Externalizing [mxm]

Chapter 2

Marc watched her working silently for a few minutes. Even though she wasn't saying much still, she at least had a smile on while she was working. He'd turned half of her playroom into an art studio—he'd wandered around an art store for over an hour trying to find things a six year old could use.

Watercolors, charcoal—which had already been smudged into the carpet—pads of papers in various sizes, as well as safe markers and better quality colored pencils were strewn everywhere. Marc tried to tell himself it was probably organized chaos to her, or had something to do with how an artists mind worked as he resisted the urge to clean it all up.

"What?" Ariel finally questioned when she noticed he was watching.

"Nothing." Marc uncrossed his arms from his chest and forced a smile. "What are you doing?"

At least she had changed some from focusing so much on her mother, too. Marc could only make out some character of a TV show that Ariel liked otherwise. She showed him the in-progress drawing with some pride. "Oh, Mr. Brendan said that the gallery opens up later this week. He says we should go, and that you should e-mail or call him for the information," she recited with some focus.

Marc nodded and hesitated before messing up her hair with his hand. She squealed and flailed around for a second before pulling away with a giggle. "Don't," she pleaded, smiling as she fixed her hair.

Marc snorted and stepped out to let her keep working. He went to his office and settled down at his desk, rubbing his hands over his face. He turned on his computer and wavered between trying to e-mail Brendan—it still felt strange to address a teacher by a first name, but apparently everyone did—and calling him.

Marc decided on the latter and keyed in Brendan's number on his cell phone. If he didn't answer, Marc would just e-mail him then.

Brendan did answer, sounding confused and answering rather formally. "This is Brendan," he said immediately, with garbled background noise flooding the phone.

"Brendan, It's Marc... Ariel's father," Marc muttered.

"Oh! Of course. Did she tell you about the gallery—oh sh—hold on, I need a second." There was a clatter of the phone and then a minute later some of the distracting background noise was gone. "Sorry, I'm back," Brendan said at the end.

"Yes, she was talking about the gallery... is it on at the school?" Marc wondered.

"No, it's at one of the public libraries. They'll be displaying all of the art there for about a month. So it's not really a gallery I guess, but they'll be setting everything up in a room and handing out some awards for pieces based on age groups between a couple different schools," Brendan explained. "I can e-mail you the address."

"That sounds good," Marc agreed, falling awkwardly silent then.

"How's Ariel doing at home?" Brendan filled in then.

"Fine. Better. I bought her some art supplies. Some of it seemed a lot more high end than what a six year old needs, but I got her some watercolors and what not." Marc paused. "You had mentioned printmaking before, hadn't you? What's that?"

"Not anything she'll be doing anytime soon," Brendan chuckled. "I'm trying to talk the school into getting a press for the art department, but it'll probably be for the high school level students."

"Yeah, but what is it? Like newspaper print?" Marc still didn't understand.

"No," Brendan hummed. "Well, yes. It's how newspapers were done back in the old days, but it also has a form of art to it. I'm sure you've seen prints; like that blue tidal wave from japan? That's a woodblock print," Brendan explained. "But printmaking is pretty hard to keep up with. I have to pay a fee just to use a printmaking studio in the area," he went on. "Because I don't just have a huge press sitting in my apartment, or acids."