Meet me at 7 pm

🤎

Sunlight peels your eyes open, and you groan, rolling over. Not yet. It can’t be morning already. You need at least another two hours of sleep, but you know that once the sun rises, you’re not sleeping anymore. You would if you could, but without nearly complete darkness, it’s a lost cause. Plus, the looming threat of work in an hour is rapidly approaching.

That doesn’t mean you can’t feel the exhaustion weighing you down, dragging at your limbs, drying out your poor, suffering eyes.

“Hey.”

A warm hand follows the familiar voice as Vernon brushes your hair from your shoulder.

“Morning, sunshine,” he mumbles, voice low and thick from sleep. It’s almost enough to coax your eyes open.

“Lemme sleep,” you huff back as you curl tighter around yourself, trying to block out the light. It’s fruitless, of course it is, but everything in you is exhausted. You need coffee. Desperately. Unfortunately, you’re too exhausted to get up and make it. You’re not even sure if you could drink it right now if someone put it in your hands.

“Babe,” Vernon sighs, and then the bed shifts, and he’s warm against your back, arm slipping over your stomach, knees curling up beneath you. Oh, that’s nice. “You really need to fix your sleep schedule.”

“I’m fine.” You’re not fine. You’re not fine and you know it. But right now you just want to sleep. Or be wide awake. Anything that’s not this awful, horrid in-between of inescapable exhaustion with no rest.

“Babe…” Vernon’s breath ghosts over your skin, ruffling your hair just slightly as he sighs again. “You need to get up.”

“‘M too tired.”

“I know you are.” He’s exasperated, but there’s something fond behind the words. His fingers brush against your hip, dipping sweetly under the hem of your shirt to draw whorls and stars across your skin. “We can get coffee, okay? I’ll get you that fancy one from the coffee place down the street –”

“‘M too tired.”

He just laughs, low and close and entirely too much for your mental state right now. Your ear rings with the echo.

“Alright, I get it,” he murmurs, nose bumping the shell of your ear. “You need something to wake you up before coffee, yeah?”

His voice shifts in a way that catches your attention. You think about cracking an eye open, turning to see what he’s up to, but before you can do anything of the sort, both eyes open wide at the feeling of warm lips at the nape of your neck.

“Vernon?” you squeak, but he just kisses you again, a little to the left. Then again, and again, and he’s tracing his way up to your jaw, and you’re breathless but tilting back to meet him.

“Is this helping?” he whispers, words buzzing against your cheek, but he doesn’t let you answer.

He pulls you onto your back and kisses you, long and slow, and you think distantly that you might melt into the mattress. His hand at your hip, his elbow braced beside your head, the knee that he slots between yours to get a better angle and kiss you deeper.

Then he pulls away, leaving you staring at the ceiling as he dips to kiss your neck again. His nose skims the line of your jaw, his lips feather across your throat, and oh, you are very much awake. Exhaustion still simmers behind your eyes, but that’s nothing new. That’s ignorable, when Vernon’s here, mouth warm against your skin.

“Vern,” you breathe, reaching up to thread your fingers through his hair.

“Is it helping?” he repeats between small, peppering kisses.

“I mean, yeah –”

“Good.”

He moves away from your neck, but instead of kissing you again, he just looks at you. Your ears burn, staring back up at him, at his beautiful brown eyes. He looks like he’s fighting exhaustion, too, but it fades more and more with every second that passes. His focus shifts across your face, roving over you, and you smile shyly, looking away.

Vernon’s fingers on your chin bring you back before you’ve even fully gone.

“Hey, baby girl,” he whispers, smiling lazily, and a little giggle bursts out of you. His smile widens. He dips, kissing you again, but this time it’s brief. He’s searching your eyes again after only a few sweet seconds. “You look pretty.”

You wrinkle your nose. “I’m a mess.”

He half shrugs. One finger strokes the underside of your chin in a way that has your heart fluttering. “You’re a pretty mess.”

“Vernon –”

But his lips are on yours, swallowing your protests. You relent, sighing and kissing him back. You know he won’t give up, no matter how hard you argue that you’re literally in his old Star Wars t-shirt and a pair of ratty shorts, that your hair is a bird’s nest, that you have lines on your face and crusts of sleep in your eyes. He doesn’t care. Never has. You don’t think he ever will.

“You’re pretty too,” you murmur against his lips as you part. He grins down at you, hair falling in his eyes, long and soft and just a little curled. You brush it back, letting your nails scrape lightly against his scalp, and his eyes flutter closed.

“Mm.”

A moment passes like that, quiet and still, his warmth cradling you and shielding you from the sunlight that spears through the horrible slatted window shades. You still haven’t changed them. You need to. You’d probably sleep better. You hope you’d sleep better.

“You ready to get up?”

You drag your eyes back to Vernon’s. He’s almost glowing in the morning light, a gentle smirk on his lips that doesn’t match the tenderness in his eyes.

“Do I have to?” You pout, and his gaze flickers down to your lips again. You stick your lower lip out a little more and are rewarded with a brief, gentle peck.

“I mean, if you wanna have enough time to do your makeup before work, then yeah.”

Vernon grins as you groan. He’s right, you know he is. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck.

“Come on, babe. Let’s get up.”

He starts to pull away, but you catch the front of his shirt, and he pauses. You bite your lip, a little shy, but he raises an eyebrow, waiting.

“Yes?”

“…Just a little longer?”

That splits his face into a grin, the slightly cocky kind that doesn’t show up very often but makes your head spin, just a bit.

“Yeah, alright,” he murmurs, and then he presses that smirk to your mouth and the last hints of exhaustion burn away.

The second time was when you were twelve, nervous at the dentist’s waiting room. Your mom suggests that you look through the stacks of magazines to pass the time and get your mind off the daunting tooth extraction appointment. You doubt it will make it any easier but after a few minutes of falling into boredom, you reach for the magazines. They’re either Cosmo girl, Reader’s Digest, National Geographic or Avon. You browse through them, not truly reading or grasping whatever hot topic there was back then. But a certain print on the National Geographic catches your attention. They were textiles all over the world and varying patterns that are nearly hypnotic. The intricate lines and shapes lure you in that you barely hear your mother calling you for your appointment. 

The third time was when you were fourteen and officially sold to the beauty of art. Your father takes you with him to a work trip outside your city. There’s not much family catered entertainment while you were there but he decides that an art exhibit should be good. It was a simple kind, curated by four art students. You vaguely remember it being about the little things you overlook. And that stuck in your young mind. 

The halls were sectioned into photographs, paintings, and a few dioramas. They range from captured moments of a lady getting into the subway, a shot of a pigeon on top of a stop light, and some silly chalk drawings of children on the pavement. There were realistic paintings of light filtering through blinds, a ladybug on a houseplant, and a set of monochromatic images of lattes, coffee mugs and beans where the artist used coffee as paint. The dioramas were made from everyday materials and miniature people. A single soup ladle had been set up to reflect a swimming pool where the tiny people slid from the handle, some books turned over were arranged to look like mountains to be hiked, and lego blocks turned over and filled with soil and tiny clay grass and flowers. 

