Merry 4
We worked all day at getting the booth up, which I knew exactly how to do, and even had to show the guys easier ways to get it done. Noelle stopped by with more hot cocoa, which gave me the opportunity to apologize for falling asleep last night.
“No worries, sweets, I knew you were tired. It’s fine. Really. Besides, as soon as I left, I went right to bed. Enjoy the cocoa!” she said and took off to deliver more drinks to other folks. She pushed some kind of electric cart around that seemed to be loaded down with drinks, candy canes, muffins, and even a few cupcakes with holiday sprinkles. The woman was a ray of sunshine wherever she went.
Unlike Ethan’s paintings that were a ray of death and destruction and terrible sadness.
We hung some of Ethan’s paintings and prints of originals, which was tricky considering how large and heavy some of them were. We weren’t going to leave them out overnight, due to the weather, but we had to make sure the hooks we’d anchored would hold them, which they did.
I made sure of it. These guys wouldn’t have been able to finish this project without me, but that was beside the point.
The artwork was the point and although it was well done, it was way too depressing for this event.
How he thought he would sell even one when they were so dark and anti-Christmas, was totally beyond me. He painted street scenes, or deserted factories, bleak, utopian street scenes of cities and towns in ruins. Not so much burned out, but rather uncared for after decades of neglect.
Scary, sad towns and cities where people no longer lived. It made me want to cry just looking at his vision of the world.
The street lights and the Christmas lights were all on in the town when we finally finished, and the trees sparkled with magic. Five-feet-high nutcrackers and snow sculptures lined the sidewalks. Kids and adults glided over the ice in the small skating rink, and Santa’s lap was continually filled by the next hopeful child willing to bare his or her soul to the jolly round man, asking for their deepest desire. Most children wanted toys, games, and bikes, while some children wanted a puppy or a kitty or even a bearded dragon, which could live up to twenty years. I wondered how many of these kids would have their Christmas wish come true, just like I wondered about mine.
That silver star on the top of the tallest tree shone brighter than anything else in the square, and I loved gazing up at it. I felt as though it had been placed there just for me, and even though I hadn’t gotten my wish yet, I knew I was surrounded by folks who needed my help. I loved helping people, and Lucas, Connor, and Ethan really needed it.
“Don’t you have anything a little more… festive?” I asked as Ethan and I stood in his studio located on the roof of our building.
His studio was right out of a movie with two square paned, window walls, and doors that showed off a view of the entire town and the tree-covered landscape beyond. It could have been such a happy room if it weren’t for all the dark paintings that surrounded us. Even the two regular walls had been painted steel gray.
“I don’t do festive,” he snapped, as he stacked some of the painting we’d just brought back upstairs.
I refused to bite on his sarcasm. I slipped out of my cherry-red princess coat, revealing my bright red Christmas sweater. I hung my coat on a hook near the door. He didn’t balk, so I figured staying for a while was an okay thing to do.
Lucas had helped with bringing the artwork back to the studio, then disappeared to his own apartment. He said he had a couple videos to make for his millions of followers.
I turned back to Ethan and asked my next question in the sweetest voice I could produce. “I have a feeling deep down inside you love festive, but something happened to discourage you.”
I knew exactly what had happened to him, Noelle had told me, but I wanted to hear his version.
I walked across the wooden floor, my boot heels striking the floor with a gentle crack until I came to a large oilcloth spattered with different shades of paint.
“Is it okay to walk on this?” I asked, hesitant to disrupt anything. There were shelves on one wall that contained bins with brushes, and all sorts of painting tools. The long wooden table held cans filled with brushes of all kinds. The table itself was spattered and splashed with paint, mostly blacks and golds. The floor had been white washed, with very few drops of paint. I assumed that drop cloths had been used regularly.
“Sure. All the paint is dry. I haven’t been painting for the last few days. Trying to sort through everything getting ready for this art fair.”
I stepped in closer to him as he carefully sorted through some of his canvases.
He’d also taken off his coat, revealing a black-knit shirt that clung to his muscled body. These guys had some of the hardest chests and muscled arms I’d ever seen. Like they all worked out at the same place, which they probably did—inside Lucas’ apartment. I could only imagine the small gym he had set up in there for all his videos.
“You know, and I might be completely wrong on this, but I think deep down inside, there’s a happy person waiting to burst out. You’ve gotten so accustomed to hiding that part of you, Mr. Happy Christmas is almost completely gone.”
Ethan turned and looked at me. “Who are you? An elf? A Christmas angel? What? A member of the happy police?”
