On Pins & Needles

Chapter 2

They had seen each other a few times in passing, usually on nights that Natalie was working and Alastor stopped in so she wouldn't have to walk home alone. If ever they should make eye contact, Angel greeted him with a smile, perfectly friendly, but they hadn't really had the opportunity to talk much. He was hoping this endeavor would give him the chance to change that. He'd made the appointment with Natalie about two weeks ago, and when he finally arrived for his consultation, Angel was clearly surprised to see him.

"Alastor? Uh, hey," he said, leaning against Natalie's desk in the waiting room. He was wearing what was apparently his typical work uniform: a pair of tight jeans and a printed tank top that showed off not only the several tattoos up and down his arms—mostly spider motifs and roses, though at least one of them featured a Thompson submachine gun—but also a distracting amount of cleavage. Still, Alastor kept his eyes trained on Angel's without too much difficulty. "You're my two o'clock? Natty just wrote 'A. Bouchard.'"

"That's me," he said with a smile. "I told Husker I was looking for realism, and he said you were the one to book."

"Aww, he said that?" Angel squealed, forcing Alastor to force down an unwarranted spark of jealousy. Surely his friend was too much older for Angel to have any genuine interest in him. Hopefully. "Well, he ain't wrong. C'mon back 'n' we'll figure out what you're lookin' for."

Alastor followed the artist down the hall on his right, with Natalie giving him an encouraging thumbs-up as he passed, and they entered the last room on the left. Angel's influence on the space was immediately observable, from the many framed photorealistic art pieces to the floral-painted tool cabinet against the wall to the hot-pink rolling stool where he seated himself at a small table in the corner, waving for Alastor to sit in the black chair at his side. He already had a sketchpad and pencils laid out but didn't reach for them yet, folding his arms on the table and leaning against it.

"So? Whaddaya have in mind?"

"I was thinking something like this." He got his phone out to show some of the examples of similar work he'd found beforehand. The basis of the piece was a neck-up image of a stag inked across his chest and shoulders.

"Oooh, chest piece, nice," Angel said as he swiped through the various comparisons Alastor had presented. "Any details or style stuff you wanna change about the concept?"

"It might sound odd, but I like the idea of...scars?" he ventured, leaning against the table himself so he and Angel could sort of put their heads together. "Just a few significant ones."

"Mmkay." The artist dragged his sketchpad over and took down a few notes. "You thinkin' color or nah?"

"I wasn't planning on it. This sort of thing doesn't include many exciting colors anyway."

"Hmmm." Pulling out his own phone, Angel brought up reference pictures of actual deer and used them to start a simple sketch while Alastor watched in fascination. There was no denying he was impressed by the blond's artistic skill; all the more reason he was sure he wouldn't regret this. Once he had a rough image together, he started to point out particular details to discuss them with Alastor. "So a lotta these are real symmetrical, and I dunno about you, but I feel like that's kinda less interesting? So I was thinkin' just a little bit of an angle like this."

"I like it," Alastor agreed, trying to keep his focus on the art and not the artist. "The scar placement is nice too. It's sort of dramatic without being cheesy. You have quite a talent for this, Angel."

"Pff, nah, what I got is a lotta practice," the blond corrected. With a wink in Alastor's direction, he added, "Ya work in this business a few years, I mean really work at it, and ya pick up a thing or two. Still feels like somethin's missin', though."