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the girl beside her informed her of the artist who created the work. she clearly liked the piece and ximena couldn’t find it in her heart to outwardly disagree. she nodded kindly instead. “i can only imagine...” she added, thinking about everything she saw just on the way up to her desk this morning. “i may be running from my coworkers, so maybe i’ll have a chance to find some good ones.” she spoke sweetly. “i’m ximena.” she let out matter of factly.

as someone with a degree in visual arts , athena often found herself appreciating the artwork around the building. sure , some of it wasn’t in her taste , but she always put herself in the artist’s shoes to understand what aesthetic they were going for. seeing an unfamiliar face staring down a piece of artwork let her know that they were obviously new. she could practically sense that they were an intern , so her dark eyes automatically rolled at their comment.  “    only people with a keen eye can appreciate such work. staring at it for more than ( 30 ) seconds isn’t going to change your lack of capacity for good art.    ”

ximena heard an all too familiar voice speaking to her. she turned on her heels toward a person she remembered very clearly from her time in school. he had a friendly offering of coffee in hand, she smiled immediately taking it from him. she leaned into the side of his cheek with hers mimicking a kissing noise. she often greeted family and friends this way. “dios mío, no sabía que estás aquí también!” she answered back, speaking rather quickly. the last person she was expecting to see was him, it had definitely been at least a year. “clearly...” she added rolling her eyes at the painting. wait, she thought, did he say personally? “did you say personally?” she added again out loud.

ximena noticed the immediate change of energy from the person. she didn’t like it. her posture straightened as she found herself feeling spoken down to. she also thought it was kind of funny how some stranger had decided himself superior over something as silly as some bad painting. “maybe.” her neck rolling a bit with more blatant attitude. as he continued ximena tried her best to hide a chuckle. “oh, someone’s a bit pretentious aren’t they?” her eyes opening wide with shock as a smile spread across her face and she exhaled sharply. “good to know you haven’t let it get to your head.” she nodded.

𝐉𝐔𝐃𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐊𝐄𝐃 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍 𝐀𝐓 𝐇𝐄𝐑, 𝐀𝐌𝐔𝐒𝐄𝐃. “ come on, ” he tried bribing, grin as wide as it always was, “ everyone believes in something. ” he was religious, yes, but he also firmly believed the pencil he’d been using since undergrad was his own little talisman. he crossed his arms as he looked back at the painting, all weird brush strokes and figurines in the bottom corners. “ you’ve gotta’ at least avoid the cracks on the sidewalk, right ? ”

despite being an engineer, chasen wasn’t a very detail-oriented person. he certainly wasn’t an artistic person either, so maybe he wasn’t the best judge when it came to paintings––but, c’mon, that was just objectively vomit-inducing. “it just really screams corporate oppression, doesn’t it? personally, i gotta say i’m a fan of abstract ‘cause then you can make it a game of ‘where’s the penis?’”  

every so often, lindsey liked to get up and walk around the office, stretch her legs, relax her eyes. she would take a breather and always end up feeling so much better when she got back to her desk. masters wasn’t a terribly decorated building, and she always loved the small things that were put around the office. there was one particular painting, though… “yeah, i know,” she agreed, scrunching her nose up. “i try not to say anything about it, but- yeah.“

benjamin didn’t often have the time to stand around and ponder the office artwork, so when he saw someone offering their opinion on a painting used on the cover of his first major book with the company, he made his way over. she was no one who he had met before, he had quite the memory for faces, which meant they were clearly a new employee and he probably shouldn’t bark at them to get back to work. but then again, if his schedule was too busy to admire paintings, then this new girl shouldn’t have time to, either. he stood for a moment in silence until he heard her speak, then crossed his arms and looked over at her, “ is ‘standing in front of artwork’ part of your job description or are you actively slacking off ? ” he asked without looking at her, unsure if it actually mattered to him whether or not she was working when he had clients to call and a trashed apartment to fix.

ximena noticed the person to next to her who asked for further explanation. a creative, definitely, she thought. unfortunately, a knack for visual artistry was not one of ximena’s skills. she appreciated art of course, but she couldn’t tell the good from the bad. she crossed her arms softly with a look of agitation on her face, trying to think of a way to describe it. “to be fair, this isn’t my area of expertise... who am i to say if something is good or bad?” she answered matter of factly. she wasn’t sure if it was a good answer or not, but it’s the first thing that came to mind. “i’m more of an abstract person, it doesn’t have to have a meaning...” she spoke informatively. ximena liked abstract art because it always caught her attention, it’s always something you’ve never seen before.

ximena’s head tilted upwards as she quickly made eye contact with the taller figure beside her. he seemed very friendly enough, kindly acknowledging her presence with a thoughtful reply.  she looked back to the painting and raised an eyebrow; she couldn’t help but smirk a bit, “that sounds about right. only the incredibly gullible would believe that.” ximena was never a superstitious person. she was a firm believer in manifesting your own desire. if you work hard to make it happen, you wouldn’t need luck. “but i’m not particularly superstitious myself.” she finished.