A Painter and Her Muse

Lately, I’ve been catching myself staring at indecent places. Like a person’s face, or their hands. It would always be something a vulgar person would do. Someone who had no manners. Someone who is scum and discourteous, giving no consideration towards the other person’s feelings. I wasn't raised to be without manners.

It’s absolutely creepy to stare at someone, especially when they aren’t looking and their scruffy hair, mesmerizingly deep auburn eyes, stunning features, and thick eyebrows begin to steal your every glance–

–is what I’d like to have experienced but for some odd reason I’ve been staring at some crude classmate with no defining characteristics at all. With my chin resting atop my hand, I indulged myself in my daily pondering of what made me like this person. He glanced to my direction. My gaze that was staring at him so intently was quickly diverted to the whiteboard as I pretended to copy the notes.

“Did he notice?” I mumbled to myself.

“Did who notice?”

“Did Wren notice–?”

I blushed at the realization of what I had just said. I quickly hid my face behind my notebook.

“Yes, sure, shout out the name of your love. I didn’t take you to be such a romantic, Robin,” my seatmate whispered back. There was an edge in her voice. “Despite being an accomplice to blackmail.”

“That was entirely his decision, Lette!”

“And you went along with it anyways,” she teasingly pointed out, “That makes you an accomplice.”

When we had gone home yesterday after finishing our presentation, Paulette and I became quick friends. It turns out our homes were quite near each other’s. It gave us a lot of time to chat. The mug was something Marcus’ mother had gotten custom-made when they were in elementary because of how often she’d visit to play with him. They were just close childhood friends. She made it clear that there was nothing more than that. Our talks went from this to that. She even found out about my small crush on our group’s dull leader.

“About that thing we talked about, come over to our club room later so I can show you!”

She said she’s been having a problem with her artworks as of late. The usual things she used to like drawing felt boring to her. To try and help her out, I asked about her paintings and she promised she’d let me take a look at them after class the next day.

“If you’re going to keep staring at him, don’t be so obvious about it.” Paulette tapped my shoulder.

The last period had ended, the boys were already leaving the room out the front and I’d been caught doing something vulgar. How disgraceful.

“Why do you have a face that says you’re considering disappearing out of shame?” She asked out of worry.

I slapped both my cheeks as we went out the backdoor. The club rooms were in a different building, so we stopped by the canteen to grab some snacks. As I waited in line, the maiden waiting for me at the table was indifferently watching someone across the school grounds. It looked like I wasn’t the only romantic here. I traced her line of sight to see who she was gawking at, and what I saw was a familiar charcoal backpack on a certain scribe with glasses.

As we walked around the school, we garnered constant whispers and gazes from students of varying years. While other schools had athletes with scholarships, this academy provided opportunities to those with any kind of talent. Mine's calligraphy. I had almost forgotten that Marcus and Paulette were sort of like celebrities in our academy.

We arrived at the school’s arts and craft studio, there we were greeted by a dimly lit room where the subtle scent of paint and glue lingered. We continued to the back of the room where a different door with the tag ‘Chavez’ attached to it.

“Why’re they covered?” Inside of the room were easels covered with cloths.

“I get the feeling that people will think I’m bragging about them if I just leave them out on the open.” 

The noisy girl screaming at Marcus  was nowhere to be found. In front of me was a shy teenage girl. She must have been bullied before for being so gifted. People must have spited her out of jealousy.

“May I see?”

It’s a little bit too late to start acting like a pure and innocent girl in front of me after what you did yesterday. I uncovered the artworks, one by one.

“You did all these on your own?”

She nodded meekly, her eyes avoiding mine. The mastery of hues used. None of these looked like paintings. If anything, all of them looked printed. Before me were a series of photorealistic artworks with what I assumed to be a recurring theme of school supplies. I wanted to punch Marcus for even considering of insulting Paulette.

To capture a brief moment with nothing but your memory and to reflect each atom with nothing but elegant strokes and colors onto an empty canvas was nothing short of amazing. My eyes were filled with awe as I stared intensely at every creation. I was reminded of the magnificence my classmate had and how truly lucky I was to stand in the same room as her.

What problem would this genius have? I continued to observe each drawing. Wait. Some objects seemed to be awfully familiar. Some are even a portion of a boy’s face.

Glasses, a pen, a black backpack, a mug. These are all––

“I’ve been painting nothing but these…” Spotting I had realized what the problem was, Paulette approached me; I had walked all the way to the end of the room without noticing it. “I don’t know what to do.”

I held both her hands up with mine to our chest.

“I’ll support you!” She was bewildered while my eyes glimmered. “I know exactly how you feel!”