It was a crisp afternoon in New York City, the kind of day where the air carried just a hint of winter but the sun still shone brightly enough to make it bearable. Jason Todd sat on his usual perch—a low stone wall in Union Square Park—with his sketchpad balanced on his knee and his phone propped up on a tiny tripod. His TikTok was live, as it always was when he worked, capturing the intricate strokes of his pencil and the easy rhythm of his conversations with strangers.

He had built a reputation for finding people with compelling stories, his followers addicted to the way he could capture both their likeness and their essence in his art. His current subject—a street vendor who sold handcrafted jewelry—was just packing up, and Jason was flipping to a fresh page in his sketchbook when he caught sight of you.

You were sitting on a bench a few feet away, reading something on your phone, completely unaware of the world around you. There was something about the way the sunlight hit your face, or maybe it was the way your body seemed to radiate a quiet confidence even in stillness. Whatever it was, Jason couldn’t look away.

He stood, grabbing his gear and walking over with his signature lopsided grin. “Hey,” he started, his voice casual but warm. “I’m Jason, and I do street art. I also film interviews while I draw people—it’s kind of a thing on TikTok. You’ve got this… vibe about you. Mind if I sketch you?”

You blinked up at him, surprised but intrigued. “You want to draw me?”

Jason nodded, holding up his sketchpad. “Yeah. And don’t worry, it’s painless. We just chat while I work. My followers love meeting interesting people, and you definitely seem like one of them.”

There was something disarming about him, the way his smile reached his eyes and his tone was so genuinely curious. After a moment, you shrugged. “Sure, why not?”

Jason’s grin widened. “Awesome. You can just sit how you are—it’s perfect.”