He finished cleaning his brushes and the palette, then wiped his hands and walked over to where she lay. He stood next to the bed, looking down at his nude model. He took off his shirt, and as he started to unbuckle his belt, she asked, “Put this out for me first, will you?” handing him her cigarette.
He took a puff as he walked over to an ashtray and snuffed it out. He kicked off his shoes, and returned to the bed. Terry moved over and he lay beside her, on his back She cuddled up to him, crushing her breasts against his arm. Her hand stroked the hair on his chest, then lowered her hand, took a hold of him, making him hard.
He turned toward her, fondled her breast, and he kissed her. His tongue virtually fell into the cavity that was her eagerly awaiting mouth.
About an hour later, when they had finished making love, Terry asked, ”What time is it?”
“I dunno, probably nine-thirty, ten.”
“Why don’t you break down and buy a watch some day?”
“Yeah, maybe I will,” he said as he lit a cigarette.
“Well, I guess I had better get dressed, seeing as how I’ve been paid for the evening. Same time tomorrow ?” she asked .
“What is tomorrow, Friday?”
“Yes it is.”
“O.K. Same time.”
“Good. You do pay your model so well.”
“Glad you like it. The nice part of this kind of payment, no taxes, and we both benefit.”
“You’ve got that right.” She agreed.
He lay there as she finished dressing. She came over and kissed him goodbye. “Don’t get up. I’ll let myself out. Bye—see you about Five-thirty tomorrow evening.”
“Yeah. See you then,” he said, making no effort to get up.
He didn’t really mean to use women, it just worked out that way sometimes. Actually he wasn’t being impolite, not seeing her to the door, he was just so deep in thought that he didn’t even know she had left. How many times was he plotting a painting in his head, and be completely oblivious t anyone or anything around him? This often times made people think he just didn’t care, or that he used people.
This really was not true, it’s just that, like many artists, Arnie constantly had a compulsion to paint. Frequently, while in the middle of one painting, he would be mentally laying out another and another. He sometimes had three or four paintings in the works and before finishing all of them he would get another one started. He painted what he wanted, rarely what someone else dictated. He would say, “If someone tells me what to paint, it aint my creation, it’s not from me.” These he painted only when he became short of funds, which seemed to be becoming more and more frequent lately.