Arlene hung the last painting on the gallery wall and stepped back to check if it was straight. She had done this seventeen times before — set up shows, arranged the chairs, made sure every piece faced outward so someone might smile at what she'd made. The room always stayed empty. She walked outside to adjust the sign on the sidewalk. A woman stopped beside her, holding a small bag from the shop down the street. "This Friday?" the woman said, reading the bright letters. "I'll be here. I love landscapes." Arlene kept her hand on the sign frame. Three years of forgotten promises had taught her what these words meant. But the woman was already pulling out her phone, adding something to her calendar with quick taps. She looked up and smiled. "What time does it start?" Arlene told her six o'clock. The woman nodded, tucked her phone away, and walked off toward the parking area. Arlene stood there on the sidewalk, watching her go. She had a choice now — believe this stranger would show up, or protect herself the way she always had. She picked up the sign and carried it back inside, leaving the glass case of paintings facing the street where anyone could see them.

Friday came slow. Arlene opened the gallery at five, set out a tray of cheap crackers, and straightened the sign on the sidewalk one more time. The bold letters caught the last of the sun. She went inside and waited. Six o'clock passed. Six thirty. She stood near the door so she could see anyone who slowed on the walk. A few people passed without looking. The woman from the shop did not come. Arlene sat down on the folding chair by the coat rack and told herself she was not surprised. She had left the paintings facing out this time. That had been the mistake. At ten past seven the door opened. Arlene stood too fast. It was not the stranger. The woman in the doorway wore a yellow coat spotted with paint and round black glasses that were too big for her face. Reddish hair stuck up in every direction. Arlene knew her before she spoke. Claire Pemberton had been her art teacher in the last year of school, the one who had told a shy fifteen-year-old that her landscapes were worth framing. Arlene had not seen her in a decade. "You painted the meadow one," Claire said. She was already past Arlene, walking toward the wall. She stopped in front of the largest canvas and put both hands in her coat pockets. "That's the field behind the school. You painted it from memory." Arlene's throat tightened. "You remember the school field." "I remember every field you ever gave me." Claire turned. Her eyes went wet behind the glasses, then she blinked it off and grinned. "I saw the sign yesterday. I drove an hour." Arlene did not know what to do with her hands. "There was supposed to be a woman. She said she'd come." "She didn't?" "No." Claire looked around the empty room, at the crackers, at the seventeen paintings hung straight and even. She did not say she was sorry. She walked to the next canvas instead, and the next, and stopped in front of each one long enough that Arlene could see her looking. At the small one near the back — a cottage in rain — Claire laughed out loud. "You got better," she said. "I hoped you would." Arlene sat back down on the folding chair because her legs would not hold her. She had wanted a stranger to smile. She had gotten someone who already knew what her work was for. It was not the same thing. It was not nothing. Claire came and sat beside her. She pulled a folded paper from her coat pocket and set it on Arlene's knee. It was a class schedule from the community center, six weeks of Saturday sessions, adult beginners. One line was circled in red pen. "I need a second teacher," Claire said. "Starts next week. You'd be paid." Arlene looked at the circled line. The gallery was still empty behind them. The offer sat on her knee, waiting for an answer she had not planned to give.

Arlene took the schedule home and put it on the kitchen table. She read the circled line four times. Adult beginners. Saturday at ten. She had six days. She had never taught anyone anything in her life. By Tuesday morning she still had a blank page. She had written "Week One" at the top and then stopped. She thought of Claire driving an hour to sit in an empty room and smile at her paintings. She thought of Claire watching her fumble in front of strangers. That was worse than the empty room. That was the one thing worse. She put on her coat and walked to the library. The small yellow building had been there since she was a child. The woman at the desk pointed her to the back shelves without asking questions. Arlene pulled down every book on teaching art she could find. Six weeks of adult beginners. Color mixing. Value. Simple still life. She copied exercises into a notebook until her hand cramped. She borrowed four books and carried them home under her arm. On Wednesday she walked past the old schoolhouse on her way back from the shop. The bell tower caught the light. She stopped on the path and watched it. Claire had taught her in a room not much bigger than that one. Claire had put a pear on a table and told the class to look at it for ten minutes before touching a pencil. Arlene wrote that down on the back of her grocery list. By Friday night she had a plan. Week one: look before you draw. A pear on a plate. Pencil only. She practiced saying it out loud in the kitchen. Her voice sounded thin. She said it again. She stacked the borrowed books by the door so she would not forget them. Saturday she arrived at the community center at nine thirty. Claire was already there, setting out newsprint pads. She looked up and grinned. "You came." "I have a pear," Arlene said. She pulled it from her bag and set it on the table. "And a plan." Claire laughed. "Show me." Arlene opened the notebook. Claire read down the page, nodding. At the bottom she tapped the line about looking for ten minutes before drawing. "That's mine," Claire said. "I know." "Good. Steal the ones that work." Claire handed her a piece of chalk. "They come in at ten. You take the first half." At ten past ten, seven adults sat on folding chairs in front of Arlene. A man with paint on his knuckles. A woman older than Claire. Two teenagers who looked at the floor. Arlene set the pear on the table. Her hands shook once and then stopped. "Don't draw yet," she said. "Just look." The woman older than Claire smiled at the pear. Arlene saw it. She kept teaching.

