“Why don’t we just talk for a while?”

“Is this cause I ran out of steam and stopped trying to get to know you? Honestly, if it were anyone else I’d say they knew enough about me already.” Cheryl groaned. “But I’m sure you’re worth keeping around, with a miracle like that between your legs.”

“Right, so… why’d you seek me out in the first place…?” he asked Ann. “I know it’s cause you saw my hard-on at work, but why look for something like that in the first place?”

“Wait, you said you found him because he had an erection in your store…” the nose-ringed woman’s eyes darted, until they widened and started staring at her ex. “You grabbed one of your employees!?”

She sighed “Okay, it’s a lot better than what you’re making it out to be. Clearly he’s into it, if he’s not calling the police right now. Neither of us could physically stop him at this point! That counts for something, right?”

The immobile woman started to yell “Fuck, this is why we keep breaking up, Annie! You never think about anyone besides yourself!”

“Excuse me!? I give you cash to put on your shows, at a loss I’ll remind you, and I don’t think about other people!? A-Are you supposed to be any better than that!? What was that shit I heard about you making your students watch for 40% of their final grade!?” It was a little surreal hearing them argue like this while they couldn’t move a muscle below the neck.

“That’s different, I give them vouchers for a free seat at the beginning of the term!” Cheryl elaborated. “And they have to turn in a full page’s worth of notes! Why do you think there’s so many audience participation moments, I’m testing their retention of the concepts I teach!”

“Um…” Leonard interjected, very much in the middle of them both figuratively and literally. “I-If it’s supposed to be a t-test, why not just keep it to your students…? M-Make an occasion of it…? I was mostly lost, I’m not gonna lie…”

“No, it’s supposed to be a test of how well they can analyze real art, the kind that anyone can enjoy.” she continued. “I-I conceived of it as a real artistic expression, not just a damned teaching aide.” Suddenly her reaction to him calling a particular section actually beautiful made a lot more sense.

“You haven’t made real art in years.” Ann spat. “When’s the last time you picked up a brush, huh? Put paint to canvas?”

“That work was banal, and I deserve to put out better pieces than clumsy two-dimensional drivel…!”

“Wait, you made paintings?” Lenny asked.

Ann explained “The best paintings. Oh, they were wonderful…! It’s how we met, one day at this college exhibition. I wanted somewhere to go to skip out on a class cause I knew a quiz was coming that I didn’t study for—“

“I’m still not sure the professor would’ve let you take another try if he saw how you spent your ‘sick day’.” Cheryl chuckled.

“Tanaka’s a sweetheart, he would’ve understood.” Ann defended. “Anyways, so I’m walking through, looking at all these drawings and sculptures. Acting all fancy and junk, like ‘Oh, yes, the purple symbolizes the grief of the human condition’, all the while I’m eating a burrito I got from the mess hall. Funny shit, right?”

“The mess hall? You told me it was from a nice place.”

“They make a mean burrito, haven’t you had one of theirs?”

“No, I have standards.”

“Alright, fuck you. Anyways, I’m walking and fake-appreciating, one’s got a guy eating his own arm so I say shit like ‘How viscerally meaningful’, but then…” she breathes. “I see this square canvas. It’s got like, three shapes on it, max. A squiggly line, a triangle, and an ‘X’.”

“This woman… I see her staring at some bullshit I cranked out the night before cause I couldn’t think of anything and cried myself to sleep, and I decide to ask her out that same day… Fuck, what’s wrong with me…” Cheryl mutters.

“N-No, I think it’s a b-beautiful sto—“ Lenny interjects, before shouting “Wait, it’s that painting!? The one in your office on the wall behind your desk!?”

“You kept it!? You piece of shit, I’ll kill you!”

“You clearly didn’t want any part of it, why shouldn’t I have a memento of the last good relationship I had!?”

“What the—I burned it after you moved out in an act of catharsis, do you understand what that means!? It means before everything went to shit, you took the thing that brought us together and swapped it for a copy!”

“I didn’t swap it! I… I copied it. I bought some paints and a canvas, and after I left I made one like how I remembered.” Ann admits. “It looks like shit, that’s why I put it behind my chair. I thought it’d make me feel better but it just made me feel shittier.”

“… fuck.”

Leonard was growing increasingly uncomfortable. “C-Can I go…?”