Chapter Text
Cam liked how the ziplock bags he dug out of alley dumpsters made the dress on his newest painting pop. He and Artt had struggled to lay the canvas on an empty part of the bartop and found it more efficient to perch it against one of the bar stools. The client—some Lestat type with the brightest hair Cam ever had the misfortune of seeing—and every other asshole in the Breaker Box seemed enamored with it for better or worse. The only one who seemed unimpressed was Eddie Watts—not surprising. What did surprise Cam was the fact that Eddison fucking Watts worked in some speakeasy dive bar.
Cam could barely believe how much Lestat was paying for something constructed out of plastic bags still filled with bits of loose food, drugs, and liquids. Memoria had congratulated Cam on his way out of the gallery that morning. Artt had said that the painting’s ‘authenticity’ and ‘transgressiveness’ made it priceless. How many times in the past hour had someone called his choice in materials ‘a stroke of artistic genius?’ It was all bullshit—Cam was just broke and happened to be a damn good artist.
The hum of the Breaker Box made his ears ring. Cam wasn’t a recluse, but a popular bar like the Breaker Box tested every part of Cam’s patience. What was maybe worse than the dancers was Artt’s smooth voice, droning on and on about the symbolism of loose food and dried cum to Lestat. Cam tried to ignore how many times Eddie cast glares at him or the painting. He wasn’t even close to the bar—he stood on a ladder beside a flickering light. How could Eddie fix a light bulb while still finding moments to shame Cam for his choice in art materials? Cam got it. He knew Eddie didn’t want him imposing his art on whatever the fuck Eddie had built here. At least Lestat—his actual client—seemed to like the painting. Or love it, based on the way he looked at it.
Cam hadn’t used regular materials. The only traditional material he used was the black crayola markers to outline the woman. Cam had textured her curls with used condoms he found behind a sex shop. A mix of mud, rust, and spilled soda made the paint for her skin and background. The Zipplock bags had been glued to an outline of her figure, fluttering—albeit a bit stiffly—like velvet or silk around her figure. The dress opened at her soft stomach where Cam had used pieces of his hair to make her stretch marks and a cooked bean for her belly button. She hadn’t worn a dress when he first saw her; she wore a hoodie and pulled it down every time someone so much as glanced at her.
Maybe he didn’t remember anything else about her, but he remembered thinking a dress would suit her.
“No, Volt,” Eddie hissed like he was apparently still prone to doing. He wasn’t glaring at Cam anymore, but that was most likely because he was climbing down the ladder. “We are not hanging this on the wall.”
“Eddie,” Volt said. He was still looking at the painting, like it had single-handedly brought life to this punked-out old bar. Memoria loved to gossip and speculate about the handsome stranger who came into the art museum to see Cam’s work. She liked him. But she loved any man with dark clothes, smudged eyeliner, and black nail polish.
Cam had only seen Volt once, staring at a sculpture of the Virgin Mary made from melted-down bottle caps, trash liners, and thrown-out tubes of lipstick.
Eddie walked over towards them, before leaning against the bar right beside Volt. He scanned the painting up and down, and for a second his eyes widened when he saw the face.
“Just think about it?” Volt said, sounding almost hopeful. “I know it’s unconventional, but it matches the patterns in the carpet. And the lighting? You haven’t been to Memoria’s gallery—the room where she displays Cameron’s work is beautiful, Eddie.”
Eddie reached out and touched one of the bags on the woman’s dress. The powder slid to one side. He said, “There’s still coke in the bags.”
Volt tore his eyes away from Cam’s painting to glance at Eddie. Despite the heavy makeup meant to sharpen his eyes and give him the look of an apex predator, they turned soft. Widened like Eddie’s face held the answer to a life-altering question. He looked about ready to burn Cam’s painting if Eddie so much as scoffed one more time. Not that it mattered to Cam.
“It’s your bar, Volt,” Eddie said. He leaned away from the painting, grabbed a half-empty whiskey glass, and began to clean it. “Don’t let me stop you from hanging up useless trash.”
