#painting in greyscale first is pain :')

[novuit]

The passion of lovers is for death.

[thewebcomicsreview]

https://pandorastale.com/

Okay, this one got submitted to me, so lets take a look.

Okay, first things first. This is a pretty solid first page. It immediately establishes our protagonist, an external conflict (”broken rules”) and an internal conflict (”What am I if I’m not obedient”) in three panels and fifteen words. This is a page that makes me want to read more. Good job!

This leads into a scene that we later realize is a few minutes ago, and I like that the first page was “smoky” like that, which made it feel more like an “intro page” than the actual page 1 of the story. If there had been a detailed background this transition would’ve been more jarring but as is it works.

Your getting a lot of mileage out of this art. I like that our unnamed trans catgirl is sitting with her legs crossed in a feminine way, and the way the director is covering the P in the sign in the background. HERE TO HELL!

Anyway, our catgirl escapes in a smokey pod while she has a think, letting us know we’ve “caught up” to the intro. Cool.

She’s found by a group of normal people who awkwardly explain to the black person that slavery is bad, which is an unfortunate blocking decision. Also, I feel like the preceding 16 pages did such a good job explaining the helpers that this exposition is redundant, and it makes Isabelle (who we soon learn is in “the resistance”) look a little dumb, like she joined an anti-slavery network but is only learning about slavery just now. This is kind of nitpicking, I know, but the comic’s been really smooth up until here and this has been the first speed bump I’ve noticed.

Okay, so, our protagonist is technomagically compelled to fall in love with Isabelle, who is also the most anti-slavery member of the group. There’s a lot to unpack there, and me saying that isn’t a criticism. 

Isabelle reveals this is a t4t romance and I’m not sure how I feel about the trans flag being in grayscale there. Like, the whole comic’s in greyscale, so it fits, but also the only way to tell it’s a trans flag is from context because otherwise it’s just kind of stripes.

On the other hand, even ignoring my shit ten-seconds-in-MS-Paint recoloring skillz, busting out the Sin City splash colors makes it really fourth wall breaking, but it’s literally a giant trans flag magically appearing so that ship’s sailed....but also if you ever want to print this book it’d be pain....but also also you could keep the spot colors in the book maybe....I dunno. I’m bouncing back and forth on it.

Anyway, Isabelle names her pet slave Pandora.They go to a doctor and are all “Can catgirls get HRT” and the Doctor’s all “Fuck if I know, let’s ball” and I’m not sure if that’s handwaving away a detail in the service of the main story or setting up Pandora having an allergic reaction that causes anime shenanigans to happen. Either/or in this comic

Pandora offers to be a sex slave and Isabella is like :| and they sleep next to each other in an awkward but happy embrace that feels like this comic could end there and be a complete short story, one that I’d say is pretty good.

There’s another six chapters, and I kind of skimmed them and I’m still a little iffy on the resistance side of the story, but at the least this is a pretty solid opening.

I got to admit, though,...I’m not super fond of the handling of the cops. Not that it’s Objectively Wrong, but I feel like they’re not quite bumbling enough to be comedy foils but they’re too bumbling to be dramatic threats so they’re just kind of there.

My subjective suggestion is think about making the cops even dumber. Having them come in guns ablazing as a serious threat like in the Matrix or whatever doesn’t seem like it’s the tone you’re going for, and you can always have the rich people have Elite Private Security if you need a scary competent villain later.

All-in-all, though, I think this is comic is well-done!

[blackvahana]

Lev observes and enforces a theme today, past selves as embers still burning in forgotten, bricked-away fireplaces, their lack of oxygen making them spew out choking toxins into the air. He tells me to paint. I paint a picture of myself.

Dreams for years now of high school, my past self is screaming for help constantly. Years now. Last night's dream... I purposely tried to reconnect with the Daisy Fields and I ended up with the most vivid and heartbreaking nightmare I've had in a long time, not from content but from emotion. I've woken up multiple times in the last few weeks to some part of me begging to let it dream of school even though it's the most... horrible shit to be subjected to.

Anyway. At the centre of the drawing, at the beginning of it, a child. I realise I don't hate that child. The Dead Kid... I realise they weren't ever really a kid, wise with selfhood - wisdom both Childlike and Primordial - I realise they weren't the problem. They're there clad in black, and for the first time I realise they aren't a person anymore. We aren't a fractured dissociative identity duo anymore. They're just... A symbol.

The theme ring in out from last night's dream, sick of people's hands on my body. Sick of being the one never wanted, and my own guardian, the only one who could choose to put me first - which is fine, but I'm sick of saying it's fine. I spend my entire life talking about how everyone deserves to put themselves first and how I need to be the one to help myself, which is true in words alone; I sit here painting these words over being treated not simply as second but a pain to be around and -

Past me, deep within, still crying out for help. High school was when it really started. I dream endlessly of younger me begging for someone to see that they need to escape school, they need to escape, please let them escape, please, I'm not leaving this place alive... And I guess in a way I didn't. And generally the realisation or the conclusion at least is "So I will have to look after myself, I'll see myself, I'll look, no one else can..." but I'm so tired of that.

So I paint over them, not erasing, just continuing forward in time. I cut myself open, shed skin from my arms, from the right side of my stomach, I take blood and thicken it, I paint with it. At some point Lev asked if he could collaborate with me and I said yes but quickly felt gross about it, so he's making... his own art of me, and I can feel it behind me, calm, greyscale in the deep smokey greys of deep-sea-light-lit temple walls and thick incense... Contrasted with mine, which stings like the knives didn't when I opened myself, which is warm and sticky like the blood wasn't, and some part... acknowledges that the discrepancy means this no longer needs to hurt. I used to fear flying myself and being viscera-out to the world - part of me recollects Lev talking to me about why I keep thinking the Almadia is translucent - the hardest thing is a dichotomy that seems unable to be unified, but I enforce it. One side: My younger self, in fact I in general since there's no longer a divide, deserved everything. The other side: I deserved either none of it or less than what happened, but that leaves me as the only one who knows, and can help me, the only one I have. The bridge always seemed to be forsaking or forgetting younger me...

Anyway. The painting doesn't drip, my blood and fibres stick in place, magnetised. I am violent like the aurora, I am calm as the raging ocean, I am the boat that drives himself, I am the ever-child witness, I am the flowers that sing psychosis, I am... Nothing but an instant - I am, as Lev said, just one book of experiences in God's library, infinitesimally insignificant, and everything at the same time. And there's no need to talk.

The conclusion and the bridge is acknowledging that I now feel unheard, that I now feel like I got nothing in high school but pain, and that to this day I feel, because I live in a house to this day where it's enforced, like I take up too much space by breathing to others, and I don't think I deserve to feel like that.

Anyway. Super excited to paint with blood and gore finally, I'm going to tear myself open and make some art yeahhh babyyy

[articwolfclawartist]

Scylla WIP! Featuring both wolf and serpent heads. I didn’t always understand why I saw so many professional level artists draw their sketches in greyscale. But after starting this Scylla painting I realized I really wanted to make the shadows matter and wanted to do them right. So I made this! It’s really a great technique for figuring out your lighting dynamics

So enjoy this Scylla WIP! I sure know I am! I haven’t been this excited about a drawing ever since I had first developed my chronic pain so I’m really happy about this!

[dkniade]

Regarding those Edwin doodles, why was he beaten up? Who was talking to him? 👀 Also, moomoo Edwin is so cute >:3c 💕💕💕

context

Oh, it was no one in particular (Maybe a rival gang member if I were to specify…? Probably not his former creative partner Thea though. She’s not that violent haha..) (I haven’t thought of details of Thea and Edwin’s backstory in a long time now, and surface personality traits are hard to pin down without a backstory.)

The joke was that in the first scenario he was painting and in the second he was in pain because of the meme (?) that there’s “pain” in “painting” haha (I don’t believe painting/drawing has to inherently be a painful process though, or that only painful emotions make good art)

Also I wanted to draw him beaten up (either it was just for fun or I was maybe frustrated? Probably just for fun though.) I like drawing characters looking up defiantly even as they’re beaten up✨

moo moo Edwin hahaha— Thank you! I’ve heard that cows can be fluffy…

Come to think of it, I dunno what animal motif he’d have if he were to have one.

A cheerful artist… with some sort of identity confusion due to winter depression (old 2019 concept. Looking back, the severity doesn’t seem to match my knowledge of winter depression)(if he’s ashamed, does he feel it so deeply that he voluntarily uses a slightly different name, uses a mask to cover his face, AND grows out his hair & dyes it, all for the sake of… having his orange look be the happy/cheerful/friendly one?) (If he hides himself in plain sight, if he can’t accept this as part of himself, this can lead to some troublesome identity issues…)(unrelated to gender)

-

“I’m Edwin! Nice to meet you too!” —Edwin, usually in spring/summer

“Hey, just call me Devin for now. No, it’s not because I want to change my name or anything. It’s, uhh… an… alias…? Haha…” — Devin, on the outside probably, in winter

“What is this ‘Devin’ name to me? Am I even allowed to feel this way as myself? God, but what am I supposed to do? I can’t just tell people that it comes every winter and gets better in spring.” —Edwin, on the inside probably

-

(…I almost want to compare him to “Childe” Tartaglia Ajax simply for his multiple names/identity thing but uhh, that guy’s on a whole different level. Venti/Barbatos? Hmm but to my knowledge nothing particularly bad happened to Edwin.)

What would be an animal that emphases this duality I wonder… An animal that looks friendly and colourful but isn’t what it seems…

…poison dart frog???

(SAD = Seasonal Affective Disorder)

[Start transcript

first image: the concept sheet

a flat colour sketch in upper corner is labelled True Palette. A cartoony waist-up version with bright warm colours is labeled Edwin and an anime headshot version with desaturated colours is labeled Devin. Another flat-colour shot of Edwin/Devin is labeled flat sample. A full body reference of both is labeled Project SAD Palette. Edwin is labeled spring/summer (“usually”) and Devin is labeled under effects of SAD

second image: the mock magazine cover

knees-up greyscale illustration of Devin sitting with his winter coat and mask, looking at the viewer, his hands in fists. His eyes and hair clip are light green. Behind him is a black circle outline with two sharp black triangles pointing at him. White magazine header: SYMPTOM. separate subheadings in green: questions, sunshine. separate text in white: What does SAD stand for? What are some symptoms of winter depression? What are some symptoms of summer depression? What hormone does sunshine trigger the brain to release? What is an alternative to sunshine? In the right corner, in green: A solution to your problems!?

third and fourth images: sketch of Edwin/Devin with some information

Edwin. he/him, 20. yellow barcode piercing (right ear). left-handed. neutral expression looks surprised/confused. hard to read based on expression & body language. has a secret he’s ashamed of. (he doesn’t have to be though.) arrow points to him, saying spring/summer.