Your father had thought you’d quickly get bored but you stayed there for an hour, admiring each piece in detail and realizing how much you fail to enjoy by simply not looking and romanticizing all the things at present. 

And when you used your humble earnings from pet-sitting in the neighborhood to purchase your first art materials–you quickly discover, you have a natural talent for art- and you loved it. Your mother was happy about it, which surprised you as she wished for you to take up skills that were “practical” and could feed you. But you figure it must be nostalgic for her, knowing her own father was an artist himself. 

Growing up, your talents were acknowledged and praised.You had your family’s full support and encouragement. In school, you often found yourself being volunteered by your teachers and peers for murals, posters, t-shirt designs, and banners. 

By the time you were sixteen, competitive and driven, you entered art clubs and regional art contests. Then when you received your first win, you decided it was the validation needed to pursue this for the rest of your life.

You enjoyed art and your creativity was boundless, thrilled by the idea of recreating beauty at the tips of your fingers. The mere idea of capturing beauty with any means and materializing it to your own interpretation gives you a rose tinted perspective on life. It’s something you want your audience to see too–that there is endless beauty in life meant to be appreciated and monumented. It makes you a romantic, that you’re aware of but it's brought you through the many lows that come your way and that’s enough.

Everyone regarded your talents as something special, your high school teachers and later your art professors during your bachelors in fine arts. It had not been easy, because you were not really prepared for the vastness of creating art and the physical stress of submitting projects almost every two weeks. The exhibits left you burnt out and exhausted each time. But you figure it's okay—everyone seems to love your work. You’re well acquainted now with your limits and mediums you’re most comfortable with. You knew it wouldn’t be easy but once you’ve got your foundations laid, you can manage.

The way was paved for you and all you had to do was walk in it.

So you walk into your next step of taking up your masters degree.

It’s been two years since you’ve completed your undergraduate program and you moved away from your city into a bigger city to work as a highschool art teacher and freelancing from time to time so you could gain experience before getting into masters. It was nerve wracking but you had faith that you got what it takes to inspire the young minds into tapping into their inner artist. You spent the first half of the term joyously advocating the splendor of life that they had the ability to bring to life the feelings it evoked. 

You finished the term lackluster and spent that you never bring up that flowery philosophy again. All that mattered then was that they attended, got their basics down, created something they loved and  submitted on time.  It had been stressful, albeit a little chaotic dealing with hormonal teenagers who manage to include some cameo of a dick in their works. 

By your second year, you revamp your teaching pedagogy and approach, being more detailed with your expectations while they work within those guidelines. They’ve had more freedom of expression from there, and they discover their philosophies of art on their own. While the load is tiresome, it brings you deep satisfaction to see the joy and pride in their faces as their love for the craft grows. And even if they don’t pursue the same things as you do, you’re content to know they have a space like this to fall back to.

You decide, this isn’t something you don’t terribly mind doing once you’ve finished your graduate program.

The first time you saw Xu Minghao, you were absolutely floored. He showed up to your first day of class, dressed like he had a runway to walk in the next ten minutes. He was just in an all-black fit, a loose button up, tailored slacks, and a long coat. But you quickly learn that his sense of fashion was merely part of his charm. 

Minghao was gorgeous, regal, and had this genteel aura that lures you in—not too close, but close enough to marvel at his beauty. It was like he was created to be admired and valourized but not indulged in. 

His vulpine gaze is steady, posture sure as he scans the room for a vacant seat. You distantly wished the seat next to you was available but alas, all you could do was watch as he occupied the seat two rows away from you. 

You know, maybe it should embarrass you how quickly you had poeticized him in your head. You blame it on your romantic nature and that’s why it was no surprise to anyone that you chose the arts. There’s life and beauty in all the unsuspecting corners of this world. It would be a waste to live once and not bask in it. And that includes ogling your hot classmate for the first half of the semester.

So when one of his charcoal pencils falls off his desk, you’re quick–too quick–that you nearly launch yourself onto the floor to grab it and hand it to him. In your head, you think it’s a classic moment where you’d lock eyes and he’d finally look your way. But your chair lets out a loud screech, drawing unwanted attention from your peers. Minghao fixes you with a look. It was brief but you see him enough to notice the slight arch of his brow and a ghost of a scornful curve of his lips. With a slight nod, he takes the pencil from your hand and returns to his task without a word.

Really, you should have been embarrassed.

Because Xu Minghao hates you. 

You’re sure of it in those few seconds your eyes locked.

You linger on that one moment more than you’d like to admit. 

Because you’re in your second semester when you spot an opportunity for redemption during your Life Drawing class. A voice tells you one embarrassment is enough, that you’ll dig yourself a deeper hole when you stand up to walk over his seat to ask for spare pastels.

You’d like to believe there’s more than meets the eye. 

Minghao likes to keep to himself, that's what you’ve learned. He has some friends, mostly from different majors like Jun from Biology, Mingyu from Photography, and some others who are just as attractive as he is. 

Minghao, also, does not seem approachable. It wasn’t that he was unkind–he was polite, well-mannered, and soft spoken. He was just simply intimidating.

And you’re wondering if he’ll spare you the same courtesy he does your peers when you come to him for a favor.

“Hey,” you whisper with a gentle tap on his shoulder.

He turns to you with a passive glance, likely displeased that he had been pulled out from his zone. 

Your smile wobbles a little but your voice manages to stay steady, “I was wondering if you had spare oil pastels on you?”

He’s silent for a beat and suddenly it unnerves you that you stumble out an excuse, “It’s just…I-...I was late this morning so I forgot them. I didn’t grab my usual bag and–”

“You're using the same bag,” he deadpans and starts to turn away from you, “Life Drawing is every Thursday, be prepared next time.”

A hot flush of indignation and embarrassment runs through you. With a mumbled sorry, you promptly turn around to retreat to your seat. Your face burns by the time you’re sat and it doesn’t even occur to you that you don’t have anything to complete your task. You stare at your blank sketch pad mounted on your easel, mind running a mile per minute processing your shame and how you could excuse yourself from this class. 

Till something brushes along your arm and your eyes drift to the person seated beside you. Lifting your head you notice your seatmate (Vernon, was it?) extending his box of pastels towards you. 

“We can share.”

He looks at you expectantly with those big brown eyes. You’re a little surprised at the gesture because you were sure he didn’t even realize you existed. Vernon was always in his own little world, given that most of your classmates are eccentric in their own ways, but he always seemed–lost. 

Still, you’re grateful for his attentiveness and you whisper your thanks before getting to work. 

You think you’d get over your embarrassment until you realize how pitiful and desperate it must have seemed to have stood and walked over another seat to borrow supplies only to be rejected when you had a seatmate willing to share with you.

Your eyes quickly flicker over to Minghao, effortlessly recreating his own interpretation of the model in front and his open supply box abundant with pastels of different types and sizes.

The shame churns into something else entirely.

Xu Minghao hates you.

And now you hate him too.

