The Mentor

Chapter 22

I stayed with Kyle that night. We didn't end up doing anything more than we'd done earlier. He just held me and we both ended up falling asleep with the TV on. We sketched out some stuff together for the pinup elimination tattoo but it was difficult. I had a hard time drawing anatomy, especially that small. Faces, specifically, were my biggest issue. I could not draw them on a small scale. Kyle didn't do many pinups at his shop at home either. He was just as worried as I was.
I woke up the next morning and Kyle was already up at the desk drawing.

"Good morning..." I mumbled, sleepily.

"Hey, good morning." Kyle said softly.

He came back over to the bed and climbed under the covers with me, pulling me close. I always felt so safe with him. He was tall and strong, and I always felt protected from any insults or physical altercations when he was around.

He kissed my head and stayed with me for a little bit before getting up to go back to drawing. I played on my phone for a little while.

"Oh my fucking god!" He yelled, causing me to jump.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"I can't draw this shit correctly. I can never do details this fucking small." He grumbled, slamming his hands on the desk.

I sat up and held out my arms

"Come here" I whispered.

He walked over and crawled into my arms, burying his face in my breast.

I played with his hair a little to try to calm him down, it seemed to work whenever he was upset.

"Where would I be without you, Jamie?" He sighed.

"Probably back in Flint at the county jail because of those anger issues." I joked.

He laughed.

I got up and pulled up a chair next to him. I drew up some of my own stuff and we decided to go in with what we had and hope for the best.

We got to the shop and the usual script and directions came from Dave and the others. Kyle would be allowed to help me, but I would have to do the tattoo entirely on my own.

Kyle and I were assigned to a man who wanted a woman on roller skates. Kelly got to choose our canvas. We didn't get the hardest one out there, but a pinup is hard nonetheless
.
I was really stressing about the drawing. Kyle came up behind me and tried to help as best he could. The canvas seemed pretty into what we had, so I just decided to give it to him. I got up and walked over to the stencil maker. I was all flustered.
As fate would have it, the stupid machine wasn't taking the drawing. I backed up and flattened out the stupid paper and eventually forced the machine to take it. I bent over to hold the paper in place better and bumped my butt into something behind me.

"Shit. That's embarrassing." I thought

"Shit, I'm sorry..." I said awkwardly, squeezing my eyes shut out of embarrassment and sucking my teeth.

"I'm not complaining." I heard a deep voice say.

I immediately relaxed and sighed. It was Kyle. I turned around to face him.

"Sorry, I thought you were someone else. Would've been embarrassing if I booty bumped Oliver or something." I chuckled awkwardly.

"I am not complaining at all." Kyle reassured, placing his hands on my hips for a moment.

He winked at me before heading back to our station.

The stencil maker took my dumb drawing and I headed back over and started tattooing. I was not having a good time. I had to sit funny with my back arched leaning in close as hell to get all the stupid details in. Kyle noticed something was wrong.