Carnival of The Animals

[skeggsismad]

It took something of great interest for Ransom to alter his habitual lifestyle and venture somewhere new. A hooded jacket clung to the young gentleman’s body as he strolled down the streets tentatively, looking for a specific sign. As soon as anyone would wander close to him, Ransom would scatter the direction furthest, anxiously scanning shop windows and listening to the sound of bells that chimed when a customer exited or entered. For it being noon time, the sidewalks were fairly clear, though that wasn’t the way that Ransom perceived it at all.

He had passed several other places before he found the store…

Heartfelt Antiquities .

Not the most appealing name, but Ransom hadn’t ever required a place he visited to sound pleasing to the ear in any sense. As long as it was in the bounds of normality (or what he considered normal anyhow) such as a bookstore or a knick-knack shop rather than a sex toy retailer…Ransom figured he could deal with it. At least quaint, locally owned shops  like these wouldn’t have entire websites dedicated to the bizarrely dressed and behaving people who frequented them like Walmart did.

The door did something to attract Ransom to it like a hummingbird was drawn to sugar-water. It was color, the sort of color that brought his world to life. Lingering for a moment, the human felt his finger against the door, as if he were feeling for the pattern of brush strokes. Then he motioned to open the door, pushing it in with his shoulder once he’d gotten it ajar, pausing in the doorframe instantly to pull the hood of his jacket over his head. He needn’t look to see if there were cameras in fear that they would capture his face,  as a safety procedure he always covered up when he entered an unfamiliar building if not before entering.

If there was any sign of the living inside of the place of business, such as other customers shuffling through the aisles or an employee greeting him as he entered, Ransom promptly ignored them and gave no response before moving himself down a narrow and confining aisle, head facing to the ground that would occasionally sweep from side to side to look at the objects that were mounted all about the place, on the walls, on shelves, and almost cluttering the floor. This was not Ransom’s natural place of roaming and he felt trapped. It didn’t help that he had brought along his knapsack that carried all of his drawing equipment that swung alongside his hip with every step he took. Enclosed. Claustrophobic. Buried. Worse, if someone happened to be browsing the same section of the store as he, they might have to pass by him in order to get out…and he knew that with this amount of space it would result in an accidental brush of body parts. It was lucky that only by chance he hadn’t brought his easel and canvas along to paint this afternoon… or else he might manage to block the entire sector.

Most people would have thought about those types of things for a second and then moved on with their life, having so many other stresses to consume their time that brushing up against a stranger in public failed to puncture the surface of all fears. Ransom didn’t move on. Like earlier with the door, finger pressed against it, he held his thoughts in place for some time. When and if someone rubbed him he could think about it for hours after, days after…the human still had memories from years back of people violating his space that had ended up being traumatizing experiences.

Despite the chatter of his cautious mind, Ransom pressed forward, searching for something very specific rather than browsing. He knew that it would have been easier to ask for assistance on where the paintings were kept if any were here at all, especially at the rate of looking he was going at when he hung his head low like that, trying to avoid a possibly non-existent camera from taking pictures of him. He couldn’t even see where he was going- those around him were simply going to have to watch out for him and avoid bumping into him. Those who didn’t risked unknowingly upsetting the male more than they could ever imagine.

By now, he had reached the back of the store, head rising much above his comfort zone where he knew one of those things could get them if they were in here, only to look at a painting at the very far left corner of the wall. Some of them were abstract pieces that held no interest to Ransom, but this one was an oil portrait, and a particularly beautiful one of a young woman. He’d never seen her before, and he wondered who she had been or who she was if she was still living. It didn’t take long for his feet to follow his gaze until he was standing as directly under it as he could, lifting a hand to hover over the painting just where the crinkles of the figure’s white dress spread out at the bottom of where she sat,  only a hair away from grazing the canvas. Closing his eyes, Ransom tried to imagine the texture on his tip; not of the canvas, but of the garment itself.  He knew better than to touch the painting, but he so desperately wanted to that the desire was akin to a swarm of insects crawling under his skin and clawing at the soft tissue in order to get out.  

Aquarium

[Trillian]

OOC: To any members thinking of joining, PLEASE DO, because my character is simply an NPC shop assistant and will depart soon


There were no cameras tracking Ransom\'s progress through the store, nor any bright and chirpy sales assistants to greet him or ask if he was looking for something in particular.  This was a shop to dawdle in, or to discover something in.  It wasn\'t a shop that was designed to make the shopper feel watched - but to feel like an explorer in a cave of mystical artefacts.

