Bare Art Read Free

You might like it.”
    Pete wrinkled his nose and shook his head. “Nah.”
    “Your brother has seen me naked a bunch of times. I think the novelty is even starting to wear off.”
    Pete snorted. “Don’t count on it.” He could picture them as old men, bored in a nursing home, and Matt still talking about Claire’s perfect body.
    Claire laughed. “My point is: would you like to look? Maybe then you can riposte when Matt asserts that I have the best ass ever.”
    “Why doesn’t it bother you more that he talks like that?”
    He heard her shrug. “It’s flattering.”
    “What if he tries to do more than talk?”
    Claire thought on that for a moment. “I think, for him, part of the appeal is that he knows I’d never sleep with him. He can look all he wants, but touching is forbidden.”
    “That’s probably why you shouldn’t let me look,” Pete said. “Looking equates to touching.”
    “I don’t know that I’d forbid anything, with you,” she said quietly. Pete held his breath for a moment. That was quite an offer, and one that he wasn’t sure he wanted to take. Claire made it sound that this wouldn’t be about evening the score with Matt, or about pushing the bounds of vulnerability in art. But there was also desire on her part, and he wasn’t sure that he could reciprocate it in a way that would be respectful to her. Besides, Claire was his roommate. Pete was a firm believer in not pissing where he ate.
    “Think about it,” Claire said. She stepped away, back to her easel. “While I paint, if you like. Then it’ll really be like being on display.”
    She picked up her brush, loaded it with paint, and began filling in the blank space under the bridge with craters. Empty ones.
    Pete thought it would be rude to leave. Walking out would be tantamount to throwing Claire’s offer back in her face, so he moved closer to the easel instead and watched her paint. She was making small, careful brushstrokes, each of them a soft tap against the canvas.
    He could touch her, he thought, and be polite about it. Maybe just once was enough to satisfy her. Pete reached out and laid his hand on the back of her head. Her hair was down, warm and soft. Matt said it was black, but he hadn’t mentioned that it ran all the way to the middle of her back. Pete’s hand didn’t stop when he reached the tips of her hair. It kept moving lower, down the curve at the small of her back until it rested at the top of her tailbone. An inch lower, and he’d cross the line into inappropriate territory .
    Pete moved back up to her hair, combing his fingers through it. Her hair behaved like warm silk. He followed a lock of it down her shoulder and along her forearm. The hair stopped just below where her elbow bent to balance her palate.
    “You like my hair?” she asked softly.
    “It’s longer than I thought it was.” Pete had heard it swishing when she moved, but most women had hair that did that.
    “I need to wash it,” Claire said.
    Pete didn’t think. He leaned forward and pressed his nose to the back of her head and inhaled her scent . She smelled like a woman, not like perfume or manufactured soap.
    “I don’t think you need to,” he whispered. He started to gather her hair in his hand for another sniff when he caught himself and let her go, embarrassed.
    “Keep looking,” she insisted. “It helps.”
    “What are you painting?” he asked, chagrined.
    “Craters,” Claire said. “What do you think made them?”
    “Accident.”
    “ Not fate?”
    “I think the universe is too indifferent by nature for fate to have a role.” Pete curled his fingers into fists to keep himself from touching her again.
    “Put your hands on my waist.”
    “What?”
    “You can rest your hands there and it won’t get in the way of my arm.” Claire was right handed. Pete was a lefty, and she knew this. He reached out, careful not to brush the skin below her waist, and settled his left hand opposite her stronger side. Her hipbone