Out Of Focus

Chapter 4 - Head . Cars . Bending

5 hours of exhaustion. Lucky just wanted to collapse on the cold cement grey floor. He is tired and started to think of a cup of iced tea or a glass full of cold orange juice. He gulped and licked his lip before he put his mind back to the photo-shoot.

"You should really change your head position," Arlie said without looking away from the viewfinder.

"Okay, I'm sorry." He answered and Arlie looked at him.

"Apologize is not accepted. Don't say sorry, you're the next super-model. Show what you've got and just do it better, alright mate?"

"Sor- I mean, understood." he said, terrified.

She's quite different than what Lucky thought; silence and just lazy but really, she's all about that self improvement and really strict. He tilted his head and put his best pose to the camera.

"Better," she said. "How about if you put your hand on your left shoulder?"

He put it. There are so much things that Arlie consider as not enough and Lucky just need to improve more. That is why the photo-shoot ended late. Max threw a water bottle to Lucky and he catched it.

"Good job," Max complimented as he smile and gave Lucky a pat on the back.

"Thank you but Arlie said I still need to improve few things on my modelling skill." Lucky said.

He opened the cap of the bottle. He stares at Arlie whose standing nearby a wooden cabinet, staring at old dusty stuffs inside it. Few times, he saw her touching the cabinet. As she touched it, the dust particles swim around in the air.

She shoved her hand to her pocket and grabbed a piece of candy. The wrapping is scrunched and a little bit dirty, it must have fell before. She opened the wrapping and eat it a whole.

Lucky drank and gulped the water. He put the bottle in a table and went away to change his clothes. He walked to get his clothes from Max. Max took his clothes from the hanger and hand it to Lucky.

"Change upstairs," he said. "I'm putting alot of things and I need the studio's changing room right now for that reason."

Lucky nodded and walked upstairs. "Hey, to the right, passed by the kitchen and there will be a hall right there. The first door on the right is the toilet." Max told him. "Okay," Lucky answered and walk again.

He realizes that he didn't say so much things when he work and just agree with everything. He don't know if that's a bad thing or a good thing in a person. As he arrived upstairs, he found himself standing inside a really well designed house. White painted wall, wooden floor and really a comfy aura covered up the atmosphere; a really different feeling he felt with the garage. He wonders if Max live with Arlie. He wonders if Max is Arlie's boyfriend. He giggled at his own thought. He walked to the toilet and change.

Lucky went back downstairs to meet everyone and wait for Pyper to pick him up. Arlie seems like she's trying so hard to chew the candy and trying to eat it.

Suddenly, Arlie spitted the candy out to the floor. Lucky saw it and disgusted.

"Darn it, I can't do this, Max!" she shouted and shoved her hand to the pocket furiously.

"Arlie, you promised me." Max said. There's a small metal box on her hand and when she opened it, Lucky saw 5 pieces of cigarettes. She put one of it between her teeth and grabbed a lighter from a table. The sound of the lighter is somehow relaxing. The smell of fire are covering the whole room. As she exhale, the smoke twirls in the air freely. More smokes appeared. It looks like a calligraphy, an art.

Lucky started to cough.

Everyone stares. "You okay, man?" Max asked. He looked at Arlie directly, "Get out. Really." he said. Without saying anything, she opened up the garage door and went outside. The smell of grasses and fresh air struck Lucky's nose and he feels a little bit better.