Hunting and Gathering by Anna Gavalda

captivated.
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“The problem is that people can’t live without expressing themselves. No one can. It’s impossible. So Zhu Da, who, like everyone, like you and me for example, had a lot of things to say, Zhu Da had a brilliant idea. He went off into the mountains, far away from all those people who’d betrayed him, and he began to draw. And from then on, that is how he would express himself, how he’d communicate with the rest of the world: through his drawings. Would you like to see them?”
    Mr. Doughton went to fetch a big black and white book from his shelves, and put it down in front of her.
    â€œLook, isn’t this beautiful? So simple. Just one stroke, and there you are. A flower, a fish, a grasshopper. Look at this duck, how angry it looks; or these mountains in the mist. And you see how he’s drawn the mist? As if it were nothing, just an emptiness. And these chicks, see them? So soft you want to stroke them. Look, his ink is like down, his ink is soft . . .”
    Camille was smiling.
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“Would you like me to teach you to draw like this?”
    She nodded.
    â€œYou want me to teach you?”
    â€œYes.”
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When everything was ready, when he had finished showing her how to hold the brush, and explaining to her how important the first stroke was, she was puzzled. She didn’t really understand what she was supposed to do, and she thought she had to complete the entire picture in one stroke, without lifting her hand. It was impossible.
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She thought about it for a long time, then looked around, and stretched out her arm.
    Camille drew a long wavy line, a bump, a point, another point, brought her brush back down in a long wiggly stroke, then came back to the initial wavy line. She decided to cheat when the teacher wasn’t looking, and lifted the brush to add a big black spot and six little half-strokes. She’d rather disobey than draw a cat without whiskers.
    Malcolm, her model, was still sleeping in the window and Camille, eager to be true to life, finished her drawing with a fine rectangle around the cat.
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She then got up and went to stroke the cat, and when she turned around, she saw her teacher was looking at her strangely, almost angrily:
    â€œDid you do this?”
    So he had seen her picture, seen that she had lifted the brush off the paper several times. She made a face.
    â€œDid you do this, Camille?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œCome over here, please.”
    Not very proud of herself, she went and sat beside him.
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There were tears in Mr. Doughton’s eyes.
    â€œThis is magnificent, what you’ve done, you know. Magnificent. You can hear the cat purring. Oh, Camille.”
    He reached for a big paint-splattered handkerchief and began noisily blowing his nose.
    â€œListen, lass, I’m just an old fellow and a bad artist to boot, but listen carefully now. I know that life’s not easy for you, I imagine it’s not always very cheery at home and I heard about your dad, but . . . No, don’t cry . . . Here, take my handkerchief. But there’s one thing I’ve got to tell you: people who stop talking go mad. Zhu Da, for example, I didn’t tell you this before, but he went mad and he was very unhappy as well. Very very unhappy and very very mad. He only found peace again when he was an old man. You’re not going to wait to be an old woman, now, are you? Tell me you’re not. You’re very gifted, you know. You’re the most gifted of all the students I’ve ever had, but that’s not a reason, Camille; that’s not a reason. The world today is not like in Zhu Da’s time and you have to start speaking again. You’ve got to, do you understand? If you don’t, they’ll put you away with people who really are mad, and no one will ever see all your beautiful pictures.”
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They were interrupted by her mother’s arrival. Camille got up and said to her, in a