Mister Henry’s apartment always seemed like a different world to me, especially when I was little. The hallway leading to his door was just as smelly as the rest of the complex, with its permanently stained green carpeting and the peeling wallpaper giving in to rot. But inside was a wonderland. The walls were painted light blue that bordered the ceiling and floor so perfectly that every visitor’s eyes widened when they were told that masking tape hadn’t been used. Each piece of furniture was placed in a way that would allow the most navigable path in the cramped home. And then there were the paintings. Placed equidistant from each other so as to not appear too cluttered, they were the only splashes of color in the room. Reds and yellows and greens, so beautiful that it felt like a sin to touch them.

So on my first day at his home, I was making an effort to exhibit some self-control. I sat on a stiff kitchen chair and stared at a painting of a gecko, yearning to feel the hardened strokes of acrylic paint and swinging my stubby little legs; the only thing that held me back was a strong fear of getting scolded. Mister Henry, seated at his desk, scratched at a piece of paper with a strange pencil, but every now and then he would turn around to look at me and try for an awkward smile. I could tell he had no idea what to do with me, which was fair. I had no idea what to do with him, either. My parents just handed me over, asking if he could watch over me for a while, at least until they both finished working. They promised him money, but he waved their offer away and told me to come in. Since then I had done nothing other than shift in my seat and glance at the clock, wondering if they had abandoned me.

Mister Henry sighed, and turned around his chair.

“Do you need anything?” he asked, his voice cracking. I shook my head. My parents had told me to be polite, but I didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want him to look at me funny like the other kids did when I introduced myself in class. Even the teacher had winced, as if I had said a word wrong. But I didn’t; I made sure to practice what to say in the mirror the night before. It turned out that the problem wasn’t my words, but how I said them.

Mister Henry turned back around and opened a drawer with care, wincing at the resulting creaks. He pulled out a sheet of paper and grabbed a pencil, placed them in front of me, and tried for a trembling smile.

“Why don’t you draw something?” he said. I grasped the tools, mumbling my thanks as softly as possible. He sat down again and went back to work, and I glanced around the room for inspiration. Finding it, I began to draw.

First came the head, then the body and legs, and lastly, the round tail. I was done! I proudly held up my paper beside the model. Two geckos stared back at me, one a beautiful blend of calculated strokes, the other done in a shaky hand. I lowered my drawing, ashamed. Mister Henry watched me wilt and walked over to me to see my work.

“It’s not bad.” He sounded surprised. I almost scoffed at that.

He pulled over a chair and sat with me at the kitchen table.

“You’re too tentative,” he said, not unkindly. I stared at him, confused. If he thought an eight-year-old could understand the word “tentative” a month after living in the United States, he was gravely wrong. He seemed to notice and grimaced.

“Be, um, valiente?” he tried.

What, like a knight fights a dragon? How do you do that with a gecko?

I must have made a face, because his dark caterpillar-eyebrows drew together. He bit his lip and grabbed my pencil. Pressing hard against the paper, he turned the choppy hump of the gecko’s back into a smooth curve in a single stroke. It looked way better! Could I fix it too? My hands shot out, in hopes of receiving the pencil.

“Please?” I asked, blushing immediately at how strange it sounded. I expected to hear Mister Henry laugh at my accent. But he grinned instead, crooked and genuine. He gave me the pencil, and I fixed my gecko’s floppy tail, looking shyly up at Mister Henry for a reaction. He gave me a thumbs-up and I beamed.

Together, we worked on the gecko until it stood out from the paper, almost as if it too was glowing with pride. Something swelled up inside me, a balloon threatening to lift me off the ground. I could make something with my own hands, something pretty. Not like the gross, oily cars that Papi spent his days under--something with life. Yet I wasn’t satisfied. I felt a tug inside of me to make more. Did Mister Henry feel the same way? The kind grin had turned into a full beam. Though his smile accentuated the wrinkles on his face, Mister Henry seemed years younger.

“Let me teach you how to shade,” he said. The teacher was almost as excited as the student--but not quite there yet. There was a tingling at my fingertips, something that begged to draw more. If learning how to “shade” would let me keep drawing, I was ready to absorb as much knowledge as possible.

