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Is it too hot in here? Because…damn.
A woman enters with the click-clack of sharp high heels and, a little embarrassed, I scoot away from the nudes section, pronto.
Only after I’ve done it do I think about how silly I’m being. There’s nothing whatsoever shameful about the human body. But Connecticut is a place where sex and especially bawdiness isn’t openly discussed. Not that I consider myself repressed; I’m a grown woman who isn’t a virgin and hasn’t been for a decade. But having sex and being okay with staring at it in public are two very different sets of parameters.
This is no doubt why my complexion feels hot. So, I stray to the far side, near those bland abstracts. Maybe if I gawk at them long enough, I’ll start to see the appeal. Eh, probably not, but I shuffle over there anyway. I’m peering more at my feet as I attempt to cool off my face, and I don’t notice that I’m knocking into someone until I make contact and hear a tight, “Humph…”
An apology is already on my lips—I swear, I’m not normally clumsy—when a pair of sultry onyx eyes slide up my torso, slither past my not-that-impressive chest, skitter along the column of my throat, and eventually meet my gaze. He’s forced to tip his chin upward to do this because I’m taller than he is.
Of course I am.
This happens to me a lot. Still, this man isn’t someone I’d ever call petite. He’s only about an inch or so shorter than I am, with all that black, wavy hair and a covering of light beard scruff, the kind that happens when a guy skips a day of shaving. He has a lean build, but he’s fit; I can tell that he has defined muscles even through the short-sleeved Henley he’s wearing.
Um,yum.
The paint on his paintbrush is somewhere between beige and yellow—still boring—and he braces himself on a section of wall between canvases to regain his balance. Nonetheless, he’s hardly moved. I like a man who’s sturdy and not easily toppled. But then he opens his mouth.
“Whoa there, tall girl…”
Two
Sam
Despite having a big, light-saturated studio upstairs, I sometimes like to work while also tending to the sales floor of my gallery shop. Patrons usually enjoy watching me work, and I can’t say that I mind the audience. There’s an extra energy involved when people observe something in the act of creation, and I feed off it like it’s ambrosia.
Besides, there’s almost nothing better than becoming entranced by a painting project. I live to integrate myself with the canvas, to tell its secrets through the flick of a brushstroke. There have been times in my studio when I’ve grown so distracted by what I’m doing that hours go by. A few times, it’s even been days. When I’m painting, all my focus and concentration goes into it. I don’t know hunger or thirst. I don’t notice the passage of time.
And on occasion, that’s led to some issues.
Like now, for instance.
I know better than to allow myself to slip into such a fugue state, especially when mixing with the general populace, but I’ve done it anyway. And when someone bumps into me, almost causing me to swipe my acrylic paint in the wrong spot, I whip around, annoyed at the interloper.
But then I look up. I have to keep looking up because the woman who stumbled into me has an extra inch or two of height on my own five-foot-ten. Automatically, I reach out to steady myself and mumble something I don’t think all the way through. Only after I’ve spouted off does it occur to me that calling someone “tall girl” in this day and age may not be the most considerate form of address.
To save myself a negative interaction with a possible customer, I plaster on my best eccentric-artist smile.
“Can I help you with anything?”
I keep my tone cheerfully cordial, but it doesn’t help. She’s throwing daggers my way so lethally that it’s a wonder I’m not bleeding out.
“Who says that nowadays? Seriously?” she hisses.
“Says what?” I should’ve kept those words from falling from my mouth, but I don’t. Not in time.
“Calls a grown woman of twenty-nine ‘girl?’ Where have you been living for the past several decades? Under a rock?”
“No. And I didn’t mean anything by it. You just surprised me, and then I noticed how big you are and…”
“Howbig?” This comes out as an incensed squawk. Oh, boy. Her eyes are like chips of jade with little flecks of silver. She’s all long blonde spirals and peaches-and-cream skin. I’d consider her pretty damn glorious if she weren’t about to slaughter me.
“Okay, maybe that came out wrong, but you’re as tall as a lot of basketball players I know.”
“So what? And I did play basketball. I do play. I…” She trails off, and her expression transforms from pure, unadulterated fury into something more vulnerable. But it’s only visible for a flash. A microsecond. Then, she switches gears. “What kind of Southerner are you?”
“I’m not Southern,” I explain, though I can’t say why. It’s not like it’s helping the situation. “I’m from New York City and Rhode Island by way of Indiana. I’m an RISD graduate.”
She digests this with the kind of pursed lips that result from feeding someone castor oil.
