Who: Rapunzel and Caleb What: Random encounter Where: Some park When: This past Friday Rating/Warnings: Low Status: Complete
It was that time of day again. Caleb needed some fresh air. So he left Stark Tower for a bit and decided to head to the park. Most of his work was already done for the day. Sure he still had some paperwork to get done, but that could wait.
He was walking around the park, pretty aimlessly when he spotted a girl, painting, barefoot. What. The. Hell? Who walked around barefoot? What if she stepped on a nail? That didn’t seem safe. He had to admit she got his attention, he was curious about her. Caleb made his way over to her. “You always paint barefoot?”
Painting out in the park was one of her favorite things to do and the scenery was always beautiful. And of course she was barefoot because if she could be barefoot constantly she would be, but it was a little sketchy to wander the streets of Orange County with no shoes on, so she left it for places like this and certainly her own place of residence.
Right now she was working on a landscape of the pond in front of her when she heard a voice behind her. She jumped just slightly and turned around to see the man giving her a strange look. At the mention of being barefoot she wiggled her toes in the grass and grinned, “I try to quite often. They don’t approve of it at school, but ya know, artistic method and all that.”
Caleb almost laughed as the girl jumped. He didn’t mean to scare her, but her response was comical. “It might be a safety thing,” Caleb suggested looking at her feet then back at her painting. She was a decent artist. But barefoot, really? He still couldn’t get over that.
He did understand the artistic method on some level. He had his own method after all. Granted he wasn’t an artist, but he could only sit still at a desk for so long before he needed a break. “You ever step on anything?” shoes were invented for a reason. “Nice pond,” he commented because it was. And it was rude to just keep questioning her without complimenting how good her painting was.
“Well, you certainly don’t want to step on glass and pottery shards that may be on the floor,” she fully understand the safety aspect, but she really enjoyed being barefoot. It was how she had been raised and it would take a long time for her to change that up.
“Um, sometimes, but my feet are pretty used to being barefoot. The soles of my feet are probably harder than other people’s. I grew up with a bunch of hippies,” she explained because sometimes that just made people understand. Bunch of crazy weirdos raising a child explained why she wandered around barefoot, right? “And thank you. I’ve got a ways to go, but it’s a basic painting right now. Needs some depth.”
“Ouch,” Caleb replied just at the thought at stepping on any of those things. He had never cut his foot on anything. Hell he hadn’t even stepped on a bee. But then he didn’t exactly walk around barefoot either.
“Hippies,” he repeated. He didn’t even know those still existed. He thought they all disappeared after the 60s. He had certainly never run into any back in Pennsylvania, or even when he did jobs in New York. “That must have been an interesting upbringing. I raised myself,” he shrugged because it was true. Though he had been tossed around from foster family to foster family no one really raised him. Caleb had been on his own for as long as he could remember. He usually didn’t share that information but as long as she was giving out the most random information about herself he figured he could reciprocate at least a little bit.
“Well you’re off to a good start. It looks like a pond to me.” And that was the extent of Caleb’s art knowledge. He was a technology guy. Art? Not so much.
“Yeah. I think shards and Legos are about the same on the pain level,” Rapunzel commented with a chuckle. Stepping on a Lego had been one of her least favorite things about growing up because they ended to be everywhere depending on who was having a play date at her house.
“Yup, it was quite interesting. Everyone was super nice and it was kind of a communal upbringing. I learned a lot from everyone,” It wasn’t as silly as people probably thought about it. She didn’t smoke pot or anything like that, but she really just enjoyed the great community she was involved in. When he mentioned that he raised himself she nodded at him, “You probably have a lot more street skills than me.”
“And thank you, I appreciate that,” there was a cheerful smile given to his compliment and she reached her brush down to mix a few more colors. He didn’t need to be an artist to understand art. As long as you liked what you saw then that was all that mattered, “Think I should add ducks to it?”
“Hippies own Lego?” he raised a brow a smirk on his face. That wasn’t something he imagined. But then what did he know? He didn’t even know hippies exited until about a minute ago.
He wasn’t going to argue with her about the street smarts. He probably had more street smarts than most people not just because of his upbringing although that was a big part but he had also run away from the system at sixteen and been involved in organized crime for four years (he was the hacker). “Communal upbringing doesn’t sound so bad,” he agreed. He would have taken any family when he was younger. Now he no longer wished or cared for that sort of thing. He had grown up.
He took a step closer to the painting tilting his head to the side as if he was examining it. “Well,” he began pretending to be contemplating the painting. “What’s a pond without ducks?”
“Hippies do have children. And I was big on Legos when I was a kid,” she grinned over at him. She knew what people thought, but most of the adults had grown up for the most part, but still liked the idea of a free and easy culture.
“It really was useful. I learned all sorts of weird things. I could attempt to weave you a basket if you wanted. Some of it really isn’t useful at all, but it’s kind of nice to be so well rounded. I will admit that I’m a bit naive when it comes to living outside of there. It’s nice to be on my own though,” she commented. Yeah, she may get taken advantage of in the future with her innocent face, but she was starting to learn. She only had to sit through someone weirdo’s mall spiel on hand warmers once before she avoided eye contact.
She considered his comment and gave a solemn nod before grinning, “Exactly. I’ll have to add a couple in. Anything else you think I should add?” She started mixing a few other colors and began to add some ducks to the painting.
