Expressionism

It was a warm Spanish spring and Maya's tears evaporated almost immediately as they splashed on the hot asphalt that made up the empty streets of Madrid. She didn't know where she was running or what she was going to do, she just knew she couldn't be around Felipe a moment longer.

It had started, as falling outs often do, with a discussion about money. Coronavirus was hitting Spain hard, Felipe had chosen to revive an old grievance, that Maya's artistic dreams were trumping the need to constantly acquire capital. Maya never felt she had unrealistic dreams, she never wanted to be a millionaire or go to lavish parties where the deep and thoughtful spent the night indulging money launderers and tax dodgers.

Maya wanted a life where she could squeeze together a living seeing the beauty in the world.

For an art graduate what that meant was a day job as an admin at an art supply wholesaler, plenty of evening gigs teaching art, and occasionally she would be able to get away long enough to put together a painting or two of her own. These paintings tended to sit in a gallery unsold long enough to compel her to awkwardly drop the price and accept a measly handful of Euros for something she had spent hours on.

Felipe didn't get her focus, he had clearly seen her art as something she would grow out of, instead she grew out of him and left. But she left to a world that was closed, she couldn't go to a hotel or a friend's house, she had her handbag and the clothes on her back but what she needed was a plan. Eventually she held back the pain long enough to think clearly and a plan formed in her mind, her workplace would be empty, she had pretty much spent the night there once or twice before, she could hide out there long enough to find a place to live.

The key fob and alarm code still worked from when everyone was told to work from home. She walked through the ornate entranceway and pressed the lift for the third floor where her company was based. As she opened the door a waft of warm air washed over her body. Clearly the managers didn't see the point in leaving on the air conditioning when nobody was meant to be in the office. Maya opened the windows, she didn't want the office power bill snitching on her squatting. Once all the windows were open, she sat on the floor and allowed herself a moment to swim in the sadness and grief that overwhelmed her.

Maya cried for some time between five minutes and two hours, before getting to work making the office into the kind of place she could spend the night. One of her co-workers had a blanket for the cold winter months and her bosses office had a sofa for visitors. She snuggled herself in and prepared for a long and ugly night.

By the morning Maya was on the floor, the blanket discarded and her clothes drenched with sweat and tears. She took a moment to wonder what she had to do today and was surprised that the answer was nothing and everything. It was a Sunday, all her art classes were cancelled, her professional and personal lives on a total pause. So she focussed on getting dug in to spending the long haul at her workplace. The first concern was food, the staff fridge had been cleared out so it could be turned off, but the cupboards were filled with instant rice, cakes, biscuits and drinks. It wouldn't last long but she didn't immediately have to worry about shopping.

Next was making the office homely. Maya wandered the office amazed at how a change in perspective could make it come alive. Before the office was the site of a concession to the corporate world, her five day a week prison of capitalism was now her sanctuary away from an aggressive force of consumerist complicity that was supposed to be her home and family. It helped that as an art supplies store they had made it look the part, swirls of colours dancing around the open plan desks, running around the office before streaming towards a colourful mural in the style of Pablo Picasso. Maya wanted to do what she always did when she came across unexpected beauty, she wanted to paint it.

Maya 'borrowed' some art supplies from the demo storehouse they had in the office, a time honoured tradition among the artistic workers that peppered the staff rosters, and got to work on her painting. She fastidiously painted every office detail before splashing colour over the walls and doing everything in her power to breathe life and redemption into a building that had formerly filled her with such dread.

She took a step back from her painting and it just looked like her office. To her it may have been breathed life anew but to anybody else it would never get a second glance, there was no burst of freedom on the canvas just another factory of consumerism.

It was getting hot again and Maya regretted the black polyester trousers and long sleeve top she had been wearing when she left, but this gave her an idea. Nudity! artists have been using nudity to signify freedom forever. Maya noticed how the colours swirled around her painting and identified the perfect place for a naked person to sit. Of course Maya knew she wouldn't be able to get a life model in and she didn't want to be flying blind so she knew what she would have to do.

