Chapter 5

“You haven’t given her an answer?” Carol asked.

My smartphone showed four forty in the afternoon. We had just finished club. Club typically ended at five, but because of Prez’s antics, it ended early. Someone would come and pick Carol up, so I walked with her to the gate.

“No…”

Despite my rejection, Nadia didn’t change the way she acted. She still tried to talk to me in class, and she decided to join the photography club. I doubt she did that for me, as she didn’t talk about my art once since then.

“... I think you should give it a go?”

“Why?”

“Why not?”

I could imagine Nadia bobbing her head up and down with Carol’s statement. Luckily, she had gone home earlier, so she couldn’t eavesdrop on us.

“There isn’t any risk, is there? You can try doing a couple of pages. If Nadia doesn’t like it, she won’t continue. Maybe then she’ll give the chance to someone else.”

“... You really liked that story, didn’t you?”

“It’s a beautiful story,” she murmured.

“A girl trapped in a fire… I wonder where she got that idea from…”

Carol remained silent. Maybe she heard the idea before? As a voice actress, she had a lot of connections within the industry. Maybe she heard something similar, or maybe Nadia had told her about it. Considering how close they seemed, I wouldn’t be surprised.

“You haven’t been practicing, but I don’t think that means all your skills have disappeared. You might need to work hard to regain it, but I think it’s possible.”

“... I’ll… think about it.”

A small smile appeared on Carol’s lips. “Haven’t you been doing that this whole time?”

“Guess I have.”

I hadn’t thought about it as seriously, though. “I’ll put a bit more thought into it.”

•••

Once I got back to my apartment, I looked through my boxes. I had a cardboard box next to the study desk that I used to store my items. A box containing my old drawing tablet sat among them. My parents gave it to me as a birthday gift a couple of years ago. The box itself had been gathering dust, but it did its job well. The tablet hadn’t changed even after all these years.

A flash of memories returned to my mind when I held the pen. I used to spend hours drawing. So much time wasted.

… Even picking this up is disrespectful.

It was disrespectful to all the other artists out there, who spent hours in their daily lives practicing. It was disrespectful to the craft itself. But, most importantly, it was disrespectful to the tablet. I had abandoned it for so long, and now, a famous person came asking me for help. Out of all the things, that was the one that made me think of drawing again.

I hadn’t practiced for so long…

The drawing app and tablet software both required an update. Some of the settings had changed. Many new features were added. I needed to change the settings and fine-tune it a bit. It had been many months since I last touched it, even more since I drew daily. A sense of fear engulfed me as I held the pen. This was just a test, just to confirm that I could no longer draw, yet I’m also scared about that very possibility.

I took a deep breath and let my pen slide across the tablet.

•••

“... Are you alright?” Ian asked. I lifted my head slightly. It was nine thirty, break time, but I had already lost all my strength.

“This is the first time you're late, right?”

I forced a nod. I had the perfect record throughout high school. I had gotten close once or twice, but never late. Even the teacher who guarded the entrance seemed surprised. He saw my tired face and looked concerned.

“Are you sure you're fine?” Nadia asked.

She was passing by, probably about to head somewhere else. The crowd that gathered around her when she first arrived had mostly dissipated. She still had a following, but only a couple of people at a time.

“Yeah, I thought you wouldn't come,” the classmate following Nadia said. “Which is surprising on its own.”

I had never gotten sick throughout high school, either. I had perfect attendance, which has been ruined as of today.

“You don't need to rest in the infirmary, do you?”

As a punishment, the school forced late students to stand in front of their class for the first two sessions. A teacher passing by asked if I wanted to go to the infirmary, but honestly, I just needed a bit more rest.

“It's not usual for you to be like this… did you get hooked up on a game?” Ian asked.

Unlike him, I didn't play games that often. I'm more of an anime kind of guy. If I wasn't watching something, I would be reading. It had been a while since I got into something to the point of not sleeping.

But no, this time, that wasn't the cause. I couldn't talk about it in front of Nadia, though.

“Nadia, let's get going. Break won't last forever,” another one of our classmates said.

“Alright, then.” Nadia moved away, leaving me alone with Ian. Ian stared at me.

“It wasn't actually a game, was it?”

“Nope.”

“Then what was it? Why were you not sleeping?”

I looked toward the entrance, making sure Nadia had gone far enough before answering, “Drawing.”

“You've gotten back to it?”

I nodded. Once I held my pen, most of my thoughts faded away. The voice whispering into my ears remained, saying that I'm not worthy. I shouldn't be holding the pen. But… it just felt irrelevant. I ignored that voice and continued practicing, even more intently than before.

“At this rate, I'll go back to my skill level in a week or two…”

“Although that rate does involve you sacrificing your sleep.”

“Yeah.” Unfortunately, I need to slow down. I couldn't keep this up.

“Will you be accepting Nadia's commission, then?”

I had talked to Ian about it. Like Carol, he supported me, despite not yet reading the story itself.

“She did insist that I'm the one doing it…”

“Isn’t it a great opportunity? Besides, the reason you quit doesn't actually have anything to do with your art.”

I tried recalling that time, but I shuddered. Honestly, I didn't want to even remember it.

“Think about it. The people from that time will no longer remember. The ones that do remember won't really be able to do anything. You have support from someone famous, after all.”

“... I guess?”

“The most important thing is that you like drawing. I like playing FPS games, and as frustrating as that is, I continued playing it.”

“I think that's just you having some screws loose.”

“Come on!”

But… I guess he did have a point. I like it enough to spend hours on it. Why wouldn't I do it? Especially since working with Nadia might resolve the issues I had back then.

“I'll… consider it, when I get good enough.”

“Show me the results.”

“I hadn't moved them from my computer.”

“Bummer,” Ian said, full of disappointment.