Page 3 of Quiet
Will shook his head, causing his frosted tips to sway artfully around his face. “If it’s not eyeshadow or foundation, I’m totally at sea.” He withstood the puppy eye treatment for a full minute before sighing and standing up to inspect the colors Isa had to work with. “Fine, you gorgeous mess of a person. I’ll try, but I make no promises.” He wrinkled his nose after taking in Isa’s handiwork. “You might need black to fix this.”
“I don’t have black.”
“Who doesn’t have black? It’s a basic fucking color.”
“Which is why I’m out. We used it up yesterday for the night set.”
“Try the art building, someone there might have pity on you. You can beg for some black and purple,” Ryan called helpfully from the top of the ladder as he attached the doorframe to an elaborate pulley system.
“Why do I have to beg? I can just go to the store.”
“About that . . . I may have used up the rest of our budget on the gears for the main set.” Ryan rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly.
“I told you they didn’t need to be that big,” Isa muttered.
Ryan might have spent the past three days complaining about their director’s choices for the ubiquitous Shakespearian play all sophomore theater majors were expected to do, but Isa knew he was in heaven. Ryan loved lesbian steampunk—he just didn’t want anyone else to know how obsessed he was with it.
Isa smiled ruefully. If his family knew about this play, they would go ballistic. “All right, I’ll go. Will? Wanna come with?”
“Go alone, love. That baby face of yours will be devastating if you’re all alone. No one will be able to say no.” Will winked lasciviously.
Ryan forestalled any chance Isa had to argue by adding, “I can’t spare him, we have a time crunch. If you take Will, I’ll be down two workers. You don’t want me to present Anna with a slapdash set, do you? I promised her this section would be finished by tomorrow.”
Isa winced at the mention of their dictatorial director. She’d taken their assignment to heart and chosen to drive every single member of the production to their limits. Right now, Isa was surviving on five hours of sleep a day. And he knew for a fact Ryan was getting less. It wouldn’t kill him to give his friend a break.
He was going paint panhandling.
It was another beautiful day, so when Isa got outside, he couldn’t stop himself from running down all five hundred million steps between the art building and the communication arts building. Spring days in New England were always a mixed bag, and the last nice one had ended up with him trapped backstage working with Ryan rather than soaking up vitamin D like any other self-respecting college student would.
Isa kept a watchful eye for protesters this time.
It had been over a week. They probably wouldn’t come back, but it didn’t hurt to be careful. Vigilance aside, he still managed to enjoy the sun and the fresh air.
Once he reached the art building, he realized he didn’t have the first idea where to begin his search. He’d had a mixed-media class last semester, but it had been on the first floor, so he knew nothing about the rest of the building.
Isa poked his way through the building, peeking in on classes, and stopping to ask people for advice. Finally, someone suggested he try the studio on the top floor. The hard-core artists tended to work up there. If they didn’t have what he wanted, they would probably know someone who did.
When he got to the top floor, it took him a while to reach the studio—not because it was hard to find, but because there were so many amazing pieces of art.
Currently, he was trapped in front of a mind-blowing triptych. Each of its three pieces went from floor to ceiling. The whole thing was easily ten feet tall. Combined, they formed a rectangle, but they weren’t the traditional configuration Isa was used to. Rather than each piece being a rectangle, they were made up of two triangles and a rhombus—all fitted together to create a wide rectangle.
But it wasn’t the configuration that held Isa spellbound. It was the simplicity of the piece. It was a plum blossom tree done ukio-e style. It reminded Isa of his favorite Hiroshige print,The Great Wave off Kanagawa, but rather than water, the artist had used a tree to suggest movement. The plum blossoms were the whitecap crests of the waves while the branches of the tree represented the body of the wave itself.
Isa wanted a print of it. He had to get Ryan up here. His friend would eat his heart out, then propose marriage to the artist.
The hair on the back of Isa’s neck stood up, and he realized someone was behind him. He turned around to see his green-eyed savior from the other day.
“This is a great piece, right? I could stare at it for hours. How did they capture the motion like that?”
His companion didn’t answer, but something about him made Isa think it wasn’t due to lack of anything to say.
“I mean, trees aren’t static, I get that. Wind, animals, all sorts of things make them move, but how did the artist managed to maintain the rigidity of the branches while still making it look like water? And with such simple brush strokes, too . . .” Isa said the last bit mostly to himself. He wasn’t an artist on this level, but he’d had some training—which was why Ryan always dragged him in to help him with sets.
The green-eyed man cocked his head to the side, and Isa saw a streak of purple paint highlighting a prominent cheekbone. There was more in his raven hair.
“Thanks again for the other day, by the way. I really owe you.” A brief nod encouraged Isa to continue. “Maybe you can be my savior again today? I’m working on a set, and we’re out of black and purple. We’re also out of money, so I’m here hat in hand.”
Ryan had told him to use his looks to charm the supplies out of people, but Isa had zero idea how to go about it. His experience was more with keeping people from being too mad at him rather than actually charming them.
