Page 66 of Something Like Forever
“Just a sec,” Corey said,tongue sticking out one corner of his mouth. “I’m trying to decidehow big I want this print to be. Is a poster too much?”
“I needyour helpnow, Mr. Tanaka, and you’re on the clock so get your ass ingear!”
That did the trick. Coreylet himself be dragged along to where the video played. Then hestared slack-jawed before he turned to Tim. “Did you know aboutthis?”
“No!” Tim gestured up anddown the display. “What does it say? Read it to me!”
“Okay. Uh. Art comes inmore forms than just photography. In the interest of supportingyour creative impulses… It’ll be faster if you just let me read itand summarize.”
“Fine,” Tim said, glancingaround and feeling twice as weird about standing there next tohimself. Then again, considering that a young woman with green hairhad just teetered into the gift shop wearing impossibly highplatform shoes—nobody blinking an eye—he was unlikely to draw muchattention even if he stood on his head and barked.
“Done,” Corey said. “It’sfor your project! The new gallery. This talks about the one back inAustin and plans to establish the same thing over here. People cansign up to be notified when it’s open. You really paintedthese?”
Tim looked at the twopieces. The first was of a downtown street in Austin, the same onewhere the gallery was located. Early on a Sunday morning, he hadset up an easel on the sidewalk before getting braver and draggingit out to the middle of the street. The traffic was so minimal thathe only had to move twice. Of course he had played with the light,as he often did, transforming it into a prism of colors. Comparedto Tokyo, the scene was quaint and caused a pang of homesickness.The other painting was of Kelly, camera held close to his chest ashe grinned demonically, the bright red horns nailing down theimpression. Tim had given that one to Kelly as a gift and hadn’texpected to see it here.
“Not for sale,” Coreymurmured, reading the label beneath it. He turned his attention tothe other. “And this one sold. Wowzers!”
“What?” Timdemanded.
Corey shot him a self-conscious gaze. “Ididn’t realize that you’re so big.”
“I hear that a lot,” hesaid, but neither of them laughed. “I’m not famous oranything.”
“Do most paintings sellfor a million yen?”
“A million! What is that—”He did a quick calculation. “—ten thousand dollars?”
Corey nodded once. “Yup.”
“Wowzers is right! And no.Especially not any of mine.”
“Konnichiwa, Wyman-sama!”
Tim turned. The girl inthe platform shoes with the pale green hair gave him a curt bow,then shuffled forward to stand next to him and face in the samedirection. She held a selfie stick and started speaking to thecamera attached to it while rattling off sentence after sentence inJapanese.
“A little help,” he saidout of the corner of his mouth.
Corey moved closer, tryingto avoid the camera lens. “She’s explaining who you are and talkingabout the project. She loves to paint. Do you?”
Both the girl and Coreywent silent and looked at him.
“Oh,” Tim said, clearinghis throat. He sized up the young lady. Her clothes wereskin-tight. Or were they just nylon stockings that she managed tosqueeze her entire body into? The insect antenna she wore seemedkind of weird, but all of this came together nicely, meaning shehad an artistic eye too. “I love to paint. Yeah. I’ve been doing itsince I was a little boy.”
After a pause, Coreytranslated. The woman squealed happily and spoke to the cameraagain. Then she angled the stick to show one painting, and then theother, speaking all the while.
“She’s talking about thepaintings now,” Corey said helpfully.
“Never would haveguessed,” Tim said.
Then it sounded like shewas counting down. He didn’t know what to make of that, but Coreypulled him aside. This allowed the woman to film the monitor. Onit, a much more confident Tim was attacking the canvas with hisbrush, sending frequent glares in Kelly’s direction andoccasionally grumbling answers to the questions he was asked. Thiswas silently recorded, the minutes stretching on and making himfeel increasingly awkward. Then the girl declared somethingenergetically and turned to face him, still holding the stick andkeeping the camera trained on them with expert skill. With anearnest expression, she addressed him with what sounded like aquestion.
“She uh…” Corey chuckled.“She wants to know if you’ll autograph her arm.”
“I’d love to,” Timsaid.
A permanent marker wasthrust toward him. Then the woman handed the camera over to Corey,her tone bossy. His job was to record this momentous occasion, itseemed. Tim was presented with the underside of her arm. First hedrew a cartoon-cute grasshopper, acting on inspiration from theoutfit the woman wore. She made sounds of excitement and surpriseduring this, which only escalated when he signed his name with aflourish.
Then she was standing athis side again, saying his name and tons of other things, Coreyunable to translate without interfering with the video. Finally thewoman made a V with her fingers and placed this sidewise on herforehead, which just happened to show off the quick sketch andautograph nicely. Acting on inspiration, Tim adopted the same poseand tried to repeat the word she shouted, although he was prettysure he mangled it. She seemed thrilled regardless. After all thecommotion, she kissed Tim on the cheek, thanked him, then took thecamera from Corey and ran off.
