patience yields focus.

when raindrops fell down from the sky the day you left me an angel cried

+ + +

The day he left me, I felt nothing.

It happened on a park bench. The last words he spoke were punctuated by a long silence. His speech felt practiced and rehearsed as if he’d stood in front of a mirror for weeks, repeating it over and over again like a mantra to convince himself to finally do it. But though his words were short and sweet, his hands trembled as he fidgeted with them in the lap of his now soaked-through jeans. That slight tremor in his hands continued even as he reached into his bag after bending down to pick up his bag. He left his hand in the bag for a split second – a sick imitation of a hesitation – before pulling it out to reveal a folded umbrella in his grasp. It was one of those cheap ones you’d buy from a dollar store in an emergency, and it was blue, like his eyes, but not nearly as vibrant.

He quietly cleared his throat before twisting his wrist to slowly point it at me. It took me a few seconds to realise that he was giving it to me. When I took it from him, he zipped up his bag and stood up. He left a silhouette of his upright body on the bench, the wood darker around it from the rain. I looked up at his departing figure in hopes of a glimpse at his face, but all I saw was his brown hair stick to the back of his neck as he walked away. His strides were slow so as to not give off the impression of haste. I watched him get further and further away from me until he followed the bend in the footpath to take his to the bus stop and out of my line of sight.

My brain had not yet comprehended the gravity of the situation. It happened so quickly, yet our movements were slow and each second felt like a minute. So, I sat there, sitting in the rain, watching the dry wooden silhouette of his body darken as it succumbed to the wrath of the sky’s tears. My gaze unfocused to the point where I could no longer see the tiny ridges in the wood.

Time was nebulous, and eventually, little bumps began to appear on my arms and thighs. The only reason why I noticed was because of a strong gust of wind that I’d failed to notice before. When the cold hit me, I pushed it to the back of my mind as I stood up and opened the umbrella. I rested it on my right shoulder and the rain stopped hitting my skin. It should have felt like heaven, but it didn’t. I’d gotten so used to the rain that I could no longer differentiate between water and sunlight.

I started the walk home. My drenched clothes weighed me down and the lack of company made the trip feel longer than it actually was. The sound of the rain hitting the flimsy umbrella was somewhat pleasing, so I concentrated my thoughts on that until I entered my apartment complex and was sheltered by a roof instead of some cheap plastic.

As soon as I entered the apartment I heard faint laughter coming from the kitchen. The smell of pasta sauce with too much tomato in it enveloped me, and to no surprise I saw Shiro and Adam standing at the stove with flushed cheeks and lazy smiles directed at no-one but each other. When Shiro’s eyes landed on me, his smile immediately died down and turned into a frown.

“Keith! You’re a little late today. Did something happen at school? Why’re you wet?” he asked seemingly all in the same breath. His gaze trailed down to the half-closed umbrella in my hand. “Especially if you have an umbrella?”

Telling him the truth felt wrong. Not this early. So, I lied and felt no remorse.

“Oh, the rain picked up a lot before I had time to pull this out.” I waggled my umbrella at the two to get rainwater on them. They were more annoyed at the stove fire possibly going out than the fact that they were wet, evident in their faux annoyed protests of “Keith, cut it out!” after shielding the pot of sauce.

“Well, go take a shower. You don’t want to catch a cold, do you?” Shiro looked up at the clock on the wall. “Dinner’ll be ready in ten. If you’re quick enough, there’ll be some pasta leftover for you,” he joked.

“I made sure it’s edible this time!” Adam quickly called out as I walked away. A faint “ow!” escaped from him as I shook my head with a small smile, leaving the umbrella on the kitchen table.

Peeling off my soaked-through clothes away from my body was more satisfying than a relief. Stepping into the warm shower was no different to sky pelting cold raindrops on my face. I lazily lathered soap on my body and did nothing to my hair. My energy was drained. The shower water didn’t replenish any of it, but it helped me feel my fingertips again.

As promised, there was pasta waiting for me when I walked up to the kitchen table in my sweatpants and hoodie. I flung my blue towel over an empty barstool and sat down at the table next to Adam. He and Shiro had already opted to sit side-by-side, the edges of their knees touching.

“So,” Shiro began with a mouthful of pasta, “how’d your day go?”

I scooped some pasta onto my plate. “Alright.”

“That’s good,” Adam replied for him. His plate was already licked clean. “Any of your teachers give you a hard time?”

“Not really. I actually handed in my work on time, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said monotonously as I covered my pasta with sauce.

“That essay, right? The one on…”

“Selfishness,” I finished when Adam’s voice trailed off. “Yeah, that one.”

“It was good,” Shiro reassured me. “You should get a good grade on it.”

I raised my eyebrows at him. “It’s about as good as an essay I wrote last night can get. When’d you read it?”

“You, uh…left it on the table this morning so I skimmed over it when you weren’t looking,” he admitted with a coy grin. I rolled my eyes. That sounded about right. “Hey, I didn’t touch it or anything, so it’s not like I did anything wrong!”

Adam elbowed Shiro’s thigh, prompting a strained groan from him. He glared at Shiro through his glasses. “What if that was a private matter? Sounds like an invasion of privacy to me.”

“I’m sure it’s not private if he left it on the kitchen table. If it’s private, it’s in his room, and if it’s in his room, it’s private,” Shiro argued with another forkful of spaghetti in his mouth. “By that definition, if it was on the table…and not in his room…”

“Alright, I get it,” Adam groaned.

We ate in relative silence for the next few minutes. I was right—the pasta sauce really did have too much tomato in it. But I couldn’t criticise Adam’s cooking because at least it was edible. Shiro’s wasn’t unless he was under Adam’s strict supervision, and even then he would explode whatever microwavable porridge he’d been allowed to make.

They say that the longer you avoid something, the more it festers at the back of your mind. But honestly, I felt nothing. As Shiro and Adam teasingly bickered with each other, occasionally dragging me into the conversation, I felt empty in the most neutral way possible. It was almost like nothing had happened, as if I hadn’t watched him walk away in the pouring rain with my own two hollow eyes. I felt like I could still pick up my phone and dial his number, asking to talk at three a.m. when my thoughts were sky-high but mood was at a low. His smile, his eyes, his voice, his laugh: all of it was so real. His words weren’t what lingered in my head—it was just him. Only the thought of him existed. His words didn’t.

When she told me that we should see other people, I didn’t expect it to hurt this much.

I tried to break down the wall she’d built surrounding herself. The further our relationship went on, the higher and stronger that wall became. It was a division between her and I; it divided us not physically, but mentally. It was an unbreakable barrier that only she could tear down—by choosing to do so. I can’t make choices for her, so I never managed to break down her walls.

Complacency is the one thing she wanted to avoid, so it seemed fit for her to break it off with me. The stage of comfortableness that all serious couples go through is inevitable, but it was like she never wanted it to reach it. She delayed every moment that we experienced together—which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing since I sincerely loved being around her. Maybe it was subconscious; maybe deep down, she knew that we wouldn't last. Maybe she was prolonging the good parts of our relationship so that we would never reach the bad. She had good intentions but bad morals, leading us down a descending staircase of discordance. Her habit of procrastination slowly ate away at me until I was nothing but bare bone.

On the night it happened, we sat on a bench in a park that bustled with kids during the day, surrounded by no-one and the lights of lonely lampposts. “This isn’t easy for me,” was what she started with. In the moment, I nodded solemnly in comprehension; however, looking back on it, I should’ve pressed her little statement. It was her line of defence against the accusations she assumed would come out of my mouth. It was a weak excuse that attempted to justify her actions. If ‘this’ wasn’t easy for her, then how was it supposed to have affected me? Did she think about my feelings, or was she merely trying to save herself?

She was a selfless person. She thought of other people before her. That, combined with her kind spirit and terrible sense of humour, was what made me fall in love with her. But a whole life lived through a lens of selflessness comes at a price—an expensive one, at that. Because when you push aside your own feelings for the sake of others’, you suppress feelings and thoughts that no-one is meant to keep inside themselves.

From across the café, I watch her.

I watch her perfect hands push her perfect stray hair behind her ear. Her perfect lips curve into a slight smile as she says, “Thank you very much,” to the barista as he walks away from her table. Her perfect cheeks turn a perfect shade of pink as she takes her first sip of chai tea. She crosses her perfect ankles underneath her chair, picking up her book from the table and continuing to read it.

Her name is Allura. She’s twenty-two years old. She grew up in England with her mother and father, who both died in an accident when she was seventeen. She dyed her previously black, long, wavy hair a pearlescent white the same year to say no to the belief that dark-skinned women can only pull off dark hair. She has a playful spirit that can be easily dampened with grief or a serious circumstance. She’s a peacemaker who believes that negotiation comes before force. She owns four pet mice named Platt, Chulatt, Plachu, and Chuchule. She loves being outside and has an intense love for space. She’s currently in her fifth year of university, studying to become a physiologist. She prefers hot chocolate over coffee and tea over hot chocolate. She’s bisexual and first came out to her uncle, whose name is Coran. She collects pens and washi tape because they’re cute despite knowing she’ll never use them. She hates messy rooms yet can’t find the motivation to clean hers. She has the kindest heart in the entire universe.