You have avoided Xu Minghao since then, feeling an immense blow on your pride for having daydreamed about some fateful connection. It was an easy task, he liked to keep to himself anyway. You only see him during your shared classes and rarely do you bump into him in the halls. 

“Before we begin with the Fundamentals of Art, I would just like to quickly go around the room and ask: what does art mean to you?”

You watch the back of Minghao’s head once he answers and it falls through deaf ears when all you can think about is the twisting pit of rage in your gut. 

You may have avoided him but you can’t stop your growing childish resentment towards him when he simply speaks to the professor, asks questions, or carries casual conversations with whoever his seatmate may be. He’s gentle and polite and you feel your ears heat up in irritation when you hear his soft chuckles for the first time when he’s with his friends. Why was it natural for him to be cordial with others but you?

The thought stays in the backburner because you were here for a reason other than letting some cold bastard plant a seed of insecurity in you.

You finish your first year of your masters by the skin of your teeth. It’s tougher than you anticipated and you supposed that's because you’ve come from a community college where pressure and competition were less tense. The constant production of creativity and the competitive nature to be unique with every project drained you. It was physically exhausting most days, and on the tougher weeks you developed cramps on your hand and lower back. Physical stress was manageable—the humbling critique and grades did something to your spirit. 

It didn’t really help that your classmates, as outlandish as they were, had different degrees of obnoxiousness. (Your snobby crush being one of them). In comparison to your college friends, you expected a lively and closely knit community bonding over the intricacies and brevity of the world captured in diverse art forms. Yet here you were listening to your peers of varying ages argue over the interpretation of a two dimensional art work every first ten minutes of your classes while flaunting their experiences and achievements. There were contrasting understandings of beauty, what art meant, and the right and wrong ways to utilize your tools. Maybe your cohort was different, your seniors seemed pretty chill–but right now, you can’t be bothered to reconcile ideals to make one project work. It felt pretty alienating to actively avoid those discussions.

But that’s okay because you’ve made a friend—Chwe Hansol, Vernon. You sit together, share some breaks together, and pair up when given the task.

And you’ve come to learn that your elusive classmate who always seemed lost—was truly lost. 

You notice it with the lack of a certain finesse when holding a pencil or brush. You hear it with his fascinated ‘oh’s’ when your professor makes a brief comment on how acrylic dries into something akin to plastic. Or how he has certain misconceptions on some basic instructions. But he’s kind, and he really tries. So you ignore his palette of primary colors and dub it as his own art style. 

Only you discovered that wasn’t the case when you paired up for another Life Drawing project where the assignment was to simply sketch out a portrait of your partner using any medium from the draw lots. 

You both had pulled charcoal.

Imagine your surprise when he shows up to the studio with a literal bag of coals rather than compressed drawing charcoals. You wait for him to burst out laughing  and tell you it was a prank but he simply stands from across you, clapping his hands to rid the dust away from his palms. Patiently, you wait for him to explain but he doesn’t.

“Vernon…what did you bring?”

He tilts his head, expression steady as he tells you plainly, “Charcoal. Did you forget? I think this is more than enough for both of us. They wouldn’t sell it to me in singles so-”

“Vernon,” you swallow and sigh, “We don’t use literal coals…”

“We don’t?”

You reach for your collection of compressed charcoal. He stares at them without a word, blinking slowly as he is processing. 

“This is charcoal…we have different types like the willow charcoal, vine, nitram–you can use whichever you’re most comfortable with or what effect you want to achieve.”

“Oh,” he mutters, “I have never used them before.”

That was normal, it was okay because there are mediums you’re yet to discover but based on his track record–you have a feeling he’s never done any of these before.

Before you could even offer to teach him,Vernon  reveals something you were not prepared for. 

“Y’know, I’m not…supposed to be here. As an art major, I mean.”

Your jaw goes slack and your brows furrow when you realize you’re nearing the end of your first year when he tells you this. 

“Sorry?”

“I read the first half of the introduction to the course and signed up thinking it was for Film Production.”

You think he’s joking, especially not when your university had thorough screenings and a portfolio evaluation you had toiled over for months.

“Did you not at least ask yourself why you needed to submit a portfolio?”

“I figured they wanted a visual of my artistic expression, I guess,” he tells you plainly.

“And your supplies? What did your portfolio even look like?” your hand fumbles for a seat.

“My younger sister had some stuff,” he pulled out a chair for you, “Prof. Jeong later asked me if I was a fan of Anish Kapoor. And I just said, ‘The Chicago bean dude? Sure.’ “ 

You grimace a little, you were not a fan of his work so to you that would be an insult. But it worked out for Vernon and if there's anything you’ve learned about him at all, especially up to this point–it's that nothing he does has to make sense.

Since then it was given that whatever project you shared that would normally be done in an hour or two, would go on for another hour just walking him through the basics. You didn’t mind, it was comfortable working with Vernon.

By the beginning of your second year, it is clear to you that the odds were not in your favor.

you: ure not lost r u?? class starts in ten 

Vernon does not reply and it makes you worry he’s lost his way around the new campus building, or worse lost his way on the way to campus. Just before you think to call, a bag plops to your right where a vacant seat had been. Thank goodness you had reserved the one to your left with your bag for Vernon–

You look up to greet your new seatmate but it dies in your throat.

Xu Minghao

He’s bleached his hair over the break and he’s wearing a white tank and a denim jacket. You’ve never been this close to him and he’s still  breathtakingly gorgeous. You notice the mole at the corner of his pink lips and how much sharper his gaze is, framed by the platinum locks curling against his forehead.

“Minghao.”

You blink. 

His brow arches at your silence but he sits down and repeats himself, “My name—it’s Minghao.”

“I know…?” you say dumbly, a little dazed at the fresh fragrance that follows him.

His lips purse, “And yours is?”

It takes you a beat to realize he’s introducing himself and he doesn’t know your name. 

You shared more than half of your classes with the bastard for a year. You may not have paired up or worked on projects with him or a handful of your classmates but you know their names from being called up by the professor, during presentations, and their exhibits. A familiar hot flush of irritation runs through you but you compose yourself and tell him your name. He repeats it before nodding and turning away to prepare his materials.

You frown at the back of his head, “I studied with you for a year.”

He glances over his shoulder, pauses for a beat before he lets out an “Oh.”

There was this unspoken rule in any class you take that the first seat one takes will be their spot for the year. And now that Xu Minghao’s staked his claim on the seat next to you, he still manages to prove he’s an asshole—

bonon: hey srry not coming. I dont feel so good.

You just hope Vernon gets better soon not only for his sake but also for yours.

You want to curl up and cry when you’ve been paired up with the bane of your existence for an exercise in your drawing class. It would have been bearable if the task had been collaborative. But the task was to use your partner as a model and draw them in six different angles. 

That meant you had to look at his stupid self, and sketch out all the details of his stupid pretty face for two hours.

You’re gripping your pencil a little too hard as you map out his eyes and lips, doing your damned hardest not to look at him too much or squirm under his intense gaze. Your sketchpad is pulled up close to your face while Minghao has his resting on his lap, movements fluid as they glide over the surface.

