The Art of Us

by KL Hughes

  “Bingo.” Cam follows him to the table. She unbuttons her cargo khakis and drops them down her legs. Once she hops onto the table, Charlee helps pull her shoes off, then slides the khakis the rest of the way down and sets everything aside on the table.

  “You remember Charlee?” Cam points at her, and Charlee gives a little wave.

  “Charlee,” Aaron says with a nod. “Twice in one week. Good to see you again.”

  “Twice in one week?” Cam’s face scrunches with confusion. “What does that mean?”

  “Um, I came in earlier this week.”

  Cam looks back and forth between them. “Did you lose a limb and neglect to tell me? Because that’s not cool, dude.”

  Aaron chuckles. “You’ll see. But first, why don’t you tell me what’s been going on with your leg?”

  Cam gives him the rundown as she takes off her prosthesis. She groans at the stern look he gives her once she pulls her sock down. “I know, I know,” she says. “I’m supposed to come in when it hurts, but I’ve been busy. Like, so busy. So, please, spare me the lecture.”

  “You’re lucky this hasn’t developed into an open pressure sore,” Aaron says, palpating the reddened skin around the blister on Cam’s thigh.

  “We can totally skip the guilt trips along with the lectures.” Cam winces a bit at Aaron’s touch. She rolls her eyes when Charlee holds out her hand, but ends up taking it anyway. “I’ll get enough of that from Charlee’s mom later.”

  “It’s true,” Charlee says. “She will. It’ll get brought up at least twice a month ’til next Christmas.”

  “Fine,” Aaron says. “At least someone gets to lecture you.”

  Cam laughs. “This is why you’re my favorite prosthetist.”

  “I’m your only prosthetist.”

  “True. Still my favorite, though.”

  Cam sits through a few more minutes of painful palpating, her face scrunching a bit with each squeeze. “Normally, the nubby massage is my favorite part, but I’m really not feeling it today, Aaron.”

  Aaron gently pats the top of Cam’s thigh. “All right,” he says. “Well, it looks like the issue is mostly with your socket. As I said in September, it’s time for a new prosthesis. You’ve kept this one longer than recommended, and you’ve had some size variation in your residual limb. It’s swollen right now, which is due to the sore and likely also the weather we’ve been having, but overall, you’ve had some shrinkage. That’s what’s been causing the rubbing. It’s a bit much to fix with a sock change or adjustment, which I’m sure you’ve already figured out. So, we’re just at that point.”

  Cam groans. “Okay.”

  “At least you won’t have to wait long.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Aaron looks at Charlee, which prompts Cam to look at Charlee, whose nerves are on fire. “Um,” she says while Aaron slips away and out of the room. “Remember how I said I could do better than buying you lunch?”

  “Don’t tell me you bought me a new leg,” Cam says, teasing. When Charlee only stares at her, her mouth falls open. “Charlee.” Her eyes blow wide. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

  “Well, you only held off in September because you had Twelfth Night to work on and because of the cost, so I—”

  “So you paid for a new leg for me?” The question is practically squeaked, and Charlee can’t help but laugh a bit.

  “That’s kind of why I didn’t get you a Christmas present and also why you won’t be getting a Christmas present for, like, the rest of your life.” She shuffles in place. “And just so we’re being completely honest here, Mom paid for most of it, because holy hell. And obviously, she was the one who talked to Aaron about going ahead with everything so it would be ready for your next appointment. So, you know, it wasn’t all me, but…”

  Cam gapes at her.

  “Are you mad?” Charlee asks.

  Before Cam can answer, Aaron returns with a large box. “Now,” he says, “we’re still going to have to try it out and make some adjustments over the next couple months, but I imagine we shouldn’t have too many issues. You know how it goes, though, so we’ll see. But I’m not letting you on it until your skin is feeling better and this blister has resolved. I’m serious. I don’t want you wearing the leg. Any leg. It’s strictly crutches or chair until I give the go-ahead. Clear?”