She’s the woman I’m in love with.

*

We met two years ago through Lance, a mutual friend. We all attend the same university, and she and I are both completing nutrition-based courses. Lance and I were already friends, as we went to the same high school; they met when Lance accidentally ran into her during his first year and flirted with her. After that, Lance introduced her into our friendship group, which was composed of us two and three others. Immediately, I was entranced by her honey-like voice and smile that was just as sweet. Even though the six of us were standing in the middle of our university’s courtyard when we first met, the only thing I could hear was her voice—and that was barely over the sound of my heart pounding in my ears. In that moment, I knew that Allura would from then on captivate me and plague all my thoughts.

Our friends – in alphabetical order: Hunk, Keith, Lance, and Pidge – were all in their first year of university, whereas she and I were in our third. As twenty-year-olds, we were expected to be the capable, knowledgeable ones of our group. And, in a sense, we were. We shared two classes, and on the day we met, we arranged to sit next to each other during lectures. Whilst our professors flipped through PowerPoint presentations, we learned things both about our subjects and each other—things we would never expect each other to know. She knew things I didn’t, and I could comprehend complex philosophies better than she could. Knowledgeable and intelligent—with a stretch, that’s what we were labelled as.

But the truth is, she and I were only two years fresh out of high school. We had no idea of how the world worked, let alone the inner workings of someone else’s brain. It took us an hour to figure out how to work the coin-operated washing machines at our university’s laundromat; how could we turn our friendship into something more if we couldn’t even wash our clothes? ‘Capable’ could not be used in the same sentence as our names unless the prefix of ‘in-’ was added to it. Though she was knowledgeable and I was intelligent, we weren’t smart. Why?

Because we fell in love in spite of knowing nothing at all.

*

The same waiter that served Allura walks up to my table with my chai tea. I nod and thank him. Within a few seconds, he’s back behind the cash register, probably bored out of his mind. I look back at the table Allura is sitting at, and a small, sincere smile of adoration overcomes me. She takes another sip of her chai tea.

Even from across the café, I recognise the book she’s reading. The vague shades of blue, purple, and pink are unmistakable as they’ve been imprinted in my mind. She’s re-read series’ trilogy numerous times ever since I gifted her them for her birthday. In the months leading up to both her birthday and the day we officially became a ‘thing’, I had no idea of what to present to give her. At the time, I didn’t know that I loved her—but I knew that there was something there. It wasn’t love, but it wasn’t friendship. It was just…something. And that was enough to persuade me to get her a present she would borderline appreciate.

*

All six of us organised a day out in the city for Allura’s birthday. At this point, we were all good friends—some of us more than that. As Keith and Lance walked hand-in-hand along the bustling streets with the unstoppable friendship of Hunk and Pidge hot on their tails, Allura and I walked a couple paces behind them all. I looked down at our feet and saw them line up in perfect synchronicity. When I smiled and looked at her, she was already staring at me. That’s when I knew I’d fallen into a bottomless pit that only she could pull me out of.

I caught Allura longingly staring at a bookstore as we approached the restaurant we’d made a reservation at for lunch. She was a selfless soul; she’d never say what she truly wanted in front of the others. Consequently, I used my voice to express hers, suggesting that we head into the bookstore before lunch. As Hunk and Pidge raced to the science section and Keith and Lance to the comics, I followed Allura as she wandered into the fiction section. Swiftly, her white dress trailed after her, flowing beautifully. Completely enthralled by the sheer enormity of the double-storey building, her curious eyes and mind became engulfed by the books that lined the ceiling-high mahogany shelves. I watched as her fingertips grazed the spines of colourful books, her head tilting to read their titles. We may have only spent fifteen minutes in the store, but being surrounded by my best friends and the one I had feelings for rendered the duration of our detour far too fast.

Before I knew it, Hunk and Pidge were at the counter paying for science books, and Keith and Lance were lovingly bickering as they walked out through the doors. The last of our group to exit the store were Allura and I—which made sense, seeing as I could spend all day watching her fall in love with the plethora of novels that had captivated her being, and she was readily willing to do so.

She stopped at a particular shelf for a particularly long time. I followed her line of sight, but I couldn’t make out which book she was staring at. She looked up at me, smiling as she carefully took one called ‘A Thousand Pieces of You’ from the shelf. Slowly, her hands rubbed the cover of the book as she read its blurb. With pure fascination, she looked up at me again with excitement.

“Are you going to buy that?” I asked. The answer seemed certain to me, but obviously not to her. She shook her head.

“Shiro, I’m a broke uni student,” she laughed. Melancholily, she sighed and put the book back in the empty slot in the shelf. “I can’t afford it.”

We continued to walk around the rest of the store, but the ecstatic look in her eyes slowly faded as we ventured out of the fiction section. In hindsight, it was just a book. It shouldn’t have mattered. Different configurations of the same twenty-six letters and punctuation conventions shouldn’t impact someone so deeply, especially if they’ve never even read the first combinations contained within the covers. It shouldn’t have affected me as much as it did, but watching her glance back at the book she so desperately wanted pained me.

At that point, that book was so much more than that.

As we approached the shop’s exit, I turned around and walked in the direction we’d came without warning. I sped over to the one shelf she’d stood in front of longer than the rest and searched for the book that piqued her interest. The skinny font spelling out its name on the spine wasn’t hard to identify, since I had spent as much time staring at it as Allura had.

“Shiro, stop,” Allura instructed unconvincingly when she caught up to me.

I shook my head and removed the book from the shelf. “No. It’s your birthday and I haven’t bought you a present. Consider this my birthday gift to you.” I grinned as I handed her the book.

I looked back at the shelf at the spot where I’d taken out the book and paused. As Allura stared at the novel with what I could only assume was guilt, I read the spines of the other books that surrounded that spot. In the same font and design as the one she was holding, there were two other novels: ‘Ten Thousand Skies Above You’ and ‘A Million Worlds With You.’ When I pointed them out to Allura, she shook her head with vigorous insistence.

“No,” she said as unconvincingly as she’d first said it.

“But they’re sequels,” I negotiated. I grabbed ‘Ten Thousand Skies Above You’ from the shelf and flipped to the back page. “See? Look. One, two, three—you need to complete the series.”

She glanced at the shelf, then at the book in my hands. “I don’t know if I’ll even like it.”

“The back of that one—” I pointed to the one in her hands, “—talks about interdimensional travel and romance. You talk about those all the time! Sure, I can’t guarantee that you’ll like the story, but I know you’re already melting over the concept.”

Allura looked taken aback by my little spiel. She took a deep breath and shook her head one last time. As she gently took the middle instalment to the series out of my hands, she slowly said, “If I like it as much as you say I might, then I’ll buy it myself later on,” and put it back on the shelf.

Her decisiveness told me that there was no point in trying to convince her. “Alright,” I said, caving in. “I’ll buy the first one, then.”

With her perfect lips, she looked up at me again. “Thank you, Shiro.”

Without hesitation, I replied, “You’re welcome,” with a crack in my voice.

I watched as Allura walked ahead of me with a soft bounce in her step in the direction of the cashier. That unmistakable white bun of hair atop of her head bounced along, too. Almost like magic, the flowy, white dress she wore seemed to emit sparkles as white as her hair. Swiftly, it ended just below her knees and perfectly circled her perfect frame. Swiftly, she placed the book on the counter and presumably smiled at the cashier. Swiftly, she looked back at me.

Swiftly, my heart fell apart and put itself back together.

After I finished paying, Allura and I walked out of the bookstore side-by-side. We were greeted by an impatient chorus of, “You took so long!” that came from our four friends. Allura apologised half-heartedly and jokingly blamed it on me. Everyone else looked at me with coy smiles on their faces but didn’t say anything. I swallowed the nervous lump in my throat and quickly directed everyone to the restaurant that was a block away from the restaurant we’d organised to eat at.

As the others walked ahead of Allura and I once again, we looked at each other. Without warning, she grabbed my arm, stood on the tips of her toes, and swiftly pressed a gentle kiss to my left cheek.

Swiftly, I melted.

*

From across the café, I look at Allura. Those same lips that once kissed my cheek now sip chai tea from a mug that sits alone. The sun that pours in from the window she is sitting next to lights up her bright, blue eyes—but not in the same way as they did when she laid eyes on ‘A Thousand Pieces of You’. Or when she laid eyes on anything she loved.

Or when she laid eyes on me.

*

After eating lunch at the restaurant – which was honestly mediocre at best – I paid for everyone and left the building. My wallet hurt, but so did my pride.