I shook my head. “None of the above. Just a girl who tries to be kind and spread a little joy wherever I go. I have a feeling that you paint festive better than anyone and have done it before, but something happened.”
He grinned, and damn if his entire attitude didn’t give me a flash of happy. Something I hadn’t seen all day.
“Fine. I’ll tell you the truth. Why? I don’t know, but there’s something about you. Something in the way you move.”
“Attracts you like no other lover?”
“You know that song?”
“Beatles… George Harrison to be exact… and thanks for the compliment… but so far, I’m not your lover.”
He walked towards me. “Maybe we should correct that.”
“I hardly know you.”
The heat was there… had been since we first met, but was I ready to take this further when we’d only known each other for a matter of hours?
Maybe…
“That doesn’t mean we can’t be lovers.”
The man certainly knew how to attract me.
“What about Lucas?”
He was standing so close now, I could feel his heat.
“Let him get his own lover.”
We kissed, a soft, warm kiss. Nothing at all like his dark, heart-breaking paintings.
Then, when the kiss intensified, and he crushed his lips on mine, I instantly saw pink stars and snowflakes. When our tongues met, it felt delicious. Heat caressed me, and I leaned in closer, wanting more. His hand came up and cupped the side of my face, and I swear I swooned.
He abruptly stopped and looked at me, taking a couple of steps back. “I’m… I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. I don’t know what came over me.”
“Christmas magic,” I told him, wanting more of the same and then some.
He shook his head. “Can’t be. I don’t believe in it. And Lucas is my best friend.”
“He’d be happy for us.” The words came out, and I knew they were true without giving it another thought. These guys were so close, I knew there could never be any jealousy between them.
“How do you know that?” He looked concerned. As if he’d just been bad and wanted to erase it, but it happened, and there wasn’t any way to undo it.
I shrugged. “I just do.”
“Just like you know I should paint something festive?”
“Just like that.” I stared at him for a moment, and a strange knowing came over me. “You’ve already painted something festive. Something recent. Why are you trying to hide it?”
“I’m not hiding anything,” he said, taking a couple of steps sideways.
That was when I noticed it. A large canvas covered in a tarp, as it stood on an easel, right near the glass wall. A drab gray sofa sat next to it, with a small pillow and a cranberry-colored blanket. It looked as though he’d spent many nights on this sofa, instead of going off to bed in his apartment downstairs, which we only walked through. His place looked fine. A little messy and void of any real colors, but it seemed clean and comfortable enough.
Just not as lived in as this space.
The stairway to this private studio rose up from his small living room.
“What’s that? Should we bring it down?”
“No. Not appropriate… and besides, it’s um… it’s not finished.”
“Can I see it?”
For some reason, I knew this painting wasn’t like his others, so now I had to see it.
“I don’t like to show my paintings before they’re finished. You might say something that’ll influence me in the wrong direction.”
“I promise not to say a word,” I said, taking a couple of steps towards the covered painting, now so curious, I could taste it.
He stepped in front of me. “I can’t let you.”
“Why? Is it festive? Colorful? Is it a painting from your heart?”
He stood his ground. “You might not understand.”
“I get that, but I feel as though we’re old souls. That we’ve known each other before.”
“Like in another life?”
I knew that wasn’t right. He was grasping, but I knew exactly what I was feeling.
“No… this is more like we’ve met before, just not formally. As though I’ve seen your art before, when it was full of life instead of death. That I fell in love with your art, with a particular painting, but I only saw it for a moment, then it was gone. Like the first time I saw a Monet, and I cried. I think I may have cried over one of your paintings as well.”
“I very much doubt that. My work hasn’t been shown much, especially some of my older work. Aside from a couple of showings with my art class, I never had an official showing of any of that work. This is what sells, not that other trivial stuff. Nobody wanted it when I first started out, and nobody wants it now.”
My heart was beating so fast, I thought I might pass out. I suddenly remembered what I saw on that canvas when I was a kid, and my eyes flooded.
“It was a painting of this very town, and I’d forgotten all about it, until this very moment. I couldn’t have been more than ten or eleven, a young girl, holding my mom’s hand. We were in some sort of art gallery or museum. I don’t even know where we were, exactly, but the scene was a Christmas town, complete with a town square… this town square, but how could that be? I grew up in the Midwest, and you grew up here.”
I felt the rush of tears trying to escape from my eyes now, and I did everything I could to hold them back.
“Fine,” he said. “But it’s impossible. No way could you have seen this painting. That would be some sort of magical coincidence that even I couldn’t explain.”
