Free The Boundless Sublime by Lili Wilkinson Page B

chilled and grey, with low, threatening clouds releasing the occasional drizzle of rain. My fingers went numb. I kept walking, aroundand around. Joggers passed me without a second glance. A homeless man dug through a rubbish bin, and I envied him his fingerless gloves and beanie. A crow perched on a park bench, watching me with a beady black eye.
    I walked, and walked, and tried not to think about what would happen tomorrow, and the next day. The dark tide rose around me once more, and I welcomed its suffocating blankness.

    Minah texted after she finished school, asking if we could talk. She met me by the duck pond, her face dark with concern, her mouth twisted as though she was struggling to get the words out.
    ‘I get it, okay?’ she said. ‘The guy is super-hot. But he’s … he’s not all there. He’s like a little kid.’
    Fox wasn’t like a little kid. He was innocent, yes. Undamaged by cynicism and bitterness. But he was also wise. He understood more about the world than I ever would. He understood people. He understood me . And the physical intensity when we were together … Fox was definitely not a little kid.
    ‘You don’t know him.’
    ‘I don’t have to know him,’ said Minah. ‘I know you . And this isn’t you.’
    ‘Maybe it is me,’ I said. ‘Maybe this is who I’ve been all along, but I needed Fox to show me.’
    Minah shook her head. ‘What is it about these people? Why are they so great?’
    I thought about it. About the Red House. The long dinners full of debate and laughter. The closeness. The trust. The honesty. The clear-headedness I had experienced over the past few weeks. The loss of it was sharp and keen, like a knifeslicing through my lungs, filling them with cold, suffocating fluid.
    ‘I don’t know,’ I said at last. ‘They helped me to see things differently. Myself. My life. They make me feel there’s a possibility for happiness after all.’
    Minah raised her eyebrows. ‘Happiness?’
    I shrugged. ‘After what happened … I didn’t think it was ever going to be an option.’
    And maybe now it wasn’t.
    Minah bit her bottom lip and looked away for a moment, as if hesitating over whether or not to say something. Then she turned back to me, her brow wrinkled in frustration. ‘I don’t understand you at all, Ruby. You called yourself an artist. We used to talk for hours about where creativity comes from. About humanity’s extraordinary ability to channel grief and anger and oppression and turn it into something more , something outside of them. And then it happens to you – you experience tragedy, the big death and everything. And you just opt out. You don’t face your grief. You don’t turn it into something beautiful. You don’t put it on a canvas or shape it in clay or turn it into a song. You become a robot. You don’t feel anything. You pretend everything’s okay, and we pretend along with you because … I don’t know why. Because we’re a bit scared of you. And then you meet some granola-munching hippies and all of a sudden you’re signing up for their twelve-step bullshit?’
    I stared at her. ‘What are you trying to say?’
    ‘I think you’re running away.’
    ‘And why shouldn’t I? What’s left to stick around for? My brother’s dead. My dad’s going to jail. My mum is a ghost. What reason is there not to run away?’
    I saw Minah flinch. She knew I wasn’t sticking around for her. ‘Problems don’t go away because you want them to,’ shesaid. ‘You have to face them. Turn them into words and art and music. Work through it.’
    I blinked. ‘You think my brother’s death was an opportunity . You think I should be grateful that he died, because now I get to be a genuine tortured artist.’
    ‘That isn’t what I meant.’
    I stared at the pond, feeling fat drops splash on my cheeks, not sure if they were tears or rain. It was getting late and the light was leaching away from everything. I turned on Minah.
    ‘You think because you