01 | I hate art and art hates me.

I swing open the wooden door leading to the kitchen, grab one of the chairs around the table, and turn it to sit astride it. I look up to meet my parents' gaze, which was already fixed on me. "I need money," I start.

My father raises an eyebrow. "How much?"

I look at him. This is the moment he's going to kill me. "A little money..." I take a moment while he waits for my answer. "Something like a hundred or two hundred-"

My father interrupts immediately with, "I'm broke." He returns to reading the newspaper he had left on the table during my entrance.

My mother hasn't said a word yet. She continues to stare at me, and I must admit it's becoming unsettling. "Did you get yourself into trouble with some drug dealer and owe them money?" she asks.

I roll my eyes. "No, but-"

Before I can finish, she interrupts me. "Are you in trouble in general?"

"No m-" I'm interrupted again.

"Are you risking your life if we don't give you this money?" she continues.

Oh God, this conversation will never end.

"No, I'm not risking my-" and once again, she doesn't let me finish. Jesus, I can't do this.

"Then you don't need it," she declares.

She goes back to cooking while my father chuckles under his breath.

"Oh come on, I need it for a tattoo," I grumble. Both of them burst into laughter. What did I say that was so funny?

"You want to get a tattoo?" my mother asks, laughing. "You, who are afraid of needles?"

My father calms down slightly and then speaks. "Do I need to remind you what happened the last time we took you for a vaccination?"

Ouch, that's a low blow.

There is a faint but real possibility that I accidentally punched the man who was supposed to give me the vaccination, breaking his nose. In my defense, I can say that I have such a great right hook that the other doctor in the room even complimented me.

I groan, exasperated. "Oh come on! That was two years ago! I'm a mature person now," I say, now thoroughly exasperated.

My mother raises an eyebrow. "Just because you turned eighteen almost a month ago doesn't make you mature." Then she leaves the room to go who knows where.

I turn to my father and stare at him. An idea comes to me. "Dad!" I call out. "Does Mom know that last weekend, when you were supposed to take her shopping, you weren't really in the hospital because a friend got hurt, but you were at his house watching the baseball game?" He flinches. "I could keep quiet in exchange for that money..." I smirk. I'll get that tattoo.

He looks at me threateningly. "You," he points a finger at me, "little evil dwarf, wouldn't dare..." then he stops speaking and pretends to wipe a tear. "No, you would definitely dare. I raised you quite well," he says, proud of himself.

We both check that Mom isn't coming back. He turns to me. "Here, and if there's any change, bring it back to me. And for safety, bring me the receipt too." He opens his wallet and puts some bills in my hand. He puts his wallet back in his pocket and continues speaking. "Your mother must never know anything. Neither about the baseball game nor about the money I gave you." He looks at me one last time. "And I want the change."

"Count on it," I say, waving my hand as if shooing away an insect. I put the money in my pocket and grab the house keys. "It's a pleasure doing business with you," I say.

He mutters a "don't tell me" and then smiles at me. I smile back, say goodbye, and then leave the house for good.

I walk down the paved road leisurely. The sun's rays warm my skin and the light breeze keeps people from sweating like there's no tomorrow.

I usually don't go out in the afternoon in the summer, especially when it's very hot because I'd burn quickly, but today the weather is nice and I needed to get out of the kitchen before my mother arrived.

Even though I took the longer route to the tattoo artist, I arrived too early for my liking.

I start pacing back and forth along the street. Maybe my parents were right. The idea of a needle on my skin doesn't excite me much. After walking the same street for almost twenty minutes, I decide to stop in front of the tattoo shop. At least the old man sitting on the bench stops staring at me as if I've escaped from a mental institution.

I open the shop door and walk in. Inside there's only a man checking some papers, a guy disinfecting the tattooing table, and a girl behind the counter.

I close the door, and I must have used too much force, even though my muscles are weaker than students' desire to get up early in the morning, because a picture that was hanging on the wall falls to the ground. And judging by the frame, it looks like it's made of gold. I mutter an "oh damn, what bad luck!" and then muster the courage to look up.

The man continues to alternate his gaze from me to the picture and back. The girl has wide eyes, and the guy is trying not to burst out laughing.

I notice that the man has dropped the papers he was holding on the floor. His gaze lingers on me, and I swallow hard. "Miss, could you tell me your name?" he asks politely. Though the vein pulsing on his forehead indicates that he would rather be anything but polite right now.

I laugh nervously. "I'm sorry, but I no capile tu lingua."

The two guys burst into laughter, and I shift my gaze to them.

The guy has dark, slightly long brown hair. He's tall with a toned and slim build. He's wearing a pair of jeans and a short-sleeved t-shirt, showing off his tattooed arms, and not just his arms. Not bad.

The girl is about my height, slim, with brown hair tied up in a high ponytail.

The man clears his throat, so I shift my gaze back to him, who has an eyebrow raised. "Oh, do you really not understand my language? And your earlier phrase 'oh damn, what bad luck!' wasn't in my language?" he asks with sarcasm. He gives me a mocking smile and continues speaking. "Are you going to tell me your name, or should I call the police?"

At that, my eyes widen. "The police? For a cursed picture that fell on its own? Really?" I exclaim, incredulous.

At his amused and knowing look, I realize the huge mistake I've just made. I place my right hand on my forehead. I sigh and mentally curse myself. "My name is Brianna."

"Good, Brianna, how about you follow me into my office to discuss that, as you put it, cursed picture?"

I've always hated art, and after today, I can say that art hates me too. The first time I went to an art exhibit, I was with my parents and about six years old. I remember that when we stopped to look at a painting with various shades of blue, I burst into tears asking my mother why they had killed a Smurf.

Clearly, I had already banged my head and had irreparable brain damage.

The second attempt by my parents to make me appreciate art went even worse. My aunts and uncles were also there, and we went in one car. My uncle was driving, and honestly, I'm better than the last time I drove when I hit a pole and parked on the sidewalk. My uncle drove too fast, and when we got to the exhibit, I vomited on the shoes of a stranger who, as luck would have it, was the painter the exhibit was dedicated to.

From bad to worse.

I enter the office and sit in the chair in front of him, separated by a light wooden desk.

Maybe he won't strangle me with the desk.

I start talking before he does. "I'm really sorry, sir, but bad luck is attracted to me like a moth to a flame. You know when you walk, step on a gum on the pavement, and when you lift your foot, the gum sticks to both the sole of your shoe and the street? And you know when you try to remove the gum from your shoe, but it won't come off even with a miracle?" I give him a moment to picture the situation. "Well, I'm the person who steps on the gum, only instead of gum, I stepped on bad luck at birth, and despite all my attempts to get it off the sole of my shoe, it's still there. It's so stuck to me that even our menstrual cycles are synced!" I finish my speech.

I could have skipped the last sentence. He's a man; what would he understand?

He takes a deep breath, clearly exasperated.

"Listen, I don't care about the gum you stepped on or your menstru-what's. That picture was my favorite and quite expensive, given that the frame was gold. So, I offer you two options: either you repay the damages immediately, or you start working at the shop temporarily, and each month, part of your salary will be withheld to repay the picture."

I take a deep breath. "You're looking at your new employee, absolutely thrilled about this job. Even though technically I didn't make the picture fall. It was probably possessed."

The man sighs and leads me out of the shop.

I go home, cursing my bad luck.

Well, today I learned one thing. Never go to a tattoo artist if bad luck is chasing you.

And now, how do I explain this to my parents?