We passed by the bookstore again, which Allura consciously looked away from, hoping that I wouldn’t bring it up again—which I didn’t. We walked past it, and a few streets later, we entered the main shopping district of the area we were in. When we walked through the automatic double doors, Allura announced that she needed to go to the bathroom. We found one, and as she walked inside, I immediately turned to the others.

“Guys, I need your help,” I said. Keith and Lance stopped bickering and looked at me. “Cover me while I go back to the bookstore.”

“You’ve already spent, like, twelve hours in there,” Hunk said.

“And half your wallet!” Pidge added.

“I know, I know,” I said quickly. “But there’s things Allura wants in there and I’m going to buy them for her.”

“What, more books? Didn’t you already buy her one?” Keith commented, crossing his arms.

“Yes, but there’s more she wants. I’m not leaving until I get them for her.” I glanced back at the bathroom. “Just—just tell her I went to withdraw money or something while I go buy them. Please, guys.”

“He’s pleading now!” Lance laughed. He elbowed me with a smirk on his face. “Man, just tell her already.”

“I plan to after I get these books!” I said with more vigour than I expected. “Sorry. I—just take her around and make sure she has fun. I’ll be back in fifteen.”

Exchanging coy looks, everyone nodded. I gave them a thumbs-up and speedily headed in the opposite direction, towards the bookstore once again. When I re-entered it, the cashier raised an eyebrow at me, to which I awkwardly grinned at. It took me even less time than before to find the books she wanted. As the cashier scanned them and I paid, my mind ran through the possibilities of what Allura’s reaction could be to my gifts. She could genuinely hate the fact that I bought the things she specifically told me not to…or, she could love it and thank me and everything would be well and good. Though I knew it would probably be the latter, my mind lingered on the former. What would happen if she completely rejected them? The books weren’t just books anymore; they were expressions of my…not love, but whatever feeling I was feeling for her. If she rejected them, then not only would my money be wasted, but so would all of my emotional turmoil. And if that went out the window, then what would become of my feelings? Would I just forget everything that happened between us? That kiss on my cheek, her soft looks, her kindness, her beauty—would it all be wasted and forgotten?

I couldn’t bear the thought of being forgotten by someone so perfect.

*

From across the café, I watch as Allura looks up from ‘A Thousand Pieces of You’. A zoned-out look overcomes her as she sighs, staring off at the wall opposite her. She glances down at her wrist, presumably to check the time, as if she’s waiting for someone. She takes another sip of her chai tea and returns to the book she’s read a thousand, million, ten thousand times. I unlock my phone to check the time: quarter to three in the afternoon. I smile into my chai tea.

*

It was about quarter to three when I met with the others again. Allura was impatiently looking at her wristwatch when I first caught sight of her. That unmistakable bun of hers complemented her beautiful, dark skin, but her eyes held a mixture of anger and worry in them when she looked at me. Even so, she was so, so pretty. So, so perfect.

“Where have you been?” she asked infuriatedly. From behind her, the other four poked their tongues out at me and grinned.

“I was withdrawing money,” I said slowly. From my bank account, yes, I was withdrawing money…and giving it to the bookstore in exchange for books.

“For twenty minutes?”

“I couldn’t find an ATM.”

Allura raised her eyebrows at me, unconvinced. Resignedly, she sighed. “Alright. Just let me know where you’re going first in the future.”

“Of course,” I grinned.

When Allura turned around, I quickly gave the brown paper bag I’d been hiding behind my back to Pidge. She shoved the books I bought into her own bag. I binned my now empty paper bag and sped up to walk alongside Allura. Together, we slowed down and let the others take their place a few strides in front of us. She looked up at me forgivingly.

We spent an hour walking around the shopping centre, constantly stopping and starting at places we found interesting. I watched as Allura bounced a few steps ahead of me when she found glittery things in shop windows, her white dress swiftly following her as it tried to catch up. In the end, Lance bought Keith a stuffed hippo as a joke, Pidge bought a pair of headphones, and Hunk bought a cookbook written by some chef whose name we didn’t recognise. Allura bought herself some pens and washi tape from a tucked-away Japanese stationery shop and didn’t stop fawning over them for a good ten minutes. I bought nothing for myself, but I drew pleasure out of seeing Allura so happy, which was enough for me.

We stopped at a café to grab drinks for the train ride back to the university. Allura insisted on paying for everyone since it was ‘all she could do to thank us for making her birthday so wonderful’—which I personally didn’t like, but my wallet certainly did. It was mostly coffees all around, and the barista taking our order judged our wide range of tastes. From a black coffee to a flat white, in my head, we ordered everything on their menu. When it came to Allura and I, however, we ordered things separate from the group. For her, it was a chai tea; for me, it was a hot chocolate. The barista seemed almost annoyed that we’d ordered something different, but she put on a smile and laughed it off.

We chose a table in a corner of the café. The room itself was quite small, but the dark grey walls tricked us into thinking it was bigger than it actually was. Leafy potted plants decorated the wall we were sitting against in a line. Our table was composed of two small circular ones shoved together, so the symmetry was thrown off quite a bit when all six of us tried to fit around it. Allura and I took the seats on the far end of the table, facing each other; the others huddled next to us, grinning weirdly between themselves. Their expressions threw me off, so I opted for looking at the beauty sitting opposite me. When our eyes met, her smile lit up the room—or maybe just our corner of it.

Eventually, everyone’s orders got handed to them. Keith’s black coffee, Lance’s cappuccino, Pidge’s flat white, and Hunk’s mocha arrived one by one at our table. They sipped away at their drinks, and when Keith burned his tongue on his, Hunk and Lance lost it so loudly that the other patrons of the café shot severe glares at us. As I told them to quiet down, Allura turned around and mouthed, “Sorry!” to those surrounding us.

Even after ten whole minutes, the drinks Allura and I ordered didn’t arrive. We gathered that it was because we’d ordered something besides coffee. Although we were ready to wait for the drinks we ordered, the others were growing antsy. Lance was cracking terrible puns that made Hunk laugh for some reason, so I suggested that they stand outside as to prevent any more glares from the rest of the café. Keith and Pidge were just as bored, so all four grabbed their drinks and exited the building, leaving Allura and I behind.

As soon as everyone left, a silence fostered between us. It was funny—we had so much to say when during our professors’ lectures, but when the time came for proper talk, our mouths ran dry. Or, at least, mine did.

My mind was racing: should I or should I not? I thought back to what I said to Lance. I said that I planned to tell her after I bought the books…and it had been more than an hour and a half since I’d bought them. But how was I supposed to tell the absolute beauty before me that I’d grown feelings for her since the first day we met? I’d never done this before. The people I dated in high school all came to me first and confessed their feelings to me, not the other way around. Anyone else I’d liked didn’t know that I liked them at all.

Then why was it so much different with Allura? Why did I feel the need to tell her right then and there when previously, I’d been passive towards the feelings I grew for people? Why was she so special? What made her separate from the rest? What was it?

“A regular chai tea and hot chocolate?”

The barista from earlier finally appeared with both of our drinks, interrupting my dramatic internal monologue. I tore my gaze away from Allura and looked up at her. She had fair skin and black hair that stopped short of her right eye, the left side of her head shaved. I nodded, and she put our drinks down in front of us.

“Sorry for the wait. We ran out of stock. And sorry about the mugs. We ran out of take-out cups.” She raised an eyebrow at me, then looked at Allura. She smiled slightly when their eyes met.

“That’s fine, thank you,” Allura said sweetly. Swiftly, she wrapped her fingers around the red mug she’d been given. She looked at me, smiling. “Looks like we’re drinking here. We can’t take these cups with us.”

I shrugged. “I’ll go tell the others.” I stood up from our table as she nodded, bumping into it in the process. I stumbled over something on the floor, and Allura giggled into her chai tea. When I looked down, I saw a brown paper bag.

My stomach hit the floor. I quickly looked over at Pidge—who wasn’t holding a brown paper bag. We made eye contact and she smirked widely, staring at me through the lenses of her huge, round glasses.

“What’s that? Isn’t that Pidge’s?” Allura asked, pointing at what I’d tripped over.

I swallowed thickly. It was now or never.

“No—well, I mean, yes, it is,” I stuttered, stumbling over my words like I’d stumbled over the bag. I bent over and picked it up. “But…some of it’s for you.”

I handed Allura the bag, and she stared at me with wide eyes. She hesitantly put down her mug and swiftly took the paper bag from my hands. With her perfect hands, she opened it. She immediately looked up at me, mouth agape.

“Shiro!” she exclaimed breathlessly. I held a closed fist in front of my mouth. “Did you—what—how? When? Why?” She pulled out a hardcover book from the bag. “Why did you get me a book on the science behind…Hawking radiation?” My shoulders slumped. She leaned back in her chair, laughing loudly. When she came to, she sighed happily. “I’m only kidding.” She pulled out the other two books from the ‘Firebird’ series and laid them out on the table, along with Pidge’s Hawking radiation book.

