Ryden Oneshots

Pretty Ain't A Job

Ryan’s sixteen and kicking around skateparks with Spencer. He’s stretching his ears and not calling back the girls who put their phone numbers in his contact list after they hook up at the parties he’s technically not invited to. He’s wearing shirts that are too tight, with stupid band designs cracking across the chest, and jeans that are even tighter. He’s throwing his cigarette butts out of his car’s window on the way to school, and he’s certainly not considering calling back the modeling scout who slips him her card when he’s confronted during an afternoon skate.

At first, the guys had elbowed each other and pointed at the woman who looked out of place at the piece of shit skatepark the council refused to clean up. Eventually, she smiled and walked over to the group, singling out Ryan and introducing herself. Her name was Greta and she worked for an agency based in Los Angeles, but, if he was interested, she would be able to get Ryan some work out here in Vegas before he turned eighteen. He’d need his parents permission, of course, but he should definitely consider it.

He nods and politely thanks her, saying that he’ll think about it. The smirk on his lips tells her he won’t, but she can’t stop the smile from spreading across her face when she sees him actually put the card in his wallet that’s made of more duct tape than anything else.

The guys wolf whistle when Ryan skates back toward them, but he rolls his eyes and tries to hide the smirk as he finally lands a trick he’d been practicing all week.

**

Ryan’s seventeen and publishing his own zine. He scribbles the articles out by hand, his writing slanty and almost indecipherable, but he gets good feedback from the kids who read it. Jac, his friend, supplies the drawings and photos for each issue. She doesn’t even laugh when he asks for her opinion on everything from prose and angsty poetry to analytical essays about patriarch society.

Now, his jeans are just as tight as they were when he was sixteen, but he’s wearing button-ups and vests rather than the My Chemical Romance shirts that sit in dusty boxes in the garage. All of his friends are applying to college, he guesses, since he hasn’t really spoken to them for months.

He admits to Spencer that he’d started researching modeling agencies online, but hadn’t really gotten around to looking at college. Spencer throws a grape at his head and says, “You’re being an idiot,” but doesn’t push it.

Ryan doesn’t know if he’d said anything at all because he wanted Spencer to push it, or if he was checking that he was doing the right thing.

**

Ryan’s eighteen and eating the eggs and bacon his father had cooked him for breakfast. His mom’s long gone. He doesn’t even know if she’s still in the city, but the missed calls he receives from her late at night suggests she isn’t. His mother never was one to grasp the concept of time differences across states.

So, without her in the picture, it’s just Ryan and his father when he opens his mouth, still chewing a piece of bacon and says, “So, I don’t think I’m going to college.”

Not really paying attention, his father replies, “Don’t talk with your mouth full,” and then, in an angrier tone, “What did you just say?”

So, Ryan’s told him and he’s packing his bags and calling the modeling scout from Spencer’s home telephone. He got a leather wallet for his eighteenth birthday, but, for whatever reason, still transferred the agency’s card when he changed everything over.

Greta doesn’t remember him, but she agrees to take the meeting anyway. He turns up in a pair of pinstripe pants and a deep v-neck. Greta takes one look at him and smiles wide, “A few years late, aren’t you?”