Devil's House

Cinnamon Roll Orgies

Chester wasn't used to hanging up women's clothes, but he was still having fun as he traveled from the closet to the bed in the spare room, where Talinda was sitting, her suitcase open beside her. Chester picked up a pink, lacy top next and held it up against himself. "What do you think?" he asked with an ornery smile.

Talinda rolled her eyes before taking another sip from her oversized water bottle. "I'm sorry, Chester, but you don't have the chest for that top." She laughed at the offended look on Chester's face, before he turned around in a huff and went to hang it up in her closet. "You know," she said as she watched him take great care to hang the blouse, "I really think you've stepped your wardrobe up lately." She pointed at his loose fitting gray dress pants and the short-sleeved blue and gray button up he had on. "You used to be mister ripped jeans and t-shirts."

Chester turned away from the closet to look over his outfit. Talinda wasn't wrong. Slowly, over the last handful of months, he'd been trying to dress a little more professionally for work. "Thanks, and yeah, I have," he confessed as he picked at the front of his shirt. "I'm not a model anymore. I kinda have an office job now, and so I'm trying to look the part."

Talinda watched as Chester pushed his black framed glasses up on his nose. "You do," she encouraged. "You always looked good in the tight designer jeans, but this look suits you better. It's more mature."

That was nice to hear. Instead of grabbing the next piece of clothing to be hung up, Chester sat down on the bed, on the other side of the open suitcase. "Thanks, T. I appreciate that. I'm the youngest one on the creative team and I'm the only one that doesn't have a college degree of some sort." He shrugged his shoulders. "They call me a kid sometimes," he admitted with a frown.

Chester didn't have to spell it out for Talinda to understand. She'd been around him long enough to pick up on the importance and meaning of what wasn't said, just as much as what was. She reached across her suitcase to give his bicep a little squeeze. "Don't let that get to you. I think they're just intimidated by you."

Chester looked over to see the encouraging look on Talinda's face. "Really? But I'm not intimidating." He dropped his eyes. "I've always been so small."

"I don't mean it that way," Talinda assured him. "I'm talking about professionally. You're the first one Forrest has added to the creative team in years, and you came out of the modeling world. Your perspective is different, which is what Forrest was going for. They see how much faith and confidence he has in you, despite your lack of degrees, and I think that intimidates them."

That made Chester smile. It was nice to hear that his boss had faith in him, even though in a general sense, Chester already knew that. It was still a boost to hear it from Talinda's lips. "Thanks," he said again. "I go into work every day thinking about how I don't want to let him down."

"You do no such thing, Chester," Talinda told him immediately. "Look at what's happening now." She flung her hand toward the open closet door. "You're going to New York in my place and I'm staying here. Being pregnant."

"T, you know Forrest would rather have you there. It's hard being you on these trips," Chester confessed, wrinkling his nose and popping up his upper lip in a snarl. "It's a lot more fun being a model when we go out of town. Ry's going to get to do all the things and I'm going to have your clipboard."

Talinda laughed as she squeezed Chester's arm again. "I think Forrest is very thankful that you're so able to float between roles at work. Not everyone can do that. You're like the Jack Of All Trades at Score." She smiled at him, and she was relieved to see him smile back. She could only hope that one day, Chester would see his worth to the people around him. "Anyway," she said, picking up a black pair of stretch pants from the suitcase and handing them to Chester, "can you believe that Ryan's getting to do a shoot in New York? His second one since being back and he got invited to be a part of the New York show for Ezra Gold."