Devin. he/him, 20. black triangle frame piercing (left ear). left-handed (still). Edwin winter an Alia’s & disguise. wears mask not for physical health (in his opinion). seasonal affective disorder: winter depression. tried to hide his symptoms but isn’t good at it. ashamed of his winter depression. wants to separate his depressed self from his usual self. arrow points to him, saying autumn/winter.

end transcript.]

[angelofthemornings]

The way I approach drawing is kind of like how I approach everything else, as in, I need to make things as difficult for myself as possible. I feel like taking any kind of shortcut, accommodation, or concession is unnecessary and making me weaker, and I have a very low bar for what counts as one of those. (For instance, I didn't want to use the greyscale method of coloring a digital painting for a long time because I thought I'd end up with an incomplete understanding of how to paint and color theory etc. if I did it long enough, which isn't really true, it's just a technique that helps you focus on the values. I only really talked myself into using it when I accepted that I struggled with values and focusing on them was going to be the most beneficial to me, and I'd end up with an incomplete understanding if I *didn't* target them.)

I've always been like this and I have no idea where it comes from. Self-hatred? Maybe I'm just really, really intense about going as far as I can. As a child - I peaked in middle school - I was really an insane person. I'd fast for up to ten days just to prove that I could go that long without eating and "improve my will", for instance. When I went to a challenging private school I'd breeze through my work so easily - and by working long hours out of sheer enthusiasm - that they had to order extra modules for me and teach me these extra classes privately just to slow me down. Otherwise I'd have run out of things to learn way before the year was over (this was one of those experimental Montessori schools, everything was self-paced).

It's a pain of a trait now that I'm disabled, though. I get really mad that I can't work, I feel like I'm making myself worse by not "training myself to push through" or whatever, even though the definition of disabled is that you *can't* push through most of the time (and if you can there are severe consequences). I spent years trying to push through and failing harder and harder every single time. Over the years it went from failing one class a semester to failing several to failing all of them. Etc. I need to accept at some point that I got on disability first try within a few months of applying, and that only happens if you're *really* fucked up. Half the people deciding on disability applications would reject Curly Mouthwashing for God's sake.

[coldblazesong]

Virtual Sketchbook 1

Hi! My name is Juna and an interesting fact about myself is that I enjoy doing nails and spend a large portion of my time learning and practicing new designs.

Pablo Picasso 1937 Guernica. Oil on canvas; 11’ 5 ½” x 25” 5 ¼”

This painting is now seen and used as an anti-war symbol

When originally painted, this work was in color, however, it is now depicted in a ‘greyscale’ color scheme

Picasso crafted this painting after the Guernica bombing caused by Hitler’s German forces supporting Franco

The reason for depicting this horrific event was to capture the ‘pain and suffering’ that is caused by war

Picasso is from Spain so this event impacted him greatly and brought out the emotions to paint

When I first glanced at this work of art, I thought it was taking on a more abstract art theme. With my little knowledge on Picasso, I was tempted to see this art as abstract or broader in message/emotion. However, after I researched it is actually spreading a message about the effects of warfare, more specifically, modern warfare. After the events of the bombing of Guernica, Picasso created this work of art. It is very clear to me now the people in the painting and how it almost looks shattered as if he is using this as a concept for how society is turning on each other. Overall, my original thought about this piece changed drastically after some research and a closer look at the work of art.

2.

Above is an important piece of art that hangs in the kitchen, conveniently placed in the center of my house. This piece of art is something I look at every day as soon as I come out of my room, it has hung there for as long as I can remember which is what makes it special to me. The media used to create this work was a camera, my father is a photographer and graphic designer so he has an eye for making ordinary things beautiful. He took the image, printed it, and created a glossy effect using an epoxy style lamination. I would say that this art serves the purpose of catching the eye of anyone new who enters my home, it's a very "non-traditional" work of art that is brand new to many people. I believe that this work is beautiful because it captures such a simple bland image yet still manages to catch everyones eye.

3. In an attempt to explain the world I see I will mention a few details about myself. I am a 17 year old female who comes from a caucasian background. I have been able to gain a lot of different customs from my step parents, one being Italian and the other being Venezuelan. For fun, I like to stay social, I spend time with family and friends, as well as what I like to call my side job of doing nails. I am a member of National Honor Society which is school based. Outside of as school setting, I work as a gymnastics coach. I have many life experiences that make me unique, I grew up in a household where we constantly were taught to try new things, so I now hold knowledge and perspective on many activities that others my age might not.

4. Below is my self-portrait, I used the collage method to bring together all things natural such as food, light, earth. All these things represent me and what I see in the world.

[deanwinchesterswitch]

Evermore

Summary: Living without Dean is an unbearable endeavor.

Pairing: Dean x Female Reader

Warnings: ANGST, character death-no graphic detail

Word Count: 1,000😮 (Probably will never do that again.)

Title Card Credits: @tumbler-tidbits

Beta(s): Un-betaed, (😬first time for everything), but tear tested.😭😭😭

Author’s Notes: Based on the song evermore and the SPN finale. I am not a Taylor Swift fan, but the first time I heard the song, there was a visceral need to write a Dean-related fic. Listen while you read. I wrote this in one afternoon after listening to the song on repeat for about four hours the night before and literally crying when I woke up visualizing the story.

November

Months pass. Devastating sorrow lingers. The scene too vivid in her mind. The torment in her heart too painful. The hole in her soul too big to fill. A gut-punch in unsuspecting moments. A colorless world void of vibrant peridot eyes. 

Roaming the bunker’s hallways like a ghost, she looks for him around every corner, listens for his voice echoing through the building, smells the cologne of motor oil, leather, and spice everywhere. 

Sam had left with Miracle and the Impala days ago. She missed the lovable mutt but knew he was better off with Sam. She couldn’t take care of the dog. Hell, she can barely take care of herself. 

They’d argued about Baby, though. That car was everything to Dean; one couldn’t be mentioned without thinking about the other, synonymous. Sam had never appreciated the black beauty the way that she and Dean had—seeing it as just a car. That is until Dean d-. Then, then, he saw it as something more—a token, a connection to the larger-than-life man that no longer existed in this life.

She’d finally let it go, exhausted from dealing with him, but had put her foot down regarding Dean’s other belongings—clothes, weapons, albums, the old record player. Finding a spell in the MOL archives, she’d ensured that no one could enter Dean’s room but her. Was it unfair to Sam? Maybe, but by that point, she didn’t care anymore. Dean had been taken from her, and she wasn’t about to let anyone, not even his brother, take more. She knew it wouldn’t bring Dean back, nothing would, according to Jack, but she couldn’t, wouldn’t, let go.

The old scaffolding groans beneath her weight, threatening to give way as she climbs higher. The wooden planks sigh under her feet as she leans against the brick. She stares disconsolately through the broken window of the dilapidated factory hiding the bunker below. The wind howls, ripping leaves from the trees. Dull, ugly shades of goldenrod, ochre, and walnut whip through the air and over the ground—drops of rain lash at her skin, the cold, harsh sting goes unnoticed. The only thing she feels is a pain so deep in her bones that she knows it will be there evermore.

December

Tiny crystals crunch beneath her feet. The path to their place hidden beneath soft white flakes and icy shards tinted blue. He’d brought her here the first time he told her he loved her. She’d found him here, heartbroken and crying after the loss of his mother. It’s where they came to escape everything the universe threw at them, even if for a brief moment. It’s where he proposed—painted a picture of a life without monsters, angels, or demons, free of the burden of saving the world and the almighty’s manipulation. A colorful, shining life full of freedom, happiness, and love.

Sitting on the fallen tree, she runs a hand over the space next to her. Face turning to the dull sky painted in greyscale, hot tears sear a trail over her cheeks. She’s lost, adrift in a vast ocean without him, tossed about on waves of misery threatening to drown her. She tries to recapture those fleeting moments of happiness, to break through the eternal sadness. Yet, every time she tries, the images distort and evanesce, like a reel of film disintegrating in a fire. The only scene to play out entirely is the one where she lost it all.

He doesn’t want her to live like this. He’s told her as much. Told her to move on and be happy. She’d tried… for him. It lasted a week. She contacted old friends, took an easy salt and burn a few towns over, and even went to dinner with Donna and Jody. It was all too much—too bright, too loud, too full of… life.

That’s why she comes here most days now. It’s peaceful, safe. She feels closest to him here. Can see him in the sun’s rays shining through the tangled tree limbs, hear his voice on the breeze, feel his presence in the thrum of the earth. Sometimes she’ll fall asleep for an hour or two. That’s when the dreams come. It’s the only place she can dream anymore.  No nightmares reach her here. The feel of his touch lingers when she wakes, a thumb brushing over the back of her hand, a rough-skinned palm against her cheek, supple lips pressed to hers. The deep rasp of his voice an echo in her ear. Ethereal, but enough to get her through to the next day. 

It’s snowing now. Inhaling the cool, crisp air deep into her lungs, she closes her eyes. The pain still there, always, evermore. A single tear slips beneath her lashes, and he gently thumbs it away, whispering into her ear, “Rest.”

It’s warm when she wakes. A soft gust of wind tousles the hair falling on her face. A shiver flutters through her as she pushes up to sit in the shade of the flowering Mountain Ash above her. It’s just like the one she pictured outside the cabin he had promised to build for her. Standing, she spins in place, the skirt of her sundress lifting in the breeze. When her eyes land on the wooden structure, her heart skips. It’s exactly as he described it. The grass is cool beneath her feet, tickling her soles. Skipping up the stairs and across the porch, she throws the door open. Floorboards creak beneath her steps as she races from room to room, ending up where she started. Chest tightening when she doesn’t find him. 

A shadow blocks the sun streaming through the open door, and her breath catches. For a split second, she’s frozen in place, terrified that the slightest movement, the tiniest breath, will send it all up in a haze of smoke. The air shifts around her, and warm, rough-skinned hands rest on her shoulders.

Turning with a small cry, she breathes, “Dean.”

“Welcome home, baby.”

Love Me Some Pie taglist: @akshi8278 / @asgoodasdancingqueen / @calaofnoldor / @compresshischest09 / @deanwanddamons / @flamencodiva / @idreamofplaid / @jerkbitchidjitassbutt / @michellethetvaddict / @mvdeanw / @shawnie74 / @siospins2 / @thinkinghardhardlythinking / @thoughts-and-funnies / @waynes-multiverse / @wayward-and-worn / @waywardbaby / @weepingwillowphoenix

[kate-komics]

Okay…

OkayOkayOkay!