It takes you about thirty minutes before you feel your shoulders ease and you forget all you’re feeling for Minghao outside of being your muse. You’re a little more comfortable glancing at him more, eyes tracing over how his wavy locks curl around his brows and the cut of his jaw. The soft color of his eyes framed by strong brows. But your gaze lingers on the fullness of his pink lips and how beautifully placed his mole is that you think of–

“You’re sure taking your sweet time on my face.”

—how much you’d love to shove your fist up his face.

You blink and realize he’s already starting on a second angle of your figure. You scoff and carry on shading his lips, “Trust me, I’m doing you a favor drawing you,”

He smirks, “I know I look perfect but it doesn’t have to be complicated.”

“Unlike you, I care about art and not simply submitting whatever I pull out of my ass though you could look like one.”

“The objective is about perspective and the right proportions in different angles. Professor Lee’s not expecting you to put out a Mona Lisa.”

You frown and ignore him, determined to show him that you can get both of them done. Like it hardly takes any effort.

But you unconsciously begin drawing your next angle more loosely, paying close attention to the lines of his figure and the shading rather than perfecting that one portion of the task.

“Hey, does this look, right?” Vernon nudges your elbow. 

You look over his station to find…a tangle of wires that was vaguely shaped like a pyramid. You squint at it a little. It was the basics of sculpture today and your class has moved on to wire sculptures. Given that the task was to produce a wire-sculpture of a well known monument, it could resemble a pyramid in Giza if he added a little more dimension to it.

“I think you made a great triangle, ” you snicker which earns him a sigh. You gotta hand it to him for sticking it out in a course he’s never done. “Look, I think you’ve got the base down but maybe…recheck your calculations. Pyramids are not two dimensional, after all they have–”

“It’s supposed to be the Eiffel Tower,” he deadpans. 

Oh. 

Now you mull over what to tell him because if it were you, you’d start all over again. Just as you open your mouth to suggest, another voice interrupts.

“Your base will work, just twist the rest of the wires in a spiral.”

You inhale deeply, recognizing that flat tone anywhere, ever since he’s decided to be your seatmate. Vernon glances behind you to nod at Minghao and turns back to his sculpture. Minghao moves around your table to demonstrate what he meant, giving Vernon pointers in the right direction. 

By the time they’re done, the sculpture was a lot more comprehensible and better than how it first started but looked more like an avant garde version of the Eiffel Tower. However, your friend seems to be happy with himself, nodding with that little ‘stank’ face he does when he’s impressed. 

“Thanks man,” Vernon brings his hand up in a fist bump. 

“Keep it up, you might be the next Anish Kapoor.”

“Chicago bean dude—nice.”

You don’t say a word and you grimace at the comparison, wondering whether you should have a little session with Vernon about real artists. But your friend looks so pleased, eyes shining with pride as he observes his sculpture like he couldn’t believe he did that. Then you find yourself smiling softly, feeling happy that he’s beginning to see the joy in creating.

Your third semester goes by smoothly though, the projects and assignments become increasingly difficult and challenging to keep up with. What stresses you out the most were the satisfactory grades and critique from your professors. You constantly felt like you never reached what it was exactly they were envisioning you to do. And you can never understand why either, you’ve used their techniques and followed each criteria to a T.  Yet you always leave their offices with an average grade, neutral reactions over your art and vague comments.

“Something’s not right.”

“No visible brush strokes. Nice.”

“It looks like something obscure I’ve only seen once in my life.”

It leaves you at a loss of where to go, how to make your art incite the same reactions and inspiration you once did years ago. You think maybe your art was not as beautiful anymore so in desperation, you learn different mediums, mixed media, and change up your art styles. It feels like a gamble each time, seeing which combination would win you the response and grades you favored.

On the other hand, Minghao does not annoy you anymore than he does when he opens his mouth. It was a nightmare to be paired with Minghao for a project–even more so on the very week you were down with a cold.

While he’s mostly quiet in class–when given a chance to speak on a topic, he speaks in that tone of his, forthright and a little acerbic. He always had the right words to say and he was not afraid to express his own critique over even the most accomplished artists. 

There was so little people knew about him that you wonder where he got the audacity. Because if Minghao opens his damn mouth one more time you’re stabbing your palette knives into his eyes.

“Reminds me of Liu Wei,” he comments on your half finished oil painting. Ah yes, yet another artist you hate.

“That’s not a compliment.”

“Not my fault.”

You grip your palette tightly, resisting the urge to whack it across his face. The bastard is smirking to himself as he carries on with his work, hands effortlessly gliding across the canvas. 

“Are comparisons to shitty artists the only way you can critique someone else’s work? I’d hate to have you as my instructor.”

“Well, maybe if you knew what kind of techniques those artists used, you’d actually learn something,” he says, unaffected by your glare.

“The techniques don’t matter when their work looks ass,” you grumble, turning back to your canvas.

He doesn’t say anything, but when you subtly glance his way, you see a sliver of a frown set on his lips. You consider it a win.

Halfway through your fourth semester, your painting professor senses that your class has been thoroughly exhausted off their creative departments. He decides to give you all a little  exercise to ‘refresh’ your basics and let loose with your canvas.

The task was to use broad brush strokes, no blending, just good ol’ impressionist painting of a fruit bowl in the middle of the studio. It’s a little nostalgic of your undergraduate days when you were just learning. 

It was supposed to be relaxing as your professor put it, and everyone else seems to be calmly working on their pieces. 

But you—you’re stressed and obsessing over the shape of the damn bowl. 

It doesn’t seem right or proportional. And you can’t bring yourself to move on until this one looks just right. You’ve been doing that a lot more lately, and somehow, it doesn’t feel like art anymore, it feels like an expectation you can’t meet, a task you need to keep consistent on.

“You spent one session on that damn bowl,” Minghao comments.

If you could hiss, you would, but that would be embarrassing. You don’t want to give him the satisfaction of looking so you ignore him.

“You’re not doing it right,” he warns you calmly.

You feel a vein in your head throb, “See how I’m minding my own business? Very demure. Very mindful.”

This earns you a scoff.

“The technique is to use loose brush strokes,” he reminds you, all the while not taking his eyes off his canvas. You hate that he’s doing so well. 

“I can read the board.”

“Funny you do, but still miss the point.”

And it's funny how this man can make anything in your hand a potential murder weapon.

Minghao turns towards you and sometimes you hate how he looks because each time he does this, you get a little less pissed and a little more flustered that the bite in your tongue just retracts. He reaches over and grasps your wrist, fingers curling over yours and the brush. 

You’re too stunned at his touch. You try not to think about how gently he’s cradling your hand as he guides your brush towards the canvas. In a few wide, well placed strokes, he’s corrected your lopsided bowl, giving you a base to work on. You're filled with a mix of gratitude and anger. Thankful since your agony has ended and anger because he had corrected it in a few flicks of his wrist.

