(Bump)
One-on-one (Closed, stalkers welcome)
"Well," Theo smiled dismissively. "I hope you don't get fired." He looked up at the girl once again, letting his gaze roam her face other then her eyes– he'd fallen silent.
She laughed and shifted her weight.
“Yeah, I hope so too,” she smiled at him. Then she stuck her hand out. “I’m Piper. Piper Wilde.”
As she waited for him to take it, she noticed his gaze, how he looked at her whole face, then down. That was refreshing, someone looked at her face. Not just her eyes.
Theo slowly took her hand, shook it. "I'm Theo Vance." Then, noticing her noticing him looking at her face, he looked down as a blush spread across his face. "Sorry," he breathed shyly.
She widened her eyes. “Oh, nonono- I mean, that’s okay- you didn’t do anything, I just-“ she paused for a second. “Most people look at my eyes first, and don’t look at the rest of my face, so it’s nice to see someone see my whole face this time.” Her hair moves in front of her face as she pulled back.
“It’s okay, really.”
As she spoke, Theo's sensitive nature took precedence over social rules.
He thoughtfully reached out and pushed Piper's hair away from her face. The texture was quite rough, dense, tangled– the best technique for capturing it would have to be layering the paint, getting some elevation to imitate the volume of her hair.
"I'm working out how to paint you," Theo said after a while, in an apologetic tone. "You're very interesting."
Piper’s instinct was to jerk back from his hands, but she didn’t. She sat there, and let him push her hair back. She watched is face as he examined hers. She was surprised at how okay she was with this, since usually a situation like this would make her very uncomfortable.
“If you actually ended up painting me, that would be really cool,” she said weakly.
A soft glow of glad surprise came over Theo, and he gave Piper a bright grin. "That's great." He pulled his hand away as an announcement informed them the train was imminent.
Piper smiled back at him, completely engrossed in the moment. Her thoughts were cut off by the incoming train.
“Oh, well it was nice to meet you, Theo. I gotta take the train to May’s Cafe. You should stop by sometime, if you ever do the painting I’d love to see it.” She stuck her hand out again as a farewell.
Part of her wanted to get this strangers number, but she opted against it. She didn’t even know much about this guy. And besides, no getting attached to people.
Theo smiled shyly, debating whether or not to say it… "I'm getting in the same train. Could we maybe keep talking?"
“Uh, sure, why not?” She said as she stood up. She adjusted her back pack (she preferred one of those to a purse) and waited for him to stand as well, so they could walk to the train together.
“So, how long have you been here in Hastings?”
"My whole life, actually. I'm a victim of circumstance," he told her with a shrug. "And you?" he questioned, taking a seat.
“I just moved here two weeks ago, I’m originally from the US. Actually I’m not staying long,” she continued as she took a seat next to him. “I’m on an extra long trip, and I needed a side job to make sure I had enough money to finish it.”
Theo suddenly looked even more interested. "That's so cool! I've always wanted to leave…" He trailed off, a nostalgic smile settling. "What's your itinerary?"
“After about two months, I’m headed to Europe, so first Paris, then Venice, and two other places. Ones in Germany and ones in the UK, but I’m not exactly sure what cities.” She sighed. “Then I’m headed back home. So what about you, where would you go if you could leave?”
Theo's blush deepened significantly and he looked down again. "Careful not to set off an infodump here, Piper," he warned her, wishing with all his heart she'd ask anyway.
She giggled. “That many places, huh? You can go ahead and tell me, it’ll be a while before we get to the cafe.”
(agggh I'm so sorry)
Still looking down, he grinned at his feet. "I want to hike in Loutro, paint the coast. Also somewhere in Saudi Arabia, hopefully Oman, paint the wild desert. Then I'd try somewhere like Sri Lanka, and maybe a mountain range. There are also loads of festivals I'd like to experience and museums I'd want to see. Did you know there's a Bansky and Dali museum in Amsterdam? I definitely want to visit that. I also want to visit the Modern Art museum in Capetown. Other than that I want the cultural capitals, like Venice and London and Milan and New York and so on. I also want to go to university somewhere away from here, maybe New York. Anyway, yeah. That's only the beginning. Like I said," he laughed bashfully. "Infodump."
“Wow, all those places are probably so amazing,” she breathed. “I love mountains so much. I actually just got here from Ecuador, where I went to the Andes mountains, and it was so beautiful.” Her eyes sparkled as she spoke about the way you could look down and see the clouds, or how clear the sky could get, or home the people were so nice, or what it felt like to look over your balcony and see the mountains each and every morning when you woke up. “Which place do you want to see the most?”
(No problem!)
"You'll laugh," he muttered, with a lingering shadow of a smile.
“I promise I won’t,” she replied. “I’m not that type of person.”
It was funny; she got the feeling that he wasn’t that type of person either. That he wouldn’t judge her for her hopes and dreams, the same way she wouldn’t judge him.
"Leadworth in England."
He had all but shut his eyes and ran away, tapping his feet onto the linoleum floor of the train.
She tapped her fingers on her chin for a second. “No, I don’t believe that I’ve heard of that place before. What’s so special about it?”
"It's, uh… amy (the most wonderful woman in the world) Pond lives there."
She smiled a knowing smile. “Oh, from Doctor Who,” she nodded. “I’ve never seen it, but one of my friends from back home loves it.” Her body jerked a little as the train came to a stop. Then she watched some passengers get off.
Relieved, he sighed with a small smile. "Yeah, it's my favourite show. Have you got a favourite show?" he asked, his curiosity not having abated in the least.
“Not really, I don’t watch much tv. But I do love watching nature documentaries, like Blue Planet. So I guess that’s my favorite.” She tucked some of her hair back behind her shoulder. “So, how long have you been an artist?”
"I started really getting into it when I was eleven and a quarter, though it was always in me. It was a natural talent, I think," Theo reminisced slightly sadly. "Art was healing to me in a hard time…"
Memories were assembling in his mind, both dark and happy, and he let his thoughts drown out his speech; he trailed off.
(feel free to make the story exciting.
So, I remembered you said this, and I feel as though the very cliche way I'm taking this in might fail to do that.
Maybe we brainstorm. Cause I have an idea, but it's equally cliche even if it's more interesting)