So, here is my first attempt at an actual digital painting. One of my goals this year is to work on an develop my digital realistic panting skills. I want to have a better understanding of values and shading beyond just a comic book style and possibly develop a more ‘concept art’ style. Really, I just want to be a well rounded digital artist overall. Step out if my comfort zone and what not.

So, that being said, I do humbly request any critiques anyone has! It was a challenge and I honestly had to force myself to just stop working and knit picking at it. I very easily just start going over areas again and again until they get too messy and it just muddies up the whole piece. I think I’m grasping how to show values and shapes but when it comes to cleaning it up and finishing… well I’m a little lost.

Any and all constructive criticism welcome!

Oh, and I guess to clarify or if anyone is wondering, the subject of this painting is Matt Murdock as played by Charlie Cox. I feel like I lost his likeness a little bit but still pretty happy with how he turned out over all 😅

Thanks, you beautiful babes!

[ID: Stylized digital painting of Matt Murdock as played by Charlie Cox. Medium close up from the shoulders up. His figure is completely greyscale with no saturated color. He wears his typical suit and tie, but no glasses. His hair is slightly mused but not messy. He faces the viewer directly with his face is at a slightly up turned angel. There is sorrow and pain in his expression. His eyes are completely white, lacking any irises. He crises tears of bright red blood. They leave symmetrical red streams down his cheeks and neck, ending with a few splotches on his collar. There are also faded splotches of red on his left temple and lower lip. Behind him is a stark white background and a solid circle of bright yellow behind his head to imitate a halo.

Below the finished painting are 2 studies done of the final piece. The first is just the blocked out lighting values of Matt’s figure. The second is a white line art sketch against and black background.

End ID]

[mousechuckles]

I was getting some questions about my process in procreate, so I just put this together. More under the cut!

1. Start with a rough sketch! It just has to be clear enough, so that when I start painting, I know where things are supposed to go. I use references throughout the whole process, but especially now! If I get something wrong here, it'll be a pain to fix later after I start adding in values and color and all the fun details.

2. I make 2 layers, one for the body and one for the helmet, just painting in the basic shapes. Then, I make 2 clipping mask layers, one for each of those. I could have more, but for a painting like this, it's not really necessary.

3. I start to lay in some values on the clipping mask layers with the flat brush. For this particular painting, I wasn't sure what colors I wanted yet, so I stuck to greyscale. Whenever you're making anything, whether it's with graphite or an apple pencil, the pressure you use is super important. Constantly pressing really hard gives you less control over your stroke. Another helpful thing to remember is painting big to small. At this point, I'm not thinking about the little scratches on his armor (at least I shouldn't be). Right now, I'm using a bigger size for my brush and later I can zoom in with a smaller one.

4. Then I made a copy of my work so far and duplicated it a couple times in a new canvas. I played around with the gradient map tool and color drop to try to quickly find something that stands out! Something I learned just recently is that you can adjust the reach a color drop has. Super helpful!

5. After finding a palette I liked, I go back to my first canvas and used the same method again to get those colors. This is a bit convoluted and only cause I don't like to work without having a clear direction in mind. If I know my colors right away, I'd probably skip the greyscale and color comps, and go straight to this step.

6. This is where the fun begins! Still looking at my references, I begin to render the form. I use a combination of the flat brush and smudge tool to build in the values. Once the basic values are there, I started to give the armor some texture. I used the dry brush and oil brush to add nicks and scratches. I also used some from the comics MaxPack set.

7. After finishing the helmet, I start to focus more on the body, using the same technique. I use the flat brush to define the large shadows on the pockets and bring it to a teeny size to add the stitches. I try to always keep the basic light logic principles in mind.

8. Last step is to take a break! I've been looking at this thing for too long, and if there's anything wrong I can't tell. I come back to look at it later and give itty bitty finishing touches. Maybe a highlight gets too bright, or an edge isn't as defined as I would like. Then I call it done!

Thanks for reading! I want to say I'm definitely still learning about painting digitally and I'm no professional! This isn't the best way to work, but it's my method. Hopefully this rambling mess was helpful to some of you!! If there's any questions I can do my best to answer :)

[nimueth]

A sketch that turned into anatomy practice, which then turned into shading and painting practice, which then turned into colour practice. I painted this in greyscale, so the colour was a bit of a pain to get right, but it was a fun new way to do art, and I’ll definitely be doing it again! The background is a screenshot from Shepard's cabin that I painted over and blurred (though I think I went overboard with the blur).

I actually wanted to try painting in greyscale for a while, but it looked too intimidating and I wasn't up to new challenges for a long time. This was also my first time painting in Clip Studio. And my first time drawing and sharing something suggestive in...well, a very long time, so it feels weird, haha. Lots of firsts in this piece!

Hopefully it’s not too risque for Tumblr. >.>

[katsukisbeatingheart]

capella and rigel

au where you don’t see color until you meet your soulmate. they come to you one at a time the longer you’re together.

word count: 2,530

a.n.: you guys are BREAKING MY HEART you’ve been so sweet and receptive with the last one ( sing to me ) im such a mess ( ´༎ຶv༎ຶ`) i SEE YOU i WILL kiss you i am not playing. anyway!! im posting these soulmate works in an order backwards from which i started - which is funny, because that way it goes from least angstish to most. 

here are the others!

Shinso

Sero

Bakugou

ao3

When the blue exploded, you weren’t ready for your world to change with a rushing suddenness. You were blindsided with the odd experience of a first time that felt like memory.

First off, you didn’t know how you knew blue would be it, but you did.

When someone told you that’s what color that sweater you liked to wear all the time was, you just knew. When someone told you that’s what color some of your favorite fruits were, you just knew. When someone told you that’s what color the sky was, you just knew.

When someone told you that’s what color the ocean was—because it reflected the sky—you cried because you just knew.

There was something revelatory of such a relationship—the rhapsodic truth that two forces of nature could be reflections of the other, even with completely opposing standpoints.

In your greyscale vacuum, you were none the wiser to a life that could promise that yet. From a young age, you hoped and prayed for that day to come, until it became a hapless strain of static that took a backseat to growing up.

In general, you hadn’t known what to expect; you imagined that cats were probably the color of sprinkles on ice cream, trees were balloons floating in the air, and pavements were the color of spring. When you looked up to the night, you thought that stars might be like lighting a candle. You thought that might mean yellow.

And even when it was so dark, you hoped the sky would still be blue.

It tore through every crevice of your vision, crowding your sight and singeing your senses.

Blue wasn’t supposed to come to you in a maelstrom on a previously peaceful Sunday morning. It wasn’t supposed to burn through the pages of one of your favorite books, or weld your utensils together.

It was supposed to bump into you on a tramline station, at a park, in a crowd, and then apologise quickly; it was supposed to be in widening eyes and stuttering breaths that gave you a name you’d knew like an old friend you had yet to meet.

It wasn’t supposed to be in so much pain.

It wasn’t supposed to cause any of it, either.

You’re on your back, starry eyed and afraid all at once, suffering the memory of your first time seeing color. It’s burning you, you realize, and the tears evaporate before they touch skin.

Blue fire is attention grabbing—it’s blue, you know it is—and watching it move like you imagined blue waves would was mesmerizing. It soaked the ground with scorch marks, scarring bedlam and terror into the earth.

Your eyes blown wide catch every moment, frozen in blue.

Though, as more of the hue crops up in all different directions, your eyes are suddenly the only part of you that can’t sit still. If the fire does anything else better than burn, it’s cast light—as it throws your vision farther than usual.

You don’t miss a single detail.

The sea of people around you scatter in fear— there’s chaos but you just can’t move—and you’re anchored to the ground like roots of a tree that didn’t get to choose its growing place. You’re trapped somewhere off centre in a spiraling vortex of entropy simultaneously inhaling and granting your newfound freedom.

Across the street in spots on a mailbox, the smallest pieces detailed the metal in cool colored rivets; in the scorching bed along the stone wall cafe lay crisped, blue calla lilies; the delicate hue accented in little flora shaded your spilled and shattered tea glass.

With the proximity of unimaginable heat, noise, and overall calamity shuffling so quickly around you, you felt encased in time. An hourglass tipped in your throat and the scalding sands ran through your veins. The inferno raged on until you noticed your place in it. It spun in a tempest around you and everything melted away.

Your vision shifts and you find the catalyst to be a tall, dark, and lanky shadow of a man. He contrasted the unyielding light—that he was producing, you agnised—to an almost sardonic degree. He held his hands in his pockets and shoulders in a slouch that said all of this was of no consequence, concern, or effort to him. He looked bored.

That is, until he saw you, too.

Freezing blue eyes glistened back at you in a cacophony of emotions.

There’s comprehension, apprehension, indignation—you try to settle on one, though absolutely fruitless with a whirlpool of your own at your feet.

You tried to speak your disbelief, a sense of joy, a simple admission to life, but your voice died on your tongue. The fumes coiled at your throat, still you held your ground. It was all you could do in your dormancy, and it was all you were going to do on the precipice of eruption.

It was like watching someone conduct a hurricane, what he did next.

His hands hummed an unknown melody to the flames, and you watched and waited and listened to the music that poured out if him—quickly becoming a little more afraid at the prospect of becoming an unwittingly unwilling participant from the audience.

However, the coiling and dissipation of the blue told you that this was the grand finale, and in a voiceless and motionless dance, he swayed out of sight under the haze of blue hellfire—so searing it was cold to the touch.

•.•.•.

When the heroes arrived, the police whisked you away to take your statement and check for injuries. It was like talking—and mostly listening—through a thick pane of glass, though. You said very little, and perceived even less.

What were you going to do? Include in your witness report that the perpetrator was your soulmate? That fact alone changed everything, and you knew that if you were to speak up about it now, the authorities would take you in. You weren’t about to be used as an asset when you had barely any time to process the truth yourself.

Everything was running smoothly, until the heroes came around to check on the injured. An expressionless man with two-toned hair and a nasty scar over his eye stepped before you, an ‘Are you alright?’ soft on his lips, contrasting the sternness in his features.

You took one look at the color of his left eye and fainted against the ambulance doors.

•.•.•.

Waking in a sweating bundle on your bedcovers was not a good way to end the day. It skewed your sense of reality, and you had to wrestle away the idea that the whole thing might have been a dream. The headache didn’t help, but it was proof you know what you saw. And what you were currently seeing.