Cam winced.
“It’s your bar, as well, Eddie.”
Eddie laughed, but said nothing.
Cam got up off his seat. He needed a cigarette. When was Cam made the designated businessman? That was Memoria’s job, and yet she had fucked off to some other art show. Maybe she would find another artist. One who was better than Cam, and he’d be down one commission and gallery.
Volt murmured something and brought his hand to rest over Eddie’s, stopping him from washing the whiskey glass. So Eddie had a thing for showmen. That was new.
Eddie slammed the glass against the mahogany bar top.
A hush fell over the Breaker Box. People were staring, and Cam wanted nothing more than to leave. Eddie looked the same. Maybe more high-strung, but the two of them had never liked others.
Eddie broke the tension, storming towards Cam—who was minding his own goddamned business—and slamming his shoulder against Cam’s. He opened the door, not bothering to check to see if it closed all the way. It didn’t. Snowflakes blew in from the inky darkness, taking on the reds and blues of the dive bar.
Volt smiled at the patrons, said a few pretty words, and everyone went back to dancing, drinking, or anything else they did in a dive bar.
“When did he become so much of an asshole?” Cam muttered.
Artt, for all his grace, looked five seconds from dragging him out of the bar and to Memoria’s doorstep. He never did, because he was a coward who could kiss ass with the best of them, but never had the substance to back it up. Cam wondered what Artt’s reaction would be if he ever saw the amount of furry porn he sold online. Would Artt consider that ‘transgressive?’
“Eddie is just…” Volt said. He grabbed the glass that Eddie had left on the counter and twirled it in his hands so the fluorescent lights caught on a small crack now running through it.
“An asshole,” Cam said again.
That made Volt narrow his eyes.
“He’s stressed?” Artt suggested, coming up behind Cam, and placing one of his hands on his shoulder. A warning. Which Cam didn’t appreciate.
“I’m going to have to reject this painting,” Volt said. His eyes found their way back to the woman. Cam would have felt bad for Volt, but Cam was losing out on this month’s pay.
“I don’t take refunds,” Cam said.
“Memoria can offer you a refund,” Artt said at the same time.
Cam shoved Artt’s hand off of him. Of course, Artt wanted to call Memoria. Cam would let him. Let Memoria deal with whatever the fuck was going on in this shitty dive bar.
Cam made his way to the same door Eddie had, but less than a second later, Volt was in his way, looking down at Cam through his long eyelashes. Though they matched his almost luminescent hair—probably just a trick of the light on the white strands—he wore mascara to accentuate them. He looked like a star. Or maybe a vampire. Probably a vampire.
Volt said, “I don’t think Eddie wants company.”
“Right,” Cam said. So the fucker was trying to intimidate him. “You’re blocking the exit, Lestat.”
Volt blinked. Then he let out a low chuckle that somehow managed to be sexy. It was low, filled with something Cam couldn’t understand. Fuck, he wanted to see this fucker and Memoria interact.
Cam—with no patience for whatever the hell this Lestat knock-off was playing at—opened the door, and slipped out of the Breaker Box.
It was nearly midnight. A fluorescent sign spelled out ‘Breaker Box.’ Reds and blues illuminated the smoke from Eddie’s cigarette and cast a pretty haze on his trembling hands. Maybe it was the dim light, but out here, the bags under Eddie’s eyes looked deeper. He still wore gloves. Probably because he thought they meant he was clean. Was that why he was so against Cam’s art? Was it the materials? He didn’t want to touch trash? It pissed Cam the fuck off. Eddie wasn’t any better than him. Where Cam dug through the trash cans to make art, Eddie counted out Biktarvy every morning to prove that he was still clean.
“No need to worry about him—Cameron’s just intense, he won’t bother Eddie,” Artt said, coming up to them and once again placing his hand on Cam’s shoulder like he was some fucking chihuahua.
He shrugged Artt’s hand off of him again and stepped out of the door.
“Cameron!”
