On this page, two artists interpret one of the character portraits with a story or tattoo. Ken (the subject of the character portraits) in turn, created portraits of each artist.


Based on this photographic portrait, Sara Sowers wrote a story imagining that character's day.

The Kangaroo's Song,
or There's a Lot Going on
with Nothing Going On

Unaware of the plastic kangaroo quarter-ride next to him, he sits, hand on his thigh, next to a pay phone. She's late.

In the window behind him, titty and car magazines glare like red arrows, pointing. He's irritated but it shows on his face like a steady contemplation.

A passerby, depending on the day's mood, might think he's thinking too hard about going in to buy something, or just tired. Another might know he could erupt at the turn of the wind. Neither would be accurate.

*

He was mad but used to being mad. Crazy bitch had stolen his cell phone again. She watched too many soap operas. When he got out of the shower, he looked around the apartment, but she was gone and so was his cell.

Before leaving, he threw on the hoody he'd bought the day before after he got paid. Bright pink and yellow lasers. It looked like outer space—electric. She had told him it was obnoxious. He didn't care. Her stupid haircut was obnoxious. But he didn't say so.

He put on the hat to match and shut the door quietly behind him to go get some lunch and play the "please give me back my phone, there is no reason to be jealous" game. Another wasted Saturday. Overcast all around.

*

The cars get noisy and a brown-headed child dressed in a pink hooded jacket and blue jeans climbs onto the kangaroo. Her mother—after arguing, We don't have time right now, Maria!—relents and puts a quarter in. He looks at his watch, at the phone, up at the sky.

The little girl sits quietly if not blankly on the kangaroo, it and its blue baby kangaroo in pouch gliding slowly up, then down. Music meant for a carnival takes over the sidewalk. The phone still doesn't ring.

Honk—honk—Fuck you!—Honk—No fuck you!—The sound of drivers stopped at the red light begin in bleeding harmony with the kangaroo's song.

*

When she's not crazy she's a good time. She'll trick you into thinking she's chill. She's got a laugh like flowers. Until she wakes up wrong and decides she's being fucked over. She wasn't always like this.

"Fuck you, no fuck you! Who are you texting now?" She was reading some girl magazine about hair—for work, she had said—when she blew up. What did she treat her clients like? He wished they had a dog.

He looked at her, knowing plain self-defense doesn't fly when she's crazy. He put down his phone and got up from the kitchen table to hug her.

"Take off that ugly thing you're wearing! Take it off! I'm gonna throw up all over you if you don't take that thing off. Did your little slut buy you that?"

"I don't have a little slut," he told her. "I'm getting in the shower."

*

He considers leaving. He considers calling her but knows that'll only piss her off. She'll think he wants his phone back because he's hiding something, in a prism of suspicions that always has him looking the bad guy. He considers going inside for a candy bar, but doesn't.

An old man hobbles into his line of sight. The mother looks at her daughter on the kangaroo, then at him. The old man holds out his weary hand, toward either of them. With a glance at the pay phone, he reaches into his pocket for a quarter and gives it to the old man, then watches him step mechanically on.

He watches the old man's fading-black stocking cap bob in and out of hurried people until it reaches a spot on the sidewalk where he sits down, hand out and open. Just in case.

The kangaroo song's begins winding down, slowing pace, stretching each note like a nightmare. The day is gray, between fall and winter. With a sigh and a glance in each direction, he walks toward the subway entrance.

Sara

Based on these four video stills, Kristen Kendrick drew a tattoo for that character.

Kristen

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