There was a soft knock at the door, and both of our faces fell immediately. My mother stood on the other side, her dark hair tied back to reveal tired eyes and a practiced smile. She apologized for the trouble, but Mister Henry dismissed it with a friendly wave of his hand. He asked to speak with her, and they stepped out into the hallway to talk. I tried to press my ear to the door, but I only caught a few words, like “very talented,” “a sweet girl,” and “art classes.” I perked up at that. More opportunities to come to Mister Henry’s home? Maybe, one day, I’d be able to make pretty things like him! I wandered to his table to see if he had more pencils.

He didn’t just have pencils, he had paint brushes and pens and oil pastels. He even had some tools that I didn’t recognize. I picked one up that looked like a pencil, but had a strange tip. It was surrounded with orange paper and string, and ended with a thick black tip. I touched it, only to have the pads of my fingers come away with a black, dusty residue. Charcoal? I tested it out on a stray paper on Mister Henry’s desk, ending up with a dark black squiggle, even darker than a pencil’s. Less “tentative,” right? My drawings could be bolder and darker if I used this cool not-pencil. The door opened, and I shoved it into a pocket of the checkered dress my parents made me wear.

“Vamos, Alejandra,” Mami said, smiling. I bounded over to her and waved to Mister Henry.

“Thank you,” I said. He ruffled my hair.

“See you soon,” he said with a wink.

When we returned back across the hall to our own far less pristine apartment, I found some tape and put up my gecko. Though I had to stand on the wobbly stool to get it high enough, I wanted it to be where everyone could see. When I jumped down, the charcoal pencil flew out of my pocket. Wait, I stole that! From a perfectly nice man! Maybe I should put it somewhere safe for now. I dragged a small cookie tin from under my bed, blue and printed with a Royal Dansk logo. It looked exactly like the one my mother had, except where she kept her sewing kit, I kept my most prized possessions. Inside was a rosary, a completely smooth skipping-stone, and a hundred bolívar note. I added Mister Henry’s charcoal pencil and carefully tucked the box back under the bed. When I returned to his apartment, I would give it back to him and apologize. Until then, I would keep it where it could be free from harm, which was, in retrospect, not a foolproof idea.

--

Bringing the pencil in the pocket of my sweater on the day of my first formal lesson, my plan was to place it on his desk when he wasn’t looking. It would be quick and easy, without confrontation. Maybe he hadn’t even realized that it was missing.

That all flew out of my head the minute he placed in my hand a little black cylinder of carbon. At first, I thought he had found me out, and my heart began to thunder in my ears. But Mister Henry explained to me that if I was to learn how to apply shadow, sombra, it would be the easiest to start with a strip of charcoal.

Drawing with only charcoal was stranger than I thought it would be. It didn’t only make lines bolder, it also smeared if I wasn’t careful. The first time my finger brushed over a line in the cube I was supposed to copy, terror seized my heart at the ruin of my work. But Mister Henry smiled.

“Don’t worry! With charcoal, it’s okay to be messy,” he said. I was supposed to work with my fingers? I proceeded to eagerly smear the paper with black fingerprints.

“Well, maybe not so much,” he said, laughing. He handed me a paper towel, where I wiped my fingers. I frowned at what was supposed to be a simple cube. The lines were way too dark.

“It’s not bad, but you need to work on balancing the light and the dark.” he said, placing his index finger where I had made the lines the darkest. He smoothed it out, turning the stark difference between black line and white square to an elegant gray gradient. Whoa!

“How come you’re so good?” I asked, and his eyes drifted to a painting of a tropical rainforest.

“Practice,” he said, softly. “Lots of practice.”

He shook his head a little bit, as if to clear his head, and smiled at me. He made to ruffle my hair, but he caught himself at the last minute. He held up his hand, blackened by charcoal, and the two of us laughed. After wiping his hands on our shared paper towel, he handed me another piece of paper, and I immediately got to work, the pencil in my pocket forgotten.

--

“The cardinal looks a little too round,” Mister Henry said, scratching the gray stubble on his chin. I nodded and poured a small dollop of green paint onto my foam plate. Sticking my tongue out, I outlined the red with the green. Even though I wore a paint-flecked shirt and shorts that I liked to play fútbol in, there was still an unused charcoal pencil tucked into my pocket. I would always tell myself that I would give it to him, but I would always chicken out.

“Mister Henry, how come my accent is so--” I fished for the word. “Thick?”

“It’s been two years. You can’t expect things to change so quickly,” he said, chuckling. “Heck, I’ve been here for decades and I still have one!”

“Does it ever go away?” I said, dipping the tiny brush in a chipped mug of water. He turned from the landscape he was painting next to me.