“Loose, broad strokes,” he murmurs before releasing your hand and returning to his own easel like it was nothing.

You fume and do the same, cheeks warm from an emotion you cannot pinpoint. You try not to think about how the skin in your hand tingles from his touch.

“Why do you hate Hao so much? He’s a pretty chill dude,” Vernon asks you over lunch when he notices your scowl the minute Minghao passes by. 

“Hao?” you raise your brow, “I didn’t know you guys were on nickname basis now.”

“Yeah, like I said, he’s pretty chill.”

“But that’s because you’re you.”

“Okay…” he rolls out the syllables, “But why do you hate him?”

“He hated me first.”

Vernon scrutinizes you, watching you absentmindedly play your food.

“What makes you say that?”

“Well, he–” then you pause, trying to pinpoint and remember when it was that convinced you that he hated you. “Don’t you hear the way he talks to me? And looks at me? It’s so different from when he talks to you or anyone else!”

“He sounds the same when he talks to you,” your friend tilts his head, looking somewhat shocked at the conclusion you’ve drawn. “Besides, he chose to sit beside you in all our shared classes when there were other vacant seats.”

You huff and stab your fork through your lunch, “That’s cause he knows I hate him and he just wants to be infuriating. ”

He looks at you incredulously, like he’s confused why you can’t see it from his perspective, “But you literally get the best grades when you’re paired up.”

“Because there’s no way I’m letting that asshole drag my grades.”

There’s a pause long enough for you to be convinced Vernon’s already dropped the topic and you finish your lunch in silence. As you pack up and gather the containers to toss into the bin, Vernon looks you dead in the eyes and says,

“You like him.”

A strangled noise leaves your throat and you whack his arm, “I don’t!”

“He likes you.”

“If you don’t shut your damn-”

“It’s fine, girl,” he rubs where you’ve hit him, “You can like him, we’re not in highschool anymore and-”

You slap his arm again, “I do not. End of discussion.”

It was after school hours when you received an email from one of your admired professors, Professor Jeong. It’s addressed to your cohort about an opening to anyone who’d be interested in being his teaching assistant  for Painting in the coming new school year for the undergraduate program. He sends the basic requirements to apply and encourages the opportunity for you to build your resume or if you’d ever be interested in becoming an art teacher yourself.

You write up your cover letter, attach your CV, and portfolio without thinking about the possible repercussions on your final year.

You get an email back in two days and a request for an interview. You pass with flying colors and you’ll be starting in the next month.

But Professor Jeong never told you that he had been looking for two teaching assistants for his Painting Class. Not that you minded but if your co-teaching assistant is Xu Minghao—you minded a lot.

You’ve decided that your professors were conspiring against you.

“I was originally looking for just one,” your professor explains as he looks over the two of you sat in his office, “But with the number of freshmen enrolled, and well—” he gestures to his wrinkled hands, “I’m getting too old to keep up, and there will be frequent sessions where  I will be absent due to doctor’s appointments. So, I figured it would be best to have two. And what do you know, they happen to be my two most competent students.”

You try to keep the grimace off your face to be on par with the man beside you, but you nod and thank your professor.

“It’s fairly straightforward,” Professor Jeong explains as he lays out a few stacks of papers before you, “This is the yearly plan, syllabus and an outline of my lessons for the whole semester. Apart from the job description I’ve emailed you, I would also need you to assist with opening and setting up the classrooms 20 minutes before the students arrive. Each week, you’ll be assigned a corner of the class where you’ll pay extra attention to the students stationed there.”

Professor Jeong flips his table calendar towards the two of you, “However, I have an overlap of schedules from this week to till the end of the semester. I need you to teach a session every Friday, you guys can choose if you should alternate each week or teach in a monthly rotation. I hope that won’t be too much of a big deal for you since you both have teaching experiences.”

Your brows nearly raise as you glance over at Minghao. Nearly three years and there's still so little you know about him.

“I also understand this is your final year, which means you’ll have exhibits, some bigger projects, and a thesis to worry about.”

The realization makes dread settle in your stomach. So far you’ve managed the past two years, and you’d like to think you made better decisions now than when you were in your undergraduate study. 

“Do not hesitate to ask for my help, in case it gets too overwhelming. You’re free to use the studios after hours. Please share your duties responsibly,” the old man looks between the two of you, and smiles,  “Though I’ve seen how well your dynamics go in the classroom so I have nothing to worry about.”

You feel the muscle beneath your eyes twitch because you’re sure he means some other pair in class since all you’ve ever wanted to do was wrangle Minghao’s pretty little neck.

Xu Minghao hates you and you think maybe your professors do too.

“Ms. Y/N, what do you think about this?”

It feels like ten minutes when its only been three minutes since you’ve been staring at one of the student’s painting wondering how you could politely say that you don’t understand what the fuck he’s doing. Just three weeks into being a TA and you’re tested in every way. You tilt your head, like that makes any difference in helping you decipher the work in progress.

The task was to draw the same figure in three different moods that were similar in nature: ghostly, melancholic, and bored.

But you feel like you’re staring at three different blobs in three different colors.

You must be quiet for too long because the student begins to shift under your gaze, looking a little discouraged and antsy. You don’t mean for him to feel that way but you don’t know what to say other than ‘what are you trying to do?’ cause that would just further discourage him. If there was anything that frustrated you as an undergraduate, it was the vague critique of your instructors that didn't point you in the right direction.

“Is it that bad?” The students’ voice was much smaller now and guilt twists in your chest as you scramble for the right words in your head. 

“It is,” a stony voice responds from over your shoulder that you jump a little. “It lacks depth.”

You didn’t notice Minghao walking to your side when he noticed your struggle. You notice the little wince the freshman does that you sigh, and put on your best customer service smile, “What Minghao means is that you seem to have the general composition. You have this, and this is great, but we don't yet have a general idea about what you're trying to present.”

Minghao’s brows furrow, “I did not say that.”

Before you could abandon all professionalism and slam his face through the canvas, Minghao moves to the student’s side. 

“A big part of expression is contrast, don’t be afraid of using darker colors,” he starts picking out tubes of paint for the student to mix in his palette.

“What if I put it in the wrong places?” 

 “We’re using acrylics, they tend to be more forgiving,” Minghao offers, before gesturing to him to mix the colors. “If that happens, you can always go back over it once it's dry.”

The student nods, eager with the clarity of his next step. 

Minghao’s eyes meet yours, a honeyed brown with a vulpine edge that makes you squirm in spite of the heat in your glare. 

Your approaches towards students were evidently different. Most days, you think the freshmen were more terrified of Minghao than Professor Jeong himself. It’s exasperating sometimes when he’d come up behind you to give a more direct version of whatever you were trying to tell a student. 

“Ms. Y/N, I highlighted the areas you’ve suggested, can you come take a look?” a girl waves her hand over her easel. You shuffle towards her station with your customer service smile but once your eyes land on her canvas, the corners of your lips twitch. She highlighted the right places, you’d give her that, but they were the wrong shade and pressed heavily onto the areas. Others may dub it as artistic expression but it is not exactly ideal for realism. 

