Work of Art

Chapter 3

Nick once again found herself sitting in front of the wall that was now covered in elaborate graphite designs. After reviewing all of her work, she smiled giddily to herself and stood up quickly.

Sketching was always her least favorite part. Frequently, she opted to skip it and just dove straight in with free acrylic paint strokes, but deemed the hospital of higher importance than her free-flowing style.

So, she had spent the past week meticulously sketching detailed marine life of the sizable white wall.

Grabbing her bag off the floor, she turned and walked hurriedly across the waiting room and down a series of hallways. The hospital staff had agreed to let her keep some of her paints in an old janitor's cabinet and her excitement led her there at a furious pace.

Nick glanced at the image on her phone, trying to determine the best colors to start with. She could only reasonably carry two buckets of paint at once she reasoned. Her phone encapsulated her attention and she felt herself falling backwards before she even registered that the had run into something hard. She gasped as her balance betrayed her and dropped her phone as her hands grappled for something to grab,

Her fingers finally found their purchase on something hard, and rather cold. Looking up expecting to see some sort of bar or cart, Nick instead found herself face to face with the man she hadn't seen since the beginning of the week.

"Dr. Cullen!" she exclaimed. "I'm so sorry, I clearly wasn't paying attention."

The man before snapped out of his startled position and gently laughed, helping right her onto her feet.

"It's no problem at all Miss Lexers."

She blinked up at him as he said her name, how she would love for the syllable of her first name to roll off his tongue. Lost in thoughts, she didn't notice her hand still grasping his bicep clad in a while coat until his eyes drew towards her hands, once again smudged with gray.

She sharply retracted her hand and quickly bent down to retrieve her phone. As she stood, she saw that Dr. Cullen was still staring at where her hand and held his arm, once again drawing her line of vision to the coat.

She gasped as she saw the partial gray hand print that stained the crisp fabric.

"Oh my goodness, i'm so sorry!" she gushed and without thinking she tossed her phone in her bag and pulled his sleeve towards her. Using her cleaner left hand, she tried to rub the smudge off, but only succeeded in extending it further.

Carlisle froze as soon as she grabbed onto him. Her face looked so genuinely concerned that he wanted nothing more than to pull her into a hug and tell her it would be alright. He settled on placing a gentle hand onto her shoulder to snap her out of her frenzy.

Startled by his hand, she froze and once again found herself face to face with the doctor. "Miss Lexers, it's alright."

She abruptly let go of his again and mumbled a quick "sorry again" before continuing to speed down the hallway.

Carlisle watched her retreat for a moment before clearing his head with a shake and continuing on his way at a much more reasonable speed than the excitable artist.

He was on his way to see another patient, but opted to quickly run into the break room to change. With a sigh and a silent prayer that the waiting patient wouldn't be too angry at his delay, he shrugged the white coat off his shoulders and extended his arm to toss it in the wash bin. But right as the fabric slipped through his fingers, she felt his arm shoot out at inhuman speeds to retrieve it once more. With a furtive glance around the room to make sure that no one saw his unreasonable speed, he folded the jacket and instead opted to walk across the room and place it in the bottom of his locker.

Carlisle couldn't quite say what compelled him to do such a thing. It was more of an urge, an inexplicable desire not to part with the soiled article of clothing. Closing his locker door, he retrieved another white coat and replaced all of the necessary items in his pockets and pins across the front then left the break room, continuing on his way to the waiting patients.

Nick saw him walking down the hall once more and quickly slipped around a corner. She stood there, frozen, with her bag slung over her shoulder and a gallon bucket of blue and white paint in each hand. Grasping the paint tightly, she leaned over and peered around the corner.

No longer seeing Dr. Cullen's retreating form, she departed the corner and quickly walked back to the waiting room, keeping her eyes peeled ahead, determined not to intersect with any more doctors for the day, especially doctors with striking gold eyes.

As embarrassed as she was to admit it, Nick found herself recalling those amber eyes as she traipsed across the waiting room, drawing curious stares her way. She hadn't intentionally looked into their depths, but their embarrassingly close proximity made ulterior options nearly impossible.

As she finally reached the wall, she set all of her supplies down with a gentle thud and rapidly let the excitement of beginning to paint consume her once more.

Nick squatted down and riffled through her bag, extracting a flat-head screwdriver from the depths. With a celebratory grin, she popped the blue can of paint open. Looking to find a place to set the lid, she quickly realized her mistake and replaced the lid before standing up to unfold the drop cloth that was neatly piled along the wall.

Not that the room was now more appropriately set up to paint, she pulled the blue lid back off and popped the white can open. Carefully, she dumped a bit of both paint colors into a paint roller tray and mixed them together with a stirring stick. The depth was awkward, so Nick mixed to the best of her abilities before opting to embrace the organic aspects of the ocean and use slightly different tints of blue. She'd be going in with more detail later anyways.

Nick put together a small paint roller and took the first swipe through the tray, coating the spongy material sufficiently before standing and walking a step closer to the wall. As she stepped, a small drop of light blue splattered to the floor and Nick silently applauded herself for remembering to add the drop cloth at the last minute. While she was friends with many at the hospital, she'd still hate to give them any extra trouble with cleanup. They were after all trusting her, a soon to be high school senior, with a task usually handed to professionals.

With a deep anticipatory breath, she rolled the brush across an open expanse of wall, careful to avoid her meticulous marine life sketches. How she would love to start with the animals themselves first.

While details were always a challenge, she loved watching the shapes and values come together. Sometimes she was unsure how she did it, but the lines always almost seemed to work to her benefit.

She laughed at herself for fantasizing about painting details and instead returned to the task at hand, blocking in the main colors of the swirling sea. Afraid to get too close to any pencil lines with the rather clunky roller, Nick once again riffled through her bag to retrieve a medium sized brush.

She carefully outlined the sea creatures then filled in the surrounding areas with more blue. Sooner than expected, she ran out of her slightly faulty mixed blue paint. Turning to retrieve the gallon buckets, she was surprised to see how dark it was becoming outside the window.

With a sigh, Nick decided she'd finish the first coat tomorrow and head home for the night, so she started the tedious process of cleaning up. It was probably for the best anyways, she required a ladder to reach the higher regions and workers were growing sparse as the sun slipped behind the horizon.

Taking one last look at her creation, Nick once again began the walk across the waiting room and down the halls to return her buckets of paint to the closet, not even realising that she walked past Carlisle's closed office door once more.