Crafted Touch

Loud

As they approached the outside of the café, Zach was about to say he'd go in and tell Zoey they were all set to get going, when she stepped out from behind the door and hugged both men unashamedly. She was tall for a woman and had short, but voluminous brown hair. Rick was sure that she purposefully never styled it, and couldn't understand why she would keep getting trims on the high maintenance haircut when it not only didnt suit her, but, wasnt even being worn in the intended way. Her chest was small and she never wore a bra, which Rick found to be very uncomfortable to know since she was constantly trying to give him hugs and attention as she wasn't the type to care about personal space. Her shoulders were narrow in comparison to the rest of her body, and if it weren't for her wide pear-like hips, she looked as though she might topple over from the weight of her bobble head like features. Rick found her unattractive and disliked her personality as well, but he respected Zach enough as a colleague and friend, to try and not let it show too obviously.

"Hi Rick! Your date will be right out." She laughed.

He said nothing back so Zoey tried again.

"She's actually taking a little longer than usual and I'm sure it's because she's hoping we'll just go on without her. She really felt roped into this! Don't worry though, I can hold your hand for a while if you feel weird being alone in front of strangers."

Zach looked sympathetic towards Rick and shrugged while smiling out of trying to wordlessly apologize.

"Maybe we should have let them meet more organically instead of forcing it?" He asked his girlfriend, feeling that Rick was even more uncomfortable than before.

"Besides, I already told him there's no pressure. Not everyone has to be a total love connection like us, right? He can just mill around the gallery and slip out when he's seen everything."

Rick nodded and Zoey began complaining, only to stop herself as the café door opened again.

"Ah! Here she is! I thought you'd chicken out at the last second."

The woman tried to smile, but shyly didn't look at anyone, other than Zoey, for a couple seconds, seeming like she was maybe waiting for something, or, possibly, planning an escape. The expression she had almost made Rick laugh, but he stayed quiet nonetheless.

"You remember my stud of a boyfriend!" Zoey said with a somewhat demeaning squeeze to the skinny man's arm.

"Yes, hey Zachary." The woman greeted him quietly.

"Zachary?" Rick found himself questioning out loud.

It caused everyone to turn and look at him, making him sheepishly raise his brows at them with uncertainty.

"I like things in their natural states, just as they should be." The woman said, giving her attention to Rick, as to provide an explanation for using the full first name of his friend.

He looked down at the woman and nodded again.

"So do I."

She was short and had long hair that had the middle strands and ends lightened into a seamless silvery pastel blend. He'd never cared for colored hair, but the faded light purple that toned the whitened blonde pieces suited her nicely. The natural regrowth of her hair was darker, but still light and ashy enough to not make it look like a stark contrast to the dyed part. When he pictured her with the length of her hair as the color in her roots, he still thought she'd look good.

Her shirt was too big for her, but her pants were tight, and he could see that she had a good build. She looked like she'd also easily fit in with the artsy crowd and Rick thought it was no surprise there since she was friends with Zoey. At first he thought her eyes were brown, because they were slightly shaded by her bangs hanging down into her face, but as he looked at her a little longer, he saw they were a deep blue that had multinational flecks of green with an amber ring around the pupil. He was sure he'd never seen another pair of eyes like hers before.

"What are you guys doing? Mind melding or something? Is this how introverts communicate?" Zoey broke the awkward silence, making Rick realize that he'd been staring at the girl, and that she'd been staring back

"I'm Rick." He said.

"Short for... Richard?" She asked him, instead of giving her name.

"Yes." He replied.

"I'll call you that then."

"I see, because shortened names aren't how things should be? A given name is a natural state?" Rick asked somewhat amused by the woman being so open about her strangeness.

It was a relief to him that he wasn't the only person who would be taken as a bit weird, and he didn't know why, but her way of talking was appealing enough that he actually wanted to go through with the date.

Zoey interrupted and gave them a head shake.

"Can we please get on with the quirky stuff and head out already? This is Verne, she's a baker here at the café."

"Verne?" He confirmed while looking directly at her again after the disruption.

"Is that short for anything?"

"No." Verne said with a tight lipped smirk.