Softly, yet seriously, I said, “Happy birthday.”

There was another long silence between us as she felt the covers of the books with her hands. The covers were much like the design of ‘A Thousand Pieces of You’ except with different colours. Yellows and dark blues and intense purples captivated her, her blue eyes bright and big with delight.

Swiftly and without warning, Allura stood up, put both of her hands on my shoulders, and pressed up on her toes to kiss me. Swiftly, she pulled away, frightened of what my reaction would be. Swiftly, I wrapped an arm around her waist. Swiftly, I pulled her in for another kiss.

Swiftly, I melted.

*

From across the café, I watch as Allura puts ‘A Thousand Pieces of You’ down on the table again. She runs her perfect hands over the cover, and she smiles into her red mug of chai tea. She catches someone’s eye from the entrance of the café, the innocent sound of the bells above the door ringing faintly in my ears. Swiftly, she stands up from her seat. Swiftly, a beautiful smile embosses her perfect lips. Swiftly, her deep purple dress follows her as she steps towards the person walking towards her. Swiftly, she reaches towards her. Swiftly, she wraps a girl’s hips in her arms. Swiftly, she presses up on the tips of her toes and kisses her.

Swiftly, I break.

The shaven side of the girl’s deep, black hair is unmistakable, even from across the other side of the café. As her lips come into contact with Allura’s, she closes her eyes and smiles into the kiss. When they pull away from each other, I watch as Allura’s bright, blue eyes light up in ecstasy. Her perfect, white hair loosely falls just above her hips. With a look of adoration, she pushes the stray strands of her widow’s peak behind her ear. She sits down opposite with the girl whose lips she was so excited to kiss.

I stare down into the red mug that was given to me. Suddenly, I don’t feel like chai tea. I stir the froth with a teaspoon for a moment, then leave it alone. I stand up, leaving my hot chocolate behind. I swallow the lump in my throat as I walk past the tables that are so familiar to not only me, but Allura. I try to fight back the urge to take one last glance at her and the woman who makes her eyes light up the way I used to, but I can’t. The beauty with whom I am in love with is right there, and being in her proximity elicits melancholy emotions that I’d been fighting off for a while. Alas, I smile in her direction with solemn adoration.

If Allura swiftly forgot about me, then swiftly, I have to forget about her.

Pink was the colour of our souls. That didn’t change when Shiro disappeared and I became the new Paladin of the Blue Lion.

It didn’t immediately register with me that I was a real Paladin Voltron. For a long while, I felt like I was lucidly dreaming—like I could do a few loop-de-loops, send Blue into a wall, take the Galra head-on, and still be okay at the end of the day. It was oddly surreal, sitting in the seat of the Lion that both Blaytz – the original Blue Paladin – and Lance had sat in, piloting the same Lion as they had. To be in the same space as both boys had battled against the universe in; to share the same link to Blue as them…it was like a dream come true.

I didn’t fully understand Blue until my first close call with death, thanks to Lotor. Up until Lotor leading us into the planet we later recognised as Thayserix, it seemed like Blue was merely tolerating me, as if she needed a stand-in pilot and I was the only one barely capable of supplying that. Though her blue light surrounded me, her controls didn’t respond in the same way the Castle did. Instead of cooperating with me, Blue did the opposite: her sensitive controls crashed us into the other Lions on more occasions than one, and firing her lasers proved to be a problem when they missed more often than not. With both Keith and Lance in new Lions, more than half the team was out of their comfort zone. We were a disorganised mess; a conglomeration of four in-training pilots and one princess who had been in a Lion for less than a quintent.

Though we didn’t understand it at the time, Thayserix was a planet made of dense gases—red syntian nitrate, to be precise. It is universally known to react violently to light, creating an explosive combustion reaction in response. In addition, the planet’s absurd polarity interfered with our Lions’ sensors because they were unprepared for the heavy change in atmosphere, so communication between each other became inadequate and sparse.

This, coupled with Keith’s inability to stray away from his personal morals and properly lead the team, resulted in Lotor further ripping the tears in the already damaged fabric of our team. If he was anything like his father, then he was set out to disband our team and capture Voltron for himself. Our feelings were insignificant in the eyes of that wretched Galran; we couldn’t expect him to care and spare us. He found loopholes in our cooperation and took advantage of the fact—just like any true villain would. And I couldn’t blame him.

It seemed like everything was going wrong: Keith was being impatient and impulsive; he, Lance, and I were adjusting to our new Lions; Lotor was hot on our tails. The hunters were becoming the hunted, and I was doing nothing to help the team. Blue wouldn’t properly listen to me, and it seemed that neither would Black nor Red to Keith and Lance. Pidge and Hunk were the only ones with their own Lions, but that was no help when our means of communication was rendered redundant.

Lotor backed all our Lions into an outward circle, keeping us on edge. I could make out Keith’s growling through the broken static of the radio, and I could tell the others wanted to leave as soon as possible. But with Lotor outsmarting us and Keith as our new leader, we couldn’t.

“As soon as you see him, fire with everything you’ve got,” was what Keith told us to do. I knew the others – including myself – disagreed with his ‘leadership’, but we had no choice. The moment we caught a glimpse of the dark Galra spaceship, Keith yelled, “Now! Fire!”

But the red syntian nitrate wasn’t having any of that. If we hadn’t have fallen into Lotor’s trap, we would have known that upon fire, the light of our Lions’ lasers would react with the gases and cause huge explosions. Alas, we didn’t. We took the bait—and we paid for it.

I was the one Lotor came after. The blasts our Lions created separated me from the others, so I was the easiest target. Recuperating from the blast, I immediately trembled with fear as his ship stared Blue and I down. I acted fast, frantically finding a little cavern to hide in. There was an incessant pounding in my head and chest as if I was about to burst. But I couldn’t afford to be spotted; if I was, there was no doubt I’d be killed on the spot.

In my position in the little hideout, I could hear the low rumble of Lotor’s fighter ship circling the area I was sat in. He flew by painfully slow, the monotonous droning beginning to resemble the repetitive pattern of one of Coran’s tickers. An irritation was building up inside of me, one that spread from my stomach to the back of my throat. I may have sat in Blue for less than five dobashes, but it felt more like a million decapheebs. Time passed by slowly, torturing me with the fact that I knew my friends could be in trouble and I wasn’t there to help them. Even Blue’s lights within herself seemed to dim down, just like my own self-belief.

“Stay calm, Allura. Think,” I breathily muttered to myself. What would anyone else do in my situation? What would a capable, non-Altean princess fighter pilot do if stuck in the Blue Lion with the son of Zarkon encircling them?

What would Lance do?

He would…he would flirt. With the Blue Lion.

I took a deep sigh and put one hand on my hip, leaning towards Blue’s walls. With a faux, shaky grin, I stammered the only pick-up line of Lance’s that I could remember.

“Hey there, Blue Lion! You know, you’re really activating my particle barrier right now.”

When Blue made no response, I groaned loudly with frustration. I gripped the main levers that controlled the movement of her paws extra tightly, hanging my head.

“Nothing works!” I grunted. I closed my eyes, feeling tears well up behind my eyes. I didn’t mean to, but I began talking to Blue out of desperation. “I’ve tried asking you nicely, and I’ve tried commanding you. What do you want from me?” I choked back a sob, my chest heaving. “I can’t do this. Everyone depends on me. The universe depends on me, but I can’t control everything. I need your help.”

With another sigh, I gritted my teeth. Nothing happened. I let go of one of the handles to wipe away the tears that had formed in the outer corner of my eyes. Maybe I wasn’t meant to be a Paladin of Voltron. If Lance was there, then—no, it wasn’t his fault. He was piloting the Red Lion just fine. But if Keith hadn’t—no, not his fault, either. Although his means of leadership was questionable, I couldn’t place the blame on him. Then, if Shiro was here, then…

Shiro. My goodness. He hadn’t crossed my mind ever since I hopped in Blue. My tongue involuntarily pressed against the roof of my mouth as more tears welled up in my eyes. How weak. If Shiro were here, he wouldn’t give up. He would believe in himself; he wouldn’t let this get him down. He would…

He would fight.

Suddenly, Blue began to vibrate. I opened my eyes—and as soon as I did, they widened, for I was no longer seeing the thick, musky, orange layer of gases before Blue and I; instead, I was seeing…something. I didn’t know what it was; there was nothing like it on Altea. There was some kind of bright blue liquid that filled my vision, waves of white and other hues of blue washing about. The waves all toppled in one direction: towards a layer of golden yellow, brighter than the Yellow Lion. The waves washed onto the shores of the yellow substance, discolouring it slightly. Humans dotted the yellow surface, some sitting under parasols to shield themselves from the sun. They were all half-dressed, some with peculiar dark glasses covering their eyes.  

I didn’t know what I was seeing, but it sure was beautiful.