“Why do you want it to?” he said, looking at me strangely.

“There’s a new girl in my class, and she has a different accent too. But people don’t laugh at her. They just think she’s cool.”

“Where is she from?”

“Ireland, I think. But I don’t get it. What makes me different?”

Mister Henry’s face seemed to be fighting with itself, like it was trying to decide how to feel. He sighed.

“You know, people used to make fun of me too,” he said.

I balked. How could anyone make fun of Mister Henry? He was the best teacher ever, especially because he was easy to understand and never got frustrated with me.

“Sometimes, people are mean to people they don’t understand. Especially if they look different or talk different,” he said.

“But her voice different.” I violently tapped the wet brush on a paper towel.

“Does she look different from the other kids?”

I thought about it. Annie had pale, freckled skin, like everyone else. The only thing that stood out from the others was her bright red hair, tamed by two tight braids. But I knew what Mister Henry meant. She was different because she didn’t have skin the color of caramel, like me, or a darker chocolate, like Mister Henry. I frowned.

“She’s nice, though,” I said. “She doesn’t make fun of me.” His face softened.

“Well, that’s great! You can make a new friend,” he said, ruffling my hair. The weight of the carbon pencil in my pocket dissolved, forgotten, and I grinned, heart feeling lighter than air.

--

I stormed into the apartment alone, not bringing any of my art  materials--except, of course for the accursed carbon pencil, buried in my backpack. I hadn’t even bothered to go back to my apartment after school, but it wasn’t like my parents were home anyway. I had taken to bringing the pencil with me everywhere, no matter the circumstance, almost like a safety blanket. Mister Henry watched me as I plopped down onto my unofficially assigned seat. I crossed my arms on the table and placed my head on them, letting out a long groan.

“Bad day?” Mister Henry asked.

“High school’s the worst,” I said, voice muffled.

“Mind telling me why your knuckles are bleeding?”

When I didn’t respond, he sighed and stood up, leaving the room. In retrospect, this could have been the perfect moment to take the pencil out of my backpack and slip it into one of Mister Henry’s drawers. But I was a little occupied at the moment, trying to hold back tears. He came back with a dusty first aid kit and sat down next to me, gesturing that I should hold out my hand.

“What did you fight about?” he asked, poking at my hand with an alcohol-covered cotton ball.

“She just went off on a rant again about how important it is to focus on school or whatever.”

“Annie’s not wrong.”

That wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I scowled as he wrapped my hand in gauze.

“She’s not my mom,” I said.

“She’s not trying to be. She just cares about you. You know grades are important for college.”

“You too?”

“It’s important to get an education, Ale.”

“It’s not like that’s going to help me! You didn’t go to college, and you’re fine!”

“I’m not fine,” he said, letting go of my hand. I instantly knew that I’d gone too far. I had never heard Mister Henry shout, but the steely calm in his voice was enough to make my stomach drop.

“Alejandra, when I came here, art was my life. Back at home, it was how I made my living. But when I came here, no one wanted my art. And I was too old and too poor to go to college. My appearance didn’t really help, either.”

He drew his gray caterpillar-eyebrows together and took a deep breath, placing his firm hands on my shoulders. I was speechless with guilt.

“You have a chance to live a different life from mine, now that things are changing in the world. You have to take that chance.”

“But I want to be an artist, like you!” I said, feeling tears well up.

“You can be, but you need a formal education. I can’t be your only teacher. And for that, you need to work hard, and that includes your grades.”

“I’m so, so sorry,” I said, my voice breaking.

His stormy expression cleared, and he enveloped me in a big hug.

“Don’t forget that we all care about you, Ale: your parents, Annie, me,” he said.

I just sniffled heavily in response. He pulled away and gave me a crooked smile.

“And try not to punch so many walls. Some people might call that ‘overreacting,’” he said. I felt my cheeks get warm in embarrassment. “Next time you’re angry, just come to me, and we can talk it out.”

“Okay,” I mumbled. He ruffled my hair.

“Well, we can’t do anything with that hand of yours. Why don’t we play a game instead?”

--

I burst into the apartment, whooping and hollering. Annie trailed right behind me, rolling her eyes. But her grin gave her away.

“What do you have there?” Mister Henry asked. He pushed himself out of his chair, drawing his white caterpillar-eyebrows together as he groaned.