"Not Laverne or Veronica perhaps?" He asked.

"Just Verne." She said, looking up at him, scrunching her face in disgust at the idea of the names he suggested.

"Did you just want me to say it myself? Maybe it seemed fake coming out of someone else's mouth?"

Rick's eyes gave her a gentle once-over as if he was smiling, though his mouth didn't match the emotion.

"Yes."

Zach looked a little bewildered by the exchange, feeling like he could watch the two interact for hours if they continued to talk to each other. To him, because he helped set up the date, it was like he and Zoey were performing a phych experiment on them. He'd met Verne quite a few times while hanging out with his girlfriend at the cafe, and he always thought she was a bit odd, or possibly rude, with how quiet she was, so seeing both her and Rick speak so naturally to one another, despite them both being the two quietest and weirdest people hed ever met, was making him more and more curious by the second. Zoey, however, was getting antsy and wasn't as interested in the exchanges anymore and was getting to be as obnoxious as always.

"Okay, so, now everyone knows everyone. Let's get going!" She commanded and turned to start walking in the opposite direction, making her boyfriend trail after her quickly.

Stepping through a stone facade entryway to an old gothic era building, Zoey made excited sounds while clinging onto Zach's arm. The inside of the building immediately lost its effect of grandeur as there had been obvious modernizing renovations done and a hushed, but, uncannily sterile atmosphere. There was no doubt that it was intended to be calming, but the harsh white walls and cheap looking ropes, to keep people behind displays, gave off a pretentious and unwelcoming environment for visitors.

She lead everyone past the plaster busts and other generic looking artwork, that were to be considered as attractions, to a room that had a guest book set out front on a pedestal. They had bypassed any entry fee because it was just supposed to be a promotional event for Zoey, as a debut for her, and a big moment for her career and portfolio as a visual artist. There were options for the viewers to buy her pieces, but only after the show concluded and was to be taken down. She had gone through several years of art school, used all kinds of media, and finally got her chance to set up a personal exhibit on her own, though everyone knew it was mostly through her rich father's connections. She liked to claim it was all because she was extroverted, but said she couldn't deny that the café had also helped a lot to advertise since she left flyers there and some small sample paintings that were hung up or left on the counters for customers to see.

After Rick printed his name and signed next to it, Verne spoke up again.

"Selvyn?"

"Mhmm." He let out, and waited to hear why she was inquiring on his last name.

"It's fitting." She said and picked up the pen to put her name on the line right below his.

"Verne Canelle?" He checked.

"Yes. Is my name fitting as well?"

Zach stepped away from Zoey, who was already busily talking to someone, to point his friend to where the food was. Rick pulled his attention away from Verne and seemed somewhat annoyed to be interrupted, although he was, of course, also thankful for the promise of food being fulfilled. As they walked over and he set his thermos down to grab a plate of sample sized appetizers, that wouldn't actually be a sufficient dinner, Zach awkwardly stumbled over his words.

"So what do you think? About her? Verne, that is. Well, and the art as well, what do you think about that?"

"Art is art." Rick said.

"Yeah but, it's better than that weirdo abstract stuff that no one can figure out, right?"

"Sure." He said, like always, but sounded more disingenuous than he hoped.

"Okay, I get it, big guy, you don't want to sound too into it or anything. How do you find Zoey's coworker? She's kinda cute, huh?"

Rick took a bite from a dry rusk that had a carelessly chosen and wrinkly skinned tomato slice on it, half of a small bocconcini cheese ball, as well as a folded basil leaf skewered into it with too much improperly reduced balsamic vinegar drizzled on top. He made a face at the sour acidic flavor and Zach winced, thinking the expression was meant for him.

"Did we really mess up? I'm so sorry, I can come up with an excuse."

"No, this fake fancy crap is not what I'd call food. Bocconcini salad should stay a salad, and crackers shouldn't be sliders." The larger man replied, dropping and leaving his plate on the table without much graceful attitude.

Zach tilted his head at his friend and smugly closed one eye.

"You're avoiding the question. You are interested!"

"She's attractive." Rick said without wavering, not liking that he was being probed for his opinion.