  “Crystal.” Cam nods eagerly.

  “And no more ignoring the pain. If you’re having issues, you come in. Okay? I don’t care how busy you are.”

  Cam salutes. “Yes, sir.”

  “Oh, and I want to talk to you about some new liners we’ve—”

  “Just show me the damned thing, already!”

  Aaron smiles. “All right. Enough anticipation, huh?”

  When he pulls the new prosthesis from the box, Charlee holds her breath. Purples and blues swirl around the socket and foot, galaxies soaring over the length and speckled with stars. Charlee swells with pride at the way Cam gasps at the sight of it.

  “Charlee, did you—”

  “Yes,” Charlee says, glancing from the prosthesis to Cam and back. “That’s why I came in earlier this week. I asked Aaron if I could paint it, and he agreed, as long as I didn’t damage it in any way.”

  “Charlee.”

  Cam reaches out for the piece and runs her hands over the design. She holds it in her lap for a long time, just staring down at it, and when she finally looks up at Charlee again, there are tears in her eyes.

  “After what you said at Christmas, I felt awful,” Charlee says. “Because everything you said was true. I have been neglecting you, and I just wanted to do something to show you—” She sighs as her throat tightens. “I wanted you to know how special you are to me. I get a little too caught up in myself sometimes, I know. But you have to know how much it means to me to have you in my life and to be able to be a part of yours.”

  Cam sets the gift aside and reaches for Charlee. Grabbing her arm, she practically yanks her onto the table and envelops her in a tight hug. “Thank you.” She trembles with the words. “Thank you so much.”

  Charlee doesn’t care that there’s a third party present. She sinks into Cam’s arms. “You’re never invisible to me, Cam. You’re my best friend.”

  “You’re mine.”

  “You were both naked.” Vinny leans back in the chair across from Alex’s desk and twirls the letter opener between her fingers. “And you just slept?”

  “Yes, we just slept.”

  “So, just clarifying here—you definitely did not have sex?”

  “No, we didn’t have sex. And, no, I won’t be sharing any details with you when we do.”

  “I just had to sit through you basically reciting a damned poem about how good it felt to be skin to skin with her again, and you’re telling me I’m not going to get sex details?” Vinny drops the letter opener, launches across the desk to grab Alex’s stress ball, and chucks it at her head. “I’m disowning you.”

  Alex catches the ball before it can do any damage and throws it back at Vinny. “Don’t act like you actually want to know.”

  Grinning, Vinny says, “You’re right. I just like seeing you happy.” She tosses the stress ball back. “You are happy, aren’t you?”

  “I am.” A small smile touches Alex’s lips. “Or, at least, I’m getting there.”

  A quiet knock sounds on the door just before a young redheaded woman pokes her head in.

  “Ms. Woodson.”

  Vinny snorts at the address, and Alex scowls at her.

  “Sorry to bother you, Ms. Woodson.”

  “Please stop calling me Ms. Woodson, Rachel,” Alex says. “It gives me a headache.”

  “Sorry, Ms. Woodson.”

  Vinny laughs out loud, and Rachel winces.

  “Sorry,” she says again, cheeks reddening.


  “What did you need?”

  “I just wanted to let you know that I took care of that purchase we discussed,” she says. “I had the package placed in the conference room until you’re ready for it.” She walks across the office, pulling a piece of paper from the slim compartment inside her plastic clipboard. “Here’s the receipt.”

  “Oh.” Alex takes it. “Thank you.” They stare at one another for a moment. “Is that all?” she asks pointedly.

  “Oh, sorry.”

  Rachel leaves the room quickly, and Alex and Vinny look at one another for one tense, silent moment before they both burst into laughter.

  “Your assistant is—”

  “She’s a little awkward,” Alex says. “I know. But she’s great at her job. I think she’s just nervous about tonight. It’s her first event. Speaking of, I’ll be even happier once that’s finished. I’m exhausted.”

