Everything's Not Lost

The lamp on Ella’s desk throws a small circle of light onto the paper in front of her, making everything outside of it disappear. Her pencil moves inside that glow, quick strokes, smudges from the side of her hand, shadows where a jawline should be sharper. Billie Eilish’s “WILDFLOWER” hums in her headphones, low and heavy, like the song is trying to press itself into her skin. Ella mouths the words without even noticing, letting the rhythm drown out the rest of the night.
She needs it. The music, the drawing, the silence in between. Today was another bad one, the kind that stacks on top of all the others until it feels like she is carrying bricks around in her chest. She tells herself if she stays awake long enough, if she sketches until her hands cramp, she might be too tired to dream. Sleep never feels safe anymore—­her sister is always waiting for her there, eyes bright like she knows something Ella doesn’t.
So she keeps sketching, focusing instead on where the canvas and her pencil meet. On the page, the face of a young Black girl appears. Not perfect, but alive enough to look back at her. She leans closer, erases, redraws. Nose wider. Eyes rounder. She presses the pencil until it almost breaks, then backs off, shading softer until the cheek curves into something she almost wants to touch.
The song fades out. The headphones slip off her ears and land on the desk with a dull thud. For a second, it is only her, the drawing, and the hush of Harlem at two in the morning. She sets the pencil down. It’s time to paint. Paint can turn this flat face into a world. Her hand reaches for her jar of brushes, but her fingers find air instead. They’re gone. Not left in the jar the way she does. Not on the windowsill, becoming bleached from the sun.
Gone.
The word sits inside Ella like a massive stone. She pulls open the top drawer, which is empty of what matters, full of everything else: pencils, paper scraps, an old MetroCard with curled edges. She yanks on the handle of the second drawer. Markers roll, a tube of lip balm slides, something clinks to the floor and spins under the desk that is not a brush, so she wants to kick it.
“My brushes.” Not spoken so much as spilled from her mouth. “Where are my fucking brushes?”
Her chest grows tight quickly, her breath already thin, the room already too loud. Especially for the quiet that lives on a late Saturday night on 124th Street.
She drops to her knees to search under her bed, where missing things usually find themselves. Dust. A penny. An earring she never really liked. A wrapper from one of her sister’s favorite candies. No brushes. She presses her cheek to the floor for a better look, feeling the chill of it, then rolls away fast as the panic climbs her ribs.
“Shit,” she says, and then it becomes a scream. “Where are they?!”
Her shriek snaps the quiet in half and the house flinches: floorboard, radiator, thin window glass. Even Harlem seems to pause, the stoop light buzzing like it’s waiting to see if it has to wake up too.
Ella starts pulling the room apart. Sheets yanked from the corners until the mattress lurches. The comforter flung toward the door, snagging on the knob before it drops. Sketchbooks slapped open, pages flashing, then tossed aside. Caps twisted off, twisted on, twisted off again, as if the turning itself might fix something.
On her desk, the brush jar is clean in a way that feels wrong. Lemon-­bright in the dim. Too bright. She lifts it to her face. It smells like soap. Someone cleaned it. A careful kindness that took what she needed and left nothing she can use.
“Dad!” she yells. Then louder, rawer: “Dad!”
Steps thud, then stutter faster; her parents are already half-way down the hall before she can breathe. Her father appears first, half-­shirted and half-­awake, rubbing his eyes with the backs of his knuckles. Behind him, her mother, in her bonnet and robe, yawns wide with a soft face as if still halfway in a dream.
“Nugget, what’s going on?” her father says. He’s been calling her that since forever, back when frozen chicken nuggets were her whole world.
Her mother squeezes past him, hands up, stepping over the mess Ella just made, breath already ragged. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?”
“The brushes,” Ella says, heat rising. “My brushes! They’re gone!”
“Ella, it is two o’clock in the morning, and we are standing in your doorway talking about paintbrushes,” her mother says, glancing at the digital clock on the dresser as if it can testify. “You should be asleep. We can sort this out in the morning.”
Her father looks around at the stripped bed, the pages on the floor, the jar laid on its side on the desk. He rubs his eyelids with two fingers. “Okay,” he says, measuring his tone like it matters. “Let’s take a second. What’s—­”
“No! This can’t wait until morning. They were in the jar,” she says. “Now they’re not!”
He swallows. Touches the back of his neck. “All right. Look—­while you were in therapy, I came in here and straightened up.”
Everything inside Ella tilts like the room caught a wave.
“What do you mean?”
“I cleaned your room,” he says as if approaching a dog that doesn’t know him. “It was honestly disgusting in here. I thought you’d have noticed when you got home. I washed your brushes too. Just the tips, with some warm water and a little soap. I put them away after they were dry.”
The words land in pieces that cut.
“Why would you do that!”
“They were caked in paint. You’ll get a better line if—­” he starts.
“Why the hell would you go through my shit?!” Ella’s voice spikes.
“Ella!” Her mother’s own voice is sharp as a ruler. “Watch your language!” She kneels, trying to catch Ella’s wild eyes, her own face pinched with fear.
“Don’t tell me to watch my language,” Ella snaps, redness flushing her face. “You two don’t respect my space at all!”
“I need you to do your breathing exercise.” Her mother begins inhaling and exhaling. “Count with me: one, t—­”
“No!” Ella’s hands carve the air. “Don’t touch my things! I need them where I left them!”
Her father opens his palms. “Nugget, look at me,” he says softly. “I should have told you. I thought I was helping. That’s on me, and I am sorry. I’ll put everything back the way you like. But first—­why don’t we try to breathe?” He does it first, the breathing, long and slow. “In for four. Out for six.”