A lot of everything else was still in greyscale, but your eyes weren’t lying to you as you took in your room. Blue comic books, pens, decals, posters, pictures; the laundry overflowed your basket, spilling in a pile of blue onto your carpet.

Blue eyes in the corner of your room.

“What did you see?” you whispered. He’s there like the shade of gossamer window curtains, a figureless concept of existence, and yet you speak knowing he’s suddenly the most solid thing there.

“You.”

You inhaled sharply, barely a pinprick to the weight in the room.

“You know that’s not what I mean. I’m not a color.”

“You were the brightest thing there. Might as well have been.”

“Impossible,” you laughed, waving your hand absently to dismiss your incredulity. “You set everything on fire.”

“Makes no difference,” he affirmed in a tone that sounded rich, drawled, and deep like molasses and a smoky room. There was silence as his voice drizzled along your skin, a safe distance in the uncertainty. It doesn’t break, even when you speak the opposite of what you should be uncertain about.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

“Yet here I am.”

There’s a flutter by your open window, and you unfold yourself from your stagnant place on your bed. Without argument, you wisp to its side, facing the world like it was unchanged.

His presence is permeable next to you, yet you were sure you had never felt anything as real.

Everything and nothing was the same.

“What do you see?”

“Still you.”

You glance to the side and see an almost facetious simper gliding across his features, even though you knew he was probably being anything but flippant.

“Dabi.”

He shifted almost imperceptibly, coiling with the dark to a time and space closer. He smelled like amber pine and sawdust, collecting evening dew.

“So you do know who I am.”

You picked at the peeling paint along the sill. It was still white.

“I follow the news. I’ve seen your face stuck to faded alley posters.”

“Now what would you be doing in alleyways?” He chuckled lowly through thinly veiled, amused bewilderment.

So he didn’t know who you were.

Just as well, it wasn’t like you lived a life of any consequence.

Truth was, you were simply a curious person with an awkward and clumsy sense of direction—finding yourself on adventures you could easily get yourself out of, only with a little time, effort, and backtracking. Even though you’d much rather see it through to the end, no matter how dark, twisted, or ugly.

The truth wasn’t meant to be pretty.

But he didn’t need to know that.

And if this were to keep up anyway, he’d find out soon enough.

You peered at him through your eyelashes and his shape almost disappeared. Instead, you leaned forward into the open world, trying to catch life as it moved below you. Your eyes spotted grass and trees, and you gasped before you could stop yourself.

“They’re green.”

“So I’ve been told.”

You turned your head to face him, chewing the inside of your cheek.

“I’ve never seen green before.”

He’s quiet as he stares at you. He had leaned against the wall beside you, hip and head propped like he wouldn’t rather be looking anywhere else. You stare back softly, still not used to the visceral experience in eye contact.

“What do you see?” he asks like holding glass. You’re tempted to keep it to yourself for at least a day longer—safeguard the truth like you were the only one in the world who could see colors. An innocent secret you’d never have to share with anybody.

And yet here was a thread presented to you by the universe, asking to be pulled from the tangle.

You looked at his frayed edges and twisted knots, feeling your own pull tighten like a lifeline.

“Blue,” you breathe. He’s beside you now, angled to the open window, eyes still burning answers and questions—so many questions—across your very surface.

You both stretch out, casting your eyes up to the night sky, in your own world like he wasn’t who he was and you weren’t who you were. Collected in a jar of your own making, you spill your breath across the open air, and he’s there with you like a pooling splash of ink you don’t want out. Oh, the memories you could write with him.

“So these are the stars, huh?” his tone hasn’t lifted from that tedium, but he talks like he’s standing among them.

Tears prickled the corner of your eyes. You couldn’t tell whether from happiness or nostalgia or disappointment or confusion or another nameless thing—you only knew that you were looking at the stars. You were looking at the night sky and suddenly seeing the stars, and—

“Some of them are blue.”

Dabi traces the bottom hemline of your sweater with his thumb, breathing clearer air than he had in a long, long time.

“There’s yellow up there, too.”

The tears spill down your cheeks, but his hand is there to catch them with cracked fingertips.

“You know,” you begin with a small sniffle, “I don’t remember the night being this… luminous.” His face splits in to a grin.

“That’s your fault.”

You roll your eyes, peeling back to lightly shove against his arm. You had barely touched him, but his heart beats as though he’d been caught in an earthquake. He’s unsteady, and grows more and more terrified by the second of the anchor in your eyes. He’s not strong enough to try and move it.

You watched him pull back, startled by the alertness in his movements. He sweeps his legs up and over the side, perched on the windowsill as though he made to jump through it.

“You’re leaving?”

“I thought you were the one who said I shouldn’t be here,” he grinned, though not without that bitter glint in his already harshly blue eyes. Your lip finds its place pulled between your teeth.

“I think there are still some things I want to see.” You glance to the side, searching for words in the spots of color blooming along the edges of your world. “With you.”

Dabi bridges small gaps between you two—some rickety and many burnt, but still there—leaving space for you to jump ship. His fingers brush warm trails across the skin of your face again, like forfeiting a whittling candelabrum to the shaking hands of a blind man.

You suppose someone like him defies all laws, even the ones of the natural world as he ghosts down the siding of the building, just another wandering shade looking for its way back.

In a day of unforseens, you try and convince yourself that it was the stars that got to you. It’s easier to place blame on things you can’t control, and part of you feels liberated knowing this was just not one of those things you were meant to expect. You let your hopes and predictions solidify the labyrinthian ground you walk on.

But as you lean through the window, you call out to him and realize you’re swallowing your assumptions like antifreeze.

“Wait!”

His head turns to the side to catch you pouring out of your mundane and into his living underworld.

“You have to come back.” The yellow on your sweater burns into your irises, and he has never been more wary of his place in the universe. Especially when it glows back at him through the eyes of a future he didn’t know he even had.

“I want to know what sunrises look like.”

The tempest in him glares up at the beacon your window—no—you provide and he feels a weird, opposing sense of mitigation and incertitude. A ubiquitous tangibility his first instinct declares a malignant impediment.

Still, he can’t help but feel as though a tide were in the process of crashing his lifeboat—a stray piece of driftwood—on to obscure shores.

That can’t be all that much of a bad thing, he considers.

With a small, barely there and imperceptibly honest smile, he places a two fingered tap to the crown of his forehead—throwing an ignition to the wind in a quiet promise.

The light fades, and you clutch the matchstick, watching the blue disappear with him into the dark of night.

[tracybirds]

Caesura

This fic is brought to you, courtesy of my complete and utter inability to trill and being mean enough to say if I can’t play the piano properly, neither can he.

Many thanks to @gumnut-logic for the prod to write it and to @hedwigstalons for making me feel better about endings.... look there’s even a title xD

-------------------------------------------------------------

Virgil wished he could tell people honestly that when he first registered the sharp snap of bone against rock, his primary concern had been for International Rescue. A broken bone was serious, even if it was a clean break without complications. He would need to be pulled from duty for at least a couple of months, leaving everyone else to pick up the slack. He knew what that felt like, to be a part of a team that was missing a limb, working longer hours and stepping into a role that wasn’t made for him.

But when the crack resonated in the air and the pain flared in his wrist, International Rescue had been the last thing on his mind.

***

Three days later, Virgil sat down at the piano. His left hand was a whirlwind of motion, running up and down the keys, and his right was strapped to his chest. He wasn’t using it but muscle memory kept his fingers twitching in the solid cast. He hissed and doubled over his arm protectively as the automatic movement twinged against the nerves in his broken wrist.

A hand fell heavy on his shoulder. He ignored it, the thought of soothing the dull ache in his wrist overwhelming.

“Virgil.”

Scott said his name like a command, and he looked up into the worried eyes of his brother.

“Come on, Virgil, what have you done to yourself? You can’t play with a broken wrist.”

“Wasn’t trying to play,” said Virgil, through gritted teeth. “Was practising my scales.”

Scott’s lips thinned, but he said nothing as he gently pulled his brother from the stool and brought him down to the kitchen. Out of sight of his beloved instrument, but never far from mind.

“Here,” said Scott, pushing two small pills and a glass of water over to him.

“No,” said Virgil, immediately. “It’s not that bad, I don’t want–”

“Stop being a hero,” snapped Scott. “You’re in pain, there’s no shame in taking drugs for it.”

Virgil glared at the pills in lieu of a response.

Scott huffed in front of him.

“What’s eating you anyway?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It clearly does.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

He pushed the glass away and strode from the room.

“Great,” called Scott after him. “Good talk.”

Virgil ignored him, stalking up the stairs towards his own room. It seemed a cruel irony that now his schedule was wide open and the days stretching before him, he couldn’t do the one thing he’d always wanted to spend more time on.

He pulled a sketchbook from the shelf and threw himself onto a chair. He knew he had a lot to be thankful for, that things could have been so much worse, but the thought was of little comfort as he stared blankly at the open page.

A pianist leapt from his pencil, captured in the throes of performance. He could hear the vitality in the piece, the energy as the sketch moved his whole body with the rhythm.

It wasn’t just the way music allowed him to relax, he needed it, the constant heartbeat of the world translating to harmony in a way that kept him connected to those around him. Without his piano he felt cut off and distant, even his humming felt flat and lifeless.

The second sketch held an aching tenderness, gentle, the pianist caressing the keys as he played, head bent close. If Virgil listened to the phantom melody, he could hear the hesitancy between the notes. The silence echoed as he lifted his pencil, art reflecting life.

Uncertainty plagued him most of all. It was the long weeks where his muscles would waste away that he feared, where the dexterity he had worked so hard to maintain all his life could be lost in one minor accident. The stiffness surrounding his wrist felt unnatural and he didn’t know how to let go of the trepidation that was coiled in his chest.

A sharp knock lifted him from the world of greyscale and charcoal.

“Virgil?”

He sighed, knowing Scott wouldn’t wait to be let in forever, and trudged over to the door, yanking it open with a suitably annoyed expression on his face.

“What?”

Scott held up a mug of coffee.

“If you’re not taking meds, there’s nothing stopping you from drowning in caffeine.”

“You can mix caffeine with painkillers, you know,” he said, taking the coffee as he stepped back.

Scott kicked the door shut behind him.

“Well, I needed an excuse to get in.” His eyes softened as he spied the drawing materials abandoned on the desk.

“You gonna turn these into a painting?”

He shrugged, not in the mood to discuss his work. He wasn’t embarrassed, and he’d learnt long ago that very little could remain private with four brothers, but the new sketches were personal. They had a sense of fragility to them that he wasn’t ready to share.

