THE DELUSIONAL NECTAR

THE DELUSIONAL NECTAR
 ‘Dear fucker, what’s up?

Yeah, it’s me—the messed-up, delusional, angry bird, Nectar.

Mom says I should get a journal to scribble down my wrathful thoughts instead of spit them all on her.

I figured it was a good idea. But now I wonder how long I would last before ditching you in the corner. I’ll take it slow, though. Today, I'll—

“Happy birthday!” mom shrieks from the door. As I’m seated cross-legged on the bed with the book set on one of my thighs, I nearly stab that thigh with the pen due to shock.

“Jesus Christ, mom, mind how you scream!” I tell her, watching as she strides in with a cake and sets it carefully on the bed.

“Blow your candles,” she says.

Right, the candles. One is the number 2, the other is the number 1.

Oh, but I’m not 12. It’s the other way around.

I blow the candles before pressing my lips into a thin line and looking at mom blandly. I’m mildly telling her to get out, yet she won’t take the memo. She never does.

“Twenty one is a big age, baby girl,” she utters while sitting at the edge of the bed.

‘No, it isn’t,’ I wanted to say. After all, when she was my age, she still acted like a breastfeeding kid. At twenty-six, she had me. Now, she’s a forty-seven-year-old, divorced—in a relationship or not, I don’t care—unemployed, single mother earning from the small company share dad gave her as part of child support. And now she wants me to grow up? Bloody no.

“If you have anything to say, mom, you can hold it until after my birthday. I wouldn’t want my mind ruined today.”

“I just wanted to say I got you a gift fit for your age.”

Mom pushes her other right hip up to tuck out something from her back pocket. A fucking envelope—like, a small rectangular envelope.

“It’s not snacks and it’s definitely not paint brushes,” I snap, “so what the hell is it?”

“Open it.”

I grab the envelope, tear the seal off, and slip out a folded A4 paper, glancing at mom before unfolding the paper.

“College application form?” I mumble, followed by mom’s enthusiastic applaud. “And who told you this is a pleasant surprise?” I ask her, and she quickly stops clapping. “I’ve already gone to college, mom. What more do you want from me?”

“You need to study law, hon, you promised to do so after graduating school of art. Painting will only get you so far.”

“Is it about that or is it about not being able to come out with pride that your daughter paints for a living? You want law because it sounds professional. And I only made you that promise because I was so desperate to study what I wanted. Law wasn’t my thing and will never be.”

“Tar, you need to learn a lesson from me. Do you see how I’ve turned out?”

“No one says you can’t change your life now,” I snap, leaping out of bed and stomping to the bathroom.

“Nectar, you can’t walk away from me!” mom barks behind me, yet I ignore her. “Come back here! Nectar!”

I slam the door anyway, standing in front of the sink and staring at my reflection in the mirror.

“Fuck…” I groan.

Looking at myself now, I realize how much of a mess I am—black hoodie, loose pants, a pimpled face from bad cream effect and recently finished menstruation, and… what else? Oh, my entire visuals.

I’m always told I look like mom, though I wish I did not.

Her petite height rubbed off on me too much that I could never beat a six-foot person.

I’m also slender, like her, but my boobs are full enough to show their mounds through a large top.

I didn’t get that bit from her. The gene is from dad’s family, I’m told. Yet, being a spitting image of my mom scares me—I mean, what if I end up like her too? She’s not much of a role model.

The slamming room door tells me she has left the room, so I exit the bathroom, leaning against the door and drifting into a daze for a while before my phone’s ding snaps my back to reality.

I find Shawna’s text: ‘Are you still coming for the Art Concation?’

I wasn’t planning on attending. But it’s high time I escaped mom for a bit.

Shawna’s text pops in again: ‘Latest update: Blank Patriarc is coming too.’

What the fuck? Fucking Blank Patriarc?

Now I’m definitely attending!

‘Yesss’ I text back before booking a flight straightaway.

The Concation is within the country—Country P. Still, it’s a great opportunity to take some time off from daughter-hood.

>>>>>>>>

Concation. A clumsy one-word for Art Convention versus Vacation. It’s a holiday-type gathering meant to bring artists together with potential buyers. It will stretch on for three days.

Within this time, there will be accommodation prepared for each participant, whose visuals are supposed to remain anonymous.

Three major events will kick off every night for these three days, all will be a disguise event during which several artists are to reveal one recent artwork with detailed explanation about how it came about.

Shawna and I have just submitted our artworks to the council and are now heading to our room.

We stay on the same floor. However, there’s a three-rooms difference between our rooms.

With twenty rooms on this floor, ten at each sides of the hallway, I’m lodged in room thirteen, while Shawna is in room seventeen.

I have just now finished putting my things in order as she comes knocking.

“You wanna go out to the reception, Nectar?” Her voice comes through the door.

I proceed to open it, but not for her to come in.

“Don’t forget your mask,” I tell her while putting on a black, knitted mask that covers most part of my face except for my eyes.

Shawna and I start heading to the lobby.

“So, what do you think we should expect from this event?” she queries on the way.

“I had really low expectations until Blank entered the picture,” I mutter. That’s my absolute truth, as I have no interest whatsoever in anything that has to do with socialization.

“Do you think you would recognize him? No one has seen the man except his manager. We don’t even know if he has friends or family,” Shawna speaks again. How do I fucking tell her to zip it?

“Surely, he’s not an artistic loner,” I simply moan.

I may have ignored the first part of Shawna’s sentence, but it bothers me now at how true that could be.

Blank Patriarc has been an artistic sensation for the past twenty years. I knew about his works while growing up. And I’ve always been a fan.

However, he hasn’t officially presented himself to the public. It’s his manager doing all the public stuff for him.

Rumors have even spread that Blank Patriarc is not actually a person. They say the name is a pseudonym that belongs to a group of artists.

But I want to believe the name belongs to a single person who exists.