Whether Ransom felt like a magical explorer mattered not to the woman sitting on the leather armchair at the back of the store.  She had very straight shoulder-length blonde hair, and a fringe that ended at her finely plucked brows.  If her hair was black, she would\'ve been accused of styling her hair Hollywood Cleopatra style.  With dark red lips as her centrepiece, the rest of her makeup was modern and immaculate.  Her hazel stare followed Ransom\'s progress every so often, but she was paying more attention to the filing of her impressively long nails - painted the same dark red as her lips.

Wearing a white pant suit with the jacket unbuttoned so a powder blue top could be seen beneath, along with a chunky amber necklace, her long legs were folded atop one another upon the knee, white tennis shoes upon her feet.  The shoes were the only unglamorous part of her, though they tended not to get noticed.

She wasn\'t terribly concerned about Ransom, uncaring if he chose to grab and scrunch items under his hooded jacket.  She would\'ve raised an eyebrow at most if he dared to steal something of high value before stumbling out of the shop.  The fact that he wasn\'t a shoplifter didn\'t surprise her, for not many of their kind came into a store like the one she was looking after, regardless of the fact it was set up as a haven for itchy fingers.  It was the attention he gave to the oil painting, not far from where she sat - directly across, in fact, though there were still a great many items between her and the canvas but none piled so high they blocked her view.

"If you want to get your rocks off with it, you have to buy it first," she said loud enough for him to hear, but not bothering to get up off the chair, change her position, or even stop filing her nails.  Her voice was husky and sarcastic.

[skeggsismad]

Though Ransom wasn’t as immersed as he would have been had he actually been painting the portrait he had his hand hovering on- the human was certainly not there at the moment. His attention had been removed from how boxed in he felt and the ‘what ifs’ of others bumping into him and all other clutter that normally preoccupied his mind. Ransom might have been able to stand here like this forever, if he didn’t fall asleep first. The way that he was standing and the deep trance of his thoughts were so nice for that, and he found that his muscles were relaxing, only just aware of his body swaying from side to side.

Sleep didn’t bite into the young man just yet. A voice stabbed into his tranquility and had a shiver of shame run up and down his back. He took a couple of steps backwards and his hands dropped to the sides of his body, cramming them into the pockets of his hoodies so nobody could see them clam up. Ransom knew his heart was beating at an unhealthy pace; the knowledge that his behavior had been noticed by those around him and that he was being scolded for it brought all sorts of levels of self-conscientiousness.

“Sorry,” Ransom spoke in return, though soon after realizing that the tone he had spoken in was barely above a whisper, and from the sound of the voice he had heard it was from a distance. She probably hadn’t heard him.

Not being one to be rude in any sense of the word when he could help it, Ransom circled around himself slowly, head lifting here and there to try to find the source of the voice. He assumed that the person who said that must have been working here- and it looked like the only person that matched that description was a youthful looking woman that was filing her nails. Something about that didn’t settle right with Ransom, but it wasn’t like he was going to say anything about it. How would he go about it?

‘Hey, don’t you think you could file your nails at home?’

That seemed like an abnormal thing to say.

“Sorry,” He repeated, a little louder this time, but it did carry across the room as a sort of mumble. He wasn’t the best at pronouncing his words, especially considering Colorado natives had a tendency to shorten words so they could be said with the least effort possible.  

Still, he didn’t feel like he had said enough. The stranger hadn’t told him to stop doing what he was doing…she had suggested he had some sort of, well, arousal from the whole thing and therefore needed to purchase it. Though he hadn’t looked at a price tag, Ransom could attest he wouldn’t be buying anything here today. Then what was he supposed to do, leave? But no…then she might think he was angry at her somehow, and the impression of hurt feelings wasn’t what he was aiming for at all.

“I don’t…like it like that,” He added in, wondering if that was a socially awkward way to respond. It probably was…but he didn’t know what else to say.

[Trillian]

She expelled a puff of air that could\'ve been a laugh, and her deep red lips had turned up a little at the corners, indicating amusement.  Still, it was difficult to tell, for her body language gave no clues.  She continued to sit as she was, though the file had stopped its job on her nails.

"Like I care what you do with your paintings in your spare time," she admonished, as though she knew he really did like it like that, but she wasn\'t going to judge him for it.

She reached down beside her and into a lumpy piece of leather that could\'ve been a bag if it hadn\'t looked like an anonymous bump, and pulled out a small pink manicure set.  She unclasped it, looked up at Ransom and her tiny smile broadened before she replaced her file with an emery board and then dropped the pink manicure set back into the leathery bundle beside the chair.

