Because of Hayley, the notebook that lived in my backpack, the one I brought with me the morning of the fire, contained records of every painting in Rich Ugly Old Maids. I planned to start with Prudence, getting into the rhythm with her two undamaged panels, and work my way backward as best I could, using the documentary photos in my camera and the notes in my notebook. Jacqueline had seen images, but she’d never seen the work in person. I told myself that I certainly had the right to make and deliver my paintings in whatever condition I saw fit. Obedience was on the posters and in the advertisements, but that one was basically all black. I could get pretty damn close, I told myself. Pretty close. Close enough.

I propped the two unharmed panels of First Prudence against the wall for guidance; since I couldn’t afford to match her materials and remake all of my other paintings, she would remain half a painting forever.

The next hours were spent making new panels of Prudence. They would, when assembled, be a total of ten feet high and twelve feet wide. I cut and drilled, screwed and framed (the wood backing would be covered in fiberglass, so that they looked smooth in the back, effortless), over and over, four times, four panels. Once done, each panel took a table.

I was more than eager to remake her; I was desperate. As I spread a ready-made gesso over the wood in thin, even layers, the work hypnotic and soothing, I felt, for the first time since the fire, a sense of calm spreading through my body, warm, opiatic. It was a relief to discover that here, even in this strange place, cradling the ghost of a painting and bereft of my pricey tools, I could work, like I had for much of the past twelve years.

Painting had not left me.

Prudence would live.

I forgot about the loss of my home, about the loneliness that had swept me up the night before. I forgot about the emptiness of the resort in which I stood and I forgot about how afraid I was.

I was working again, and so my life was full.

Somewhere around 4 a.m., I curled up on the ink-stained sofa in the studio, pulled a moth-eaten blanket over my aching body, and forced myself to fall asleep.

This was my chance—no matter how strange—and I was determined to make it work.

*  *  *

One of my professors once told me that she started all of her paintings with a photocopied picture of her parents and the words FUCK YOU scrawled across their faces. The final compositions—abstract seas of color—show no traces of the beginning whatsoever, yet the paintings speak to you, screaming a version of FUCK YOU felt in the back of your throat weeks, months, or years later.