But just as quickly as the vision had appeared, it left. The images of waves and the humans and yellow surface disappeared right before my eyes. I was confused for a moment, but I quickly came to realise that I was back in the Blue Lion—and that vision wasn’t mine. No, it wasn’t a vision; it was too vivid. It must have been a memory. But if the memory wasn’t mine, then…

There was no doubt about it. It couldn’t have been Blaytz’s, for he had never seen a human in his entire life. The memory was Lance’s.

The vibrations started again, this time more violently than before. Before I could say anything, Blue began to move on her own. Her neck raised up and she roared loudly. The blue lights that surrounded me became incredibly vivid, and I felt my spirit brighten with it. With relieved tears in my eyes and a wide grin, I gasped.

“I can hear you!” I cried.

“A banquet?”

The Paladins of Voltron stood before me, bearing a variety of expressions. Hunk and Lance’s eyes immediately lit up, grinning like children; Keith and Pidge merely looked at each other, shrugging their shoulders. Shiro was the only one who kept his eye contact with me, asking the question.

“Yes, a banquet,” I confirmed. “Or, as you humans may more commonly call it, a f—”

“Party!” Hunk and Lance interrupted, high-fiving each other enthusiastically. Pidge joined in, shimming his way in-between the two other boys on the couch and cheering with them. Keith rolled his eyes in annoyance and Shiro chuckled.

“I was going to suggest a feast, but I suppose a party will do.” I clasped my hands together in front of my hips. “We must celebrate our success in gaining the Arusians as an ally in our fight against Zarkon. As you know, we Alteans believe in spreading peace throughout the universe. My father loved to do so by holding interplanetary banquets and inviting guests to our castle. I would like to continue his tradition by holding one tonight in the castle. We will open the castle’s doors for the Arusians who inhabit this planet and serve them Altean delicacies.”

In a small gesture of solemness, Hunk, Lance, and Pidge exchanged their excited chatter for quiet nods. The two who didn’t nod were Keith and Shiro.

“Princess,” Shiro began, “I’m all for following in your father’s footsteps, but we only just secured an alliance with the Arusians. Opening up the castle leaves us vulnerable to attacks from all around.”

“Shiro’s right,” Keith agreed. He leaned forward in his spot on the lounge, his black fringe barely falling over his eyes. “Yesterday, we fought the Gladiator. The Galra already knows we’re here. Who knows what could attack us next? We should build the castle’s defences and train. We need to—”

Lance haphazardly interrupted Keith with a loud groan. “Keith? Chill! Like the princess said, it’s tradition for Alteans to hold things like this. It’ll be a great way to show that we’re definitely on the Arusians’ side!”

“We already did that by defending their village from the Gladiator; by not letting their people get crushed to death!”

“Far out, Keith; what’s your problem?” Lance exchanged his tone of annoyance for mockery. “You know what you need? You need to take a chill pill.”

“I’m extremely chi—”

“Keith. Lance. Calm down.” A glance and sharp word of warning from Shiro immediately ceased the Paladins’ bickering. Sometime during their quarrelling, they’d stood up from their places and butted heads again—literally. But after Shiro’s short chastisement, they sat back down and crossed their arms, still glaring at each other. Pidge and Hunk were stifling laughs; they seemed to be willing to sit this one out.

I met Keith and Shiro’s eyes. “If it’s any consolation, Coran and Pidge have been working hard on improving the castle’s defence systems, especially the particle barrier. And Shiro, if you’re that uncomfortable with this, you can perform as many perimeter checks as you want.” I paused. “I want you all to understand that I really want our first step as a team to be a welcoming, friendly one. As one of the only Alteans left, it would mean more to me than you could ever imagine.”

I cast my eyes on Shiro, who listened to me intently. Despite his concerned eyes, he begrudgingly nodded. “If that’s what you want, Princess, then alright.” He ran his prosthetic hand through the white part of his hair, then stood up. “How long until the banquet…feast…thing?”

“We open the doors in about two vargas,” I answered. When everyone looked at each other quizzically, I added, “That’s around two of your Earth hours.” I turned to Hunk. “Coran is currently in the kitchen, preparing our meals for tonight. If you’d like to help—”

“I’m not letting Coran cook everything tonight unless you want the Arusians to die from food poisoning!” he interrupted, running off to the castle’s kitchen. “Seeya!”

Everyone in the room laughed; I joined in. The Paladins’ general opinion on Coran’s cooking was that it was certainly…questionable. That was most likely half due to Coran’s cooking skills, and the other half due to Altean food tickling humans’ acquired tastebuds.

After that, the rest of the team began to dissipate. Keith and Lance split into opposite directions (after childishly trying to get the last word in, of course) and Pidge went to his bedroom. Soon, it was only Shiro and I in the room. He was still standing and so was I.

I smiled at the ground. “Tonight should be fun. I’m looking forward to see all of the Arusians in the castle. Besides, it's only fair to let them see the inside of a castle that's been sitting on their planet for so long.”

“That’s true. But I still can’t help but wonder when Zarkon will attack again,” Shiro sighed. “I’ll make sure to do perimeter checks all night, just in case.”

I nodded. “Better safe than sorry. Thank you, Shiro.” After a moment’s pause, I began to toy with my hair using the tips of my fingers. To save face, I said, “I may as well tell the other Paladins that their dress code tonight is their suits,” and began to walk off.

Surprisingly, Shiro followed me. “I can do that for you.”

“What? No, there’s no need for that.”

“I insist,” he smiled, falling in line with my steps. “You can go ahead and get ready for tonight.”

The automatic metal doors of the room opened as we approached them. We walked into one of the castle’s many hallways. “Get ready? What makes you think I need to get ready?”

My simple question seemed to take him off guard. “Oh—no, I didn’t…” His voice trailed off, stuttering. He quickly recomposed himself. “I just thought that you might like to take a nap before the banquet tonight.”

“A nap?” I laughed. He did, too. “You don’t need to try and save yourself, Shiro. I’m already dressed as I’d like to be.”

“I’m sorry, Princess,” he muttered shyly. He rubbed his non-Galra hand on the back of his neck. “It’s just—on Earth, many females prefer to spend a lot of time getting ready for parties. There’s no problem with that, of course. I personally don’t mind that.” He looked down at the ground and rubbed his cheek. “Not at all…”

“Oh? Is that so?” I clasped my hands behind me. “Would you prefer me t—”

“No, no, Princess,” he quickly sputtered, “I didn’t mean to suggest anything. I believe that everyone should be able to dress the way they’d like.” His voice was soft now, like he didn’t want to upset me.

“Don’t worry about offending me; in fact, I believe that, too.”

“Just you, or did the rest of Altea believe in that?” Shiro couldn’t help but ask.

“As far as I know, we all believed in free spirit and peace.” I looked up at the metallic ceiling, smiling nostalgically. “We wanted to spread our levels of peace throughout the entire universe. We did not discriminate between one another because we saw no point to that. The only wars we participated in were interplanetary wars—and even then, we believed in mercy before murder.” I glanced at Shiro, who was fully engaged in what I was saying. His dark, black eyes were interested, but there was a certain melancholy in them that I could not put my finger on.

“That’s…that’s amazing,” he said finally. “Earth has a long history of civil wars—wars between its own people. It was often because of different beliefs or skin colours that they fought. Some ended in mass genocides because the leaders drove themselves into madness. They killed those who didn’t fit their concept of perfection.” My heart sank as he talked. He took a deep breath through his nose. “Even a century later, people still hate each other because of the way they dress or talk. If Earth was as peaceful as Altea, maybe humans would be nicer people.”

I took a moment to gather my words. “A planet of constant warring within itself sounds absolutely horrible. And because of the way people dress? That’s unbelievable. But…if Altea was a little like Earth, then maybe we would have been a little more prepared for the big Galra attack that wiped everyone out.”

We stopped at the end of the hallway. “Princess, don’t say that,” Shiro said softly. He put his hand on my back and searched for my eyes, which had dropped to the ground. I held a hand to my chest. “Don’t blame yourself. I know you do. It’s not good for you.”

“I’m trying, Shiro. I’m trying.”

Shiro removed his hand from my back. We turned left into another hallway. A silence had fostered between us again, but this time, it wasn’t uncomfortable to be around; in fact, it was quite enjoyable. Walking next to Shiro was therapeutic, in a way. Our arms brushed a few times, and although each time I quickly retracted, a part of me wondered what it would be like to constantly hold onto that warmth.

“Tell me something else about Altea,” Shiro said gently. He looked at me inquisitively, eyebrows raised in interest. “Maybe about the clothing your people would wear.”

“Well, lots of female Alteans liked to wear longs skirts and dresses like mine,” I began. “Our clothing’s staple colour was white: white for purity and peace. That’s why your suits are white—because even when you’re fighting, you’re fighting for peace.