“I’ll walk back to my place. Don’t worry about it. Enjoy a beer. Or a whiskey sour or whatever the fuck Eddie’s specialty is these days.”
Eddie’s head turned, but Cam didn’t care about Eddie now that he was fucking around in a bar owned by some coiffed peacock. He wanted to get back to his apartment. Maybe jack-off, and maybe drink until he passed out in his tub.
“Cam!” Artt called after him, but he was already down the street.
When Cam got back to his apartment, Prince Pringle greeted him with two vicious paws on the door. Cam hated most people who tried to talk to him, but a raccoon with a knack for breaking into his apartment daily to ransack all the drawers and cabinets? Cam was in love.
He knelt, and let Prince Pringle all but throttle him with his entire twenty pounds of raccoon fluff. When Prince Pringle had discovered Cam allowed any amount of affection from the Prince, he had done away with any form of boundaries. Cam laughed when Prince Pringle’s grubby fingers went directly to his pocket, where Cam had saved a greasy napkin wrapped around five French fries he’d ordered from a local McDonald’s. They hadn’t been crispy even when the cashier tossed the bag at him, but Prince Pringle didn’t seem to care. He gobbled them in one vicious bite.
Cam touched the Prince’s head before walking off to the kitchen. The fridge light illuminated the open cabinets and torn-up cereal boxes strewn across his tiles. The pizza rolls that Cam kept in the freezer were scattered alongside several broken eggs, a box of raw pasta, and the desecrated remains of his ketchup.
He could have used the ketchup to paint the red mark on the woman’s wrist. She had that. He’d only seen it because she kept scratching her skin, and one point had bled. Ketchup dried into flakes, but the flakes would mimic the natural scabbing process. If he got the painting back, maybe he would add it.
Cam opened one of the cabinets and pulled out a half-filled bottle of whiskey. He took a swig and jumped up on the counter to watch Prince Pringle explore his newfound work of food art.
Prince Pringle, this apartment—all of it was his new normal. And though he had to keep a padlock on his art room, he liked this new normal. Sure, it was less fun than spending most of his days high on whatever he and Eddie managed to get their hands on, but at least he got an emotional support raccoon out of the whole thing. Maybe the Prince was not entirely legal—and sure, Cam had been telling his sponsor that Prince Pringle was a rabbit—but the point still stood.
His phone rang.
Cam answered, but said nothing.
The other line was silent. Maybe they were waiting for him to respond, but anyone who knew him had to know that Cam was never the one to talk first. Prince Pringle pawed at the ketchup, and when it got all over his paw, he licked it.
“I thought you died,” Eddie said. He sounded annoyed. “Fuck. Not what I meant.”
“No, Eddie. I didn’t die. I’m alive and making art out of condoms.”
“I meant how?”
Cam laughed at that. He pressed his phone between his shoulder and ear. Cam looked down at Prince Pringle, who crawled across the floor to one of the pizza rolls. He squished it. When the cheese and pepperoni squares squeezed out, Prince Pringle began to all but attack the pizza rolls around the kitchen.
The Prince had figured out how to thaw Cam’s goddamned pizza rolls. Cam smiled. Yet part of him wondered if maybe it wasn’t the best idea to feed Prince Pringle junk food. Pizza rolls tasted good, sure, but for a raccoon? Eddie would probably say something shitty like ‘how the hell is that thing still alive when he never got the proper meds?’ Cam decided to balance out the Prince’s diet and tossed him one of the untouched apples on the counter.
“I don’t know, Eddie,” Cam said. “Aren’t you the expert on HIV?”
Prince Pringles touched the apple, picking it up with his paws. He bit into it. Each bite took nearly five seconds. Was the Prince debating the quality of this offering? That seemed characteristic of him. Prince Pringle’s eyes locked on the dark corner where two of Cam’s counters met. He dropped the apple and launched himself. A loud thump echoed through the kitchen, followed by Prince Pringle rolling away from the cupboards, cradling a dust-covered and squished pizza roll.
“What the fuck?” Eddie asked. “If you aren’t on meds, you can’t just sleep with anyone, Cam.”