“I don’t want to breathe,” Ella says. “I want my things where they’re supposed to be!”
“I hear you,” he says. He lowers himself until his eyes are level with hers. He leaves a respectful space. “Let me show you where I put them so we can fix it together.”
Ella does not answer. He moves anyway, narrating his actions so no move feels like a surprise. “Bottom drawer,” he says, sliding it open. “Here.” He holds the brushes like they might break if he squeezes. “Safe.”
She looks at the bundle of brushes, but nothing in her loosens. “Why the hell would you put them there?” she asks, the pitch of her voice climbing even higher. “That doesn’t make any sense! They don’t belong there! Don’t hide my shit from me!”
“I didn’t hide them,” her father says like he’s trying to keep the ground from cracking. “I put them where I thought they would be safe.”
“Why do you get to decide where my stuff goes?!” Ella screeches. “It’s mine! Not yours, mine!”
“Ella!” Her mother steps forward but not too close. “I hear you, but don’t talk to us like that. We’re on your side.”
Ella’s throat feels raw, but sound keeps tearing out anyway. “You don’t get it! You don’t get to come in here and move my stuff around like I’m not real! Like I’m not even here!” Her hand sweeps across the desk—­pencils, pens, canvas, paper clips scattering like firecrackers. A marker bounces off the window, smearing a blue bruise across the glass. She grabs the sketchbook closest to her and flings it. The cover slaps the wall and it flutters down, pages crumpled, half-ripped from the binding.
“Ella! Stop!” her father yells, stepping into the storm of it, palms still wide, pleading.
But she’s already on to the next thing, pulling the drawer all the way out until it hits the floor, contents exploding. Erasers, scraps, old broken headphones, a crusty bottle of nail polish that leaks on impact. She kicks it, heel cracking against wood, a sound like splintering bones.
“Baby—­stop—­please,” her mother begs, her voice breaking under the weight of the moment. “This isn’t you—­”
“This is me!” Ella shrieks, hair flying as she spins toward her. “This is me; you just don’t see me!”
Her hands land on the jar where her brushes should be. She hurls it to the floor, glass shattering across the hardwood, skidding under the bed, into the corners—­tiny stars everywhere. The sound is sharp enough to wake the dead.
Her mother closes the distance, voice low, sure. “You’re getting worked up. Let me hold you so you can catch a breath.” She reaches and grabs Ella’s wrist.
“Let me go!” Ella howls. “Get the fuck off me!”
“Stop cursing at me,” her mother says, breath sharpening, eyes narrowing. “I am your mother. I am trying to help you.”
“No!” Ella thrashes, trying to twist away from her mother’s grip. “Don’t touch me! Don’t touch my things!”
Her mother holds firm, trying to anchor her, but Ella yanks harder, flailing. “Stop it, Ella! Stop right now!”
“No! You stop!” Ella’s voice cracks into something inhuman, the words bubbling into sobs and screams tangled together. Ella claws at the air and at her mother’s sleeve until, with a wild, instinctive motion, she kicks out. Her foot slams into her mother’s shin with a violent thud. Her mother cries out, stumbles backward, one hand flying to her leg.
Ella’s pulse thrums in her ears, drowning out everything else. Her mother is bent forward, face twisted with pain, and the sight slices through Ella sharper than the broken glass on the floor.
“Enough!” her father roars. He grips Ella’s shoulders, not rough but solid, steadying. Still, she bucks against him, chest heaving, spit flying with each ragged breath.
“Let me go! Leave me alone!” she screams, though the words are swallowed by another crash—­her elbow hitting the desk, toppling a lamp that bursts against the floor.
The whole house feels awake now, every surface rattling, the pipes in the walls humming, the windows trembling in their frames.
“Ella.” Her father’s voice is urgent, like he’s trying to cut through a fire alarm. “Do you see what just happened? You hurt your mother by accident.”
The sight of her mother in pain tightens something loose inside Ella. The noise in her head goes silent. For a second, she’s confused about how she could have hurt her mother. Shame floods her throat so fast, she only has a few words left.
“I didn’t mean to!” Ella stumbles until her calves hit the edge of the bed. “I didn’t mean to hurt her!”
Her mother presses one hand against her shin, wincing, then forces her voice to go soft. “It’s okay, Ella. It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean it.”
“I’m sorry!” Ella chokes on her own sobs, wishing she could take back what she’s just done.
Her father’s voice threads through it, trying to anchor her. “We just need you to breathe, Nugget. Just breathe like Dr. Dupont taught you.”
Her mother nods, voice fragile but insistent. “Yes. Ella, baby, do your breathing. In for four. Out for six. With me.”
But Ella can’t find the rhythm, her gasps still frantic and jagged. “I—­I can’t!”
Her father’s hand presses gentle but steady on her shoulder, grounding her. “Nugget, you can do this.”
Ella’s chest jerks, air catching sharp in her throat, but she tries. One inhale, ragged. One exhale, shaky. She hiccups on the breath, tears still streaking her face, but she tries again. This time, her lungs cooperate—­her shoulders lift, her lips part, the breath goes in deeper. She lets it out slower than before. Her body trembles, but something eases at the edges.
Her mother, still clutching her shin, nods quickly, encouraging. “That’s it, baby. Just keep going.”
Ella’s voice is smaller now, cracked and wet. “I don’t know why . . .” she whispers. Then again: “I’m sorry.”
The air in the room loosens a notch. The chaos, though still there, shrinks enough that her father finally exhales with her. There’s a moment where the world feels as though it is beginning to make sense again.
Suddenly, the doorbell wails, sharp and insistent.
Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.
Her parents freeze.
“Who the hell could that be?”