"So were you going to buy it, or are you only interested in renting it by the hour?"  She stared at Ransom with amusement.

[skeggsismad]

Am I being made fun of? Ransom’s mind whirred. He always felt queasy at moments like this, like how in the movies people always had to run off stage and vomit if they had to speak in public. He never actually had that happen to him before and thought it was more of an exaggeration to demonstrate just how sickening things like that could be. The more he thought about it, the more he could understand why they had to make it so dramatic: on the outside someone could look calm and content, while on the inside their stomach was doing flips and so much was building up that they might as well explode.

However, Ransom wasn’t the type that could hide something like that with a stone face. The heat swelling to his face gave it away, and the human jerked his head forward suddenly so that his long curls would fall in front of it, hiding the looks of discomfort as best as he could.

“Oh, um, I’m just browsing,” He mumbled once more, failing to put that much effort into projecting his voice because his mind was racing with other things. He understood that it would have alleviated some of the burden if he’d found something cheap and bought it, just so that he could say fairly he was a customer and had the right to be standing around browsing…but Ransom knew he wouldn’t be able to part with fifty cents into a tinker toy vending machine. A place like this didn’t have those anyway.

He had thought that maybe if he just said he was browsing, all of everything else would go away and he would be fine and could go back to looking around and then leave when he was done. Now that he’d done it, he knew that it wasn’t going to be that simple. He couldn’t just let her think that he was some abomination, a type of freaky person that enjoyed looking at portraits for sexual pleasure. He hadn’t even been looking at the portrait, really! All he had done was close his eyes and get lost in his imagination. It must have looked sooo incriminating for her to even think that, and Ransom’s itch to be normal surely wouldn’t allow someone to insist he was a freaky guy with a painting fetish.

“But, it’s not like that .” Ransom insisted, this time louder and with an edge of irritation. He hadn’t intended it to come out that way since he knew it made him sound guiltier and as a result his face flusher a little darker underneath the mass of his auburn curls.  Maybe if he explained more, it would make the situation better. Or I could always make it end up worse by saying too much. He hoped his pessimistic thoughts were wrong.
 
“I’m an artist…I was just admiring the painting,”  He had reverted back to his previous tone, and was biting his tongue, trying not to say something about how once the woman had put away her nail file she just had to get something else out to make him uncomfortable about.  Maybe she just didn’t know it was making people- or rather, Ransom- uncomfortable. He wouldn’t speak up about it either way, and the strangest thing was…Ransom couldn’t tell if he was refraining because he was being polite, or because the stranger really, really, really intimidated him.

[Trillian]

The woman watched as he struggled quite obviously with his humiliation.  A slight raise of an eyebrow was the only clue that his reaction surprised her.  Her smile disappeared and her expression blanked, though it wasn\'t such a big change.  There was very little expression in her face to begin with, that any drops or rises in expression were only noticeable by those who were quite perceptive.  Any movements in her deeply coloured lips, however, were never missed - perhaps the reason why she chose to paint them so.

His insistence that he wasn\'t a perv for the painting had her nodding lightly, in agreement. Yes, her nod told him, I know.  All the while moving the board over the tips of her nails.  There would be no apology coming from her for a false accusation, however.  She certainly didn\'t behave like the usual simpering store clerk running after a customer and complimenting them on their taste in order to get a sale.  She still hadn\'t left her chair, like she was glued to it.

When he told her he was an artist, she stopped nodding and tilted her head sideways, lowering her hands into her lap. Other than replacing the file with another instrument, it was the biggest move she\'d made. Her gaze left Ransom and she studied the painting for a moment.

"She is worthy of admiration," the woman said matter-of-factly.  Her stare dropped back to Ransom\'s face before she addressed him directly.  "Are you a painter of portraits, also?"

[skeggsismad]

He couldn’t help but take note of how much worse it was when the woman wasn’t smiling. He could only assume that he had done something insulting or maybe insulted her in the way he had reacted. Maybe she deserved it for poking fun of him earlier, he guessed…but he didn’t really want to agitate anyone. If he could keep the peace and avoid all tension it would be ideal.

Though he noticed the stranger turn and look towards the image of the lady he had been looking at previously, Ransom fought the urge to round himself the same way.  Eyes tracing the movements of her fingernail action, he tried to politely look somewhere else; not at her face, and definitely not at her hands…but at whatever was behind her. He tried to look like he was in deep concentration over something else, but his gaze continued to flicker where he didn’t want it to go…the nails…until the female spoke again and he could no longer pretend to be distracted if he was going to be polite.

