09. sketches and rooftops

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WHEN MONDAY ROLLED by, I wasn't ready to face Archer. After the party at his grandparents' house, I felt afraid. Not of him, but of the way he made me feel. The feeling was nostalgic, bringing me back to my first kiss with my ex. When everything was okay and he would sacrifice anything in the world for me. Sometimes I'd like to think that he does still care about me, but it's all in my head. Everything he did tells me otherwise, and for a year I remained ignorant. I was naïve.

     Archer glanced at me with a small smile during lunch, but nobody seemed to notice other than me. I didn't take the gesture to heart considering Amy was sitting on his lap as she talked to others at the round table. They looked like a cult, though I couldn't tell who the leader would be.

     Maybe it'd be Cole Jackson, with his platinum blonde hair and his signature smile that always stayed on his face. Ayana had talked with him a few times, always telling me how easygoing the boy was. Even with the bags underneath his eyes and a pack of cigarettes somewhere in his pocket, he always got his way.

     "Star, I want you to draw me like one of your french girls," Tobias deadpanned. He was completely and utterly serious.

     "I can't draw," I turned him down while shaking my head.

     "No, you can't make that excuse anymore. I saw your sketches," he told me and my heart dropped out of my ass.

     "Those were only for me," I exclaimed while shoving a low quality cafeteria chicken nugget in my mouth.

"You can't keep your talent hidden from the world, Star," he told me, "you have to put yourself out there! Express yourself through your work— your art."

"I'd rather not," I murmured before Ayana chirped in. "It's been a couple years."

"I agree with Tobias. You're amazing, Irene," she complimented me, "it's okay because you're the next Da Vinci."

I let out a huff while continuing to eat the chicken nuggets. They weren't good at all, but at least it filled my appetite. Though I wasn't sure I'd be willing to fill up my amazing stomach with something as low as school cafeteria chicken. To be completely honest, they could be a lot worse.

"So draw me," Tobias demanded, "come on, we have thirty more minutes than normal lunch. Just a quick sketch."

"Fine, but you have to hold still," I gave in as I pulled out a blank sheet of paper. If not, he would've pestered me about it for an extra thirty minutes than normal. Tobias grinned as he held up a rock and roll sign with his hand as his pose for the sketch. I shut my mind off before anything could flood into my mind.

     Ayana talked to us, but mostly Tobias as I nodded along to the conversation about pineapple pizza. I was too busy focusing on the boy's face, analyzing every feature. It was nice— distracting. It was also something I never thought of doing, being too focused on his different colored eyes. The boy had a small freckle on the left side of his nose and a scar near his blue eye. Every part of him seemed to glisten underneath the artificial cafeteria lights. His eyes, his smile, his skin.

"You done yet?" the boy asked me, "I'm tired of smiling and holding my arm up."

"Shhhh, a little longer," I shushed him before putting a finger up to signify for him to be quiet.

Ayana peeked over my shoulder and gasped at the drawing. Or at the marvelous cafeteria table that had a food stain that looked like shit. A wonderful, lovely shit stain. I laughed while I finished up the sketch of Tobias. One long glance later and I was turning it around to show it to him. It was messy considering I haven't drawn in forever, but there wasn't much I could do about that.

"Holy shit, Star, this is amazing!" he exclaimed, earning a few glances from around him. "You even got the scar I got from smacking my face into a knife!"

"You what?" I gasped, looking at the scar that was partially faded.

"Yeah, don't question it," he chuckled before looking back down at the sheet of paper. "But this. This is good. No, not good. This is literally the best sketch of anyone I've seen in my entire seventeen years of living. Congrats, Star, you're a prodigy."

"I am not," I disagreed as I put the pencil away. Ten minutes of lunch left.

"Irene Altair Anderson," Tobias called my full name out like he had known me for years, "you need to."

There wasn't any playfulness in his voice. He truly did want me to display my art, but I didn't want to.

"You're always drawing," the boy told me, though he was the one who ultimately got me a sketch book for my sixteenth birthday. "You really care about your art more than me?"

"No, of course not," I replied, shock laced in my voice. I stared at the pencil markings on the white piece of paper. There were many evident erase marks and even more covering them— to me, it was beautiful. Messy. Raw. Something I doubted that he could understand, but I loved him too much. Far too much.

"You think you can make a career out of this shit?" he asked with a laugh. I told him about my dreams the first time we met, and at the time, he encouraged it. He told me that somebody like me could do anything.

"Well, I. . ." I trailed off, not knowing what to say. I cleared my throat and looked up at him, urging the tears away. "I'll stop. For you."

"Thank you, baby," he murmured, hugging me from behind and kissing my neck. "I love you so much, you know that right? You're the love of my life. I'm the only person that could possibly love you as much as this. You deserve me, okay?"

