From Up Here

5

|| Ryker ||

I hadn't been expecting to see Ryan again, not after our first encounter on the rooftop, so when she came waltzing into my shop I was taken by surprise. I was even more surprised to learn that she was the person my dad had hired to create a website, as well as other marketing techniques such business cards, shirts, logos, and possibly billboards for our small bike shop. 

Throughout our meeting my fingers had twitched to draw her again. She was no longer the raging hurricane that I had seen on the rooftop, instead she was quiet and calm waves that lapped at the beach and sparkled under the sunlight. Instead of being angry and forward like our first encounter, she was passionate and invested in her work. 

She was no longer dark blues and strokes of grey, wind and pouring rain - she was aqua and bright yellow, sun blazing down on a summers day as a low tide washes over the sand. Ryan is talented and full of ideas, ideas that when put to paper or screen were amazing and eye catching. It's no wonder my dad is paying her to modernize our business. Who wouldn't want to come to our shop when she advertises it the way she does. The only problem is that the glamorous work she had shown me wasn't us - it's not my family. We're not fancy fonts and bright colors, we're simple and so our advertising should be too.  

I'm not sure, but I think my suggestions and comments had offended Ryan. I had basically told her to scrap everything she had been working on and start over, and while I feel a little bad that she wasted all that time, I don't regret anything I said. This business is all my family has, it's my dad's legacy and one day my siblings and I will inherit the shop so it needs to be perfect. It needs to stay true to it's roots and to who we are - who my mom was. 

From inside my backpack my phone begins to ring and I put down the yellow colored pencil and reach for my phone, contemplating ignoring the call when I see my brother's name on the screen. I look down at the sketch I'd been working on for the past two hours and decide that maybe it's time to take a break so I swipe my finger across the screen and accept the call. "Hello." 

"Hey Ry, what's up?"

"Not much, just hanging out at home." I don't mention to my brother that I'm sitting on the rooftop, he doesn't know that I spend the majority of my time up here sketching and thinking. He doesn't even know that I sketch at all, no one does. My mom was the only one that knew of my hobby and she was the only person that I allowed to look at my work, now that she's gone I keep it to myself - hidden in my backpack or in the drawer of my desk.

"Do you have any plans for tomorrow night?" I can hear my dad coughing in the background as Link speaks and I flinch at the sound. 

"No." 

"Then come with me to the Early Morning show." 

"No thanks." I decline the invitation knowing that there's more than likely some hidden agenda involved. 

"Ry, come on. Ever since you moved out we only see each other at work." He lets out an exasperated sigh, the same that he does every time he asks me to make plans with him and I turn him down. 

"Yeah, and we work twelve hours together, six days a week." I start to pack up my things, shifting my phone to my other ear and holding it in place with my shoulder. 

"You're exaggerating a bit, and besides, it's not the same. Just come with me, please."

"Link, I have-"