He took a sip of the coffee, its taste bitter on his tongue. Scott always made it too strong.

“Can we talk?”

Virgil eyed his brother.

“Depends on what you have to say.”

Scott’s eyes narrowed at the challenge.

“You’ve been moping around for the past three days. I want to help, that’s all.”

“Well unless you’re hiding away a new medical breakthrough that can knit bone back together again, that’s going to be a challenge.”

“C’mon, you’ve had worse injuries than this.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“And that shattered knee was what exactly?”

“It’s not the same.”

“Four surgeries, Virgil.”

“But I could play then, Scott,” snapped Virgil. “You can’t make me feel better about this.

Scott halted at the words, regret washing over his expression. Virgil felt a twinge of satisfaction watching his brother crawl his way back to his contrite opening.

“I know piano’s important to you, but it’s only for a few weeks. And Grandma said you can switch to a brace and restart your strength training by May.”

Virgil sighed and shifted his gaze. Scott followed his line of sight to the beat up piano his brother had insisted they bring with them to the island. The one their father had given their mother as a wedding present. It had been ancient even then but it was infused with their parents’ love and both brothers had spent countless hours learning simple tunes on the instrument under their mother’s tutelage.

“I just miss it.”

Scott smiled sadly.

“Yeah, I know it sucks.”

“And what if there are complications and it never comes right? What will I do then?”

“You’d figure it out. People have played piano after worse injuries than a poorly mended wrist fracture.”

Virgil scrubbed at his eyes and leant back, suddenly feeling exhausted.

“I know it’s only a few weeks in the cast, and only a couple of months before I’m back out there on rescues. Maybe that should be enough.”

Scott nudged him.

“There’s no ‘should’ in this, you can be upset.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Just don’t get hurt in the process. Stay off that piano, you can’t help yourself.”

“It’s the perfect time to work on my left hand technique though.”

“Stay. Off.” Scott jabbed his finger at Virgil, a menacing look in his eye. “Or I’ll sic Grandma on you.”

Virgil rolled his eyes.

“Sure, Scott, whatever you say.” He glanced back over at the abandoned drawing materials and Scott stood, taking the hint.

“Right, well, I’ll leave you to it.”

“Scott?” he called after him. “Thanks.”

“Any time,” Scott said with a grin, closing the door behind him.

Virgil sat still, waiting, for a few moments before sidestepping the desk and making his way to the old upright in the corner.

The piano lid creaked as badly as it did when their Dad had first bought the instrument but the tuning was true.

His left hand sought out the chords instinctively, running up and down the arpeggios and exercises he’d learnt as a child, letting the notes wash over him like a soothing wave.

Scott listened from outside with a half-smile and a shake of the head.

He had to trust his brother with this.

[wherevermyway]

we’re professional. (1/??) // minbin // 18+

❄ part of yuki’s favourites! ❄

we’re professional. chapter one: sophisticated series navigation: [desktop] [mobile]

pairing: lee minho x seo changbin rating: explicit! 18+ warnings/tags: slow burn, angst, eventual sexual content, age difference, art student changbin, artist minho, fake dating AU. word count: 4,807 also on AO3

originally posted: 17 december 2020

series summary: Lee Minho, or Minho: The Heartless, is a famous artist, which comes with an annoying entourage of paparazzi that are very invested in his life.

Two years ago, a piece at UBC's annual student's exhibit catches Minho's eye: "arranged: in black", a series of greyscale paintings crafted by sophomore Seo Changbin. Minho talks with Changbin at length for hours, then offers to help him financially if they pretend to date for a while, so Minho can please the press. Naturally, a walking exhibit of the "starving artist" stereotype, Changbin accepts the offer wholeheartedly.

There are no strings attached: Changbin can leave at any time. Hell, Minho doesn't even ask him for sex in exchange for the money, just companionship and occasional skinship. Changbin knows that Minho is emotionally damaged from several bad relationships in the past, so to have someone pay him just for providing them company is nice. Sure, he could go off and date someone and work on settling down, but he just doesn't want to. Minho is too interesting, too valuable.

Eventually, something's gotta give. When it does, it could potentially damage their relationship and careers forever.

disclaimer: this is a work of fiction! any reference to persons in this work of fiction are purely coincidental. the characters referenced from Stray Kids are  interpretations loosely based on their personalities in the group and do  not represent the real people behind the personas. if this, or any of  the content included in the warnings above make you uncomfortable,  please stop reading now.

chapter summary: Minho brings up an interesting proposal while celebrating the second year of his professional arrangement with Changbin.

“I can’t accept this.” The young, blue-haired man at the opposite side of the table of a middle-aged brunette pushes an open envelope back across the table. “It’s too much. You’ve already given me so much this month, I couldn’t possibly accept anymore.”

“Changbin,” the brunette smirks, bringing the crystal glass of wine up to his mouth. “Please, don’t insult me. I’m not offering this just off the cuff. Besides, it’s not just cash that’s in there.”

The bluenette frowns, bringing his gin and tonic to his mouth, taking a careful, prescribed sip as he watches the older man cautiously. He lets the gin burn its way down his throat before he sighs. “It’s sex, then. That’s what you want, Minho?”

“No.” Minho’s expression quickly turns serious and slightly sour. “Not at all. I told you when we first started this arrangement that this wouldn’t turn sexual.”

“Right.” Changbin cocks his eyebrows up in response, his tone somewhat sarcastic. He brings the glass up again, tilting it and his head backwards, letting the ice slink down and hit him in the nose as he finishes off his drink. He sets the glass down on to the table, ice settling with a soft clink, before he rolls his eyes up and frowns. “What’s all this for, then?” The young man rolls his wrist around, bringing his chin down to his right hand. “You’ve really gone all out for this date.”

Minho softly smiles, then mimics Changbin, mirroring him in the way that he places his head in his left palm. “It’s been two years, officially.” He makes eye contact with a server somewhere off in the distance, and nods upward.

“Two years, eh?” Changbin tuts. “Surprising that neither of us have gotten sick of each other, nor found other people to spend time with.” He takes in a quick breath, then flashes his teeth with a lazy smirk. “Sure you’re not getting serious with me yet?”

The older man opens his mouth to speak, but quickly recedes his statement as a lanky waiter confidently struts over to the table. “Hyunjin, could you please bring me the bottle of Clos D’Ambonnay I have in the back?”

“Of course, Mr. Lee,” the blond waiter nods his head once with a polite smile before he makes his way back to whence he came.

Changbin squinted, knitting his brows together as he shook his head once. “You own this restaurant, too, don’t you?”

“Mmm, I wouldn’t necessarily say own it, no.” Minho hums, bringing his index finger in between his teeth as he ponders. “It’s a partnership with an old colleague of mine, Chan; you met him at the Vivace Vancouver exhibit over the spring. He had that dreadful red hair, the one where you said he looked like he got electrocuted and then spray painted by an angry ex-lover.”

The younger man’s eyes go wide as he tries to hold back his laughter. “Oh my god,” he sighs, “I remember that. How do you forget something so audacious, is that even possible?” He regains his composure and rests upright against the back of the chair. “In my defence, though, I was two glasses of Chianti in when I said that. Please tell me that his hair isn’t that horrible shade anymore. It was so bad.”

Minho smiles widely and softly shakes his head. “No, no, god, no. I met with him the day after and told him that he needed to go back to see my stylist immediately and never go back to the hellspawn that butchered his hair.”

“Apologies for the interruption, Mr. Lee,” the lanky waiter from before returned, presenting a black bottle before he placed it on top of the table. “As requested.” He placed well-crafted champagne flutes in front of both Minho and Changbin.

“Hyunjin,” Minho tutted as the waiter grabbed the bottle, “I’ve told you several times that just ‘Minho’ is fine.”

The blond waiter half-smiled as he wrapped a hand towel around the cork, deftly wiggling it off with a muffled pop. “And I will tell you each time,” he poured some of the champagne into Changbin’s glass first, “you will always be Mr. Lee when I’m at work.”

“You’re too stiff,” the brunette gently pushed his glass towards the blond as he set Changbin’s glass down. “I know that Chan — sorry, Mr. Bang — is strict with all of you, to maintain a pristine image,” Hyunjin picks up Minho’s glass and bites his lip as if he’s holding back commentary, “but you’re still in your prime. Bend the rules a little while you can get away with it.”

Changbin watches the way Minho’s eyes flutter around from the glass to Hyunjin, catching himself getting caught up in the way the light sparkles against his brown eyes, the way his eyelashes paint shadows on his irises. He doesn’t mean for every detail to be etched into his memory, but there was always something about remembering the details of Minho’s soft face that warmed him. If it were any other world, any other person, perhaps he would be catching feelings.

This arrangement, however, was strictly professional. There was no room for feelings.

Hyunjin sets the bottle back down onto the table. “Sure thing, Minho,” he sarcastically scoffs as he wiggles his shoulders in some sort of strange dance of mockery. “Would you like an ice bucket to keep this chilled?”

Minho shrugs, seemingly indifferent, but his expression turns a bit more serious. “I suppose. Don’t worry about us, though. Tend to the other customers first — we’ll be here for a while longer. A bit of champagne slowly warming won’t be the end of the world.”

“You got it, Mr. Lee,” Hyunjin says, tipping his index and middle fingers off of his forehead in some sort of joking salute before he spins on his heel and walks off to another table.

Minho grabs his champagne flute and flashes his teeth at Changbin. “Sorry about that, love, I’ve just gotta give the staff here trouble every now and again.”

Changbin blushes as he picks up his champagne flute, bringing it close to Minho’s. “Don’t apologize.” He tries to restrain his embarrassment, still mentally replaying the way that Minho called him ‘love’, desperately trying to get the sound to imprint upon his memory. “Anyway,” he lifts his head from his palm and stares directly into the brunette’s eyes. “Two years? I can’t believe it’s been this long since I met you.”

“Your ‘arranged: in black’ series captured me, Changbin, what can I say?” The older man tilts his head to the side, tugging his lips into a smile. “I still think about it every day.”

“It’s hard to avoid thinking about it when all four pieces are hanging behind your bed, wouldn’t you say?”

“Suppose that’s fair,” Minho bites his bottom lip as he avoids laughing. “But, wow, two years. Two very eventful years. To think, you were a scraggly sophomore two years ago when I met you. You really kind of fit the ‘starving artist’ stereotype back then, hmm?”