“My father instructed our family’s dressmaker to use lots of blue and yellow in our clothing. There were yellow and gold accents in the details of our clothing, and many materials were dyed a royal blue—why, I never knew. Perhaps he liked those colours.”

“I take it that you like blue and yellow, then,” Shiro assumed.

“Yes…they’re nice,” I said waveringly.

“But?”

“But they don’t compare to my favourite one.”

Shiro cocked his head to the side, the white part of his fringe falling over his left eye. “Which is…”

“Pink!” I exclaimed, pointing to a stripe of baby pink on the bottom of my long dress. Shiro smiled widely, laughing. “What? What is it?”

Shiro held a fist to his mouth, grinning into it. “I—I don’t know what I expected, but that definitely wasn’t it.”

I pouted, lightly putting my hands on my hips. “Why not? Is there something wrong with pink?”

“Absolutely not.” Shiro calmed down, shaking his head. His eyes clouded over. “On Earth, pink is…the colour of femininity. Lots of little girls like pink because it reminds them of ballerinas and cupcakes and sparkles.”

It was my turn to be confused. “Why was a gender placed on a colour? I don’t understand.”

Shiro shrugged. “It’s just been that way for a very long time. But in the last century, lots of people have been rebelling against associating colour with gender. I’m sure if you asked nicely, the other boys in the team wouldn’t care if you got them to wear a pink shirt.”

I smiled. “Would you wear a pink shirt?”

“If you want, Princess.”

I laughed, lightly elbowing his arm. “I like pink because there was not a lot of natural pink on Altea. That’s also why I like mountain juniberries so much: their deep, pink colour is beautiful, and their scent is amazing in a morning breeze…” I took a deep breath through my nose as if I could smell the Altean flowers.

“They sound amazing, Princess.” Shiro’s tone was sincere. “Were there many plants on Altea?”

“A few—not as many as Arusia, of course,” I explained. “The other plants were shades of blue or purple, but never pink. Lots of male Alteans picked flowers for their partner as gifts. It was incredibly heartwarming.” I chuckled. “Of course, my father would never see it that anyone gifted me anything. He was very overprotective.”

Shiro gave me a teasing look. “I’m sure he’d approve if Lance – or any one of the other paladins – gifted you flowers.”

“Lance? Don’t be ridiculous!” I laughed alongside Shiro. “If anyone was to be approved by my father, then it would be—”

I cut myself short. The mood suddenly grew tense.

“Who?” Shiro pried gently.

I swallowed thickly before saying, “It’s not important.”

I put on a fake smile, continuing to ignore the heavy beating in my chest that became present when we first started talking. Thankfully, Shiro didn’t push me any further; if he did, the awkwardness would have spread throughout the entire castle.

We came to the end of the hallway and turned right into another one. Sometimes, the castle seemed like a giant maze. I couldn’t begin to imagine what it must have been like for the new Paladins. In saying that, there have only been a few instances in which people have gotten lost in the castle. Despite only having lived in the castle for a couple of quintents, the five new residents have grasped the layout of the castle quite well—Shiro especially.

I had to break the silence somehow, so I asked, “Why did you laugh when I said I liked the colour pink?”

“I…didn’t expect pink to be your favourite,” he hesitantly explained. “I thought blue might be, but that’s just because of your father’s fashion choices.” He looked at me and grinned lopsidedly. “Plus, you said it so excitedly that I couldn’t do anything but laugh.”

“Perhaps I was a little overenthusiastic about the cause,” I admitted. Glancing at him again, his side profile struck me as stunning. His jawline was extremely prominent and his eyelashes were longer than any of the other paladins’. I cleared my throat. “What’s your favourite colour, then?”

Shiro pondered this for a moment before saying, “I don’t have one.” He chuckled. “That’s a bit boring, isn’t it? But there are too many brilliant colours to choose from.”

For a decisive team leader, he sure was indecisive. “That really is quite boring.”

After a moment, Shiro said quietly, “You know what? No. My favourite colour is the same as yours: pink.”

“Really?” I blinked in surprise. “That is…not what I expected.”

“See? Not what you’d expect, right?”

I smiled, shaking my head. “Well then, why do you like pink? It can’t be the mountain juniberries, so why?” I asked, genuinely intrigued.

Shiro’s gaze dropped to the floor. He rubbed his cheek, side-eying me. Behind his hand, I saw a glimpse of pink. The large-bodied man actually managed to look small.

“It’s actually a really cheesy reason. It’s not something you’d expect from me, either. At least, that’s what I’ve been told from people I’ve told before.”

“Cheesy? What…what is cheese?”

Shiro snorted. “Cliché. Cheesy means cliché. Cheese is a type of food on Earth.”

“Oh.”

As Shiro laughed, I wondered how ‘cheesy’ his explanation could be. I gently nudged Shiro’s arm, coercing him into admitting his explanation. As he died down, he pre-emptively apologised, saying, “I’m sorry for what you’re about to hear.”

“It can’t be as cliché as you think it is.”

Shiro sighed. “Back on Earth, my mum really liked romance novels. The really chee—cliché ones. When I was younger, I’d sometimes walk downstairs at night time when I couldn’t sleep and find her sitting in front of our fireplace, wrapped in a blanket and re-reading one of the ones she knows like the back of her hand. She always looked so happy reading, even when she got to a sad part and started crying. No, happy isn’t the word…‘content’ is. Yeah. She looked content.

“One night, I walked up to her in front of the fireplace. She was holding a notebook instead of a novel. It had a pink hardcover and had the words ‘Letters to the Sky’ written on it in black marker. She was holding a pen in her hand. I asked her what she was doing. She told me she was writing. I asked her if she was writing a book like the ones she always read. She said, “Kind of.” I asked her if I could read it, but she said, “No; when you’re older.” So, I sat on the floor in front of her and watched her write.

“As she wrote, she began to cry. I asked her what was wrong; she said, “Nothing. Everything’s okay.” So I didn’t ask her anything anymore.

“She eventually finished writing. When she did, she put her notebook and pen down on the table beside her and told me to sit on her lap. When I did, she hugged me close to her and put her chin on my head. She hugged me so tightly that I wondered if she was okay. She kissed the top of my head again and again. She said, “Shiro, I want you to know that everything I wrote in the book is true.” Then she kissed me one more time and told me to go to bed.

“The following year, Mum died from breast cancer—a terminal illness that human women can get. I was twelve years old. I was…really sad. I felt broken, actually. But I found her notebook in my bedside drawer about a week after her funeral. On the inside cover of the book, she’d written a message to me, telling me to not read the notebook until I was eighteen. But I was a grieving kid, so of course I read it.

“The notebook was a collection of letters she wrote to future me, telling me how much she loved me and how proud she was of me. She used her writing as a coping mechanism to help her through her chemotherapy. She never told me about her cancer because she didn’t want to destroy a kid who was eleven years old, so my aunt helped her hide it from me. She told me everything—her experiments with her sexuality, her first kiss, the music she liked, the books she liked. She recorded everything she remembered about her life in that notebook, all in the form of letters.

“The last letter was about the colour pink. She told me that when I was little, I’d planted pink flowers for her as a part of a school project. It took me weeks to grow them, but when they were fully in bloom, I gave them to her. She cried when I gave them to her. During her final days, she asked my aunt to buy her a bouquet of the same kind of flowers and put them in her hospital room. She told me that the last thing she wanted to see were those flowers because they reminded her of me.

“She wrote about what she thought the colour pink represented. It’s a colour of femininity, yes—but it was also a colour of love. She said that it was the colour she thought of when she felt love. Throughout her life, she observed that pink was the colour people were drawn to when they were in love. People’s cheeks went pink when they were in love. People drew pink hearts when they were in love. People bought pink rose quartz gems as gifts for the person they were in love with. People’s lips went pink when they kissed the person they loved. People thought about pink when they were in love. Mum said she wanted me to know that she loved and she lost, and even though she wouldn’t be there to see me grow up and fall in love and have my heart broken like she did, she wanted me to know that she liked whoever I would grow up to love because she knew I would make the right choice. I always did.

“Then, she said she named her notebook ‘Letters to the Sky’ because when she died and went to Heaven, she wanted to take these letters with her up into the sky and keep both me and her memories with her.”

My heart was shattered. His story touched me. I felt like I was obligated to say something because he had spoken for so long, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t find any words that fully expressed what I wanted to say. It was only when I sniffed, trying to clear my nose that I realised I was crying. I tried to wipe away the mess on my face, but my tear-stained cheeks would tell everyone the story of how I cried listening to another person speak.

Shiro and I had stopped walking about ten seconds into his story. He stopped all the formal talk and spoke from his heart. The entire time, I watched him go through all the motions. His face contorted at some parts and he had to take breaks at others, but he got through it. There was pain in the both of his beautiful, black eyes, but the entire time, there was a hint of a smile on his lips.

His pink, pink lips.

“Why…why aren’t you crying?” I asked slowly, sniffling. “Aren’t you sad?”

