The next few sculptures were made from old cans, bottles, and wine corks. And then we got to one that I had to look at twice.

“Are those?”

“Yep,” Ryder said, reading the card under the canvas.

It was a collage. Of condom wrappers. Ripped condom wrappers.

“I wanted to use old condoms, but figured that might not be sanitary,” a voice said behind us as we leaned in close to inspect the condom collage.

I turned to find a guy with an impressive black moustache that must have been waxed recently, platinum blonde hair, and a septum piercing in his nose.

“Hey, man. The place looks fantastic,” Ryder said, giving the guy a hug. “Sloane, this is the artist, Gilbert Cunningham.”

Gilbert held his hand out. “Gil,” he said as we shook. He had the undeniable air of cool that only a few people can pull off. It was a mix of confidence and knowing exactly who you are and what you want the world to see about you.

“Nice to meet you, your stuff is great.”

He nodded his head in my direction. “Why thank you, lovely lady. You never know how your work is going to be received. It’s nice to hear someone else gets it.” Well, I didn’t know if I “got it,” but it was cool.

Someone called Gil’s name and he excused himself.

“You’ve got cool friends, Ryder. I like him.” We wandered some more around the gallery then finally made it to the food table. I was starving.

“I always wished I was good at art, or at something,” Ryder said, popping a stuffed mushroom into his mouth.

“But if you’re really good at something, then you kind of have to do it. There’s not a whole lot of choice.” I’d always loved clothes and fashion, and known that was what I’d go into when I grew up. But I’d always wondered what I would have done if I wasn’t good at that. That would have been exciting. An adventure.

“But if you’re good at nothing? Now that’s a bitch,” Ryder said, stealing the last mushroom off the tiny plate I’d been holding.

“You’re not good at nothing, Ryder. I’m sure you have many talents that you just haven’t discovered yet.”

He wiggled his eyebrows at me. “Oh, yeah? You want to try discovering with me?”

I was taken aback by the comment and gave him a puzzled look. “I thought you weren’t going to be like that tonight. That’s something a person on a date might say,” I said, grabbing a few more of the mushrooms.

“Huh. Guess I couldn’t do it anymore. That dinner the other night? That was brutal.”

“Oh, really? So that was all an act?”

“Yup. How’d I do?”

I snorted into my champagne. I was starting to get a bit tipsy. “Well, seeing as how your brother didn’t buy it for a second, I’d say you need more acting lessons.”

“Really? Shit. Guess that’s out as a career choice.” Definitely. He ran his hand down the side of his face, one finger tracing his scar. I’d never asked him about it. There were a lot of things I never asked Ryder about.

“Yeah, it was a nice try. But you definitely failed. So I wouldn’t even bother in the future.” Plus, I liked him flirting with me.

“Oh, I see. So you like when I flirt with you?” Crap. I didn’t mean to make it sound like that.

“No, but you not flirting with anyone is weird. You flirt with everyone.”

He threw his head back and laughed. “Yeah, I do.”

I shook my head at him and stuffed my face with tiny hors d’oeuvres as we wandered through the rest of the gallery. I liked going through twice so I made sure that I saw everything. Plus, I wanted this to last as long as possible, this not-a-date thing with Ryder.

We made three rounds of the gallery, stopping to chat with Gil about his work. He talked about how he found all the objects for his show at junkyards and told stories about his adventures in dump picking and dumpster diving. He was called away again, and I wondered if we should call it a night.

“Hey, so there’s this really cool bar just down the street from here. They serve desserts and booze, and it’s really cool inside. A guy I work with sometimes tends bar there. Want to go?” Booze and cupcakes? Fucking fantastic.

Tags: Chelsea M. Cameron Erotic
Source: readsnovelonline.net