Changbin’s eyes subconsciously darted down to the maroon tablecloth. He avoided thinking about his life before he met Minho, since it wasn’t something he was overly fond of. Sleeping for a couple of hours a night after a late dishwashing shift at the restaurant, waking up before dawn to run to his part-time barista job, then somehow getting to class just in time to nearly doze off mid-project sketch, all to repeat it again the next day. The chronic sleep deprivation painted him in an ashy grey, and he perpetually smelled of instant ramen and coffee.

No. That was in the past.

He shuddered at the thought of his past life. It was stressful, and he was thankful that Minho came along and offered him some kindness. Most art students either came from wealthy families, or lived in the same shoes that Changbin did. The ones that weren’t from wealthy lineage would probably stay under the poverty line for the rest of their lives, but at least they would be happy creating things that came from the depths of their soul.

For some, it was worth the sacrifice. He knew what he was getting into when he was accepted into the visual arts programme at the University of British Columbia, and he was prepared for the pain and agony it would cause him for the small chance he could make it big while doing something he loved.

“Binnie, love?” Minho’s soft voice pulled Changbin from his memory. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Changbin nodded his head a couple of times, almost as if he was willing himself to be calm. “Sorry, I just kinda got distracted. Thought about when we first met and kinda got transported back in time.” It wasn’t entirely a lie, but it definitely was far from the truth.

The older man softly smiled and nudged his champagne flute forward. “Well, here’s to two years of whatever the hell this is. Here’s to however long we have left and to wherever we may go next.”

Changbin smiled, turning his chin slightly inward as he tapped his flute against Minho’s. “I like that. To whatever the hell is next.”

“‘Whatever the hell is next’,” Minho smiled as he brought the flute up to his lips. “That’s a good one.”

They didn’t get to the bottom of the bottle of champagne until about a half-hour past closing. It had been two years of the same company every Tuesday and Thursday night, and usually most Fridays and Saturdays, yet they still found new things to talk about each time they met. “You’re still so foolishly young and in university,” Minho would scold Changbin over the phone, “so go out and get hammered at a stupid house party and I’ll come by tomorrow and help nurse you out of your hangover.” Minho was really a sweetheart, even if he didn’t want to date and was, to quote Minho himself, ‘emotionally unavailable’.

It had been two years, and Changbin still didn’t fully understand why people were so pressed on calling Minho heartless.

“And so,” Changbin took a sip of water from his glass, setting it down a bit roughly, some of the water sloshing around and splashing on to the table, “I had to sketch a live model, right? Turns out Seungmin makes a horrible model at two in the morning, but we thought the idea was brilliant.”

Minho loudly cackles, throwing his head back and clapping his hands once in front of his face. “You had just gotten done downing several shots at the bar. What made either of you think that sketching in charcoal was a good idea?”

The younger man folds over, resting his head in his palms as he tries not to collapse on to the floor in laughter. “The project was due on Monday! And, hey, we got it done, and I somehow got a decent grade in the end.”

“Ah,” Minho leans back into his chair as he looks up to the wall to his left, smiling as he wipes a tear from his eye. “I’d love to scold you for that, but the truth is, I can’t. I did the same things in uni ten years ago.”

Changbin rests his chin against the back of his hand, languidly smiling as he watches Minho get lost in memories past. These moments that they shared, where they were just so plainly human — not a famous artist, not a struggling art student, but simply Minho and Changbin — these were why Changbin never sought out another partner. It was unconventional to most people, especially those his age, to have such a hands-off relationship, but it just worked for them. Sometimes, the things that came off the most discordant could somehow still find a way to harmonize, and that was what they did.

“You know, you didn’t totally open the envelope,” Minho points at the middle of the table with an open hand, as if he were guiding Changbin back to the thick paper.

Changbin shrugged his shoulders and bashfully looked away for a moment before staring Minho down. “Come on, Min,” he lowers his voice a bit, “I don’t need to know how much you’re giving me, at least not now.”

Minho dismissively waves his hand before nudging the envelope back to Changbin. “It’s not just money, love, I promise. Nothing too domestic, either. Just,” he pauses, bringing a finger to his chin as he looks up at the ceiling, “I suppose it’s partially a token of my appreciation? Yeah, that sounds right. A way to tell you I’m thankful you’ve stuck around for so long, even with all of the weird shit we’ve gone through. There’s more to it than that, but that sounds nice, doesn’t it?”

“I dunno, you’re making this feel like a real relationship,” the bluenette sarcastically mumbles a bit as he gingerly picks up the envelope, squinting a bit at Minho. He opens it, then pulls out a few plastic-like polymer bills: some green, some red. His expression quickly shifts to confusion when he comes across papery stationary, the textural difference causing a nerve to spark up in his arm. Stationary. A letter? He pulls the light grey paper out of the envelope, eyeing Minho as he opens it. “Really? Getting awfully boyfriend-like on me, Min.”

“Oh, come on, just read it,” the older man tuts, rifling through the inside pocket of his suit jacket. “I promise, it’s not as sappy as it looks.”

Changbin plucks his glasses from the table, wiggling the temples to fit just behind his ears, then clears his throat. He tries to swallow down the smirk on his face as he mocks Minho’s intonation and speech. “My loveliest Changbin,” a laugh creeps up from his stomach as he reads on. “Every single day, I wake up and I see your ‘arranged: in black’ pieces, intricately framed behind my bed, and I’m taken aback by the fact that your mind knows no bounds when it comes to expressing creativity.” The younger man peers over the sheet again, studying the somewhat bored, slightly flustered expression on the elder’s face.

“So I had a couple of glasses of wine while writing, I got a bit sentimental.” Minho flutters his lips as he rolls his eyes and flicks his wrist. “At least it’s not as bad as last year’s letter.”

Changbin smiled, but quickly brought the paper in front of his face to hide the subtle reddish tint growing on his face. “I usually don’t like keeping my own work, as you know,” he continued to read off of the letter, still avoiding eye contact with Minho, “but the graphite portrait of you, asleep on my bed from your last bout of finals — it holds a special spot in my heart. I love seeing it every time I enter my closet. It’s like there are little reminders of you scattered across my apartment, and across my heart.”

Oh.

There was a warmth that blossomed and grew in Changbin’s abdomen. The warmth reminded him of ivy hanging off of old buildings, quickly encompassing and embracing everything within its reach. It was a strange sensation, and it gave him pause before he continued reading the note.

Perhaps this was more than sentimental.

Perhaps Changbin was reading too far into things again.

“Changbin?” Minho’s voice pulled the bluenette from the cavern of thoughts he had recessed himself into. “Where did you go?” His tone was firm, distracting Changbin from the fact that Minho had interlaced his fingers between the younger man’s left hand.

This was something they always did. Minho was always touchy-feely, even if it didn’t progress past shirtless embraces as they slept next to each other, or walking hand-in-hand. The way the pads of Minho’s fingertips softly caressed the back of his hand, though, made things seem different. Special.

“Your closet.” Realizing he had spent too much time losing himself in between the grooves of Minho’s fingerprints, Changbin sputtered out some words to barely form a coherent thought. “You reminded me that I still have one of your Burberry hoodies lost somewhere in my apartment.”

Minho furrowed his brows for a moment, trying not to get caught up on how distant Changbin’s response was. “The oversized black one? You know I don’t mind if you keep it, Bin.”

“It was nearly a thousand dollars, Minho.”

The older man scoffs and rolls his eyes a bit, bringing his left hand up to the table, a small brown box of sorts covered up by his palm. “Well,” the brunette squeezed Changbin’s hand a bit, causing them to make eye contact, “when you’re done reading that letter, I’ll be sure to avoid telling you how much your ‘anniversary’ gift is.” Minho winked as he ended his sentence, right when Changbin was thinking about saying something in protest.

“Minho,” Changbin whines, drooping his shoulders a bit as he frowns.

“Changbin,” Minho teases a bit as he mockingly whines in response. “Trust me, it’s not just me spending money aimlessly. It’ll tie into the idea I have in that letter. You know, really make some of those tabloids make us look nice and get off our backs for a while.”

The younger man bit his tongue and scanned his eyes down the letter, trying to find the last spot he had read over. Across my apartment , reading the words caused his hands to sweat, across my heart, made his stomach clench. Domestic and soft, exactly what they were, but also, somehow exactly what they were not. He continued reading off the letter, but his memories started creeping up during the empty gaps between sentences.

There was the callous bite to Minho’s tone during their first real meet-up. “Our arrangement is for mutual gains: you’ll be able to live comfortably, and I’ll get the press off of my back. You won’t be a starving artist, and I’ll no longer be ‘Minho, the Heartless’. We’re professional boyfriends: all of the benefits, none of the downsides, like feelings.” His bony hands felt cold, like ice, when they shook hands to confirm their arrangement. Changbin had felt in over his head then, but he knew he didn’t have anywhere else to turn.

In contrast, there was the night that Changbin had recently stayed over at the end of October. They had gotten back shortly after one in the morning after celebrating Minho’s thirty-first birthday with a handful of his friends and several well-renowned professional artists and gallery owners. Sure, Changbin had been Minho’s quote-unquote “boyfriend” for the night, but it benefitted his art career a bit, just to branch out and connect. None of that had mattered, though, because the best part was when they had gotten half-undressed and passed out on Minho’s duvet together, giggling about how some of the attendees thought ‘artist’s birthday’ meant ‘licence to dress as insanely as humanly possible’. The one-on-one time was always what Changbin looked forward to the most: that soft, personal connection with another person on such a raw, human level.

That was the weekend he borrowed Minho’s black, oversized Burberry sweater to wear home. Changbin lied earlier. He knew exactly where it was: curled up next to his wall in his bed. The soft scent of bergamot and mandarin of the Dior Sauvage that Minho wore on his wrists and in the divots of his clavicles had slowly started to fade into hints of vanilla and sandalwood. While he knew that his arrangement with Minho wouldn’t last forever, he wanted to live in the moments that made him feel like he was in a true, caring relationship. He had a friend in Minho, he truly did. It would probably hurt like hell when they eventually decided to move on from their agreement.

We're professional. Changbin would remind himself every night as he curled up into Minho’s sweater, remembering the way Minho’s arms felt warm on his back and on his shoulders, how soft his manicured fingers were when they fit perfectly in between Changbin’s. We are not real boyfriends. The sweater would catch his inevitable tears as he lost himself in the confusing haze they had painted themselves under. Business dynamic. This was the price he would pay to get into the elusive elitist art world. Strictly professional.

Even if it cost him his sanity.

“Did I just read that correctly?” Changbin’s voice was alarmed, and he frantically re-read the words on the paper before darting his eyes around nervously. Minho smirked as Changbin leaned over the table, dropping his voice to a just-audible whisper. “You want to do what to get the press’ attention?”