“That’s my rabbit,” Cam said. “My sponsor said this rabbit tends to knock shit over. And to stay away from assholes I used to shoot up with.” He hung the phone up. Prince Pringle looked at him, his scruffy head tilted to one side. Maybe just surprised at how sharp Cam’s voice had gone. More likely, the Prince was begging, but unless another pizza roll magically appeared in a different mysterious corner, Cam had nothing else to give.
The phone rang again. Against his better judgment, Cam picked it up.
“I called for a—”
“I don’t do refunds. Tell your boyfriend to talk to Memoria.”
“He’s my business partner. And I’m not asking for a refund,” Eddie said. “I want a commission. No needles. No condoms. Just use acrylic or watercolor or whatever the hell you want to use. Volt likes your art, but I’m not gonna work around that shit. It fucks with me. Like I’m…”
“Distracted?”
“Trash.”
Cam scoffed. Trash. Eddie thought he was trash.
“That a bad thing?” Cam said.
The phone line was silent.
Cam looked down at his kitchen. Trash littered the floor: tomato sauce, crumbs, ketchup, and torn-up packaging still covered the tiles. But so what? It just meant Prince Pringle had fun with some food that Cam had bought with whatever cash left from his commissions after taxes, rent, and the thirty percent Memoria took. Why the hell did Eddie think he’d buy acrylic when he had at least five hundred dollars worth of materials right in front of him?
“My commissions. My rules,” Cam said. If the motherfucker wanted something ‘clean,’ he could commission some other starving artist who enjoyed kissing ass.
“Look. This is important to Volt. I know you don’t owe me shit after… everything,” Eddie said.
Cam took another swig from the whiskey bottle. It burned going down, but he liked the way everything felt almost dull, and how giddy the sight of Prince Pringle hanging onto one of the open counters made him. Cam laughed. Then said, “After what exactly?”
Eddie said nothing coherent. Maybe a ‘fuck’ or two.
Cam hated that about Eddie. He liked to sanitize his words. He never just let them be. “Like I said, even if you did want to commission, you need to go through Memoria.”
“I gave you that needle,” Eddie said.
Cam licked his lips.
Prince Pringle had managed to move himself onto the counter and was stalking over to Cam. In the dim kitchen, illuminated by the fridge light, Prince Pringle’s eyes glowed like a true predator Prince.
“Yeah?” Cam said.
“I messed up. I made a bad decision… Fuck… I knew the needle was trash. But I didn’t throw it out.”
Trash. Eddie had some fucking nerve.
“Talk to Memoria.”
“I’ll cover everything,” Eddie said. It sounded like he was talking through gritted teeth. “The supplies, the acrylics, the brushes, the canvas. We can do this without the gallery or Memoria. I’ll pay double whatever you get for normal commissions.”
Prince Pringle reached Cam then. He laid his head onto Cam’s lap, and not so subtly put his tiny paws into Cam’s pocket—probably in search of more hidden pizza rolls. When Prince Pringle found nothing, he bit Cam’s thigh.
Cam hissed.
“Cameron?”
“Lestat doesn’t like other artists?” Cam said. Prince Pringle looked up at him innocently.
“Lestat?”
“Your ‘business partner,’” Cam said.
“You’re his favorite. He’s looking at other artists, but I know him.”
Cam was Volt’s favorite? That couldn’t be true. But Volt had been to the galleries maybe more than Cam had, and paid more for the painting than any other buyer had. How many people looked at a painting he made the way Volt did?
“I know that woman,” Eddie said. “Does she know you painted her out of trash?”
Cam gnawed the inside of his cheek.
Prince Pringle looked up at him, flashing the widest eyes Cam believed a raccoon could make. He was begging. Cam shook his head. He didn’t have anything else to give his Prince. Prince Pringle dramatically threw himself over Cam’s lap.
This commission also meant money. Money to provide more pizza rolls to Prince Pringle
“Whatever,” Cam said. “I’m better with watercolor.”