ironically enough, it is her conversation with theo beckett that anya contemplates as someone waits outside her door. she stands, hand gripping her elbow, staring at the space where a painting once sat. it hadn't rested there long enough to gather dust, but she reaches out a hand and traces its outline regardless. 

come back and find me. let this connect us. she hadn't said it, but perhaps she had, in the way they spoke, in the way he took her offer as she turned down his own. a piece of her left with him that day, spinning out in the world and reminding it that she exists. that she is here. that she lives on. 

she does not know yet that she will come to regret this decision, or that the woman who crosses her threshold has unknowingly crawled into the belly of the beast. his sentries wait with bated breaths, listening and watching, ready to report at the drop of a hat. 

protection. the thought is tinged with a curling pink.

"don't fear the artwork, dear. it doesn't bite." her soulless gaze slides from the spot on the wall to her newcomer. this one moves like an insect. this one moves with secrets. a warning curls in her belly. 

a couple of other onlookers grant them a cursory, interested glance, and then return to their browsing. anya takes a seat back at her easel and dons her smock. 

Lulu Flint

☉

too quick for most, but not for the woman with eyes like hers. movement, even the slightest muscle spasm, is telling in her work. she didn't get to where she was with her brilliance and her degrees alone, after all. but she is impassive as this woman toys with her. 

so beckett, you've come to play. she'd left the invitation open. the spot on her wall is still barren, notably so. works in progress and finishes canvases alike are propped beside her easel; any of them could have hung in its place. 

she picks up her brush and squeezes some of her paints onto her palette. red meets blue and a vibrant purple emerges. 

"thank you," she says simply. "what started as a hobby became a passion, and somehow, with a little luck, a profession." her amicable chatter flows freely under the guise of her pseudonym. molly fouller has friends, has connections, has a history in this city. she is a wholly realized person and anya wears her skin like latex - close and formfitting. 

but is it close enough? 

she sees a little girl walking through the purple road in her painting. her fingers slip. the paintbrush falls to the floor, spraying. she blinks. 

Lulu Flint

☉

her fingers curl. above her, a kecleon's scales shimmer as it cocks its head. she tucks a lock of hair behind her ear and forgets herself, for a moment. she skirts around her easel, past the woman who's taken such an interest in her, and reaches to pick up her paint brush. 

she is half-turned when the woman utters something so despicably on the nose. anya inhales, composes herself, and takes her seat, fiddling with a wrinkle in her smock. 

a glance to her side and her 'sleeping' lioness flicks her tail. fernando's spies face away from her easel and so she picks up her paintbrush and sets it to the canvas. 

she hums as she paints in looping scrawl - eyes. ears. 

"you an artist yourself? or simply an admirer?" her gaze flickers, question clear. will i put myself in danger for nothing? or are you truly worth my time?

Lulu Flint

☉

she does not know that this is moot. that this woman is recognizable of her own right and that fernando has toyed with her just as she has anya. the silhouette on the easel comes to form, in that abstract way of hers, edges blurred. she takes a scraper and starts moving the paint with blunt edges, head cocked. 

"ah," she says, finally understanding. 

it would seem her files hadn't been as irreparable as she'd thought. it's of little consequence. the woman is on her doorstep because of her gift to beckett. that she's sure of. 

"i left that spot for a reason, you know," she says idly. "the street was a bit too...busy for my tastes."

Lulu Flint

☉

at the realization of just who this person is, anya finally relaxes. the brush strokes become more fluid. the silhouette woman in the picture becomes solidified. but her eyes and her ears and her features blur, lost to the abstract world around her. 

"talent," she says with a laugh. a couple more of the gallery's passersby still linger. molly fouller wouldn't shoo them out, and so she doesn't. molly fouller also loves coffee, but lulu isn't asking molly. she's asking anya. 

"i'm more inclined to tea." her lioness perks her head at this and sits up to preen a paw. 

Lulu Flint

☉

yes, they do, and she out of all of them must know about their eyes and ears hiding within their nooks and crannies. but, of course, she has the position anya once held, with all of its security measures and more. no one would dare touch her, not with the threat of rocket at their bedside in the middle of the night, or worse. 

but anya does not have that luxury. she is still in a chokehold, just as lulu is (even if the woman might not yet realize it). anya reaches a hand up and touches the collar of her shirt, where underneath his bruises still linger. 

she stands and readjusts her easel just a bit, and then gestures to lulu. "there are several. the gallery closes in twenty. peruse or take a seat." she tilts her head and goes back to her painting. 

"you're too kind," she says. "most don't realize the risks that come with being an artist. most of the greats weren't recognized until after they'd been dead." and then she steps to the side, reaches down to squirt some yellow onto her palette, and gets close enough to murmur, "we're being watched."

Lulu Flint

☉

will she pay for this transgression? the circlet of bruises around her neck throb. she could put a halt to these petty shenanigans. because she does not own herself anymore; her autonomy has been stripped, her life's meaning is his. is him. 

and yet she hears the tinkling laughter of a small girl and she thinks i need to see her face. 

her tongue is thick as she continues to paint, and as lulu continues to peruse. one of the onlookers drawers her away from lulu before she can answer her question. and molly fouller emerges completely, swallowing her other identity whole (because it is the other, truly. she knows not where the original has gone, or if it has ever existed at all.)

bright smile and passionate, cheery eyes, she manages to sell one of her smaller works. once the exchange is made, she selects another from her menagerie (she has been busy, as of late) and replaces it. 

when she's finished sliding the new placard into place, she turns to find that the others have left; lulu stands alone. her eyes slide past her to the gallery's front door as the lock snicks closed of its own volition, as the sign turns to closed. 

"shiva, darling, if you would." the lioness snarls and pounces, but not at the woman who stands waiting. no, she pins the invisible creature beneath her heavy paws. the kecleon spits and writhes beneath her, scales shimmering green and bringing it into view. 

shiva opens her mouth, dripping with drool, and anya snaps her fingers again. "you may not eat it. he'll be cross with both of us if you do. keep it here. play with it if you must, but don't harm it. we'll be back soon."

she crosses the gallery and unlocks the door. "let's have that tea, shall we?"

Lulu Flint

☉