“Yeah, I paint…portraits, mostly. Sometimes landscapes.”  He shrugged his shoulders casually. He didn’t go on about how good he thought he was or how long he’d been doing it or anything excessive…if she asked he might indulge a bit, but for the most part he wanted to talk about himself as little as possible. The best way to avoid questions and inquiries about oneself was to direct the conversation elsewhere, and the way the blonde had reacted to his statement, he figured it was worth a stab in the dark.

“Um...do you?”   Does she what?  He strummed his fingers inside his pockets and rephrased the question.

“Paint, I mean. Do you paint? Or anything really…like, artistic?” He asked, though the rest of the dialog he had wanted to say continued inside of his head unvoiced...

But you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to tell me. I mean, I’m not trying to pry or anything. I’m not trying to be nosy. I’m just trying to be polite. I didn’t mean to act weird earlier…I just…

[Trillian]

When he admitted that he painted portraits, her tiny smile returned to her lips, turning them up at the corners.  He\'d pleased her with his answer, it was quite easy to see by that Mona Lisa smile of hers, but when he prompted about her own potential painting hobby, she shook her head, dismissing the question.

"Are you any good?" she prompted.  She was still looking at him, making eye contact, as she leaned over again in order to remove the manicure set from the lumpy tan leather bag and place the emery board into it.  Nothing came out to replace it, and she snapped the pink case shut and dropped it unceremoniously into the puddled material beside her chair where it disappeared from view.

She knew she was likely making him uncomfortable with her questions and brazen way of addressing him, but his body language made her think of him as the nervy type.  She didn\'t particularly care what he thought about her or the situation at hand, though she didn\'t want him scurrying off out of this hole and back to whatever hole he came from.

She thought maybe Helena would take a shine to him.  Stranger things had happened.  The idea of this mousey little man being presented to the feline predator that was Helena amused her so much that her dark red lips split into a further smile, showing a hint of perfectly straight and mostly white teeth.

If Ransom knew the kind of woman she was, he would\'ve been rather amazed to see such a dramatic reaction.

[skeggsismad]

The young man forced his body still when he sensed a shift in mood. Maybe she wasn’t making fun of me after all. Perhaps he had imagined it all in his head; Ransom could admit that sometimes he had a tendency to jump to the worst possible scenario whenever there was a tiny hiccup in a conversation.

“Yes. I’m very good at it.” There was little hesitance in his answer and it came off as a firmer, more confident answer than any of his previous ones had been.

It didn’t even bother him that the woman had skidded over the question he had thrown out there towards her…for he hadn’t really wanted to know. It occurred to him too that perhaps she was asking because she was interested in his services and any opportunity he had to advertise he knew he should take full advantage of.

“And…uh…it’s not a hobby.  I do it for a living. So if, you’re interested…or something…I can give you my number…and you just call later or…” Ransom wasn’t the most convincing salesperson, but he did try. Artistic ability and style was often times hard to put into words, and even if they could be described, Ransom wouldn’t be the one who’d have the sort of vocabulary to do it right.

He nervously returned the woman’s stare, relieved that there would be no more distractions since she had stowed all of her grooming materials away and out of sight. But if she calls…isn’t it going to be awkward if she doesn’t even know who she’s calling for?

“Eric. You ask for Eric. That’s my name.” He knew that he was making it sound like it was a business line-as if he was the type of person who had the resources HAVE such a thing. There was nothing wrong with leading someone on to that idea, he decided, because he needed the business and if they thought someone who worked in some outrageously huge business building would probably be a better investment of their money than the local Joe down the block with the canvas who did all of his work out of his home, then all the better.

He didn’t reach into his bag to retrieve a pen and paper yet. He wanted to wait for an absolute ‘yes’ or ‘no’ before giving out his number so that he didn’t come across as overly pushy and assuming.

[Trillian]

His reply that he was very good had her nodding once more, perfunctorily.  She preferred sensible responses over false modesty, and she certainly didn\'t suspect he was full of egotistical bravado to think he was better than what he actually was.  He appreciated talent, considering his attention had been captured by the painting across from her.

When he offered that she call him, her nodding stopped and she tilted her head once more.

"Why would I call you later when we can just talk now?" she said, her tone perpetually derisive.  It was hard to know if her constant down-toned speech inflections were simply part of her manner or if she was going out of her way to be confrontational.  Considering her genuinely curious expression, a person who had a more positive outlook would believe she simply talked that way all the time.