The class ended at noon. Six students thanked Arlene on the way out. The seventh, one of the teenagers, left without lifting her head. Arlene had watched her all morning. The girl had drawn the pear three times, crumpled each sheet, and pushed the last one under her chair. She wore a hoodie two sizes too big and would not meet Arlene's eyes at the door. Claire found Arlene stacking chairs. "You did well." "One of them left crying." Claire stopped. "Did she say anything?" "No. That's the problem." Arlene picked up the crumpled paper from under the chair and smoothed it on the table. The lines were careful. The girl had looked at the pear. She had looked hard. "If she tells people the class made her feel stupid, no one comes next Saturday." Claire nodded once. "Do you know where she lives?" "I have the sign-up sheet." "Then go." Arlene went home first. She stood in her studio and looked at the paintings stacked face-inward against the wall. She did not want to arrive empty-handed and she did not want to arrive with a lecture. She opened the drawer under her worktable and took out a small sketchbook with a soft painted cover. She had bought it a year ago and never used it. She put it in her bag. The address was a narrow house near the old schoolhouse with the bell tower. Arlene knocked. A woman answered, tired, holding a dish towel. Arlene said she was the art teacher. The woman called up the stairs. The girl came down slowly. She stopped four steps from the bottom. "I brought your drawing back," Arlene said. She held out the smoothed paper. "You looked at the pear longer than anyone else in the room. I watched you." The girl's mouth tightened. "It was ugly." "It wasn't." Arlene set the sketchbook on the stair rail. "The first ten I ever did were worse. I kept them. I still have them." She paused. "This is for you. Not for class. Nobody sees it but you until you decide." The girl looked at the cover. She did not take it. She did not walk away either. "Come Saturday," Arlene said. "Sit in the back if you want. Draw or don't. But come." The girl reached out and took the sketchbook. She held it against her chest. "Okay," she said. Arlene walked home the long way, past the schoolhouse. She thought about the girl holding the book against her hoodie. She thought about the six others who had thanked her. For the first time in three years, she had given someone something and watched them keep it. At her kitchen table she opened her notebook and wrote Week Two at the top. Under it she wrote: bring extra sketchbooks.

On Monday morning Arlene sat at her kitchen table and counted supplies. Six pencils. Four erasers. Two half-used pads of newsprint. She had seven students last Saturday and the teenager she visited had promised to come back. If one more person showed up, someone would sit with nothing to draw on. She could not afford to buy paper for a growing class out of her own pocket. The community center paid her to teach, not to stock the room. She walked to the community center and found Claire in the hallway, arms full of folding easels. Claire wore her yellow coat with the paint spots and her big round glasses had slid down her nose. She pushed them up with her wrist. "I need paper," Arlene said. "A lot of it. By Saturday." Claire set the easels down. "The center's supply budget is spent for the quarter. I already checked when you called about sketchbooks." "Then I have four days and no paper." Claire tilted her head. "Try the newspaper office. Ask for Mrs. Smith. She runs the front desk and she knows every roll in that building." Arlene walked over that afternoon. The newspaper office smelled of ink and old coffee. Mrs. Smith stood behind the counter in a floral dress and a tan trench coat, sorting a stack of returned copies. Her gray hair was pinned back. She looked over her glasses when Arlene came in. "You're the painter," Mrs. Smith said. "Claire's teacher friend." "I need paper for my class. Newsprint, if you have any to spare." Mrs. Smith set down the stack. "How much is a lot?" "Enough for twelve students for six weeks." Mrs. Smith walked to a door behind the counter and opened it. Inside stood a rack of end rolls, each one taller than Arlene's knee. Some were half full. Some were nearly whole. "Misprints and short ends," Mrs. Smith said. "We can't sell them and I hate to throw them out. Take what you can carry. Come back for the rest." Arlene looked at the rolls. There were nine of them. "All of them?" "All of them. On one condition." Mrs. Smith folded her arms. "Put my name on a little sign in your classroom. I like to see my name in print." Arlene laughed. She had not expected to laugh. "I can do that." She carried two rolls home that afternoon and came back with a borrowed wagon for the rest. By evening the rolls stood along her studio wall, next to the paintings she still kept facing inward. She cut sheets at the kitchen table until her hands ached. She stacked them in twelves. At the bottom of her notebook she crossed out bring extra sketchbooks and wrote: enough paper for anyone who walks in. Then she stopped. She had not thought, before, about strangers walking in. She wrote it again, underlined, and left the pencil on the page.