Page 32 of Sawyer
She clucked her tongue. “I will arrange takeout if you disappear into your studio again like this. No one has to interrupt you. We’ll bang on the door and leave it. Can you remember the signal?”
“Do I look incapable of following simple instructions?”
“You have paint in your hair, and you don’t look like you’ve slept. So yes, but I’m used to fashion people. We’ll make sure you don’t waste away.”
“Operation Sawyer,” he finished.
“Exactly—although it is a funny name to me,” Axel remarked before gesturing over his shoulder. “That is very good. May I?”
Sawyer stepped back to let his friends inside. God, he could feel himself tense up. He supposed it was habit. When was that going to stop? Would it ever? He was going to need a Xanax for his first show.
“Sawyer!”
He noted the gift in Brooke’s hand as she thrust it out, distracting him from monitoring Axel’s every hum and gesture as he studied his work.
“You need this,” she was saying over the rapping of his heart, “although you may need food and sleep more.”
No, he needed this damn lack of confidence to wash out with the tide and never return. “You’ll have to open it for me as I’ve got paint hands.”
“Of course.” She tore open the green paper—a shade very close to Phoebe’s eyes, he thought suddenly—and held up the leather-bound day planner. “You can look later, but I put an inscription in it. Well, Axel chose it actually.”
“Tell him what it is, Brooke.”
Axel was standing in front of his canvas, a giant even in the large space, like a Viking god deciding his fate. Was that a frown on his face? Was he being paranoid? Probably. Hewished someone would slap him across the face with a rose-scented glove and challenge his inner critic to a duel or something.
“Using an epigraph from a philosopher like Rousseau and Voltaire seemed silly, but this one…” Brooke was oddly embarrassed, he realized, which snapped him out of his inner drama enough for him to attempt an encouraging smile. “It’s from Picasso.Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.”
His chest grew even tighter. Yes, it truly did. His fear seemed to recede for a moment as the sheer magic of the feeling Picasso had captured in that saying rushed over him. He’d been painting nonstop, and those words described the feeling inside him perfectly. Hollowed out of the mundane, the doubt, the busy. Filled with peace, satisfaction, and—yeah, he had to say it—joy. He told himself to hold on to that feeling now, as his friend viewed his work. Hell, as anyone did.
“Thank you.” He touched his heart. “It’s perfect.”
She leaned forward and carefully kissed his cheek, likely where there was no paint. “I’m glad you like it. It’s from both of us.”
“It is from Brooke, Sawyer.” Axel didn’t turn around. “I might have been consulted, but the idea and execution were all hers.”
Sawyer almost laughed at the eye roll Brooke gave, but he admired Axel’s refusal to claim something that was not of his doing. It was one of the reasons he liked the man. Not only for Brooke. But as his friend. Because he and Axel shared an artistic understanding. Both of them understood the loneliness and doubt of creative pursuits. Yet Axel had triumphed over his inner demons. Sawyer hoped to do the same. No, he had to do the same or everything would be lost.
“You like Phoebe Anderson a lot, it seems,” Axel remarked, making Brooke pause as she set his day plannerdown on a nearby table. “I only guess because I know of your personal connection. Others may not see it given the Impressionistic style.”
None of that conveyed what Axel thought. He found he was holding his breath again.
“I do like her, and I’m relieved it’s notobviouslyher,” he responded because a man was honest about such things. “I wouldn’t want her to be uncomfortable.”
He still planned on getting her permission when he saw her.
Shit! He needed to text her about their next date.
“I doubt a woman like her would be uncomfortable,” Axel only replied. “You captured her inner fire perfectly.”
He wanted to thrust his fist up in the air and let out a victorious cry. He’d thought he’d met his goal, but it felt damn good to hear confirmation from someone at Axel’s level. “She makes it easy. She’s bold and vital and very much herself. But I hear you’ve met her, Brooke.”
“Ah… We wondered if she was going to mention it.” She lifted her chin. “Sorry if you’re upset, Sawyer, but it’s what friends do.”
“I did not do it,” Axel said with a hearty laugh. “You should have seen them, Sawyer. Clustered together, talking in whispers. Dean even suggested changing into all black like a cat burglar.”
Sawyer spurted out a laugh. “Of course he did.”
“I laughed too,” Axel continued, “until I was practically hoarse, especially when Brooke confessed Phoebe had caught them because of an open window.”