Shiro smiled melancholily. “I was sad. I am sad—of course I am. Ever since Mum’s death, I would spend my nights re-reading her notebook and blaming myself for not seeing that anything was wrong with her. It was my way of grieving. Sure, it wasn’t healthy at the time, but I managed. Slowly, I began to read it every second day, then every week, then every month…Eventually, I read it only on the yearly anniversary of her death. Growing up past twelve was hard without Mum, but I think I did pretty well.”

Shiro stood in front of me and held my face in his hand. He wiped away the rest of my tears from my cheeks with his free hand. My heart skipped a beat and legs felt like green space goo.

And, for a moment, I saw pink.

There was pink on Shiro’s cheeks. His biological hand was pink from body warmth. His neck and ears were pink. When I looked into his eyes, I saw pink beyond them. When he pressed my chest against his, I felt pink spread to them. When he wrapped his arms around me and when I wrapped mine around him, I felt my heart grow pink.

If you want something interesting to listen to, step outside. Right now, tomorrow, and forever, the world is and will be your oyster—so head out and put the surround sound system inbuilt into your body to good use.

In the music world, certain sounds are romanticised. Something widely appreciated is when musicians jump back into the 1950’s and use voice samples that are distorted by car radio static. The sound of rain on pavement is used in the background of some chillhop songs; sound effects from golden age video games litter some indie songs. Slow, jazzy beats made from bass guitars and romantic piano tropes often accompany music tracks, and you can just imagine the lingering smile on the singers’ lips as they sing their last notes. Technology has advanced so far as to even manipulate our binaural headphones, having different sounds play in different ears at the same time. There’s something so comforting about hearing these sounds over and over again in different songs, make each one different, but still the same on some level.

These noises all used to evoke one thing: nostalgia—a powerful emotion. It takes us on journeys, taking us back to a time in which everything was simpler.

Countless people fall asleep to jazz songs, and a vast amount of students study listening to soft R&B. The music playing on your car radio? Punk rock. The music in the background of that video? Ambient. The music that band’s producing? Alternative. We laugh, befriend, bond, and sometimes even cry over music. Music is so important to our lives—and some people don’t appreciate that. Those who use their vocal chords to create beautiful melodies and hands to strum guitars and press the ivory keys of pianos…they are gifts to this world. We humans have so much potential to give to the world through sound, so why don’t more of us give back to it?

Out of all things you could be doing right now, you’ve chosen to read this… thing. I don’t know what to call it—a memoir, perhaps, or maybe a mere commentary. Apart from continuing to read this, I request that you do one thing: ask yourself, ‘Am I listening to music right now? If so, what kind? Does it enhance my reading experience?’

Think about this carefully. Maybe you’re listening to music directly through your headphones or a speaker. Maybe there’s someone next to you who’s playing an acoustic guitar. Maybe the drops your leaky kitchen sink produces is making a beat. Unbeknownst to you, the gentle breeze blowing outside or the typing of someone sitting across from you might be accompanying you.

And if you’re not listening to anything, then maybe you should be listening to something.

“Keith. Keith. Keith.”

Upon hearing his cousin’s voice, Keith groaned quietly. Refusing to open his eyes, his position underneath his blanket remained unchanged, the only moving part of his body his socked feet. Perfectly comfortable curled up on his bed, he didn’t see a point in moving.

Keith heard a heavy sigh from the other side of his bedroom door. It clicked open, and the sound of rubber-soled shoes entering the room made Keith furrow his eyebrows. He rolled over onto his side, facing his wall instead of his cousin.

“It’s eleven in the morning.”

Keith begrudgingly parted his lips, slowly forcing himself to pry his eyes open. His grey walls stared back at him hard. “I’m trying to sleep.”

Shiro – completely used to Keith’s morning uncooperativeness – didn’t move an inch. “C’mon. I have to meet with Allura soon, so I need you to man the shop.”

“Again?”

“Yes, again. We have to talk about the shop advertisements.”

“Whose?”

“Both.” Shiro sighed again. “Look. It’s only going to be for an hour this time. You can sleep when I get back.”

Keith slowly pushed himself upright, finally having mustered the willpower to do so. He scrunched up his face as he tried to unstick his gums from his teeth, pawing at his eyes with the both of his hands. Eleven in the morning was too early for him—way too early.

“Well, when you went out last week to Allura’s, you weren’t back until three in the afternoon, and I’m not taking a nap at three.”

Shiro cleared his throat. “We had to talk business. That’s all.”

Rolling onto his right shoulder, Keith noticed that Shiro wasn’t looking at him like he’d expected; instead, Shiro’s gaze lay down at the ground beneath his feet. Keith squinted at Shiro for a moment, eyeing him up and down. His arms folded across his broad chest, having seemingly swapped his black florist’s apron for a white business shirt and navy blue tie. In fact, the only evidence that he worked at – let alone owned – a flower shop were his steel-tipped rubber shoes; other than that, he looked like any other acceptable businessman ready to sell some insurance. His body leaning against the frame of Keith’s bedroom door, Shiro looked like he was getting impatient. Of course, this wasn’t true, for he had copious amounts of patience when it came to Keith. He just had somewhere to go and didn’t want to be late; no wonder he was getting antsy.

“Fine. Just gimme a few minutes.”

As Keith sluggishly tumbled out of bed, Shiro seemingly let out another sigh, this time one of relief. “Thanks, Keith. I really appreciate it.”

With a delayed shrug of dismissal, Keith said, “Don’t mention it.”

Within a few moments, Shiro hurried out of Keith’s room. Keith managed to rub away the majority of the sleep that clung to his face. Lazily sitting up, he threw a quick glance around his room. Everything was in its place…if you count the floor as ‘its place’. Clothes, old high school textbooks, game cases, and magazines were strewn all over his wooden floorboards. His bookshelf and closet were the same in the sense that both had random articles of junk stuffed into them. His desk was no different, for papers littered its surface. The grey walls only added to the room’s faded, outdated vibe. Shiro hated how gloomy Keith’s room was, and swore that one day, he’d convince Keith to re-paint his walls. If Shiro couldn’t manage to do that, then he’d do it himself.

The only spot of colour dotting one measly part of the room was Keith’s collection of potted cacti. The succulents’ colours all stood somewhere on the extremely vast spectrum of bright green to forest green. Some were round; some were essentially mini tree trunks with branches extruding from them. Some were those fluffy kinds of round cacti that looked safe to touch; others were the spiky, dangerous-looking ones that looked like overgrown pickles.

There were heaps of them, all lined up on his white windowsill in some kind of order only Keith understood. Keith’s gaze trailed over them, and after making his bed, Keith sat on it, facing the little, green succulents with his back slouched and legs crossed.

He counted them all, just in case he’d accidentally knocked one off with his arm in his sleep. It was quite easy to do so, for his bed was parallel to his wall. (He’d done it once before during a night of presumed nightmares and wild gesticulating. Worst of all, he only noticed one was cracked and on his floor a week later.) One, two, three…twelve, thirteen, fourteen…seventeen. All seventeen cacti intact and accounted for. So he hadn’t knocked over any in the night after all.

Keith nodded gently in approval. He reached out to the cactus nearest him: a relatively large one that was tall and flat, much less round than the others. Its colour danced on the border of muted green and yellow, reminiscent of a forlorn desert. Instead of spikes, it had small, brown nubs dotting its surface, almost as if they were the precursors of spikes that could have been. The cactus’ pot was like the rest of the cacti’s spread along Keith’s windowsill: made out of clay, its colour orange and, when scraped with long nails, would make one’s skin crawl because of the stippled surface.

“Platypus.”

The word left Keith’s lips as a faint whisper. That was its name: Platypus. Why? Because after having Googled the cactus’ species soon after he bought it, he discovered that its shape was often described as ‘like a beaver’s tail’. But naming the cactus Beaver would be too conventional and boring, whereas Platypus reached just the right level of uncomfortableness and seemed just right. Besides, he’d most likely never go to Australia to see one, and platypi were close enough to beavers, anyway.

In the grand scheme of things, yes, Keith knew that Platypus was a stupid name for a plant, let alone a cactus. But nobody besides himself knew that he even named them. Like, come on—naming plants? That’s something only kids do. Keith just…didn’t want to grow up, even if his constantly annoyed disposition said otherwise.

After stretching one final time, Keith cracked his neck and rolled off of his bed. Expertly finding and stepping on pockets of floor in the mess he’d never bothered to clean up, Keith clumsily tip-toed out of his bedroom and into the apartment hallway.

“Shiro?” he called out flatly.

“Kitchen,” Shiro replied a few doors down.

