Hands stained by paint

There were many times when I only wanted to be the idealised version of myself as a constant.

There were many times when I only wanted to be the Baron.

Yet, most times, I was simply Agreste.

There were certain times however, when I thought that being Agreste wasn’t such a bad thing.

Usually, those were the moments when I stood upon the path of Theresia Hayes.

The sun bore down harshly upon our backs. I had left my cloak long behind, if only to alleviate the sweat that collected so frequently upon my brow. The sleeves of my button-up shirt had long since been rolled up, leaving my paled skin to burn against the warmth of the constant red-haze.

I sat opposed to Theresia on the side of the street that bordered the theatre. Her skin was as dark and as glistening as the surface of an acorn. I couldn’t help but laugh in that moment, for it was a comparison alike to a future I strived for.

“I think in such a way, you will grow to great heights...” I whispered softly.

“Hm?” Theresia wondered, staring up at me as she tore her eyes away from the project that sat before us.

“Ah, nothing.” I spoke simply in return with a smile. “I just mean to say that even if I have to tear the sun from the sky, I will make it so that you shine the brightest in everyone’s eyes, Theresia.”

Her face lit up a bright-red in that moment, matching clearly the backdrop of a cherry-splashed sky.

“To speak such things out of nowhere...” Theresia spoke amidst her blushed expression. “Just get to work, won’t you...?”

A sign sat between us, drenched in the paint that too clung to her hands. For days we had tirelessly worked towards the arrival of another play; a new story borne by the hands of the playwright Theresia Hayes.

“Well, it’s not as if we haven’t been working all day...” Theresia shook her head suddenly. “Perhaps it’s time for a break after all.”

Along with us, we had brought a basket filled to the brim with the simple delicacies of the undine. Within a nation of steam and machinery, everything seemed wholly mass-produced, as if the concept of flavour had been abandoned in pursuit of efficiency. Not for a moment had I grown disposed to such a thing.

The blandness of undine cuisine was a constant, unchanging hallmark of the steam city’s culture. The concept of spices were a simple antithesis to their idea of efficiency. Food was not meant to be enjoyed.

As if the undine were machines, food was meant simply for fuel.

The flavours of food had always been a treasure I was happy to explore. To exist without the vast journey of differing flavour, it was as if I stood under a blanket of dark-grey clouds that I did not want to expand my sky.

Within our hands, both Theresia and I held small loaves of what I had presumed to be some sort of pan-fried bread. In the past, I had prepared food alongside my mother. It was times when we fleed the dishonour of our family name where I had grown to know a life besides nobility.

Food had always been the gateway to the heart I constantly chose to ignore.

To abandon such a thing felt slightly bitter, but even that was a flavour I found myself longing for.

“Do you plan for us to eat atop the soil?” I laughed softly as I turned to face her. “While its not something I’m outwardly disposed against, perhaps its not something you wish to do.”

“I’ll grab a cloth-sheet from inside.” Theresia smiled in return. “If only to sate your need for cleanliness, my Lord.”

Caught up on her own dress, Theresia fell hard towards the ground in an instant. I dropped that which I held in my hands, abandoning it to the soil below me as I lunged forward. I was knocked to the ground as I caught the entirety of her weight, and with widened eyes, she knelt atop me in an instant.

It felt as if the length of the world had vanished as a concept, for the space that sat between our gazes was inconsiderable. I could feel her soft, heated breaths upon my bare neck.

It was when she was that close to me that I was given the opportunity to learn the most about her. Meeting a person was as if I would have been offered a palce within a library, only presented with carefully-curated books that establish the prose of that library’s character. The falsities of those selections in order to posture distracted away from reality, for that same library was so much more than a few books.

When I stared upon Theresia who sat so close to me, I forget in an instant of those few pages she had allowed me to read. Against the darkened skin I had once gazed at, I saw clearly now the light freckling that littered her blushed cheeks. She had a softened scar against her left eye that sat invisible at face-value.

Only in that moment could I have gazed upon the beauty of her imperfections.