  “Well, the fact that you and Charlee have been sobbing over each other every five minutes for the last few months probably hasn’t helped matters.” Vinny catches the stress ball when Alex tosses it back her way and then throws it back. “Dehydration is a bitch.”

  Alex purses her lips. “Yes.” She pins Vinny with a hard stare. “And so are you.”

  She doesn’t give Vinny the chance to react before she chucks the stress ball at her as hard as she can. It smacks into Vinny’s forehead with a whacking sound and results in an echoing shout of “motherfucker!”

  Vinny’s expression is so dumbfounded as she cups her forehead and gapes at her that Alex has to clap a hand over her mouth to keep from erupting with laughter. When it shifts into a glare and Vinny poises herself on the edge of her seat as though she is preparing to launch, Alex braces her hands on her desk.

  “Vinaya,” she says, still choking down laughter. “We’re in the office. I want you to consider this carefully before you make any rash decisions. There’s no need to make a scene.”

  “Oh, I’ll make a scene!” Vinny jets out of her seat and around Alex’s desk.

  Alex is barely out of her chair before Vinny latches onto her and tackles her to the floor. They grapple for a few moments before Vinny manages to get Alex on her stomach. Alex grunts as her face squishes into the carpet, her arms jerk behind her back, and her sister’s knee digs in between her shoulder blades.

  “Give?” Vinny asks, a bit breathless.

  Alex huffs. “Give.”

  “Good.” Vinny smacks a kiss to the back of Alex’s head and ruffles her hair with her hand. She releases her a moment later and sits on the floor with her back against Alex’s desk.

  Alex grumbles as she sits up, smooths down her mussed clothing, and settles across from Vinny, back to the opposite wall. “I almost had you.”

  “You never had me.”

  “Almost,” Alex says, and Vinny smiles.

  “All right, kid.” Vinny sticks her legs out and rests her feet against Alex’s. “Almost.”

  They sit on the floor in silence for a while, their shoes pressed together, then Alex says, “Thank you for bringing me breakfast.”

  “Welcome.” Vinny taps Alex’s toes. “Everything ready for tonight?”

  “I have final checks to do later this morning, and then I want to run over to the venue to make sure everything’s in place. Other than that, yeah. It’s just a matter of everyone being where they’re supposed to be when they’re supposed to be there, including me.”

  “I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

  “Yeah. It’ll be nice to be able to focus on other things once this is done.”

  “On Charlee, you mean?”

  Alex taps her foot against her sister’s. “Again, mind your own business.”

  “You are my business.”

  “Well, then the business is doing just fine, so you can stop meddling.”

  Vinny chuckles and nudges her feet up so both their legs are suspended in the air. She pumps her feet, creating the rhythm of peddling a bicycle, and Alex grins. They haven’t done this in years.

  “It’s good to see you like this again,” Vinny says.

  “Like what?”

  “Like you.”

  The words sink in, comforting, and Alex nods. “I think I’m starting to feel like myself again.” She leans her head back against the wall. “You were right.”

  “About what?”

  Alex closes her eyes, sees Charlee’s smile in the dim bedroom light, feels her hands on her skin. She takes a deep breath and lets it out in a slow, easy stream. “I finally got to the air.”

  “What do you think about this piece?”

  As she looked the painting over, Alex tilted her head. “I’m not sure.”

  “You don’t like it.” Charlee led her along to the next piece on display.

  They’d been at the indie art show for a little under an hour, and Charlee had loved every minute of it. Everything from the poetry readings to the dances to the various sculptures on display thrilled her, despite not all having been to her taste. She could tell that Alex had enjoyed herself as well, even though most of the paintings hadn’t been her style either.

  “I said I wasn’t sure, not that I didn’t like it.”

  “You say you aren’t sure when you don’t like something but don’t want to admit it,” Charlee said, looking over another piece by the same artist.

  The large room was mostly empty thanks to the interpretive dance performance taking place in the front room, so she didn’t feel rushed from piece to piece. She could linger at each one, properly absorb everything.