Looking around the office, Maya slowly undid the fly on her trousers, awkwardly shuffling on her seat to allow the fabric to escape and fall to the floor, pulling off her socks as she wiggled her feet out of the crumple of fabric. She lifted her top over her head and sat for a second in her comfortable underwear, feeling a deep sense of joy that she could re-conceptualise her office with her body. She unclipped her bra and felt the fabric loosen as her breasts pleaded to be free. She let out a shuddering breath as she pulled the bra away from her and placed it on her pile of clothes. Finally a little moan escaped her mouth as her knickers followed their path down her legs and were removed from her body.

Maya took a moment to relish the freedom she sought to celebrate. She stood up and wandered the office, her new kingdom of solitude. A tentative walk became a skip, a skip became a dance, soon Maya found herself laughing and singing as she celebrated the world she was crafting for herself. She propped her phone camera next to her easel and set a timer before bounding to the desk she had chosen and draping her naked body over her co-worker's keyboard, giggling at the clumsy imposition of office equipment.

Maya returned to her easel and sat down, seeing no need to put her clothes back on to complete her painting. She used the photo as a reference and began to paint her naked form onto the canvas. Maya had never appeared in one of her own paintings before, so she had never studied her body closely as she was now doing. She had never let it bother her that she was shorter than average, in fact her proportions matched the desk quite well, her tanned skin light enough to differentiate herself from the brown desk but dark enough to sweep her body away with the swirls of colour that formed a cyclone of imagination in the otherwise conservative office.

Her pussy was unshaven, a statement on how much she valued her relationship with Felipe, she made sure her bush proudly stood out away from the smooth curves made from her ample thighs draping over the desk. Her bottom, although more toned than she would have thought, still had enough give in it to make it a tricky contour as it unevenly squashed itself over the desk and keyboard. She almost let vanity take her hand to flatten her tummy, but if she was going to embrace freedom she knew she had to do so honestly and didn't shy away from painting the bulge of stomach that stuck out as she bent over backwards. Next she got to her breasts, she had always loved her breasts; C-cups not too big but not a surfboard, perfect for such a composition where gravity was clearly pulling them towards her head, but full and pert enough to impose themselves away from the body, areola that didn't dominate and nipples stiff enough to really stick out and draw the eye, no better way to convey her genuine excitement.

Once she had finished her outstretched arms she moved on to painting her face, the look of purest joy and exhilaration, it was vital that the canvas reflected it, every tooth in her beaming smile, the twinkle of fluorescent lights reflecting deepest satisfaction in her electric blue eyes. Finally her long draping bright purple hair, streaking with colour, as if joy was merging her with the office itself. It was mid afternoon by the time the painting was finished and Maya thought it was her best work yet, it was a shame she had no plans to sell it or even let another human being see it, although that didn't stop her hanging the picture in pride of place on the wall in her bedroom, the former boss' office.

Maya spent the rest of the evening relishing the ability to lounge around the office naked, she watched a movie on one of the computers, cooked herself some instant rice in a microwave and even placed a shopping order to get some toiletries, nice food, and wine in. As the sun went down she felt she had just had the perfect lazy Sunday.

The automatic alarm on her phone woke Maya up early Monday morning, she was meant to go to work today. A feeling of dread creeped over her, not just the usual Monday morning despondency, but the deep fear that her new outlook on her office would be lost to the renewed mundanity of her mandatory routine. The cupboards had cereal but no milk so Maya ended up pouring the contents of her bowl back into the cereal packet and settling for Nutella spread on some cheap Madeira cake she was sure nobody would miss.

Usually at this point Maya would have a shower, but there wasn't a shower in her office, she would have to go to work with two days worth of sweat on her, today was not going to be a good day. Maya let a scream of frustration echo her empty office and then tried to think of a way forward. She remembered that when they first refurbished the office they were offered a shower and turned it down, so it stood to reason one of the other offices in the building could have one. She couldn't get into any of the offices that were currently let out, but the former sportswear brand offices on the ground floor had still not found a new company to fill them and if anyone needed a shower it would be an office full of sporty people.