You hum, pausing and choosing your words carefully. You’re nearly tempted to call Professor Jeong to take this one but you feel he may be too harsh on the girl’s breaking spirit. Earlier, while you had assisted this girl, you could feel her frustration and doubts. It's her tired eyes, the confusion in them, and her hesitating hands. You pointed her in the right direction with all the grace and empathy  you could muster. 

The medium had been oil paints hence an easy clean up before it dries, but that would mean recreating the colors and strokes all over again. You don’t know if she has enough in her to do it again. 

You decide to do it over again for her instead, sensing she’s close to tipping over the edge. You pat her shoulder and tell her that you have a ‘trick’ to show her as you walk away to grab a paper towel and spray bottle up front. Just as you return with the damp paper towel, your heart literally sinks seeing your co-teaching assistant standing behind the student you left momentarily. 

“What made you think light hits this way when your source of light is up here?” Minghao points out. 

“I just thought that it made sense if I…” she sputters, unused to the weight of his hard gaze.

“Sometimes common sense is the guide that we need.”

Once again, he’s made the paper towel in your hand a potential murder weapon if you’d just shove it down his throat. The poor girl looks disheartened, her mouth opening and closing at a loss for words. You take a deep breath, intending to remain composed.

“Hao,” you call out sternly, which surprises you, that even Minghao looks mildly intrigued. “Soobin over there needs your assistance.”

You place a hand on the girl and lean over to begin wiping off the poorly placed highlights.

“Your comments are more welcome there,” you mutter with a bite, fully expecting him to leave with a snarky remark. But he doesn’t, he just leaves.

You’re relieved he does. Your ears are hot and your heart is racing as you gently walk the student through techniques of how she could fix her mistakes. 

Later, you pull aside Minghao as you finish gathering up the supplies and reports. Normally, it would intimidate you to confront him with something serious and outside your daily banter, but seeing that girl’s face crumple before him today had laid heavy in your chest.

“I don’t like the way you spoke to that girl earlier,” You turn to face him, arms crossed not in defiance but rather you feel naked each time he looks at you with such intensity. “Since last week, she hasn’t been at her best. It’s clear that something is wearing her down hence affecting her performance.”

Minghao scowls, “It is not our job to be babying these adults. They came here to learn the fundamentals of art and we give them that.”

“I know that you like to think everyone needs the no bullshit approach you use but it will not kill you to have a little more kindness and sensitivity,” your gaze hardens, nails digging into your arm, “You may care about them perfecting their techniques and craft but I-...”

Your mouth runs dry as you struggle to find the words to say. Minghao waits, he looks at you expectantly, guarded but not defensive. 

“I don’t want them to start hating themselves or their very hobbies,” you swallow.

There's a pause and silence that unnerves you. You’ve argued with Minghao before, insulted each other and you’ve given him your nastiest glare—but this was different. This wasn’t about the two of you anymore or how much you hate each other’s guts. 

You don’t know how you manage to handle his gaze but you do because ironically, you can see that you’ve been heard. He slowly nods, face neutral as he reaches for the folders from the desk behind you. 

“Okay, next time.”

Juggling your duties between your classes, projects, and teaching each week started off manageable until at the beginning of your fifth semester, your dean had begun discussions of your thesis and an exhibition seminar. The theme would be: The Art of Everyday. Thankfully, the exhibit would be done as a collective rather than on your own which meant that the instructor organizes the exhibition while the students deliver the execution. 

You feel sorry for Vernon that you couldn’t be as available to him as you were before when you’re rushing between classes to prepare for the undergraduates or you’re too exhausted working on a project late at night. But he assures you that he’d be fine. You trust he’d be, he always managed in the end.

The stress is catching up, you can feel it, and it manifests in ways that frustrates you–forgetting where you left your car keys, piles of take out, eyes half closing while you grade and worst of them all, staring at a blank canvas for more  than ten minutes at a loss of what to create.

Minghao, on the other hand, you have no idea how he’s managing well. Sure, there was a bit of a rush in his pace but he still kept up to his tasks. 

You see him nearly everyday and almost the whole day. Most days, he beats you to Professor Jeong’s class, having set up everything and every Monday, you would see three cups of steaming coffee on his desk. The second Monday you see this, you thank Professor Jeong for always thinking of you two on his morning coffee runs but he just smiles and says that it was all Minghao. 

You don’t mention it to him. But you do start to notice all the things he does in quiet. Opening doors for you even in the middle of your daily banter, a hand over the edge of the table when you duck to pick up a fallen brush, and his open tub of titanium white and blue between the two of you because you use those colors way too much. He takes over the students with an unbearable attitude, and somehow you’re thankful for his deadpan expression and withering comebacks because you might just cry if it were you. Sure, you still have to deliver a sugar coated version of whatever he had in mind for most but it works. You find yourself unconsciously challenged by his suggestions and strangely understanding how his mind works the more you have to…translate for him. 

Maybe Vernon and Professor Jeong did have a point when they mentioned the ‘dynamics’ you didn’t think existed all that well between the two of you.

You don’t know if it's your exhaustion, your confrontation, or new found appreciation for him, but he irritates you less.

It doesn’t mean you no longer hate him, you’re just affected a little less than before.

After all, you’re still sure he hates you.

Your drawing class had been kicking your ass as of late. It was the most fundamental form of art yet you end up feeling uninspired and pessimistic. You suppose your exhaustion and the vague feedback of your previous works had finally begun to eat away at your resolve. But inspiration or heart cannot matter at this point, especially when you have a huge final project due in two days. You’re never really a person who’d rush your things last minute but last minute panic is all you’ve been running on in your final year.

Ironically, the project had been using charcoal to draw a  self portrait in four different moods: robotic, despondent, listless, hopeful. 

It should be manageable, but  it's a terrifying feat to accomplish in black and white colors. Your perfectionism overrides your panic that you barely notice the nights prior were spent taking advantage of your TA privileges and staying till the wee hours in the studio. You don’t intend to but you’re light headed and starved by the time you notice how late it is. You can’t help it, you’ve already bought two packs of paper from how quickly you’ve gone through them only to be dissatisfied and scrap them.

Now you’re sitting back where you were four consecutive nights right after the 5PM class. 

meanhao: are you still there? I misplaced the keys to the studio and i forgot the papers prof left us

you: yeah i am. 

He shows up twenty minutes later, greeting you with a knock to the door and heading straight to the corner where he had dropped the folders. You don’t say a word to him, you don’t expect any conversation after all. So you carry on your fifth draft of your second expression. 

“You’re still on that?”

“Yup,” you hum, making it clear in your tone that you’re not in the mood for any of his snarky remarks. 

After a brief pause, you expect him to leave but he doesn’t, dragging a vacant stool to sit next to you with his body tilted towards you. Even without looking at him, you can feel the intensity of his stare flitting over your tired features and project. You spare him a questioning glance before you shake your head and get back on task. 