  “Fine.” Alex shrugged. “I didn’t like it.”

  Charlee steered her across the room to a wall of watercolors. “Oh,” she said, reaching up toward a large canvas painting. “This is beautiful. You see the way they did this? It’s actually really hard to—”

  She brushed her hand across the apparently unstable canvas and gasped so hard she choked as it wobbled and crashed to the floor at their feet. Charlee froze in place. The piece didn’t look damaged, from what she could see, but her heart still plummeted.

  She glanced around the room. They hadn’t drawn any attention to themselves, thankfully. The music playing over the speakers had masked the sound of the crash. Her face snapped to Alex’s. She gaped at her, unsure of what to do.

  Alex shrugged again. “Run,” she said.

  A second later, she grabbed Charlee’s hand and took off through the gallery. People startled around them as the two of them raced into the nearest room with a crowd, Alex shouting, “Sorry! Someone knocked over a painting. I think they went this way. I’ll catch them!”

  Unable to help herself, Charlee laughed out loud. Their hands were still entwined, and she let Alex pull her along. They shot out the nearest exit into the warm summer night air and bolted down the street, feet slapping against the pavement. When they reached their parked car, Alex used their momentum to spin Charlee around and pin her against the driver’s side door.

  Charlee giggled between gasps for air. Those bursts of silly spontaneity dizzied her in the best way, because Alex didn’t just give those pieces of herself away. She gave them only to the people who managed to wriggle their way into her heart. She gave them to Charlee because she loved her. Alex loved her. And it was a wild kind of love. A raw kind of love. Tender and vulnerable and strong.

  And so fucking free.

  As she calmed, she realized Alex wasn’t laughing at all but was simply looking at her, lips stretching around a wide smile. Her eyes shone bright in the moonlight.

  “What?” Charlee reached up to tuck an errant hair behind Alex’s ear. “What is it?”

  “Your laugh.”

  “What about it?”

  “It makes me feel good.” She leaned into Charlee. Her warm breath and the look in her eyes made Charlee’s stomach swoop and stir. “It makes everything feel so good.”


  Alex leaned in farther, touched her lips to Charlee’s. It was a gentle kiss, soft and barely there, but Charlee felt it everywhere.

  “This.” She breathed against Alex’s lips, the heat of the night licking at their flesh and Charlee’s body thrumming. “This makes me feel good.”

  She kissed Alex soundly, deeply.

  “You make me feel so alive.”

  A gust of cold wind blows in, and Charlee is tired, but her heart jumps at the sight of Alex closing the gallery door behind her, cheeks reddened from the bitter wind, and hair wild around her face. She suddenly feels wide awake.

  “Hey,” she says as Alex stomps her shoes on the doormat, clumps of snow falling from the soles.

  Alex smiles at her, simple and small, and Charlee’s heart leaps again. “Hi.”

  “It’s late.” Charlee checks her watch. “Really late. Wow. How was the banquet?”

  “Mm.” Alex nods. “It went well. One of the servers cut her hand open and had to go to the emergency room, but other than that, it went smoothly.” With a yawn, she crosses the room. “I went by the loft, but you weren’t there. Thought I might find you here.”

  They hover in front of one another as if they aren’t quite sure what to do, and Charlee feels like a teenager again, following the cute girl with the temper into a private study room. There’s a grin on her face. Her stomach is in knots. She feels like they’re brand new again.

  “I’ve been packing all day.” Charlee leans her back against an empty half wall. “Several pieces are going out tomorrow, so I’ve been getting those ready for shipment and trying to figure out which pieces to put up in their places. Once I get all that out of the way, each new piece will need a title card, and then, of course, some pieces will need special assists, so I’ll have to get Cam in to look at—”

  She stops when she realizes Alex’s small smile has grown into something nearly unrestrained. She laughs and swipes her hand through her messy hair. “What?”

  Alex shoves her hands into her coat pockets. She gives a little shake of her head. “I’ve really missed this.”

  “What? Me talking about packaging and placement?”