“Oh, this?” I asked, waving the letter in the air. His eyes turned into saucers.

“CalArts?” he asked, breathless.

“Yep!” I said. I danced around the room, feeling very much like I was eleven years younger. Annie leaned over to Mister Henry.

“That’s all thanks to you,” she said. “Well, except for the crazy part.”

“Hey!” I said, turning and pouting. But Mister Henry wasn’t laughing like he normally would. I had seen him happy and I had seen him angry, but I had never seen him cry before. He was soon wrapped in a hug by two eighteen year-old girls.

“This wouldn’t have happened without you,” I said softly, and he began to tremble.

“You worked very hard,” he said.

“But you taught me,” I said, pulling back and wiping at my own eyes. Even Annie was crying, and she had seen the end of Toy Story 3 without shedding a single tear.

“I’ll be back!” she said. Knowing her, she was off to the bathroom find a tissue. Mister Henry sighed.

“Is she going to California with you?” he asked. I puffed out my chest.

“Yep, Berkley!” He smiled up at me.

“I’m so proud of both of you,” he said, which instantly struck me in the heart. I suddenly felt so small.

“Mister Henry, you shouldn’t be,” I said. He raised his eyebrows.

“Why not?”

“You deserve this, more than anyone!”

“I think I’m a little too old for CalArts,” he said, chuckling.

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

He sighed.

“Ale, there are plenty of people out there just like me, who never had the chance to get out there like you. It just wasn’t the right time for us,” he said.

“But you’ll never get any recognition. That’s not fair!”

“It’s not, but it doesn’t mean that you don’t deserve that same chance.”

I opened my mouth to refute his claim, but he went on.

“The world’s starting to change, Ale. You can have the chance that I never did. Knowing that you’re happy and thriving is enough for me.”

What did I ever do to have someone so incredible in my life? I moved to tuck the crumpled acceptance letter into the pocket of my hoodie, but was met with some resistance. It couldn’t possibly be--how did that even get there? I slowly pulled it out, feeling my cheeks warm in sheepish embarrassment.

Mister Henry broke into booming laughter. He wiped his eyes, which were still leaking a bit.

“You didn’t even use it?” he said, sides shaking.

“You knew?”

“I knew the whole time,” he said. “It’s fine, I had more. And I was happy that you were interested in the tools of the trade.”

“And you didn’t care? At all?”

“I cared more about my new friend.” I simply stared at him for a moment. I then burst into tears again, and gave him an even bigger hug. Annie returned to the room, eyes dry, and stopped.

“So we’re still doing this?” she asked, but couldn’t help a smile. She joined in.

--

Mister Henry’s room still seems like a portal to another world. The furniture is unmoved and gathering dust, and paintings still adorn the walls. They’ve changed since I first stepped foot in my classroom and second home. There are now some new paintings, one of a fifteen year-old Latina girl and her redheaded best friend. There’s also a skyline of the city, a collaborative work between teacher and student. Next to an old painting of a gecko is a newer one reflecting it. But one is realist and one is impressionist. I could never truly capture his style, but he never wanted me to.

The air conditioning’s broken, so I had to open a window to keep myself from boiling in the sauna that his apartment becomes in the summer. Annie’s helping me get everything into boxes, but she’s out right now. Something about getting me dinner because I “don’t take enough care of myself.” I think she just wanted me to have some time to myself. After all, I’ve had to be in charge of all of the organization. It’s a lot of work, and I absolutely hate it, but apparently no one else would do it. I might be fresh out of college, but by no means does that mean that I’m actually responsible enough to do all of this on my own. I’m lucky, though. My parents are willing to help as much as possible, and so is Annie. But I’m the one the will was written for, and I’m the one who has to say the eulogy.

I sigh and take a seat at Mister Henry’s desk. I guess I should clean out the drawers. I start packing up different types of pencils, kneadable erasers, and Copic markers. I even decide to keep the little transparent slices of paper he kept to prevent my hand from blurring my drawings as I worked. I’m digging through a collection of paintbrushes, when I find something strange. It’s a cookie tin buried in the bottom drawer, and I almost laugh at the Royal Dansk logo. I pick it up, and something rolls around inside. After carefully pulling it open, I stare at its contents for a full minute, maybe more. And then I begin to laugh. Perfectly unused, paper-wrapped pencils lie inside, all of varying colors. There’s even a standard black one. There’s no note, but there’s no need for one. A breeze ruffles my hair.