You see him open his mouth from your peripheral and you suck in a sharp sigh, “Stop, I’ve got to get this out before Thursday and I don’t have time for your bullshit remarks.”

Minghao tilts his head, “I was going to ask if you’ve already completed the first draft of your thesis for tomorrow’s mid-year meeting.”

His question feels like you’ve been hit by a truck then run over by a sixteen wheeler…and a family van for good measure. The charcoal falls from your hand in shock and you gape at him, wondering if you wish he hadn’t said it or thankful he did.

You had forgotten.

Of all the projects you could have forgotten to panic about, it was the most crucial of them all. And if you didn’t press your palms into your eyes, you think you’d be seeing Minghao’s smirk of satisfaction. Dragging your palms through your hair, your eyes are wide, derailed from the steadfast will to complete your current task at hand.

“That’s tomorrow.”

“Yeah.”

You take in a shaky breath, feeling your fingers tremble. You can’t cry now, not with so much at stake and especially not in front of Xu Minghao. 

“Look, you still have a little more time,” he quietly offers, and it startles you how much softer he sounds, “It’s just the first draft after all, it doesn’t have to be perfect. In my opinion, you can get more helpful feedback when you submit work that you’re not completely satisfied with.”

You try to process the fact that this is his attempt to soothe you more than his reasoning behind it. It goes against your standards of constantly delivering your best still you can’t help but find that he does have a point.

Slowly, you glance at him to make sure he isn’t stifling his snide smirk or laugh. Instead, you find the mild concern in his eyes veiled by the nonchalance he holds. You take in a sharp breath when you realize that this expression is more familiar to you nowadays than the arrogance in them. You don’t want to wonder why, so you’re thankful and relieved instead because his aloof nature isn’t something you need at the moment.

You take a deep breath, calculating the amount of pages you have left to complete and the hours you need to complete your charcoal project.

You’d have to ditch your charcoal project for the first draft submission, you still have one more night to finish it, you should be alright, you should be okay-

A knock on the door interrupts your self spiral, followed by a familiar ring of your friend’s voice, “Delivery for Ms. Y/N. Oh, hey, Hao!”

You inhale before turning around to greet Vernon. You muster a smile but you figure it doesn’t show anyway with how he meets your expression with a frown. He sets a bag of take out on a table before reaching your side.

“And your project literally beat you up, huh?” he chuckles, roughly rubbing the stain of charcoal over your forehead and eyebrows that you hadn’t realized was there.

You groan and slump your head against his stomach. He hums, patting your back as you seek solace in his worn black t-shirt. You’re aware that each minute not spent on your pressing priorities meant a minute lost. But you were so relieved to see Vernon that you think you might cry. Just the familiarity of him and the mouthwatering smell of your favorite takeout brings you such a comfort of normalcy that you would otherwise have if it weren’t for the damn projects and gradings.

“C’mon, you need to take a break. You’ve been at it for days. There’s no way you can finish this on an empty stomach.”

You give out a muffled thanks, scared that if you look up you’ll actually start crying over the gesture.

“And how about you, man? You here for your projects too?”

You nearly forgot about the man who watches your exchange with Vernon with a hawklike gaze. You suppose that's what stress would do to you. 

“No, I’m done,” Minghao answers, your head perks up while your friend turns to unpack the boxes of take out. Minghao looks between the two of you with something familiar, like aversion but not quite.

“Already? How do you even manage to do that while grading the midterms?”

Then you see it—a coldness you’ve never seen from the man as he regards you with a stony glare. Your face visibly falls, stunned with how quickly you’re being reintroduced to this iciness he possesses just when you were getting acquainted how warm he truly is. 

“It's not that hard when you’re committed.”

You know that it's his usual sarcasm, the kind that’s meant to goad you into challenging him and yourself. 

But it doesn’t spark a fire of indignance in you like it usually does. Instead, you feel something inside you snuff out like a candle by the shutters during a thunderstorm. 

Was that it? You weren’t committed? Or…were you just fighting for something that wasn’t ever meant to be yours?

You shift your gaze over to the piece you’ve spent an hour on—it stares back at you, half done as it is, a reflection of you—despondent. And the crumpled pieces of paper overflowing from the bin stares back at you in mockery.

Did you even deserve to be here?

You say nothing…and Minghao frowns at your silence.

“Okay, food’s ready,” Vernon announces, “Will you be joining us, Hao?”

You remain despondent, staring at the dark strokes until they blur against the white page. 

“No,” Minghao answers quietly, getting up from his seat when you’ve locked him out. “I have to get going.”

You hold your tears long enough till the door clicks shut.

You thought you loved art and that your sheer passion would have been enough. But somewhere in between, you started to hate it.  You didn’t anticipate it–how the burnout slowly wound its veiny hands across your throat. Being on a constant loop of creating, receiving vague to dissatisfied feedback, and rushing through consecutive projects were taking the joy off it all.

Or maybe Minghao was right; it shouldn’t be hard when you’re committed.

That’s further cemented in your thoughts when you leave your two hour mid-year meeting with your thesis with your papers brightly marked with red more than the words you’ve tirelessly written. You left exhausted, already running on three hours of sleep and taking power naps between classes. You shove the papers into your bag, not particularly in the right headspace to review them without descending into the torment of your own thoughts.

A loud tear rips across the empty studio as you angrily pull off, crumple, and toss your third draft for your third expression. There’s soft music playing from your phone, a contrast to your exasperated sighs. It’s been three hours since you’ve locked yourself in, determined to finish this charcoal project for tomorrow’s submission. You’d have to be up early for a meeting with Professor Jeong,  assist in his class at 8AM, grade their midterms, then finally tackle the dreadful task of going through your first draft again. You had an exhibition seminar at 2PM and you’re tempted to skip it but you know you’ll miss a lot. If you ask Vernon to take notes for you, as much as you adored that guy, you’re not so sure he could provide nor ask the details you’d like.

Your charcoal scratches across the paper where you’re particularly stuck on mapping out a robotic ‘mood’ in your eyes. You moderate your movements, being intentional with the highlights of your eyes to emphasize a deadened, unempathetic gaze. It gradually comes together, relief fills you once you realize you can finally start working on your last piece for this project. 

Then you lift your hand off the paper to step back, and finally see it, the smudged lines from where your wrist had rested without a barrier. It would have been salvageable if it hadn’t been stubbornly stained with the sweat from your palms. 

You flop back onto your stool, slouching into your hands. Your arms, fingers and back are cramping and you know you’ll feel it for days. Quietly groaning, you release stuttered breaths and attempt to ground yourself. Last night's breakdown over boxes of takeout, your open laptop, and Vernon’s inept to give you any sound advice that wouldn’t push you to quit your major was enough to have disturbed your already tight schedules.

You peek at the wall clock: 10:44 PM. You’ve been here for four hours and you had your meeting at 7AM. If you still had to head home for a quick shut eye and shower, it would take you thirty minutes to commute and another thirty back. This would probably mean you’d only have an hour of sleep. It’s dreadful but you’ll take whatever at this point.

Before you could switch to a blank canvas, a soft knock startled you. 

