Open For Him (BBW / Billionaire Erotic Romance) by Karolyn James Page A

apartment and smiled.
    Fine, she thought, Derreck wants me to stop hiding...
    Even though she knew she would never see Derreck again, something inside her told her to listen to him.  If a man like that could look beyond her curves and bigger figure, wanting to really see her, then Macy wanted to try to be that person.
    For the first time since moving into the apartment, Macy took her painting supplies out of the closet and into the living room.  She had a small table, an easel, a horribly uncomfortable stool that was that only stool that Macy liked to use, plus an array of paints, brushes, pencils, sketch pads, and notebooks to write about her ideas.  She had known a few people who could close their eyes and sketch an idea, but for Macy that didn’t work.  Through a creative writing class in college she found that by writing what she thought about and saw in her head made it easier to paint. 
    Starting felt strange, so far out of Macy’s comfort zone that she considered stopping.  She pictured herself taking everything back into the closet and having a long hot shower.  There she could cry without realizing she was crying, without seeing the tears even though she’d feel the pain.  But when Macy started to paint, even just drawing a few random lines up and down a fresh piece of paper, she suddenly felt alive and liberated.  Soon the paper became a mess of shapes and the best part of it all was that it all meant nothing.  It equaled nothing, it had no purpose, no meaning, and Macy had absolutely no pressure as she threw colors and lines to the paper, over and over.  Some of the colors and lines blended together creating pretty looking designs.  Others mixed and became an ugly color. 
    Either way, it didn’t matter.
    The only thing that mattered was that Macy finally came out of hiding. 
    She tore the paper from the pad and walked it to the dining room table.  She sat back down and stared at the blank piece of paper.  An idea came to her and she reached for her pencils. 
    There, she sketched something that looked like Derreck Hagan.  His chiseled features against the backdrop of heavy black lines.  She drew him as though he were hiding in the shadows of something.
    Of light.
    Of himself.
    Of a way Macy almost wanted him to be.
    She found herself lost within time, not caring about anything.  A first in a very long time.  And even when her cell phone started to ring, she ignored it.
    She ignored it when it rang again, and ignored it for the rest of the night.  By the time she took a break from painting and drawing, four hours had gone by.  And when she told herself that was enough for one night, she continued some more, watching midnight come and go.  There was something liberating about painting through midnight, letting a new day arrived while doing something she truly loved. 
    Packing everything up and putting it back into the closet just before one, Macy felt really good.  When she closed the closet door, a small sting of pain ran through her, reminding her that she was still hiding.
    Little steps though, that’s all that counted.
    And just before falling asleep, she thought about the art competition that Stacey had won.  A smile grazed her face, knowing that if she had sent in her artwork, she would have won. 
    She also thought about Derreck, wishing he had been there to see her paint.  To see her not hiding.  To... just be there, with her.

 
    From the first yawn, Stacey wanted to know what had kept Macy up so late.  Macy felt a small fire inside her stomach, wanting to burst out and tell Stacey the truth, maybe even take some pictures of the stuff she had worked on, for Stacey to critique... and get jealous over.
    But that didn’t happen.
    Macy left it at a simple reason.
    “Just a long night.”
    She repeated it five times over before slipping in something about Derreck.  Something she didn’t mean to do and regretted because when she said it, Stacey got that big smile on her