The memory ended with silent tears streaming down my face. My eyes were wide as I stared at Tobias's worried expression. I instantly turned away, wiping the tears away from my face and urging myself to not look at neither Ayana or the boy.

"Star, what's wrong?" the dirty blonde boy asked, his voice full of concern. "Hey, look at me."

     I couldn't.

     I felt his fingers gently cup my chin and turn my head to him. The second our eyes met, I felt the urge to run away. The cafeteria full of chattering students made everything worse. I wanted to get away from all of it, so that's what I did.

     My mind traveled through hundreds of thoughts as I walked up to the school rooftop. A sudden gush of the cold, dry air hit my face when I opened the metal door. I slid down the brick wall and leaned my head against the building, taking deep breaths.

     Inhale.

     Exhale.

     I expected to find Ayana and Tobias walking through the open door, but a familiar dark-haired boy showed up. He squatted down to be at my level and gave me a small smile that told me everything I needed to know. I wasn't alone. It was more reassuring than I thought it'd be— all of this chaos in my mind was like a never-ending storm, but his smile seemed to somehow calm it down, if only a little bit. I let myself believe that he wouldn't hurt me, at least for now. I just needed someone.

I put my hand around the back of his neck, pulling him onto me as I connected my lips with his. At first, he was shocked but he soon melted into it. I ignored the tears that stained my cheeks as our tongues intertwined with one another. It wasn't passionate. In fact, it was anything but passionate.

The kiss was hurried and intense, like we only had so little time left. Like I couldn't get enough. I grasped his black hair as he moved his lips to my neck, sucking, biting, and leaving small kisses. A moan escaped my mouth as his hot breath fanned over my neck. The one that'd be covered in hickeys in a few moments, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered as long as I had him— I needed him.

"Irene," he murmured, moving away from my neck and staring deep into my eyes. "I don't want our kisses to be like this."

Reality hit me like a freight train.

"I shouldn't have done that," I muttered as I felt my cheeks turning a dark shade of red.

"Stop doing that," he told me, a surprisingly sharp tone to his voice, "you can't kiss me and then act like it's wrong."

     "It is wrong," I told him, my voice raising before dropping into a whisper again, "I just— I don't know anymore."

     "What do you not know, Irene?" he asked, his voice still sharp but somehow more gentle as well.

     "I don't know if this is the right thing to do," I whispered, staring at the cement ground. I felt my walls slowly break down. "I don't know what's right or what's wrong anymore. Everything seems wrong. Do I deserve to be happy? Do I deserve to feel the same way I did when I first started dating Oliver? Will you be the same as him?"

     The questions started to pour out of my mind and through my lips. Many of them had been trapped in my mind since forever, others from just recently. All of them were slowly driving me insane because frankly, I didn't think I deserved any of it. I didn't deserve Ayana or the happiness I felt in my heart whenever I was surrounded with people I loved.

     I didn't realize Oliver, my ex, was abusive at the time. I mean, how could I? All of the empty praises he led me to believe, the meaningless I love you's that had my gullible heart racing. Him making me cut people off and stop doing the things that brought me joy was because he loved me. He was jealous, but I loved him. He wanted more attention, so I gave him that. Now, it didn't make sense to me why I ever believed a single word that came out of his mouth.

     Sometimes I found myself believing that I deserved it all. I deserved a mother who gets too drunk for her own good and a boy who I thought would give me the world but only gave me glass shards that I had to pick up. Sometimes it's so fucking difficult to stay optimistic when everything around you makes you want to scream in anger and despair.

     The dark-haired boy sat down and moved to be next to me as he leaned against the wall. We both turned out heads to look at each other and there was a sense of gentleness in his eyes. I could tell that his walls were gradually breaking down when he was around me as well.

     "I want you to be happy," he told me, his voice gentle but laced with determination.

"I am happy," I told him with a grin, "see? All good."

He leaned closer to me face, wiping a tear away from my cheek. Our lips were only inches away from one another and I couldn't help but bring my gaze down to look at them. They were a peach color; they were like the pretty soft, pink shade you'd see on a pantone color palette aesthetic. Everything about his lips were perfect, from the color of them to his cupid's bow. They curled up into a smile.

"Do you want this?" he inquired.

I answered his question by connecting my lips with his, and I felt the butterflies in my stomach increase by the second. It was nothing like earlier. His cold hand cupped my cheek with the other wrapped around my waist. He pulled me closer to him, sitting me straddled on his lap as his tongue entered my mouth for the second time. Except I didn't pull away this time. It was more passionate than any kiss I'd ever experienced with my ex.

Part of me realized that he was different from Oliver; I didn't know if he'd end up hurting me but I knew that Archer just wasn't like him. He was kinder. Gentler. More real. More broken. And it frightened the hell out of me.

-

qotd: favorite childhood show growing up?

aotd: wonder pets

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