Keith trudged his way down the hallway, stifling a couple of yawns into the back of his wrist. When he reached the kitchen, he noticed that Shiro had already prepared his breakfast—or, at least, the ingredients for it. On the black breakfast bar sat the half-full box of Kellogg’s cereal (that Keith may or may not have snacked on the night before) as well as a carton of almond milk. Keith collapsed onto one of the breakfast bar stools and grabbed the milk. After shaking it around, opening the lid, and peering inside it, he narrowed his eyes at Shiro’s back. The damn thing was about ninety-eight percent air. What the hell was he meant to do with about two tablespoons of milk? He sighed. At least he didn’t pour the cereal in his bowl first. He put the bowl as well as the spoon Shiro had provided him with back into their respective places, settling for snatching the cereal box itself and shoving handfuls of that into his mouth instead.

“Hey, I—Keith.” Shiro heaved a disapproving sigh. “Why don’t you just pour some into a bowl?”

“There’s no milk left.” Keith’s voice was muffled by the chewed-up bits of cereal in his mouth.

“Yes, there is.” Shiro grabbed the carton of milk on the breakfast bar that Keith had quickly abandoned. He shook it, unscrewing the lid and showing it to his cousin. “See?”

“I’m not about to eat cereal that has, like, no milk in it.”

“Isn’t…that what you’re doing now?”

“This is deliberate. With that amount of milk, it’s kind of like trying to pass a test they didn’t study for.” Keith’s voice had a salty edge to it.

Shiro stared at him for a moment then shrugged, turning back around. “Suit yourself,” he said as he downed the rest of the milk straight from the carton.

“Gross.”

“You’re the one eating dry cereal.”

“It’s deliberate!”

After having stuffed several handfuls of cereal into his mouth, Keith begrudgingly folded the cardboard box’s flaps inwards and got up to jam it back in the pantry. When he closed the pantry door, Keith was startled by Shiro, who was standing behind it. He held out a mug of black coffee to Keith. Keith took it gratefully, murmuring a “thanks” before sitting back down at the breakfast bar.

However, Shiro clearly had different plans for Keith and his mug of coffee. “No, no, nope. Put on some sweatpants and grab your apron. You can do that downstairs while you watch the shop for me.”

Keith groaned, rolling his eyes. He stood up. “Why can’t I wear what I’m wearing now?”

“Because boxers aren’t professional, Keith.”

“You can’t say anything about being ‘professional’. Your shop doesn’t even have a uniform besides an apron and work boots.”

“If it did, I know boxers wouldn’t be a part of it. And…is that your Pokémon shirt?”

Keith crossed his arms, tugging the hem of his oversized Pokémon shirt. “Yes, Shiro, it’s my Pokémon shirt. And because you didn’t tell me to change out of it, I’m going to wear it.”

Shiro shrugged, turning his hands upwards towards the ceiling. “You do you. It’ll be covered by the apron, anyway.”

Keith skulked back to his bedroom to change, much to his chagrin. He hastily threw on a pair of comfy maroon sweatpants he’d bought at some Boxing Day sale, immediately feeling a little more relaxed the moment the soft material came into contact with his toned thighs. After taking a quick glance at himself in the mirror in his bedroom, he ruffled his bedhead a little and smacked his cheeks a few times before deeming himself at least a little presentable. Thankfully, the bags under his eyes weren’t as bad as they used to be; he no longer looked like a racoon, unlike a week ago. His faded Pokémon shirt hung loosely on him, doing absolutely nothing to outline the lightly defined muscles underneath it. Keith looked around his abomination of a room, searching for the black apron Shiro had given him on the day Keith first moved in with him. Spotting it on his swivel chair, Keith leaned towards it and snatched it. Around his head went the neckpiece, and around his waist, he tied the frayed ends of the cloth into a cute bow. Shiro was right; you really couldn’t see the Pokémon details of his graphic tee anymore except for the bulb of a Bulbasaur peeking out the top of the apron.

Perfect.

Whilst walking down the apartment’s narrow hallway, Keith bumped into Shiro, who had just turned into it from the kitchen.

“Hey,” Shiro called over his shoulder, “if you happen to like sitting there today, maybe—”

“I don’t want to work here.” Keith immediately interrupted Shiro. They’d already had this conversation a billion times; he didn’t need to sit through it again.

Shiro turned into the bathroom and opened some drawers. “C’mon, Keith. Why not?”

Keith walked into the kitchen. He sunk into the same seat he sat in before, wrapping his hands around his mug of coffee once more. “I’ve told you already.”

Keith could hear Shiro sigh even from a few rooms away. He took a sip of his coffee. It was strong – very, very strong – because of the lack of milk. But that was the way he liked it: black and bitter. Diluting it with milk would only delay the speed at which the caffeine would reach his brain and actually wake him up. Keith knew that most people don’t like black coffee; initially, he didn’t really like it, either. But after his high school exams hit him like a truck, he had no choice but to start downing the stuff so that he could pull all-nighters and pass them.

Not that it always worked, but that’s not the point.

“I know you don’t like flowers,” Shiro began, to which Keith rolled his eyes at. “I get that. But I thought you found them fascinating.”

“The key word there is ‘found’.” Keith took a gulp of his coffee. He let the warmth emitting from the mug envelope his cold hands, like a candle’s flickering flame to an ice cube. “They were pretty interesting, but not anymore.”

“Why?”

“Dunno. I just…lost interest in them. Plus, you know, you were getting stressed out over them because of your university exams, so I guess that rubbed off on me.” Keith tucked his long, messy fringe behind his right ear so that he could see clearly. “I guess there’s only so much pollen you can take before getting desensitised to the stuff.”

“Then how do you explain me taking it up in university? And getting through those exams?”

“You’re just one of those people that actually enjoys looking at heaps of colour every single day of your life. You don’t have an allergy to pollen, you’re naturally good at retaining information, and you…” Keith sighed. “You’re patient.”

Shiro reappeared in the kitchen, the rubber soles of his work boots monotonously thudding against the wooden floorboards. “And you’re saying you’re not?”

“No, not really,” Keith simply said.

Shiro chuckled. “Well, when you’re stuck in that bedroom of yours all day, it’s no wonder that you shrivel away at the sight of colour.” When Keith glared at him, Shiro held his hands up in defence. “Sorry. Just trying to lighten the mood.”

Despite saying, “None taken,” Keith’s voice still had an offended edginess to it. However, his voice took on its usual quieter, more reserved tone when he spoke again. “I like my room a lot.”

Shiro walked around the breakfast bar and to the kitchen sink where, for some reason, his car keys lay. “I know. I’m not holding you against that.” He shoved the keys into a pocket of his black business pants. “You have your cacti there, and as long as you’ve got plant life in there, then that’s okay. Besides—” Shiro’s grin was wide. “—you even having plants in there means you’re a step closer to being my next employee.”

Keith likes cacti more than flowers.

Sure, having lived above his cousin’s flower shop for the better part of his life, he may be a little biased against the bundles of petals and leaves sprouting out of the ground. But, honestly, could you really blame him? After all, living with a botanist cousin obsessed with the pungent pollen producers could only bring you so much positivity—especially after having done so for twelve years. It was only inevitable that Keith would eventually drift away from flowers’ sweet scents and instead have his interest piqued elsewhere.

That being said, Keith definitely didn’t expect that that elsewhere would be cacti. Neither did his botanist cousin. But after being gifted one for his birthday, he discovered that he loves the fact that he can own real plants without the hassle of having to give them extensive attention. He supposes that’s why his interest in flowers dwindled so quickly: maintaining their pristine condition is too much work for him. On the contrary, the cacti Keith has only need to be watered a very minimal amount, and he assumes they don’t need special soil or fertiliser to survive. (His obsession hasn’t extended so far as to ask his cousin what’s the deal with the growth of his cacti—yet.) Their pots don’t need drainage holes, so they never make any mess on his desk. They’re the perfect plant for someone like Keith, and he knows it.

Soon after being gifted his first cactus, Keith bought another one of the same size. Then, he bought a slightly bigger one, afterwards a teeny-tiny one. Soon, his bedroom’s little windowsill became lined with some spiky, some soft succulents, all of which varied in size. He became quite fond of them, actually. He named a few of them, though he never told anyone. He would never be able to live that down.

The only thing that upsets Keith when it comes to his cacti is the fact that his cousin’s flower shop doesn’t sell them. According to his cousin, there’s no space left in the shop to start selling a couple of potted cacti. Keith understands this perfectly, for whenever he stumbles downstairs each morning, he almost always slams into a cluster of flora his cousin conveniently places right in front of the staircase simply because there’s nowhere else to put them. After having lived with him for twelve years, Keith still doesn’t know how his cousin manages to arrange everything in a way that it all fit in the shop yet is simultaneously pleasing to the eye.

But Keith, sceptical as always, constantly raises his eyebrows at this whenever it crosses his mind. Couldn’t his cousin find a little spot on the cash register counter and sell one or two? Yes, he knows orders don’t work like that – it’s either in bulk or none at all – but still. He had the mindset that if he could buy and collect a couple dozen of cacti, then his cousin could, too.