/lit/ - Literature

This is a paragraph from a piece I'm working on about a critically acclaimed robot painter who's struggling to reinvent himself while navigating the fickle and shallow New York art scene.
"Do you think it's a name for girls?" he asked shyly, struggling to fish out a cigarette with his cold titanium claws. "Don't you?" she replied, handing him one, and lit the thin cylinder of paper clenched between his mechanical jaws, A faint whirring of gears could be heard as he inhaled. "Lindsey," she said, airily, feeling the soft touch of the syllables on her ears, "Lindsey..." They were staring at the painting by the window, a Caravaggian rendering of Chairman Mao waiting in line at a Starbucks; mid-morning light drifted in from the tall windows and bathed the packages of coffee beans in diluted gold. "I guess so," he said, defeatedly. The squeaking of taxi brakes and a myriad of horns -- long aggravated wails, short impatient jabs, and cute double half-notes -- echoed up from the street. Almost sounds like birds, he thought.