Helena raised her eyebrow from behind her counter and crossed her arms over her chest. She shook her head slowly and threw Shane an arctic look.

“I don’t think she’ll agree…”, Shane murmured.

“Fuck!”, Alice exclaimed rolling her eyes, “We’re so fucked, then!”.

“Unless…”, Shane considered, scratching her chin and watching Carmen.

Carmen widened her eyes.

“No way”, she said, and Shane laughed nervously.

“Why not? You look much hotter than Nikki Stevens”.

“No, I don’t”, Carmen replied defensively.

“Yes, you do”, Shane insisted, “Please, take some pictures with me”.

“No, Shane, please”.

“Oh, come on, Carm… You’re amazingly beautiful…”, she insisted.

Carmen blushed and swallowed.

“Really?”, she murmured.

Shane stared at her and her smile disappeared.

“Really. And I’d be glad to be portrayed with you… I’d be proud, to be honest”.

Alice’s narrowed eyes shifted from Shane to Carmen, from Carmen to Shane. She smirked and clapped her hands.

“Alright. Weirdo is right. Carmen, go get dressed”.

“But…”.

“Now!”, Alice shouted and Carmen jumped.

”Leave you now
Can’t convince myself
That you’re the one somehow
To free me from this smile
I call my loneliness
Stuck inside this need to feel complete
Now I’ve left you standing on your feet…”

**

At first it was embarrassing, for both of them. They were both rigid and tensed, they looked uncomfortable and out of place, and Alice was out of her mind. Very pissed.

She shouted at them, she yelled like a savage and reprimanded and scolded them like a teacher would do with two dunces. Both Shane and Carmen ate their humble pie shifting from foot to foot and bowing their heads.

Then something changed. Maybe they felt closer because they were both uncomfortable with the whole situation, maybe they just forgot about the substantially uninterested audience staring at them, or maybe they just started concentrating on each other. In any event, after a couple of hours of wasted photographs, something changed in the way the looked at each other.

They felt each other. Carmen felt Shane, Shane felt Carmen.

“Alright!”, Alice was yelling, “Now Carmen, I want you to touch Shane like a lover would do, okay?”.

Carmen, wrapped in her wonderful evening dress – a blindly red evening dress with a very sexy placket – just nodded.