a misty gashed aperture

selective hearing

"I'm not people. I'm awake," came the reply.

"Oh." Roseanne found herself smiling.

Lisa held the phone between her ear and shoulder as she washed her hands at the sink. "I was cleaning my studio."

"Sorry if I disturbed you."

"Not at all. Can you just hold the line? I need to adjust this painting I hung up on the wall, it's slanting."

"Sure." Roseanne then got up from the bed and put the phone on the bedside table, switching it to speaker as she wore her oversized Vaquera Blue Devil sweater on top of her black, silk nightgown.

Over the phone, the sound of Lisa stepping down on something and her footsteps getting louder was heard. "What's up?"

Picking up her phone, Roseanne headed downstairs to get her day started. "I couldn't sleep so now I'm going to make coffee."

"Did you try counting sheep?"

"Didn't work."

"How many sheep were there? Are you sure no one was missing?" Lisa quipped.

Roseanne chortled, placing her phone on the countertop. "If I try to look for that stubborn one, do you think it'll make me sleep?" She went with Lisa's quirks that appealed to her so much.

"Sorry that Dolly still thinks she's human. Can't blame her."

The supermodel laughed at Lisa's clever humor while turning on the coffee machine. She could start her day like this.

Any day. Like this.

Lisa asked, "Hey, everything okay?"

Switching back to handset, Roseanne prepared her usual coffee, decaf, black, and no sugar. "Not really. I was arguing with Hyeri the whole day yesterday about this thing I have today."

Lisa yawned audibly at the other end. "Sorry."

"No, I'm sorry, you haven't slept yet, have you?" Roseanne frowned. "Do you want to sleep now?"

"It's all right." Lisa massaged the back of her neck. "I never sleep at regular hours anyway. I took a nap around nine and woke up three hours later to my studio screaming to be cleaned so..."

Talking with Lisa was bringing Roseanne some normalcy. A conversation about cleaning, what an odd one. "Should've called you earlier then you could've had an extra hand."

"Do you clean?"

"Of course, I do!"

Lisa snickered. "Just making sure I can afford your service because I'll take up that offer next time."

"Shut up." Roseanne picked up her cup of coffee and walked out to the balcony. As she put the cup on the wooden table, her eyes found the pack of Raison Blue cigarettes laying there. Without thinking twice, she picked it up and threw it in the trash can.

"Tell me, what's going to happen today that it stole you some good night's sleep?" Lisa could be heard picking up some keys.

Sitting on the wooden chair with her legs folded up to her chest, Roseanne let out a sigh. "There's going to be a working lunch with Anna Wintour today. Or more like, we were forced to work and have lunch with her since we didn't have the option to decline. Do you know her?"

"I do. Only because I still don't get The Met Gala, no offense."

"None taken. The Met is a topic for another day, but I just hate her so much!" Roseanne whined. "The reason she was flying here was to fake niceties with Asians and cover up her issue on tolerating and cultivating racism at work."