The Color Nobody Mixed

Every Saturday, Karolina opens the print shop at eight. The shop smells of ink and warm paper. She turns on the big press and listens to it hum.

She has a list. First, she cleans the press. Then she loads the paper. Then she prints whatever the owner writes on the board that week.

Today the board says, "Lost cat. Garden sale. Bike repair. Choir night." Karolina prints the same kinds of posters all year. She is good at it. She never makes a mistake.

Behind the press, there is a dark corner with the ink shelf. The lamp there is broken. Karolina keeps a small flashlight in her pocket for that corner. The beam is weak and yellow. It makes a circle the size of a coin.

"One day I will buy you new batteries," she tells the flashlight.

By noon, the first three jobs are done. The posters hang on the drying rack like white flags. The owner comes out of the office with his coat on.

"The folding machine is broken again," he says. "I need a part from the other side of town. It will take all afternoon. Watch the shop."

"Can I use the press?" Karolina asks.

"Only the small jobs," he says. "Nothing new. Nothing difficult."

He leaves. The door bell rings behind him. Karolina sits on her stool and looks at the quiet shop. This is her favorite part of the day. It is also the most boring.

Then the bell rings again.

A girl rushes in. She has paint on her sleeves. A paper roll is under her arm. Her hair is tied with a shoelace. She looks around the shop fast.

"Hi. I'm Anika," she says. "Are you the printer?"

"I am one of them," Karolina says. "What do you need?"

"Fifty posters, by four o'clock," says Anika. "My band plays tonight at the youth hall. The other shop says no. They say it is too late."

Karolina looks at the clock. It is twelve past twelve. She thinks about the owner and the rule about nothing new.

"Show me the picture," she says.

Anika opens the roll on the counter. It is a hand drawing of a huge fish with a guitar. Every line is thick and brave. Under the fish, big letters say, "THE SALT KIDS. TONIGHT. SEVEN O'CLOCK."

"I want it in blue and gold," says Anika. "Deep blue, like the sea at night. And a gold fish."

"We have gold," says Karolina. "Let me check the blue."

She walks to the dark corner. She takes out her flashlight and turns it on. The weak circle moves along the shelf. She finds a can marked "Sky Blue" and lifts it. It is light. She opens it. Only a thin line of ink lies at the bottom.

"There is not enough blue," she calls.

Anika's face goes sad. "Is there nothing?"

Karolina looks at the shelf again. There is some green and some black. There is also half a can of pale gray. The yellow beam shakes in her hand. She cannot read the small labels. She cannot tell the true colors at all.

She thinks of the owner. She thinks of the word "difficult."

Then she thinks of the fish with the guitar.

"I can mix something," she says. "But I cannot promise the color."

"I trust you," says Anika. "I have no other shop."

Karolina carries three cans to the big table under the lamp. She pours a little pale gray into a clean tin. She adds the thin blue from the bottom of the empty can. She adds a spoon of green, because it looks dark and sea-like. Last, she adds one tiny drop from a can in the corner. In the poor light, she thinks it is black.

She stirs. The ink turns a deep, strange color between green and blue. It looks like water at night. It looks like nothing in the shop.

"Teal," Anika says softly. "Is that teal?"

"It is something," Karolina says.

She tests the ink on a small piece of paper. She lets it dry for a minute and then holds it up. The paper is beautiful.

"Okay," says Karolina. "Let's do it."

They work fast. Karolina loads the paper and Anika watches the first sheet go through. Gold goes down first. The fish shines. The press hums, then clunks, then stops. Karolina changes the plate and starts the second color.

When the sheet comes out, they both stand very still.

The fish is gold and bright. The sea around it is the strange deep teal. The letters look like they float above the water.

"It's perfect," Anika says. "It's better than I drew it."

"The edges are not clean," Karolina says. She points at the corner.

"I like the edges," says Anika. "They look alive."

They print fifty copies. It takes two hours. Karolina carries each wet sheet to the rack. She pins it by one corner. Anika cleans the ink from the table with a cloth. They hardly speak. They work like two people who know each other well.

At ten to four, the last poster goes up. The rack looks like a wall of shining water. Karolina's arms hurt, and her fingers are blue and gold. She feels like a runner at the end of a long race.

"I should go," says Anika. "Can I take them now?"

"They need ten more minutes to dry," Karolina says. "Let me put them in a box by the door."

They lay the posters in a box by the front door together. The afternoon sun comes in through the window. It lands on the counter. Anika takes one poster from the top of the box. She holds it up in the light.

She stops.

The teal is gone. In the sunlight, the sea around the fish is a deep purple.

Karolina stares. She puts the flashlight in her pocket. She does not remember adding anything purple. She looks at the empty tin on the table. Then she looks at the can in the corner.

Anika stares too. Then she starts to smile. "It is purple," she says. "I want them all. Both colors look like the sea."

"Karolina," Anika says slowly, "what was in that last drop?"