Free Fearscape by Nenia Campbell Page A

difference in quality from ordinary pens and pencils was extraordinary.
    The first drawing in Val's sketchbook was her earliest attempt at sketching: a very sad-looking animal which resembled a horse but was actually supposed to be her neighbor's black Lab, Chocolate. If it were up to her she would have balled it up and thrown the drawing away, but Ms. Wilcox said that throwing away mistakes was forbidden.
    “ Otherwise, how can you be sure you won't do it again?” She said, when she caught Val trying to tear out the page. “Keep it. Learn from it.”
    So the ugly picture, partially torn from her book, continued to remain in Val's portfolio to taint the rest of her collection and embarrass her every time she looked at it. She stuck out her tongue at the dog-horse, whose tongue was also sticking out, and flipped through the pages — flowers, hands, feet, tree — until she came to the sketch that she wanted to work on.
    This drawing, also unfinished, was of an old warehouse that lay on the edge of the town perimeter. Mrs. Kimble thought the building was an eyesore that ought to be replaced by a new, sparkling facade similar to that of Derringer's newly renovated downtown, which had been refurbished to look like what The Derringer Tattle referred to as a “west coast Cambridge.”
    But Val liked this building, rundown as it was. The crumbling roof tiles and boarded-up windows gave it character; it was a building one might take a picture of on Instagram and then tag with an inspirational quote. She also liked her drawing, in spite of its flaws. It might not have the same charm as a saturated photograph, but it was hers, and contained part of her in it.
    She selected one of the sharper pencils and began shading in the grass in the shadow of the rusted chain-link fence. She was aware of someone sitting down in the desk besides hers, but only distantly, and she didn't look up. She was too intent on trying to recapture that juxtaposition of shadow and light, of color and contrast, in her mind's eye.
    “ Chiaroscuro.”
    The word rolled off the speaker's tongue with easy fluency.
    Val jumped, and all the red that had vanished only minutes before flooded back into her face with a vengeance as she realized who was sitting beside her. He was leaning on his hand, watching her draw, though his eyes went back to her face when she stopped.
    “ What you're doing there. That's what it's called.” He nodded at her drawing. “Chiaroscuro. The contrast of light and dark. I didn't mean to startle you. You've ruined your drawing.”
    Val cursed when she saw the scribble she'd inadvertently scratched into the pad. “It'll erase,” she muttered, rubbing at it, hoping that it would. “I'm surprised you remember.”
    “ There was an assignment on it just two weeks ago.”
    Oh. He was right. Val stopped rubbing. Crap.
    “ Then again, I am TA. It's my job to remember.”
    “ TA?” She stared at his sketchbook, then at his face. “That's right. I remember now you told me in the ….”
    Wait. He was TA — so did that mean he'd graded her work? She thought of all the assignments she'd turned in and tried to remember if any of them were stupid or lame. God, he probably thought she was a total idiot, regardless; she couldn't come up with anything to say.
    “ You're still allowed to participate?” she said at last.
    “ I draw for fun. I've taken this class twice before — I can't take it for normal credit anymore.”
    “ Oh.” She stared down at her white freckled hands, smeared black from the charcoals. Chiaroscuro . She wouldn't be forgetting now.
    A sudden bustling at the door made both teens look up. Ms. Wilcox, who had always reminded Val vaguely of Ms. Frizzle from the Magic School Bus, was incapable of entering a room quietly. Her blonde hair was frizzy and wild, held in place with a plastic purple clip in the shape of a daisy.
    She set her battered satchel down in its usual spot behind her desk and inserted one of her