Sketching Fruit

         “Fine.”
         “Really? Are you sure?”
         “I said fine.”
         Allison returned to her attention to the fruit bowl sketch to recapture her concentration. She could feel Jason hovering and she added a spot to the banana that wasn’t on the original. Finally he left the studio and she breathed a little easier.
         Seriously, Jason, she thought as she tilted her head to the side and examined the three dimensionality the banana’s edge, just text me next time. That would be so much faster than the lengthy build-up with the pleading looks and the hesitation over the tone of her response. She could say “fine” in a text message much faster and without this examination of her underlying meaning.
         Just, fine.
         Allison focused on the banana ridges as they disappeared into the bunch of grapes, finding where each ended and where they continued in the spaces between. She chose a lighter pencil and worked each line into the openings, careful to maintain the continuity of the unseen curvature.
         Then she glanced up at the apple and cursed.
         The sun in the window had moved just enough since she’d sketched the apple that the shadows no longer matched the shadows on the banana. Stupid Jason! Stupid Allison for getting distracted!
         She tossed her pencils in the tray, jumped off her stool, paced the length of the studio, then went and grabbed her phone.
         “Just tell me something,” she texted to Jason.
         “What?” he replied instantly.
         “What time?”
         “Movie starts at 7:50, dinner about 6:30, so pick you up at six?”
         “Fine.”

[260 words]