Under normal circumstances the prudent thing would be to put on her clothes and nip downstairs to check, but Maya knew she was fighting against prudence and needed some drastic action to prevent her office building becoming oppressive once again. To that end she decided to leave her clothes behind and roam the building naked.

Maya took one step out of the door and suddenly remembered that she needed her key fob, she stuck her foot back behind her, catching the door before it closed. Her stomach churned at the thought that had she taken another step she would have been locked out of her office, trapped in her freedom. She skipped over to her key fob and picked it up before once again heading out of the door.

The corridors were more intimidating than Maya thought they would be, painted plaster meeting burgundy carpet, the ever-present thought that even though her office was empty, it didn't mean the others were too, not to mention part of the journey took her across the entranceway which could be seen from the road, suddenly her jaunt of freedom filled her with trepidation. Every creak and draft a powerhouse of paranoia that someone would be around the corner to put an end to her freedom.

She got to where the stairway met the reception, a big open featureless gray marble box with a single desk that would hold a receptionist in less virulent times. Maya gazed out and absent any prying eyes streaked across the hallway, down to the door to the ground floor office. She pressed on the door and felt deepest joy as it yielded to her touch and allowed her access.

The ground floor office was almost completely featureless, grey concrete walls ceilings and floors, with a row of windows contained behind a row of cheap beige blinds. The giant cubicle had a few doors coming off it, the managers' offices, the toilets and to Maya's stunned amazement, a shower room, white tiles welcoming her to the new expansion in her empire of nudity.

Maya's toiletries would be arriving with the delivery from the shop in the afternoon so for now she was just in the market for a rinse, she turned on the shower and it sputtered to life, spitting out rusty pipe water that slowly gave way to a clear and fresh waterfall. It looked set to be another blazing hot day so Maya set the temperature low and let out a squeak as she stepped into the refreshing stream (she would later find out it didn't matter where she set the water temperature, the hot water had been switched off long ago). The shower was magnificent, every cell of her body felt refreshed and stimulated as the cold water crashed it's way over her naked skin. Maya stayed in the shower as long as she could, but eventually concerns about the outside world intervened and she found herself stepping out.

Wet footprints slapped their way across the concrete floor, Maya didn't have a towel and so had opted to air dry as she went about her naked day. Peeking out at the empty reception and satisfied with the absence of humanity, she skipped to the stairs and up to return to the office she had made her own. She was under no illusion she was not going to wear clothes for the rest of the day.

Maya sat down at her desk, free and ready to face the day. She powered on her computer and ran her hands up and down her body before getting down to business looking at the latest invoices. Her joy overflowed at her rebellion, sitting naked at her desk, nobody the wiser that she was a nymph, a changeling imitating a responsible worker.

Maya had only been working half an hour when she got a notification, her boss was asking her to join a video conference. Suddenly her carefree nudity morphed into a frantic search for her clothes. She shoved her breasts into her bra, pulled on her top, even put on her trousers and knickers despite her lower half being below the desk, before accepting the invitation to the meeting.

"Maya! Glad you could join us, sorry for the short notice but the director of finance was planning a new invoicing system and I wanted to bring in someone who uses our current system." One of the many pale managers beamed over a camera. It was the least nymph-like Maya had ever felt.

After giving her input to the managers meeting Maya couldn't even bring herself to strip again. She spent the day sat in front of the computer in a dark mood. Her mood lightened at the arrival of her shopping, then darkened after the delivery man could only leave all her shopping in the entrance way and she had to carry it up to the office herself. That night she had a cheap microwave meal, a bottle of wine, and a post-mortem on her good mood.