Minho grabbed the ashy brown jewellery box from the table, letting go of Changbin’s left hand. He opened the box and his expression flattened. “Exactly what the paper says, Bin.” Inside the desaturated box sat a contrastingly bright, rose gold band.

It was a ring embedded with actual fucking diamonds.

To anyone else, this would be serious. ‘Call your parents, scream at your best friend, even at two in the morning’ levels of seriousness. However, Changbin and Minho were not ‘anyone else’. They were in their own strange, unique bubble where the rules of modern society did not apply to them.

“How about we graduate from professional boyfriends to professional fiancés?”

Like most Sunday mornings nowadays, Changbin woke up to the scent of freshly-brewed coffee. Minho may have travelled to fancy galleries across the world and tried extravagant blends of coffee during his tenure, but he would always fall back on Starbucks’ blonde roast for his morning routines. “Why bother going through all of the effort of getting my hands on something overly fancy from Europe? I have yet to be let down by this one, and it’s been over ten years since I started drinking it. Why stop now?”

The logic made sense, really, and the coffee wasn’t bad.

“The Vancouver Sun’s already got an article out,” Minho excitedly muttered under his breath, setting a ceramic mug down on the nightstand closest to Changbin. He stared at his phone as he made his way back around the bed, causing the mattress to sink as he sat down. “So many people are speculating, like it even matters. If they had really been following me these past two years, they’d know better.”

It was too early for this. Minho was always business as soon as he woke up: endearing in theory, terribly annoying in practice.

Changbin rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands as he rolled onto his back, sleepily glaring up at Minho. “You’re loud.”

“And you’re hungover,” the brunette quipped, not looking away from his phone as he smiled at himself. “Drink your water and your coffee, love, you’ll feel better.”

“Whatever,” Changbin grumbled under his breath as he sat up, reaching over to the nightstand. There was a sheen on his left hand that caused him to momentarily lose his breath. Shit. He drew his hand into his face to stare at the ring he had conveniently forgotten about overnight. It felt like nothing before he noticed it, but now that he was staring at it, it felt like the ring was going to cut off the circulation to his finger. It felt like a boa constrictor was tightening around him, making it hard to breathe.

Changbin had every intention to pull himself away from the suffocation of the ring. Instead, he found himself trying to count each small diamond wedged between the two layers of rose gold. A sudden dip right behind him and an arm around his waist literally pulled him from his thoughts. “Min!”

“It’s pretty,” Minho gently grabbed Changbin’s hand, tucking his chin into the younger man’s shoulder. “I didn’t know if you’d like rose gold, but I know you hate gold, and silver’s too simple for you. For a fake engagement ring, seems pretty convincing, hmm?”

As much as he doesn’t want to, Changbin sinks into Minho’s embrace. Blame it on the fatigue, he figured, but found himself surprised that the older man didn’t pull away. For the shortest of moments, it almost feels like they’re meant to fit together like this. “It’s expensive,” the brunette whispers, “to no one’s surprise, so please don’t lose it.”

The younger man squints in disapproval. “How much was it?”

“It’s impolite to ask a fiancé something like that, you know,” Minho huffs a bit dramatically as he feigns irritation.

Changbin, however, seems plenty irritated for the both of them. He rolls around, mere centimetres away from Minho’s face as he frowns up at the older man. “It’s a good thing this is all fake, then, right? How much was it?”

“Bin,” the brunette’s expression falters as he cocks his head to the side. “It’s not important, I don’t understand why you’re so—”

Changbin desperately wants to stay this close to Minho, to drown in his embrace and the warmth of his touch. Professional. Fake boyfriends, fake fiancés. “It’s just for show, I know. Since it’s fake, though, you shouldn’t have a problem telling me, right?” There’s a layer of hurt in his voice that he knows he can’t hide. He dips his chin into his chest and closes his eyes, desperate to make this all just stop and go away. Something about this, though, just felt too real, too close to an actual relationship.

What the fuck were they doing? All of this had to cross some sort of unspoken relationship rule somewhere, right? The blurred lines between what was real and what was fake in their arrangement was causing Changbin's head to spin.

Minho doesn’t seem sure about how to handle the situation. The moments pass by in silence until the older man takes in a deep breath, then he wiggles his index finger under Changbin’s chin, tilting his face upwards. “Hey,” he quietly demands, “look at me, Bin.”

So, the bluenette does as requested. He stares into Minho’s eyes and instantly softens.

“If it bothers you that much, I can go out and get something simpler.” Minho’s voice quivers a bit, almost like he feels how uncomfortable Changbin is. “I just… I don’t know what I was thinking when I went out and I got this one. I looked around with the agent for over an hour, and then that one just caught my eye, just as things were looking hopeless.”

Suddenly, Changbin’s hand is in Minho’s again, and the older man stares at the band with purpose, rotating the younger man’s hand around freely. “I guess I put in a bit too much of a personal flair on this. I really prioritized what I figured you’d like before the importance of keeping up the façade that this is all fake.”

They both stare at the ring for a moment, then look at one another. Neither of them moved, neither of them breathed as they stared at each other with shared panic, concern, worry. There was an unfamiliar emotion that lingered at the back of their gaze, but it was hard to place. Changbin hadn’t felt anything like this before. He was equal parts nervous, nauseated, and lost.

If this were like the romantic comedies that Changbin and Seungmin would watch while hungover, this would be the part where Minho would roll on top of him, say something like “fuck the rules, I just want you”. They would cry and kiss and roll around the sheets together. There would be a swell of uplifting orchestral music in the background, indicating that fate had given its blessing on the couple.

This wasn’t a movie, though. This was fucking reality, and there was nothing but tension in the air and a yearning in the bottom of Changbin’s stomach. Their situation was complex and convoluted and it was going to end in heartbreak for him, and only him. Really, he had no one to blame but himself.

Our arrangement is for mutual gains. Minho’s voice was so loud.

We’re professional boyfriends. It was sour.

All of the benefits, none of the downsides, like feelings. It hurt as it echoed in Changbin’s head, but Minho’s voice was all he wanted to hear.

Feelings.

Feelings?

That’s when it hit Changbin: he was falling for Minho — Minho, the (supposedly, yet to be proven) Heartless — and he couldn’t stop himself, no matter how stupid he knew it was. Perhaps the most terrifying part of this, though, wasn’t the fact that Minho didn’t feel the same way.

No, the most terrifying thing was that Changbin couldn’t tell if Minho was actually interested in him or not. Minho always felt strongly one way or another. For them to sit here, struck dumb in silence, was unnerving. The silence meant uncertainty.

It meant possibility.

[d-l-dare]

“Once Written”

Ideas come and go, like a spinning door with a constant flow of entrances and exits. Some might stick around and expand even further into something great. Others might be stick for a few moments before their mind is changed and they never look back. But what must the world the ideas live in look like from conception until its inevitable demise?

I'd just gotten off the phone with the guy I'd been talking to for a while. We haven't exactly made anything official but I know he's interested, just as he knows I am. He and I met at the grocery store. I was picking up some alcohol and he must have been doing the same. We nearly bumped carts with each other before cracking jokes and we began talking. We must have hit it off because we've been talking ever since.

We'd been talking for a few weeks now and he just recently invited me over to his house. He told me over the phone how to get there and I fully intended on making my way there soon, I just needed to get ready.

I'd gotten home from work a few minutes ago and I knew I was all sweaty from running around all day. There's no way I was going to let him remember me like this, especially on a first date. This counted as a first date right? It's not like he actually said it was. I was just overthinking.

After showering, I found the best outfit I could, threw on some makeup and headed out the door. I hope I make a good first impression. After all, we hadn't actually seen each other since our little run-in at the store. It's mainly been texts and phone calls.

I followed the road signs to the places he'd told me to turn at. I was lucky to be blessed with a good memory, so I didn't have to call him up and disturb him for directions he'd already delivered me.

It seemed far faster than it actually was before I made it to his house. It was a large, well-kept, two story, brick house. The doors and shudders were painted black with the frames being painted white. It all looked fresh and new as though it was all built yesterday.

I made my way closer to the door as I continued to admire the house. I knocked on the door a few times but heard nothing. I found the doorbell beside the door and pressed it, hearing it ring through faintly on the inside. Still nothing.

I was about to pull out my phone and call him when the door creaked open. I pushed the door open but saw nobody standing anywhere near it on the inside. I stepped inside and called out for him. Silence.

There was a room to my right with some sounds coming from within. I decided to check it out. Maybe something had happened to him and he needed help. I opened the door to be greeted by darkness. I called out for him but the room fell silent. I felt something cold land on my shoulder and sharp teeth sink themselves into my neck. Pain shot through me as I swatted at whatever it was.

I staggered out of the room and was caught by the guy I'd been waiting on. I stood up and rubbed my neck. I asked him what was in the room and why it bit me. A look of shock spread across his face when I said it bit me. He said it was a vampire bat. He was unsure how it got out.

I began to feel sick and he offered to drive me home.

*** I awoke on my couch. How did I get here?

I looked around but found I was home alone. I guess the guy brought me home but didn't stick around.

I went to look outside to find it was mid-day. I looked up at the sky and saw it a color completely unnatural. It was grey. I looked around and saw the color actually melting away and being replaced by greyscale. What was happening? I looked down at my own hands to find it had taken me over as well.

There was a wave of white passing over the world in the distance. Was this the end?

*** I backspaced and deleted everything I had written. I wasn't much of a fan of where the story was going. I should have turned the girl into a werewolf instead. I shut my laptop for the night and turned the lights out. I figured I can start the new story tomorrow.

[iwroteinapastlife]

Least Favorite

Hey everyone! This is a little extra from my ChloNath fake dating fic, Honey I’m Home, but it also functions as a standalone oneshot for those who haven’t read HIH. Enjoy!

Warning: Contains detailed descriptions of blood.

--

He had painted her numerous times, but not like this. Running a thumb coated in gold down her cheek, yellow and black dipped fingers over her neck. He’d never kissed a canvas before. His canvas had never kissed him before. Whispered his name before.

Nathaniel.

Laid across his chest, restricting his breathing before.

“Nathaniel.” ...Or shaken his shoulder, jolting him from sleep before. “Wake up.”

Nathaniel blinked tired eyes, vision blurry from the mess of blonde hair draped across his face. He pulled it back to find a dark room, only dimly lit by the first dull hints of light peeking out from behind the curtains.

“Chloé?” he asked groggily. “What time is it?”