"So, Eric," she began, not waiting for him to answer her question, which had become rhetorical thanks to the non-existant pause she\'d given him to answer it, "you may refer to me as Isabella.  Don\'t call me Izzy or Bella, or you and I will have a problem," she warned, and launched further into her conversation with a very quick intake of breath.  "I want a portrait done, five foot by three and a half foot, oil on a linen canvas.  You would have to paint from a sitting, and not a photograph."

She stopped talking and watched him, expecting him to offer her a price or ask whatever questions he\'d need to ask in order to give her a price.

[skeggsismad]

Only a moment ago, he had been wondering if he should pull those locks of hair out of his face and look the woman in the eye. But it was with the last comment- the one that was spoken so quickly he didn’t have time to edge a single word in- that made him doubt that reasoning. Ransom’s face remained covered, though it did little to take the edge off of his shocked expression.

Thank god, then, that she didn’t continue with an onslaught more of what could have been horrifically self-esteem damaging remarks. He gave a jerk of his head to confirm her requests about her name would be honored. If there was anyone who knew how aggravating it could be to be called by the wrong name it would be him.

Though it wouldn’t be something you could see from the outside quite yet, when Isabella began to speak about what sort of portrait she’d be requesting, Ransom’s mind switched gears. He didn’t have to be tip-toeing his way around a conversation, worrying about what would be offensive or appropriate to say. When he was talking about painting he said what he felt and what he knew…it was something he couldn’t mess up with or go wrong with, a topic that he always had the confidence to know that what he was saying was right.

“I don’t paint photographs. I only do live sessions.”  He replied flatly, informing rather than negotiating. He was always upfront and firm with that rule, especially since it was one of the only rules that he had.

As he spoke, he decided it would be better to be in closer proximity of his possible customer so they could retain a certain sense of privacy. It took him a moment to move through the piles of things, and even then, he wasn’t that closer to Isabella….but it was an improvement.

“How many figures will there be in the portrait, and is it going to be the whole body or a head study?  And uh…vignette or detailed background, and if there is a background….is it going to be indoors or outdoors? And….do you want it framed?”

He was no longer looking at the blonde anymore, eyes wandering around the room in a sort of deep thought, mentally trying to come up with a price estimate of how much it would cost so far with the few details he knew. So long as he was going to be doing pricing, he thought he might as well fill her in on the ‘extra’ fees that he issued since it differed from artist to artist.
Lowering his voice a tad, he concluded,

“If the subjects are nude…there’s different pricing for that, but that’s a flat fee…for everything, even like…painting intimacies with a partner.”  Being that they were in a public setting, he didn’t think it would be appropriate to get into detail upon that…but he did paint people having sex from time to time. It seemed so taboo and one might think that there was such a low demand for it that it was hardly worth mentioning in a causal conversation over painting services, but Ransom had found that the number was more than even he had initially expected.

[Trillian]

Isabella\'s expression was serious and studious, an eyebrow raising minutely due to the last statement.  Nudes and intimate settings?  How daring.

"Two figures... both clothed," she said, her lips twitching a smile before it disappeared again so she could be as business-like as possible.  "One standing, one sitting, indoors."  There was a longer pause as she considered framing.  It was something she hadn\'t thought about.  "Framed.  I assume you would have a selection to choose from.  Ornate and highly detailed would be best.  Nothing modern and basic," she said, wrinkling her nose as though the idea of a flat frame was abhorrent.

"Do you have a studio or would you prefer to travel to a location?" she asked, the question only just occurring to her.  Didn\'t all artists have studios?  "It would have to be in the evening."

Her perfectly manicured fingernails stroked the arm of the chair she sat in as she talked, but she still hadn\'t shifted position.  It looked rather comfortable and laid back, as though she was already sitting for her portrait.  She hadn\'t moved when he\'d approached, and didn\'t look like she was going to move any time soon.  There was a sound of the shop door opening and closing as someone left, and then the shop was theirs alone for the moment.

[skeggsismad]

“I take-” the pictures to a framer and pay them extra to do it for me. I can frame but I hate doing it and they’re just better quality when you do it that way.

No, the customer didn’t need to know that information. Some of them would argue and it was easier if only told information if they asked for it…he had learned that life was so much easier when it was done that way.

He made a second attempt at what he was trying to get at after clearing his throat.