"I didn't need to put these fucking clothes on." She drunkenly slurred to herself. "I could have said my camera wasn't working, or pointed the camera at my head so they couldn't see below my neck. In fact, why am I still wearing these sons of bitches?" Maya clumsily pulled off her trousers and wrenched her top over her head, the strained elastic made a slight ripping sound that made her slow down. "Careful Maya, those are your only clothes." In the fog of her drunk impulsive mind Maya had an idea she couldn't shake. She took off her remaining clothes and went across the office to the corner with the photo-copier.

She was not looking for the photo-copier but the small device kept next to it, another tool of liberation the office had offered to her. She took her top and lowered it into the slot, the electronic whirring confirming that the shredder had sprung to life and was dutifully eating her top. She took some nearby scissors and used them to ensure her polyester trousers were cut into more manageable chunks, feeding them one by one into the shredder. Next she cut off the metal clasps on her bra and unthreaded the under-wire to ensure what remained would be a suitable snack for her new favourite office pet. Finally she took off her knickers and joyed in their devouring. As an unnecessary but liberating act Maya took the bin under the shredder and tipped its contents out of the window, her soul soaring as she watched the colourful fabric flutter to the ground.

"No safety net now, fear can't control me anymore." She mumbled as she staggered towards her bed. She looked up at the painting of her naked form lounging in the office, she wondered what it would be like if she too made a Dorian Grey style bargain. What if any time she put clothes on they would melt away, the picture taking their burden as she remained unencumbered for the rest of her life? That night she had good dreams.

Maya awoke to a groaning realisation of what she had done last night. She stared at the under-wire of her bra and the pile of metal clasps to confirm it wasn't some drunk imaginings. She took her usual trip to the downstairs office to take her shower and wash off the drunken remnants of her night before, trying to refresh herself for the day ahead. As she walked back across the empty office she jumped at a shadow of a pedestrian walking outside, reaffirming to her just how vulnerable she had made herself.

She sat down in front of her computer and looked at today's calendar. Not much work to do, but to her horror there was a video meeting late in the afternoon for the whole department. Her mind swirled with ideas to get through the meeting without clothes, the obvious answer being to keep the camera turned off, but to Maya that was just one step removed from wearing clothes, she was meant to be a nymph, and nymphs were as cunning as they were mischievous.

She went back to the art supply cupboard and picked out some choice paints, meticulously thinking through which of her outfits would work with the look she was going for. Eventually envisioning her outfit, she took a chair into the women's toilet, and sat in front of the mirror. Dipping her paintbrush into the paint, she moaned with mischievous joy as the brush began to glide over her torso. She created a white base coat, but with meticulously planned creases and folds following the natural contours of her body. As a final idea, she painted a fine grey layer around her breasts to make it look like her blouse was slightly translucent and her bra was visible underneath where her sweat from the hot day had caused the white fabric to cling to her body. This covered for the fine olive of her skin that showed through the white paint and drew attention to her breasts, the darker colour hiding the contours caused by nipples currently standing to attention.

Maya looked at the time and saw it had only just reached lunch time. But she was having so much fun she figured why not continue bodypainting. She went over to her shopping and praised her forward thinking in buying a razer and some shaving cream, her pussy was going to need some work before she could paint trousers onto herself. She also grabbed that obnoxious bowl that Conchita bought to try and guilt the office into eating more fruit, she took specific pride thinking about how her pubes were about to be floating around in it.

It was awkward squatting in the toilet over a bowl of water, so much so Maya couldn't even get excited at the feeling of metal blades gliding over her pubis, leaving behind smooth skin. Nonetheless when she was done and saw her glistening pubis, clean and clear, it only spurred her on with the next part of her plan.

Black paint and lots of it, liberally splashed down each leg, before lumping great dollops of the stuff with smooth brush strokes down her waist and tickled across her pussy, giggling as much at the joy of the deception she was putting together as the tickling sensation of brushstrokes over tender skin, stopping only to paint a subtle button and fly just below her 'blouse'.