broken eyes

TOUR

the art venue was only a few blocks away from modere's place and the walk only took a few minutes.

"it's so close, so i can't possibly get lost." he is pulled by moose, who was on a leash, one that i had secretly bought and mailed to modere.

"convenient," i walk behind them both, to modere's left.

traffic was quiet, and the light posts were turning on for the night. the autumnal breeze made the air cooler. calmer.

once arrived, modere carried moose in the venue, careful not to lose control over his almost uncontrollable pup.

"hold on, he should be here," modere stops in front of the entrance, standing there unmoving.

a long haired pale man wearing blue overalls and a grey sweatshirt with sneakers comes towards modere with arms outstretched. moose yaps excitedly at the man.

maybe because of his exciting outfit,
i think to myself.

i realize, dogs don't have color perception.

"hey man! moose, my doggy dog!" the man ruffles modere's curly locks as well as moose's.

the man turns to me, "who's this lovely lady?" he looks at me with grinning eyes, his dimpled cheeks stretching wide. he turns back to modere,"girlfriend? c'mon tell me she's you're girlfriend,"

modere smiles shyly, quickly changing the subject, "can you give us a tour? i wanted to show this place off," i pretend to not seem bothered, changing my mood so that i seemed calm.

my chest burned.

"oh, hermia, this is grant. grant this is my-" modere licks his lips in his struggle to finish his sentence. he clears his throat and looks down at his boots. moose licks his ear. "hermia." he completely scraps his sentence. he chews on his lips.

grant's eyebrows were sky high with interest. he crosses his arms against his chest, his hands in the space under his arms. rocking on the balls of his feet, he bites his cheek. "your hermia,"
modere opens his mouth to protest.
"yeah okay. well, let's get this tour started," grant turns and leads us into the building.

modere followed closely behind, dropping facts about every painting we passed by. sometimes he would let me trace my fingers against a few of them.

grant told me that he and modere helped curate the venue and that it was purely non profit. they would take in any painting from within the community.

"but sometimes people still give us money," grant explains.

"so we donate it to charities. any legit and respectable charity we can find." modere finishes tracing a painting of an ocean.

i nod, but he can't see, "cool,"

"yeah, pretty cool," modere leaves a lopsided grin for me, as he quickly gains pace with grant.

we spent about two hours talking about some of the stories that came with each work.

by the end of the tour my legs burned and my feet were sore.

"so," grant hands me a sheet of paperwork. "give us a nice review, did you like the tour? would you recommend me to any other tour goer, et cetera," modere interrupts the transaction, ripping the paper out of grant's hands.

"not necessary, at all," he holds moose in one arm, and his other hand rested firmly on grant's shoulder.

grant makes a small sigh. "yeah, okay dude." he smiles gently. his eyes held a mischievous light.

"wanna head back with us?" modere asks grant, supposedly in a whisper, but i heard it clearly.

grant lets the suggestion simmer. he looks at me and smirks. "i'll come by tomorrow. tonight is your night," he gestures to me, "you'll be over tomorrow right?" i nod. "cool." he winks to me, and modere couldn't see, but i just knew he felt the change in air.

we left grant to a new tour group, he told us that they might be the last group for the night. he loved his job.

i spent the night at modere's place, helping cook dinner-chicken alfredo, his and moose's favorite- and cleaning up. i had fell asleep on his couch after he went to bed. the couch sat in front of his large windows.

i faced towards the west, the sun had long set, and had started to rise on the east.

-----------------(grant)--------------------