Her scent was a light-citrus against the biting sting of the ash and smoke in the air. I had compared her gaze to an ocean within my own head as a constant, but I had come quickly to realise that Theresia would not even understand that comparison.

Therefore, in a world of heat, bronze, and steam, her eyes were the coolness of a still and quiet room. They held a softness that came only with the hushed air of the storage closet I had grown accustomed to sleeping within, and now too did they carry the remnants of the glimmering starlight I had fabricated for her sake.

I realised then that the books not set out for the reader were those that held the most valuable words.

As Theresia knelt atop me, there was one detail about her that was apparent above all others. It was something that wholly related to her, but had no stake in the outward perception of her personage.

Amidst Theresia’s closeness in proximity, my heart would not cease its quickened pace.

The ache within my body had stood most apparent in that moment.

I quickly abandoned my flushed expression, helping her sit back up in a moment. Her cheeks still held a faint blush, and her mouth sat slightly open as if begging for the utterance of any semblance of words to cross her softened lips.

Theresia could not even begin to imagine summoning a sentence from her mind, however. As she clutched desperately at the cloth of her white-satin blouse, she tried desperately to appease her still-beating and aching heart.

She had once joked about her love for a man she had never met, the ‘Baron of Lilacs’. Theresia knew it to be a simple respect for another creative.

But the man before her was real. Agreste was a person she had laid her eyes upon.

In that moment, Theresia’s heart felt torn.

Amidst the meal I had tried to partake in, sat a fruit that I had not purchased. Moreover, it was one I did not recognise in the slightest. It was bright-red upon its surface, with a leathery layer of skin blanketed over its flesh. With the lengthened nail of my thumb, I slid it across the skin of the fruit, and in turn split it in two with simple force.

Without hesitation in my eyes, I stretched out a hand towards Theresia, handing her the other half of the fruit I had not known of. She accepted it with confused wonder in her eyes, breathlessness against her tongue as she looked towards me.

“To offer me this much...” Theresia spoke softly. “You truly aren’t undine, are you?”

“Why speak in that way?” I asked of her, placing the fruit against my lips as I spoke.

Biting into it, a sudden shock of euphoria crossed my mind. The fruit itself was sweet, but not in a wholly overwhelming manner. It was cool against the heat of the steam city, as if I stood within a chilled, rushing river in that moment. Its sweetness was a softened breeze against my lips. If it were to be described so simply, the gentle flavor of the fruit was the encapsulation of summer.

“To give me fruit...” Theresia spoke softly. “In a nation that goes without it, is to love me.”

I nearly choked upon the sweet and prized delicacy that had touched gently against my tongue. I had not even for a moment considered the meaning of something I had thought to be so simple.

Perhaps in a nation where plants did not often grow, a fruit was what I considered to be a diamond.

“Well, perhaps that wouldn’t be too awful...” I whispered in a hushed tone, trying desperately to gather my endlessly-racing thoughts. “To love you...”

Her expression turned towards surprise in an instant, melting away to an amused smile.

“Perhaps you should be writing the humour within my plays, Agreste.” Theresia laughed.

I wondered then if I too was fine telling myself it was all just witticism.

I wondered if it was okay to tell myself that it was all the simply trickery of my heart.

“There’s a gentle pain within your gaze, my dearest Theresia.” I spoke softly towards her.

She looked up at me with her ocean gaze, and in turn did I smile.

“Why do you speak to me as if addressing a letter?”

“Do you not like when I refer to you in this way?” I asked of her.

“No, it’s not that... it’s just a surprise when you say my name like that.” She replied. “I like it. Please keep referring to me in this way, my dearest assistant.”

A gentle smile crossed over her face, and I was reminded of why I had chosen to speak words as the Baron of Lilacs. To weave such an expression into her mood was the whole meaning of my secondary personage’s existence.

Even amidst the blandness of an atmosphere, and the tastelessness of food, I had grown to enjoy the sweet taste upon my tongue. On Theresia’s path, I had been able to gaze upon an expanding sky, and read books whose words held heavy importance within a restrictive library.

For all that Theresia had offered me, too did I imagine that soon I would offer the whole of my heart’s effort in return.