“… Thanks,” I said, turning around, and lo and behold:

Dave Eggers.

By now Randy’s looked up from his screen too, subtly pulling his earphones off, putting Beyonce on pause.

Maria smiles and introduces us.

“Thanks for all your hard work guys,” he says softly. Then, he notices the sheets on my desk. “Wait, is that vellum? Are you using vellum? Oh man, I remember when we used to use these…”

Then, a trip down memory lane about old art school practices. Chuckles. Short and sweet, he says another thanks before he walks over to Maria’s desk to tell her all about his adventures in Argentina, and how his kids can now speak better Spanish than him.

Randy and I exchange looks, then smirk. Did that just happen? I think that just happened.

He puts his earphones back on. I reshuffle my sketches.

Okay, back to drawing.¹