He stepped out of my way and walked over to the covered canvas. He hesitated for a moment, then slipped off the oilcloth that caused a layer of dust to float around him. All at once, I knew this wasn’t a work in progress, like he’d said. This was one of his first paintings… a painting he called trivial, that no one wanted to buy.
As soon as I saw the painting, I dropped to the floor, crossing my legs, and just stared up at the canvas.
It was the very painting I’d seen when I was a young girl. The very painting of the town I wanted to live in when I grew up. The very town I’d just moved to.
“I painted it when I was seventeen. I was in art school in Chicago, a prodigy they said. My class had a showing at the Art Institute. It’s what got me a full scholarship.” He had his back towards me when he spoke.
I couldn’t stop my tears no matter how I tried. He turned to me, came over, sat next to me, and took me in his arms.
“It’s the painting that brought me here… brought me to you. It’s beautiful. It’s Christmas. My Christmas town. I found my magical Christmas town, the town you painted all those years ago and captured my imagination.”
We kissed again, only this time, it didn’t stop, and as we slid down on the oilcloth on the floor, I had visions of us rolling around on wet paint until our bodies were covered. I had a thought as we kissed and couldn’t seem to let it go.
“Do any of these paints wash off?” I asked as he slid his hungry mouth down my neck, and his hand rested on my breast.
He stopped and stared at me. “That’s a strange question, but yes, some of them are water based. Why?”
“Bear with me. I have an idea.”
He twisted his head sideways. “Okay… but if it has anything to do with Christmas…”
I shook my head. “Not really. I want you to paint me.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
“Can I paint you after we… I mean, I thought you wanted…”
“I do, but I want to do it with those water-based paints.”
He smirked. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Not at all. I don’t kid when it comes to sex.”
“I’m liking you more and more.”
He made a move to stand, but I stopped him. “One condition. No black or gray or anything even remotely drab. It has to be done with all bright, vibrant colors. Preferably festive colors. Colors that spell out joy and happiness. Take it or leave it.”
“If I leave it, will we still have sex?”
“No.”
“You drive a hard bargain.”
I reached between us and ran my hand over his hard cock. “I believe that’s your bargain, not mine.”
He leaned back, legs straddling me, knees bent, and slipped off his shirt. “You’ll have to paint me as well.”
“Love to,” I told him, running my hands over his beautiful, ripped chest. His hard body sent waves of heat down to my core.
“You’ll have to get naked… and when I say naked, I mean everything off. Are you willing to do that while I get the paint ready?”
A tinge of shyness bubbled up inside me, but I had a calling, a wish that needed to be fulfilled, and if he was going to see the value in painting with color again, it would start with me.
“Not a problem,” I told him and pulled my sweater up over my head.
“Where have you been all my life?”
“Trying to find you.”
We kissed again, but this time, he reached behind me and unsnapped my lacy black bra, then slowly slipped it off me while his hands loved on my breasts.
I came out of the kiss and said, “We’re painting, right?”
“Fucking right. Yes. Painting.”
He stood then and went off to get the paints ready. While he did, I slipped my hair into a band and pulled it into a bun on top of my head. Then I slipped out of my boots, jeans, and panties, and lay back down, resting on my side, with my head perched on my hand, totally naked, with my pussy soaking wet, just thinking about what was about to happen.
He gathered all the paints on the table above us, adding water to some. When he finally turned to look at me, his lips stretched in a wide grin.
“My God, woman, you are a witch… look at you. Not a care in the world. Totally naked with complete trust in me.”
My grin widened.
“You’re the reason I found this beautiful town. Now, get on over here and show me what you can do.”
He chuckled then and ripped off the rest of his clothes and shoes to reveal a body that made me drool.
“Oh, this is going to be fun,” he said, as he piped different colors of paint onto a board in long stripes, filling the board with all the colors of a rainbow.
“Now, that’s what I call festive,” I told him, flicking off a bit of red, then spreading it in a line under his bellybutton, until I reached his dick. He flinched when I touched him there.
“I get to go first,” he said. “After all, I’m just fulfilling your desire.”
I leaned back and spread out on the cloth, boldly offering up my body as his canvas.
“Open your legs,” he said in a sexy, low voice.
“Is this enough?” I asked, letting my legs fall open as far as they would go.
“Can I touch you?” he asked.
“Yes. Please,” I told him.
He dipped his fingers into his paints, and when he parted my pussy, I knew this would be the hottest night of my life.