“Shitfucktits.”
My head snaps up from my laptop to see Cade struggling to juggle a cup of paint brushes, a handful of other supplies and a four-foot by four-foot canvas. He tucks the paint tubes under his armpit and shoves the cup between his teeth, one paintbrush stabbing his cheek while another almost takes his eye out.
“Need a hand?”
He squints at me.
A tube of paint slips and hits the floor.
His nose wrinkles. A frustrated huff.
I shut my computer, rising from the couch to cross the room and take the canvas from him. It’s heavier than it looks. He ducks to grab the fallen paint tube while I stand there like a luggage assistant at a hotel.
“I don’t have enough space in my room,” he says once the cup is out of his mouth.
I realize I’ve never seen his art. I know he paints— he’s always got blue under his nails or smeared on his clothes— but he only creates in his room or in the art studio at school.
He pushes the coffee table against the entertainment center and lays down a stained sheet before arranging his supplies. The cup, which is actually multiple stacked cups, paint and brushes are all placed with intention.
“You can set it here,” he gestures, his back to me.
Right. I’m still holding his canvas.
I shuffle forward, placing it on the coffee table so it leans against the entertainment center.
“Thanks.”
I’m stunned by his politeness. He immediately snatches a fat brush and a tube of blue, squeezing paint directly onto the canvas. He’s acting bizarrely reserved and hyper-focused.
It’s suspicious.
And very un-Cade-like.
After hovering awkwardly for way too fucking long, I return to the couch and open my laptop. Except I’m definitely not working on my application now. My attention is completely stolen by the organized chaos unfolding in front of me.
Bristles drag blue and black swatches across white nothingness, the brush an extension of his arm in a dance to music I can’t hear. Some strokes are aggressive and short— others languid, flowing from one into the next. Ignoring me, he falls into a trance, mapping out an unseen world.
I could watch him paint for an eternity.
It’s terrifying.
How can he both repel me and fascinate me?
The ceaseless tide of guilt rises again.
“I took Andrea out on a date last night.”
It comes out like a rushed confession.
Cade’s brush pauses.
“Oh? How’d that go?”
His tone is impossible to read.
My finger taps incessantly on the keyboard. “Really good, actually.”
Why am I bringing this up? We don’t talk about this shit. We don’t talk,period. We bicker, argue, bump heads— all of the above. The scratch of bristles on canvas fills the awkward silence, but rather than soothe me, it hikes up the anxiety.
