Chapter 4

The next few weeks fell into a new, tense rhythm. In the art room, a palpable distance grew between us. Nicole would set up her easel on one side of the room, surrounded by her friends, while I worked alone on the other.

I watched her struggle. Her initial confidence began to curdle into frustration. She'd start a piece, work on it for a day, then paint over it in a fit of pique. Her canvases were a graveyard of half-formed, generic ideas: a wilting flower, a weeping willow, a shattered mirror. They were technically proficient but utterly soulless.

Mr. Davies, our teacher, noticed.

"Nicole, this is... competent," he said one afternoon, looking at her latest attempt. "But it lacks the spark I've seen in your earlier work. Where's the originality? The depth?"

Nicole flushed, her knuckles white as she gripped her paintbrush. "I'm just exploring different styles."

He wasn't convinced. He walked over to my station, where I was working on a series of charcoal studies based on my death. They were raw, claustrophobic, and full of a desperate energy.

"This, however," Mr. Davies said, his voice full of genuine excitement, "This is powerful, Caleb. It's unsettling, but it's honest. There's a real story here. Keep pushing this."

I saw Nicole watching from across the room, her expression a toxic mix of envy and disbelief. She couldn't understand it. In her mind, I was the follower, the helper. She was the star.

The pressure from her father was mounting. One evening, I overheard their conversation from the hallway.

"The scholarship application is due in a month, Nicole," Mr. Anderson's voice was sharp, cutting. "Your last report from Mr. Davies was... disappointing. He used the word 'uninspired'."

"I'm working on it, Dad!"

"Working on it isn't good enough. You will win that scholarship. It's a direct path to the Rhode Island School of Design. It's what we've planned. If you fail, you can forget about art school. You'll be enrolling in the business program at State University. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Dad," she said, her voice small.

"I'm not asking for your best," he said, his voice dropping to a low, menacing tone. "I'm demanding it."

Nicole, overconfident in a talent she never truly possessed, didn't see the danger. She saw it as a challenge she was born to win.

"Don't worry," she said, her voice regaining its usual arrogance. "I'll win. It's what I do."

She believed her own myth. And that was going to be her downfall.