Well when she put it like that it made sense. But then Caleb wouldn’t exactly know much about that either. He never had Legos. So that might have contributed to the fact that he didn’t make the connection. He wasn’t going to point it out though.
“Next time I need a new basket I’ll be sure to give you a call,” not that he had her number but it was an expression. However what she said next, well that was something he could help with. He had been on the outside his whole life. He could at least give her a few tips. “The first thing you should probably know is not to walk around barefoot,” okay that was a joke, mostly.
“Lilypads and frogs,” because ponds had those. At least he thought they did. Either way it seemed like a nice touch.
“You certainly could. And I think I’m going to have to politely ignore that piece of advice,” Rapunzel commented with a playful grin tugging at the corner of her mouth, “I wear shoes most of the time. This place is cleaner than most, so I feel safe being barefoot.” She wasn’t sure why people have an issue with being barefoot when that was how the world worked in the past. If people weren’t throwing trash everywhere and being disgusting then they wouldn’t have to worry.
That was the perfect idea and she began to paint them into the picture, “Perfect idea. Certainly adding that. So, what do you do, Mister….”
Well as long as she felt safe he supposed. There was other advice he could give her. Like everyone lies. But she seemed so innocent and upbeat. He didn’t want to crush the girl’s spirits. Plus then she might not trust him which wasn’t exactly what he was going for. “Just watch out for bees,” he warned. “I heard those hurt.”
Look at that he was giving good painting advice. Caleb had to admit he was a bit proud of himself. “Caleb,” he replied when she hinted for his name. No way was he going to have her call him Mister Rivers. No one called him that. Hell he didn’t call anyone Mister or Ms. Not even his bosses. “Just Caleb. And you are?”
She was a bit innocent, but she knew that the world could be a cruel place. She just chose to see the positive in the world and lived her life that way. Caleb seemed nice enough and she was willing to talk to him as long as the conversation continued to be pleasant. Ending it and walking away was something she would resort to if she had. The bee comment earned a laugh, “Okay, that has happened to me once. I don’t recommend it.”
“Hi, Just Caleb. I’m Rapunzel,” she only said the mister part to sound polite. She swung her paintbrush a little and almost placed it on her face as she studied him for a moment, “Although, you didn’t answer my question. What do you do? It’s not often that you see guys my age out wandering in the park.”
Caleb had to laugh at the just part. “Caleb is fine,” he replied. Rapunzel certainly wasn’t a name you heard every day. Or at all. It made sense though with the hippie parts and everything, and he had to admit it seemed to fit her.
Oh right, what he did. He had been sidetracked by the whole mister comment he had forgotten about her question. “I work at Stark,” he replied not sure if she had heard of it or not. Most people had though. “In the tech department,” that was easier than giving out his job title. No one knew what it meant and some of the things he did were classified so he couldn’t exactly explain anyway.
“Ah, that’s exciting. I hear that he’s a pretty cool dude to work for. And the tech department? Do you work with robots or do you do hacking?” she really didn’t know much about working in a tech department, but those were the two things that came to mind. She didn’t really expect him to give her a full detail of what he did at work, but she was curious.
It would be pretty cool to work with robots. But Tony was the inventor. “Hacking,” he replied. Rapunzel was smart. She had basically guessed his job right away. “Robots are more Tony’s thing.”
“Ahhh, gotcha. You kinda look like the computer hackery type. It might be the long hair,” Rapunzel explained to him with a chuckle. She knew a handful of people that were big into computers, but she certainly didn’t know enough to ever compete on their level. She turned back to her painting to add in his other suggestions and then began to do a bit of shading and make it all come together before a thought occurred to her, “would you like this painting? I’m almost finished.”
“You know, I get that a lot,” he laughed and tucked his hair behind his ear for emphasis. Rapunzel had a good amount of hair herself. Besides there were worse things than looking like a stereotypical hacker. Especially considering that was his job anyway.
He wasn’t expecting her to offer him the painting. He wasn’t all the used to kindness from strangers. He was getting used to kindness in general though. And he was going to be getting an apartment soon, so why not? It might be nice to have some artwork to hang. Plus he had contributed the frogs and lilypads. That was a big deal. “Sure,” he said giving her a genuine smile. “Thank you.”
The smile was a nice thing to see. He looked a lot more relaxed when he smiled like that. She nodded at his thanks and turned to finish up the painting. The shading helped add an element of realness to it and she switched to a smaller brush to sign her name to the painting. Once that was finished she cleaned off her paint brushes, dumping the dirty water on the ground, and started to put her things away. “It’ll probably be a little wet still, so don’t hold it against your body,” she commented with a smile. The canvas wasn’t massive, but it could get a little heavy if he had to walk far.
Stark Tower wasn’t that far. He never ventured too far from the building on his breaks. Granted his coworkers might wonder where exactly he had gotten a painting on his break but most wouldn’t care. “Got it,” he replied he wouldn’t want to ruin the painting. He picked the canvas up off the stand she had it on to paint making sure to hold it so the painted side was facing away from his body. “I should be getting back to work now. It was nice meeting you Rapunzel. Watch out for bees.”
“Nice to meet you as well, Caleb. I will make sure to put my shoes back on when I leave. Have a great day,” she commented with a laugh and a wave. She grabbed her art bag and slung the strap over her shoulder and took down her easel. It was nice to meet new people and even better when she could share her art. She watched him walk away and then began her walk out of the park and back to her car.