Page 68 of My End

My stomach dropped.

She’d found the painting.

“Oh, nothing,” Stretch called from the couch next to me, his arm lazily draped around my shoulders like he hadn’t just broken through a goddamn gate and helped take down two of the most dangerous men I’d ever known.

Sloane rolled her eyes and flipped over the canvas.

She gasped, loudly. “Oh. My. God.”

A few heads turned.Dovecalled from the other side of the room, “What is it? A penis?”

The entire room erupted in laughter.

“No!” Sloane shouted, hoisting the canvas up like she’d just discovered buried treasure. “It’s, oh my god, you guys, this is insane.”

I covered my face with both hands. “Oh no.”

Sloane turned the painting toward the room, and the collectiveohhsandahhsmade me sink deeper into the couch cushions.

“Wait!”Danishrieked and scrambled to her feet. “That looks like a Tilly X.”

“That’s because it is,” Stretch said casually, not even looking up from where he was lazily twirling a bottle cap between his fingers.

Dani’s eyes bugged out. “You are Tilly X? Like…theTilly X?”

I hesitated. “Uh… yeah.”

She let out a squeal that I swear shook the rafters. “Oh my god, oh my god, I have every one of your notebooks. Every single one. I’ve tried to bid on your paintings at auction, like, five times. But I never win.Never. You are amazing.”

I blushed and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Thank you. That means a lot.”

It always caught me off guard when people actually liked my work. I painted because Ihadto. Because the colors in my head needed a place to go. That people wanted to hang it on their walls? That still felt unreal.

Saylor popped up from her seat and snatched the canvas from Sloane. She stared at it like she was studying the Mona Lisa.

“This is seriously amazing,” she said. “It screams Stretch.”

Dove barked out a laugh. “That’s probably because itisthe man’s face, Saylor.”

Saylor tilted the canvas. “Okay, but still. The emotion. The brushstrokes. It’s alive.” Then she turned to me, face lit with a spark of something wicked and brilliant. “Could you do a painting of each of the guys?”

I blinked. “What?”

She set the canvas gently against the wall and faced me. “I’m serious. For theTreadpremiere. Don would eat this up with a spoon. Ten bright, colorful portraits of the guys. Lined up. Lit properly. It’d beepic.”

I glanced around the room, doing a quick count.

One… two… three…

I’d need to paint nine more.

My eyes widened. “Uh… when’s the premiere? Nine months?”

Saylor winced. “Five weeks.”

My stomach flipped.

Five weeks?I could do it… maybe. Barely.