A Million Ways To Spend Our Time

Part 5: A Fool's Dream And A Monkey In The Wrench

Jim got up to go to the restroom, also not finding their conversation amicable. Robby took the seat next to Dorothy. "Who cares whether she likes Jim? Everybody likes Jim." He began to look over his menu. "Oh come on. So she probably likes the band and thinks he's attractive. A lot of people do. But, I don't take her for some kind of homewrecker. She's a nice, young and respectable girl. And a damn good artist," Ray retorted." Regardless of her feelings she wouldn't purposely cause trouble," Dorothy chimed in.

After putting in Jim's order, I returned back to the table where Jim was still absent. "Did you guys pick anything?" John settled on beef enchiladas, while Robby asked for shrimp tacos. John began to tease him over his order, shaking his head as he spoke. "Wow, Robby. All the way from fish tacos to shrimp tacos. What a change." Robby looked up at him and shrugged his shoulders. "Hey man, they're good."

I held back laughter listening to the guys bicker. It was humbling to see them act innocent and playful like regular people, and for them to have problems like normal people did. I went back towards the kitchen to put the rest of the orders in. On the way there, I saw Jim exiting the bathroom, still not looking too pleased. Nevertheless, he stopped and looked up at me. "Did you still want to show Ray those paintings?" "Oh, yeah. I'm glad you mentioned that. I almost forgot. The only problem is I can't really leave the building." "I can go out and get them for you if you want. Beats going back over there for a few minutes." I tried not to show my level of inner surprise. "I guess so." I handed him my keys, trying to ignore the small voice in the back of my head reminding me how dangerous such a thing could be to do with someone I hardly knew. "Don't worry about me going anywhere. I've got a Shelby GT500." With that, he turned around and walked out the door towards my car. I could only assume he remembered which car I had from that one night we were at Ray's, making a mental note that he had serious observation to detail.

I resumed my typical duties such as greeting other customers, communicating with the other workers about orders, and trying not to stare at the clock in hopes it would move faster. When I got my next spare moment, I noticed that Jim had comeback in with two of my potential masterpieces. For the living room I had created a scenery of a pathway surrounded by lemon trees, with the contrast of the light-blue sky versus the bright yellows of the fruits among the varying shades of green in the leaves. The pathway was a faded yet blonde-colored dirt, somewhere between a tan and yellow but not too strong. I was trying to decide if it needed more background scenery or any black outlining around the lemons or in the leaves, or if I should even add shades of orange to the lemons and to the dirt? To the sky? So many possibilities.

For the other painting, which I had imagined being in a bathroom or a spare room, I had composed a scenery of a glass vase of pink and white tulips, sitting on a table which had a white tablecloth over it. The exposed wall next to the table was a pastel purple with white trim, and I even added shades of light and dark I imagined coming in through a nearby window. I loved the flowers, but wondered if I needed to find some way to balance the green of the stems more somewhere, or even the purple of the wall.

Dorothy was loving the tulip painting, and together we decided to add the vine and flower of a pink mandevilla on one of the sides of the purple walls, and to also add white and purple tulips to the vase. Ray began brainstorming about having a painting the size of the whole wall of the lemon trees (if not on the wall itself) in the living room, and Dorothy reminded him that the walls where they lived were not going to be painted. However, I was given larger size dimensions for my final canvas, and agreed to make an even larger version without any added orange and more black outlining around the lemons and leaves. I was stoked, and very pleased that they found them amusing. Jim found the paintings artistic and surreal, and wondered what he would think of them high or on acid. Robby grinned at the sight of them, describing them as "neat" while he imagined people walking down this path trying to grab at all the lemons (particularly their children). John rolled his eyes and scoffed at Robby's imagery, and informed me that I had a very artistic flair and structure to my work. Now that I knew more of what to do, I couldn't be more inspired. I wanted desperately to try to paint that night, even if it meant losing sleep.