“But theirs are nowhere near as bad as mine.”
He leans in and whispers. “Pips, did you take a look at Finky’s? I can’t tell if his wife has three eyes or if that thing in the middle of her face is supposed to be a nose.” I snort and cover my mouth. “Trust me, it’s not going to be as bad as that.”
“Oh, it’s bad. Plus, you’re good at drawing. This isn’t fair.”
“I’m not good at using paint. This isn’t my medium, so I struggled quite a bit.”
That eases my worry. “You promise?”
“Yeah, I mean frankly, when I show you this, I’m going to ask for forgiveness, because I don’t want you thinking that this is how I truly see you. You’re so much prettier than what I have on this canvas.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, Pips.” He tugs on his hair. “Actually, maybe we should try again.”
“No,” I say, holding out my arm. “We said we would show each other. So we have to show each other.”
“Okay. You go first.”
I stare down at the ten-by-ten canvas in front of me and then back up at Wilder. His eyes are too far apart and way too wide, his nostrils are way too prominent, and I used black paint to outline each individual tooth, which was a bad mistake. But his lip ring, that looks pretty good. And I think I did a decent job on his hair.
Maybe it’s not too bad.
I lift the canvas and turn it toward him. I watch his expression as he takes it all in, his eyes curious, his lip quivering.
“Are you about to laugh?” I ask.
“What? No…” His lip tilts up.
“Wilder,” I admonish.
“What? I’m not laughing. I’m…I’m observing.”
“You’re going to laugh.”
“No, I’m just…” He sits back and folds his arms. “I’m trying to decide if you took creative freedom with my nostrils or not.”
I place the canvas back on my mini easel and fold my arms. “If you think you’re that much better, show me what you have.”
He looks at his picture, winces, and then picks it up. Ready to bust out in laughter at what he painted, I steel myself, only for him to turn the canvas around, revealing a very real caricature painting of me.
And sure, it’s a cartoon, but it very much resembles every piece of me…even hard nipples.
My mouth falls open as he says, “I know, could be better. I don’t think I captured just how soft your lips are, and I probably should have added more volume to your hair, but that ass and those tits, I think I nailed them.”
I stare at the picture, mesmerized by his talent. He actually did that. Drew that. It looks just like me.
“Wilder, you lied to me.”
“What?” His brow genuinely creases. “No, I didn’t. I told you you’re more beautiful than this, and you are. I haven’t done caricature art in a long time, so I struggled a bit with it. I think I could have done a much better job if I was using charcoal or even a pencil. This paint, it was hard to work with.”
“Hard to work with. You added shading. You mixed colors so you could do shading.”
“I had to make sure people knew I included your hard nipples. That’s a very important feature of yours.”
I shake my head. “You tricked me.”
“What? No. Babe, yours is way better.”
