Most Likely (Most Likely #1) - Sarah Watson Page 0,44
on my way now. Be there in fifteen minutes. Actually, ten. I’ll speed. Because I am so, so, so sorry. Love you. Bye. On my way.”
She paused for one second to catch her breath. She needed to steady herself. Scott wanted her to maybe call him later. And she maybe wanted to.
Ava felt awkward and stiff in front of Logan’s camera. At least he didn’t tell her to pose or say cheese or anything like that. He told her to just act natural. As if that were possible.
“Who are your favorite artists?” he asked while taking a couple of test shots.
“Frida Kahlo, David Hockney, Cabrera, Reyes, Léger, Sorolla.”
Logan took a couple more shots. “Better,” he said. “You’re relaxing.”
“Ah. The question was just a ploy.”
“Of course,” he said. “People are more natural when they’re talking about something they like.”
“I could list a million more if it helps me get this over with faster.”
He laughed and took a shot. His camera made a click, click sound with each picture. “You’re like me with directors.”
“Directors?”
“Movie directors. Stanley Kubrick, Max Ophüls, Orson Welles. Those are probably my top three. Kathryn Bigelow and Kimberly Peirce if we’re talking modern day.”
“Is that what you’re going to study? Film?”
“That’s what I would love to study. But no. Prelaw.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “So I can be a lawyer?”
“That’s what you want to do?”
He shrugged again. “Not really. But my parents are both lawyers. They have their own firm and want me to join it. It’s the family name. It’s like my destiny, basically. I’ve been groomed for this since birth.”
“Yeah,” Ava said. “But if it’s not what you want… if it’s not your dream…” She paused. “I don’t know why I said that. I still haven’t told my mom I want to apply to art school.”
Click, click. Logan took another shot and checked it. “This one’s great. I got you in a really interesting moment.” He raised his camera back up. “So you’re going to do it, though? You’re going to apply?”
“I really want to. Really, really want to.” Click, click. “But I don’t know. I probably won’t even get in, so it won’t even matter. RISD is so competitive.”
“Ava. You’re going to get in. There’s no way you’re not getting in. You’re the best artist in the whole school.”
The compliment made her feel weird. “That’s not really saying much. I love Mrs. Simon, but it’s a public school art program. I’d be going up against art magnet students and kids who have studied with actual artistic masters. It’s a different level of competition.”
“Is the postcard painting for your portfolio?” Logan asked.
If he was trying to get her to relax, this topic was not going to do it. “No.”
Click, click. He checked the photo he’d just taken. His expression changed and he looked up at her. “Did I say something wrong? You seem… tense.”
Ava shifted. He was right. “That painting is just for me,” she said. “The postcard was from Mom. My birth mom.” He lowered his camera. “It’s the only thing I have from her.”
He didn’t say anything, but his expression did. A combination of compassion and Holy shit.
“I do think about finding her,” Ava said. “It’s complicated. I can’t do anything until I’m eighteen, though. And maybe I won’t even then.”
Logan raised his camera, then lowered it again. Raised and lowered. He wasn’t uncomfortable exactly. He was thinking about something.
“What?” she asked.
“I don’t know if I should say anything. This is so not my business. But I think I know a way you could find her,” he said. “Even before you turn eighteen. If you ever wanted to.”
Ava looked away. Was he seriously about to mansplain how to find a birth parent to someone who had lived with this question her entire life?
“I’m being serious,” Logan said.
“Logan. You don’t know anything about my adoption.”
“I help out at my parents’ firm when they get busy. Just doing filing or whatever. They have this private investigator who works there. We’ve actually gotten pretty tight. He’s a cool guy. He does stuff like this. He usually charges a lot, but I bet I could get him to do me a solid. If you’re interested…”
“Nope,” Ava said. “I’m not interested.” It was a lie. She wanted to find her birth mother almost more than anything in the world. Freshman year, when she’d been at her lowest, she’d been so desperate for that connection that it felt like a giant gaping wound that wouldn’t close until she at least got to see her,