She was already partially on top of him, but he wheezed as Chloé leaned further forward across his chest to check the alarm clock on the other side of the bed. “5:03.” He opened his mouth to complain but before he could, she was talking over him. “How many drawings do you have of me?”

He blinked, squeezing his eyes shut a couple times as if that could clear the fog in his head. He felt like he was missing something. “What?”

“How many drawings do you have of me?” she repeated, voice more insistent. “Or paintings, or pastels, or whatever.”

Nathaniel blinked up at the woman hovering over him, watching him with an expression that was far too awake, alert, and inquisitive for this god awful hour. His brain was moving slowly, he knew it was, but no, he wasn’t missing anything. It was just Chloé being Chloé. “The sun’s not even up yet. Why are you awake?”

“Dunno,” she shrugged, brushing past him. “Answer the question. How many? It’s more than I’ve seen, isn’t it?” Nathaniel pressed his lips together, glaring at her. A knowing smile spread across her lips. “It is; I knew it. How many?”

“...I don’t know.”

She drummed her hand on his chest persistently. “Aw come on, tell me.”

Nathaniel rubbed the heel of his palm against his forehead and let out a long sigh, resigning himself to the world of the living. “I’m serious,” he admitted. “Too many to count.”

Any embarrassment he might have had to confess such a thing melted under the light of that smile. “Show me,” she said, still a demand, but speaking the slightest bit softer.

“Okay.”

It took about five seconds of her watching him expectantly to realize, “You mean right now, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

Nathaniel frowned at her, but he knew it was pointless. Both of them knew he would do anything for that stupidly beautiful face. She knew he would do anything for that stupidly beautiful face. Even cater to her random demands at the crack of dawn.

Five minutes later Nathaniel found himself sitting in front of his computer with Chloé on his lap, one arm around her waist while the other maneuvered the mouse to pull up his art folders. He double clicked the folder titled Her Majesty then handed over the reins. As Chloé leaned forward to scroll through the various files, he rested his forehead against her back and closed his eyes, a small but powerful portion of him still hopelessly clinging to the notion of sleep.

“What even are these titles? A-l-k-s-d-f-j-a-l-s-k,” he huffed a small laugh as she read out each individual letter in the keyboard smash, “bees, bees question mark, bees and honey, go to sleep, gothefucktosleep—all one word—hella gangsta…” a pause as she scrolled further down, “oh and here’s just a sea of wips. Wip 14, wip 178, wip 389, wip 509—Jeez how many works in progress can you have?”

“A lot,” he responded, voice muffled by her shirt—well, his shirt, just on her.

“How do you even keep track of anything this way? There’s no organization system, no order; it’s just complete chaos. You don’t even have unfinished works separate from the finished ones!”

“Excuse me,” he grumbled, “I agreed to show you my art, not have my system criticized at five in the morning.”

“I’m serious though, how do you not lose track of everything?”

He shrugged. “It works for me.”

Even if he wasn’t looking, he knew she was shaking her head. “Absolute madness.”

A comfortable silence finally settled over them as Chloé began actually opening up images to look at them. He breathed slow and deep, sinking himself in the lingering scent of her perfume from yesterday. The sound of clicking slowly grew more and more distant as the comforting beat of her heart took over, the peaceful lull of sleep seeping back into his body.

Right as his mind was starting to cross over into dream mode, Chloé’s voice shattered the silence, waking him again with a tiny shock. “Show me your least favorite drawing of me.”

“What?”

“Your least favorite. The worst one. I want to know.”

“Why?”

“Because I do,” she replied simply, as if that should be self-evident. She twisted to look at him, forcing Nathaniel to pick up his head and open his eyes again. He frowned at her expectant look. “Come on, it can’t be that bad.” He pressed his lips together, his frown only deepening. She narrowed her eyes, giving him an inquisitive smirk. “Is it dirty?”

He rolled his eyes. “No.”

“You have dirty ones though, don’t you?”

“N—,” he paused as he thought. “…No.”

A wicked grin spread across her lips. “What was that hesitation, Nathaniel?”

“I don’t have any dirty drawings of you.”

“But you have something.”

Two seconds of staring, a battle of wills. He was—unfortunately—very weak. Nathaniel sighed and leaned forward, taking the mouse. He scrolled until he found the file titled Summer Heat.

“Ooh.” She leaned forward to inspect it as he dropped his head against her back again, this time more so trying to hide his embarrassment than fall back asleep.

The drawing wasn’t dirty, but he would be lying if he claimed it wasn’t created in the passion of heat and desire. It was pinup style, featuring a practically glowing Chloé seated on the hood of a car—fashioned after Bumblebee from Transformers, naturally. She had one leg pulled up to rest her elbow on while the other leg extended down toward the ground. From the arm resting on her knee she held a cherry red lollipop up to matching lips that were parted in a seductive smirk. She wore a yellow and black striped T-shirt tucked into black high waisted shorts that really didn’t offer much coverage of her thighs, and draped over one shoulder was a black leather jacket with a patch on the sleeve depicting a bee with a crown.  Light shined off of everything—the gold buttons on her shorts, the gloss on her lips, the sheen on her skin—serving to accentuate her every curve and the sweat slicked heat of the summer sun.

“Wow,” she said. “I’m hot.”

Nathaniel huffed a laugh more out of relief than anything. “Yes you are. And it was really hot that day, and I… Yeah.” He even had her hair pulled back in the exact yellow bow she had been wearing  at the time.

“I should get a pair of shorts like that…” she mused.

“No, you really shouldn’t.” Or I will die; please have mercy.

She giggled and he got the distinct impression that she was going to actively seek out those shorts now.

“Alright, now show me your least favorite.”

“…No.”

“Come ooooon,” she groaned, twisting toward him again. He frowned, blinking tired eyes up at her. “I doubt it’s as bad as you think.”

“It’s not that it’s bad, it’s…” He bit the inside of his cheek, unsure how to finish that sentence.

After a few seconds with no answer, Chloé squeezed his arm gently. “Come on, show me.”

He stared up at curious eyes in a dark room, the only light that of the screen behind her, outlining her figure in a heavenly glow. She was radiant, beautiful, breathtaking, and he was so helpless to do anything but her every bidding. As he watched her this time—looking back and forth between those eyes that absolutely owned everything that he was—it was less a test of will, and more a question of how stubbornly he would deny her in order to keep from making old scars fresh for the both of them.

The gaze that looked back was patient, but adamant. Somehow, she knew this wasn’t a battle of will, but a battle she would win nonetheless.

Would he ever learn to say no to her?

With a long breath out, Nathaniel finally released what was left of his resistance and took the mouse. He didn’t look when he opened up the file. He didn’t need to. Despite giving it physical form, the image it seemed would forever be etched into his mind in full, painstaking detail.

“Oh,” she whispered as she leaned forward. Nathaniel rested the side of his head against her, pressing his ear to her back to listen to that reassuring heartbeat as he wrapped a second arm around her and pulled her close. “This is...real.”

It was a complete work, and objectively speaking probably one of his best. The details and shading were as fleshed out as his artwork got, complete with every tiny speck of dirt on her skin, every stray strand of hair. Every drop of blood. The piece was entirely greyscale with the exception of the blood—bright awful vibrant red pooling at her waist, soaking her shirt, painting her hand. Smudges of it colored his own hand where it sat atop hers, holding pressure to the wound to keep her from bleeding out right there in that alley.

His other hand held her head, fingers tangled through long locks, knotted and frizzy and loose from her usual ponytail. Decorating her cheek were two drops of water where his tears had fallen, and worst of all were the eyes. Eyes that were usually so bright, so fiery, so spirited, were instead emotionless, dull—not quite lifeless, but tired and void as they looked up at him with that excruciating blank stare.

He hated it. He couldn’t stand to look at the image and he hadn’t since finishing it and putting it away. Making it in the first place was utter hell. Every stroke of his stylus pained him. He felt like he was the one cutting into her flesh, as if he were the cause of her injury. He was hurting her—hurting Chloé held in his own arms on the screen.

He could feel the scar under his palm where it rested on her waist now.

“I didn’t want to make it in the first place,” he murmured. Her hand settled over his, fingers delicately brushing the backs of his knuckles. “It was stuck in my head for weeks. It wouldn’t go away, even after you stabilized, even after you were out of the hospital, even after you were already up in the air again. It was just there, burned into my mind’s eye at all times, the scene playing over and over and… I finally made this just to...get rid of it. Give it physical form so it could be put away.”

“I get why you didn’t want to show me now,” she whispered. Then a tiny breath of laughter. “And why you didn’t want to leave the hospital. I mean… Did I really look so…?” She never finished that sentence, but he could fill in the unspoken word on the end.

“Yeah.”

She stared at the image for a few more seconds before closing out of it. Nathaniel picked up his head again as she turned to face him, and was relieved to find her still just as at ease as she was before. If seeing herself near death had shaken her at all, it didn’t show.

Cold fingers combed back hair from his forehead. “I never thanked you.”

“For what?”

“What do you think, idiot?” Even if her words were aggressive, her tone was anything but. She spoke softly, with the gentlest hint of laughter in her voice. “For saving my life.”

“I don’t thank you every time you save my life, or all of Paris,” he rebuked.

She immediately rolled her eyes, an amused sort of annoyance taking to her face. “Yeah, but that’s my job.”

He felt a calm smile returning to his lips. “Yeah, and being your sidekick is mine.”

“Oh I see.” She shifted her position so she sat perpendicular to him and draped an arm over his shoulder. His hands naturally settled at her hips. “So I’m just a job to you.”

Nathaniel found his face tilting upward in automatic response to the way Chloé inclined her head, an intimate space coming into existence between them complete with the magnetic draw of gravity itself. “Of course,” he responded, matching her sarcasm with his own, but still not breaking the quiet of the moment, “what else could you ever possibly be to me?”

Her second hand brushed more loose hair behind his ear before settling at the base of his neck. “Certainly nothing romantic. I mean, look at us.” She was speaking in a low murmur now that sent a subtle but powerful spark down the length of his spine. His thumbs dipped under the hem of her shirt as she leaned in closer. A strand of her hair tickled his collarbone. Whispered words brushed his lips. “There’s no chemistry here.”

Even if they had been dating for five months, Nathaniel still wasn’t used to Chloé’s kiss—her real kiss. The kiss that was only shared with him behind closed doors in the intimacy of private spaces. The kiss that felt like a dance with fire itself and left him breathless every time.

She was absolute rapture thinly contained in a work of art.

The whispered words were out of his mouth before his thoughts could even place them. “I love you.”

“Good,” she whispered back. Her forehead rested against his, fingers steadily combing back his hair. “Because I love you too.”