He spotted her across from them, a good safe distance away where he didn't feel like he had to worry about speaking honestly to Zach, or while letting himself check her out again.

"Really good looking."

"Wait... really? Wow, Zoey was right then. Damn, she's good at this match maker stuff! This is awesome, we can get our lunches at the café and do stuff together then. It would be nice to see you out and about more often! She's not my type, which made me skeptical, but what do you like about her?"

Zach went on without too many breaths between his words and was too excited to care that he had gotten louder while talking.

Rick silently watched Verne as she moved nimbly from one painting to another, making it seem like she had walked the gallery a thousand times before, looking like she belonged there and had inevitably become part of the exhibit.

"She's like a... fairy."

Zach laughed out of not expecting such a response from the burly man beside him.

"What?! A fairy?"

"She's too delicate. I'm a carpenter, my hands are too rough to be with someone so soft." Rick told him, sounding upset at the other man, but mostly with himself, for admitting anything.

"It's not like you have to touch her right away, I never took you as a gutter mind. It's always the quiet ones though, I guess. Maybe you'll ease up on some of your work and your hands will get less calloused if you start seeing someone."

Rick sighed with irritation again. "I didn't mean it like that."

"I get it, I get it. You're an honorable man and all that. It wouldn't kill you to talk to her though, right?" Zach prodded.

Taking the not-so-subtle hint, and wanting to get away from the incessant babbling, Rick went over to where Verne was looking at a fairly non-descript, but overall, boring and talentless, painting of some wilted flowers in a grey vase. A lot of the paintings had a somewhat sad theme or attempted morbid edge to them. Although, with her amateur style, Rick thought they came across more like the canvases he'd seen hanging up in his old high school's art classroom that were done by angsty teenagers who viewed themselves as artistic geniuses for choosing dark colors instead of bright ones, or painting faceless people instead of having them smile, or even frown, because showing emotion was too passé.

As he got close, he could hear the wood frame around the picture start complaining.

I'm on this plain wall and keep getting stared at. All these ugly faces constantly breathing on me. I was supposed to be in the fresh air, growing free.

Rick grimaced and touched it out of instinct to help the material. He tried to sway it, the way he would at work, by thinking positively towards it.

You hold someone's painting, you've become a vessel for art and people appreciate you, that's why they look.

He told the wood with a stern inner voice, not caring to think about how he most likely wasn't supposed to be touching anything in an art exhibit.

It became silent and Rick slid his fingers down it's edge, almost superstitiously, to seal the optimism in with an invisible wax or varnish. As if Verne had somehow noticed a change in the atmosphere in front of them, she peered up at him with a strange look in her bright eyes. He looked back at her, equally puzzled by her reaction, and followed along without a word as she moved to another picture.

The next frame was also whining. It was lacquered with a black tint, when it had originally been a light blonde wood, and it didn't like the feeling.

Black is a strong shade.

Rick told the frame as he touched it lightly.

You look expensive and bold-- luxurious even.

Unfortunately the whispers didn't stop. They only got louder and began to sound angry at his attempt to silence it. So he stepped away and decided he wouldn't waste his time trying to convince the material on any other art piece to be content, as it wasn't his exhibit, or his place to be doing so. He wouldn't have gone there if it hadnt been for Zach, and he didn't even like Zoey. Helping the wood that held her creations, made him feel like he had subsequently been helping her, when, really, he just hated knowing the wood was so upset.

"Richard?" Verne asked as she approached the man who suddenly seemed like he was disturbed by something.

"Hmm?" He acknowledged her, bringing himself out if his thoughts with the abrupt and unfamiliar sound of his full first name being used.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah." Rick said, "It's just loud in here I guess."

Verne gave her surroundings a quick glance and he was relieved to see that at least his excuse wasn't too unbelievable since more people had started entering, congregating in little groups, and circulating the room as well.

"It is loud." She agreed and cocked her head toward the exit sign.

"Would you like to get some air?"

Rick took a deep breath as if he took her words literally, and went to grab his thermos from the table. He then followed the woman out, feeling intrigued by her notice of his changed behavior, and didn't bother to tell his friend that he was leaving.