Above The Line [Ch.4]

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— 4. Mise en Scène —

Saturday morning found the Briton wide awake to greet the sun as always. Arthur was in the habit, ever since a very young age, of rising when others in the ever-partying movie industry was likely to go to bed. It had started from a desire to beat his brothers to the Christmas presents and the biggest pancakes at breakfast, but had soon developed into a full-blown habit that he could not get rid of—not that he tried. Arthur was in possession of a wide variety of hard habits, all of which he intended very much to keep.

After taking his small breakfast of a cup of tea and an English muffin (which he thought was a great bastardization of true English breakfast fare), Arthur readied himself for a relaxing day of reading, baths and perhaps a little light jog around the area. However, as he passed by the mirror on his way upstairs, the sight of himself stopped Arthur in his tracks.

It wasn't that he looked bad, per se, or that he had a terrible sense of fashion. In Arthur's opinion, he had quite a great flare for style, actually, what with his knowledge of color and all. His dark, near-black trousers hugged his legs quite closely, matching well with his green pocket scarf and subtle cream-colored shirt. On most days, Arthur considered this to be very well dressed indeed. The only problem was that tomorrow would be no ordinary day, and standing next to Alfred Jones, Arthur was sure he'd look like some pitiful pauper in anything he currently owned.

The artist examined himself a bit more in front of the mirror before he began to feel foolish. Here he was, on a perfectly good morning, strutting back and forth contemplatively in front of a reflective surface as if he were some shallow actor far too obsessed with his image. He was being exactly who he had thought Alfred Jones might have been, before Arthur had had the privilege—err, misfortune; definitely misfortune—to meet the man himself.

With an exasperated sigh, the artist went up to his room and flung open his closet doors. As foolish as he felt now, caring about how he would look tomorrow, Arthur was sure he'd feel even more foolish tomorrow if he were complacent now. Arthur had no idea what tomorrow would bring, but he would not allow himself to be outshone by any actor, least of all one four years his junior.

The inside of the artist's closet was surprisingly organized. Most people of the creative flare tended to live very messy lives, in Arthur's opinion. He had seen their palettes, had had a chance to view their bags and examine their makeup kits. Most of them were messy to the point of distasteful, and Arthur had always walked away from those situations with a vague sense of smugness and superiority at his neater way of living. He took whatever victories that came his way, no matter how trivial; such was the pettiness of competition in Hollywood.

It was easy for Arthur to quickly rummage through his clothing to find that he really had nothing he deemed suitable for a... a "date" with Alfred, for lack of a better word. Arthur had casual clothing, like the sort that he was wearing now, and then he had business clothing, of the suit and tie variety. Then there was a section of his closet devoted specifically to award shows and the red carpet, though he rarely got a chance to use those. People didn't exactly ask for makeup artists to walk about and smile for the cameras, and though Arthur got asked more than most due to his stellar reputation, it was still a measly amount of only about once or twice a year.

Still, the Briton didn't mind that. He liked living his quiet life tucked away in a modest home. If anyone entered this house right now, they probably couldn't tell that he had a steady income that most would consider quite well-off. They'd probably think that he was living off of some clerk desk job with support from his family on the side. That is until they saw his makeup collection—at which point they'd honestly probably think him just the same, except now with an added color and beauty obsession that bordered upon the unhealthy.

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