together they went over to the sewing basket. He pulled out his comic. “I don’t know if you’ve read my comic, but I talked with some friends today, and we decided to try and illustrate it in some different ways. I’m going to try and embroider the art. Before, I used pencils.” His grandma took the comic and looked through it. “I had not seen this issue, but I love that idea, your comics will have fantastic illustrations. It sounds like you have some fun friends too. Lets get to figuring out what we need for your comic then.” She said, and the two of them began picking out pieces of fabric, thread colors, and trying to find the correct sizes of needle.

Del sat at their desk with their desk light on in their room, some magazines spread out in front of them, a cassette tape playing quietly that they had borrowed from their brother, and some glue and scissors out. Del had already deconstructed a cereal box into the shapes of some blank cardboard mermaid figures. Now, Del was using the magazines to create collage paper dolls. This color tail, intricately cut from several pages and glued together, This hair style, artfully posed, and swapable with this beautiful hair. Underneath all that, if the colors, and tails, and smiles, and make up were left off, was words: thoughts, charts, figures, numbers, emotions, from the same magazines that had made Del think of the comic, or even of the way this comic felt in some ways like “Vampire Bat, UFO Detective”. Verbs, emotions, commands, it helped them see what a good comic book writer Mac was. Del wasn’t finished yet, and had ideas about how to put some of the things on: velcro, pop-up, snaps, pull string where different make-up options come loose and stack up. Del also had a box set aside with some dowels from the crawl space to make a diorama and maybe have these be puppets. After working for a while, the thought popped into their head: paper mache. They seriously considered about starting over, that seemed like just what they had wanted to do from the start.

A couple weeks later, Mac was eating toast and marmalade for breakfast when a knock came on the door. He opened it. Roe and Del were there. “Hey, we want to know if your art project is finished, because we wanted to invite everyone, and eachother to come see.” Mac grinned, “I am finished! I wasn’t sure if I should ask you yet. I finished up yesterday.” “That’s great!” said Del, “you and Roe should get some glasses and a water pitcher, and maybe some snacks, and I’ll go hand these out. I made fliers to invite everyone to the art show for when we finished, but I didn’t put a date on. Should I just say today, or should we write a day on, like tomorrow or something?” Roe looked at the fliers: “Art Show, Featuring “Mermaid Sewer Races” comic and new illustrations and concept art.” The three looked at it together. “I like it” sad Mac. “It doesn’t have a date or time, but we can just tell people. Do you think the park outside the library will be a good spot, or should we meet at that lot at the end of the cul de sac?” Roe thought about it a little. “I think the library. We’ll each bring water and cups in our bags for people. Its a good place for an art show, and its also where you make your comics, so other people who know you might want to come check it out. And we can go invite people now, and do it on Friday.” Mac nodded. Friday is a good day, I’m going to wear my favorite outfit. “I’ll dress up too” Roe said, waving some new nail polish. Del smiled. I guess I can change into a clean shirt and stuff they pretended to get huffy, and then laughed. We’ll all have to get cleaned up, including Cheese! And they gave the dog a big hug. “Come on, lets go hand out fliers!” They headed out to make the last preparations for their friends first art show, and were happy to get to be a part of it. Which banadana should Cheese wear on Friday? Del asked? Roe looked down, should I paint his little toe nails too do you think?” he joked. Mac laughed. Lets all paint our nails together tonight, and pick out Cheeses bandana then. And let’s go invite Gina!” They raced off down the road together, with Cheese happily barking, possibly due to the prospect of beef jerky smells and additional cuddles at the convenience store.