“Yes, that kind of frame can be done. But it’s not included in the initial estimate…I can take a couple of frames to show before a painting session or after you can browse for one.”

That sounded a lot better.

“I’ll travel anywhere as long as it’s, um, quiet and well lit. It’s hard to paint in a dance club or something…I don’t do that a lot…and…”

He trailed off, mostly grateful that he had been given an option other than to paint in some presumed studio that he didn’t have. If he was desperate and couldn’t find a suitable public place to paint at when the customer didn’t provide a space of their own, he’d sometimes take clients to his home and into his  room to do it…but he never felt quite comfortable doing that, even if the elderly couple wasn’t home at the time of the painting sessions.

“Do you…do you want an estimate…or?”  His hands emerged from his pockets for the first time after he had shoved them in there earlier. Both dropped to his side, and the one on his right side dug into his pants pocket and drew out a cellphone.

It was the older type of cellular devices, the kind without the touchscreen and full keyboard. It was turned off so he pressed the end button until the screen lit up with a familiar ‘welcome’ text.  The moment it was through with that, the screen was bombarded with a number of beeps and chimes that indicated he had thirteen missed calls, two voicemails and seven text messages. The majority were from the same number, all made within the last hour. It hadn’t been on for a full minute before his ringtone blasted throughout the shop.

In a quick act to silence it, Ransom reached to press the end button, doing it several times so the call would go to voicemail and all of the message alerts would go away too, mouthing a quick and soundless \'sorry\' towards Isabella. Clicking a couple more buttons he appeared to access a rather dinosaur version of a cellphone calculator before turning his attention back to Isabella with for her response. He was once again rather concerned that he was going to do the wrong thing, and was being especially sure to check with the woman and make sure he wasn\'t wasting her precious time with the needless details.

[Trillian]

Isabella proved herself to be remarkeably patient.  One couldn\'t work in a shop like the one she worked in and be impatient, or it simply wouldn\'t work.  The manicure set looked to be the only method of passing time Isabella had - though there was no telling what she had in the lumpy non-bag beside her chair.  It was big enough to fit a laptop certainly.  A whole tower system could likely fit in there, in fact.

"Yes," she answered succinctly when asked if she wanted a quote.  She said nothing more as he began fumbling about with his mobile.

The ringtone caught her attention and made her smile.  She made a little shrug with her right shoulder when he mouthed an apology at her.  If he cared to read her gesture and presumed correctly, she really didn\'t care about being interrupted with the cell phone.  He could\'ve taken the call, but when he didn\'t, she didn\'t invite him to either, for next time.

"It\'s a pretty melody," she told him.  "Like a music box."

[skeggsismad]

He didn’t give a ‘thank you’ in return to the compliment regarding his ringtone. Though it wasn’t particularly impolite, he knew he should have said something other than the slight nod of the head he gave. Yet, he didn’t, simply because he feared doing that might welcome more conversation about it such as where he got the ringtone or why he chose it. That was something he didn’t want to think about at the moment.

As he got the go ahead, Ransom started stroking keys on the phone, doing a number of calculations with as much haste as he could. It wasn’t that he was rushing for Isabella’s sake, even though she did make him feel under scrutiny at times. What he was mostly worried about was the phone ringing again and interfering with his actions. If he knew anything about Griffin it was that she’d call back within five or ten minutes of calling and doing it again and again until she got distracted or he finally picked up. Calculators like these didn’t revert to what you had been counting up if someone called- you just had to start the whole process all over again.

“So, from everything that we have right now…it’ll be like, about $1,817. They’ll be two payments, one upfront of $908.50 and then another when the portrait is done of the same amount.” He was still looking at his phone, pressing the end button down so that it would turn off. When it had done that, Ransom put it back into his pocket, taking the same hand and rounding up the strands of hair that were in his face to tuck it behind his ears. He didn’t feel totally unprotected because his hood was still covered the majority of his head and so he had decided it would be better to try to be less impersonal while talking about the money aspect. It was a lot of money after all…or so, it seemed like a lot of money to him.

“ I uh, charge a security deposit of $200…just because, it’s going take a few sessions to do it and if you change your mind and don’t want the painting before it’s complete I keep the $200 and refund you everything else.”

Blue eyes steadily met hazel, hoping that she’d think what he was offering was reasonable. He wasn’t charging five grand like those famous and becoming artists did…but at the same time, he wasn’t a college art major who was going to charged $700 accounting for the price of supplies only and not factoring in the labor prices.

“But if the portrait gets completed then you get back the deposit.”