You frantically glance around you, terrified at the sound when you expect the building to be empty. Reaching for your phone, you lower the volume and cautiously reach for the closest thing to fend yourself–which happened to be a glass pencil holder. 

The knock comes again and you finally recognize a silhouette from the frosted glass. The knob carefully twists open and you’re surprised to see Minghao enter with a paper bag in his hand. He’s dressed in a much ‘casual’ manner–grey hoodie and jeans. Still, you find it so unfair how incredible he looks in any outfit.

“Hao?”

You wonder what he could possibly be needing at this time, much less come back hours after classes are over. You don’t get to ask. He offers you a tightlipped customary smile before standing a few feet away from you. 

“Still here?”

Frowning, you twist back in your seat.

You know he means that as a greeting but yesterday’s meeting left a sour taste in your mouth and you feel acid rise up your throat. Everything that came from his mouth just sounded condescending now. 

Minghao sighs, dropping the bag on the table before stepping back. You think he would leave but when you don’t hear any footsteps retreating, you spare a stony glance over your shoulder.

“What?”

His expression doesn’t give way to any emotion apart from how his eyes are firmly fixated on yours. 

“You need to eat.”

Your eyes dart over the paperbag, noting the label from your local convenience store. 

An olive branch. 

Minghao knew he had done something wrong.

You huff, turning to your stack of paper, “Already ate.”

That was a lie but you refuse to let him think this was sufficient  to count as an apology. 

“Then,” Minghao pauses, and you think you heard a slight stammer, “You need a break.”

“I can’t afford to.”

“Just go for a walk.”

“Not at this hour.”

“You won’t be alone. I’ll go with you.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“But I am.”

You halt your movements, feeling a sharp surge of irritation shoot through you. Shaking it off, you begin mapping out your portrait and simply tell him, “No.”

You think Minghao was incapable of ever admitting his own flaws without being indirect with making amends. There was no way you were going to let him think that it was okay. If he knew he messed up, the next step was to just say he did. He’s never had any problem with honesty. But instead he’s here at nearly 11PM with a peace offering and a demand for you to leave pressing matters for a walk as a means to assure him nothing’s changed.

It’s silent but the sound of your pencil scratching the surface and the soft music you resumed playing. The tension is thick and you’re waiting for him to accept your rejection and just go.

Then he softly calls out your name in a way that sounds foreign to you.

“I’m sorry about last night,” he finally says. 

Even if you expected him to know he’s hurt you, you didn’t actually think he would admit it. However, if it was your fatigue, ill mood, or pride, you’re not sure but you snap, “What about last night?”

You hear him inhale quietly, “I know I hurt you. You probably felt like this wasn’t the place for you.”

Now that you think about it, why was he apologizing for that? 

Your eyes widen and you whip around to look at him, “Vernon told you!” 

Minghao owlishly blinks at you, “No…you did. Just now.”

You groan, completely forgetting that this man, as unapologetic and aloof as he could be, had such a  deep understanding for people. That’s why his critiques are precise and catered to whoever asked, but that also meant his dry insults were just as lethal.

“It wasn’t my intention to make you feel like you weren't committed or doing enough but it still hurt you,” he continues and it gives you a whiplash that he would still elaborate. “I said that because…Vernon was there.”

You frown to yourself, feeling like he meant something else other than keeping his cold facade.

“I think you’re the most committed person I’ve met when it comes to doing what you do. But well, this–” he vaguely gestures to your art and the clock, “--is unhealthy, but I believe you’re trying.”

Minghao had no problems being honest, it was his strong suit–but you didn’t expect him to be vulnerable either. You’re gaping at him, like he’s grown a second head. He remains unfazed at your stare but you do notice the tips of his ears turn pink.

“And someone once told me that she wouldn’t want anyone to start hating themselves and their very hobbies, so I’d like to take her on a walk.” 

The corner of his lips tilt a little when he catches the shift in your expression. You chew on your lip, already tired and too confused with how to navigate this territory of your relationship. 

“Why would you think a walk would help?” 

Minghao shrugs, shoving his hands in his pockets, “It helps when we stop creating for a while and just do something else.”

You contemplate on it awhile, recalculating the time you would need to come back quickly and finish your work. Glancing over at your piles of crumpled paper, you figure, you’ll only be stuck in the same cycle if you don’t take a break.

The night air is cool around the school campus while you walk side by side. You have no idea what it would be like being with Minghao outside of your school responsibilities and teaching assistant tasks. You think that between the two of you, you’d have to be the one to draw out a conversation to fight off whatever awkwardness might settle. But it doesn’t happen.

You’re surprised to learn that Minghao is a natural with leading conversations and asking a good balance of questions and thought provoking statements. Even in nearly three years you’ve known each other, there’s a lot you didn’t know about him. 

He tells you he originally planned on majoring in fashion, given that it was part of his interests, but he figured he could do more with this major. He grew up learning martial arts and that he enjoys dancing. That surprised you as he didn’t strike you as someone who’d express his art through movement. Still, the image of him dancing so beautifully and powerfully puts a smile on your face.

He talks about his hometown, about the busy ports and quiet pockets of the shore. Later, you find out his apartment now wasn’t too far from here, a good five minute bus ride or a fifteen minute walk if he feels like it. Minghao had been a private art tutor for some time, to which earns him a raised brow because that could only mean he tutored some rich kids. But you figure that's why he speaks so eloquently and is quick to provide advice that best fits a student. The experience, much like yours, makes him consider teaching art so he plans to get a certification come graduation.

He asks about you, and you find it funny how you’re just getting to know each other after having studied and taught together. So you do; you tell him about your own hobbies outside of art, about your family, and how your grandfather had been a big influence with your art. Your eyes visibly light up when you talk about the peonies, how they used to overflow through the picket fence, and you’d pick them with your grandmother.

You tell him about your experience teaching art in highschool, that earns him a fond smile and you, a warm flush. You begin exchanging stories about your students from there–their shenanigans, their difficulties, and the art that has stuck with you. 

An hour has passed by the time you’re making your way back to the studio. It was short but those minutes had changed two years worth of whatever you both had. It didn’t count as a friendship but it is something. 

You wonder why he’s going back with you when he could go home. There was no more bad blood and he wasn’t obligated to stay but he said nothing about it. 

“What is art to you?” he suddenly asks, visibly more comfortable.

“Why do you ask?” you ask, peering up at him curiously and you don’t comment on how close you are to each other that your shoulders brush and you can smell the faint powdery scent of his fabric conditioner. 

Minghao glances at you and it doesn’t intimidate you anymore, knowing him the way you know him now. 

“I was just wondering if your answer would still be the same.”

Huh?

Seeing your confusion, he further elaborates, “During our first year, Professor Lee asked us the same question.”

Your brows furrow, “If I don’t remember that question then I most likely can’t remember my answer.”

He shakes his head with an amused smile and you decide that you don’t mind seeing it more often than his infuriating smirk and glower.

“You said something like ‘to create something beautiful,’” then his nose scrunched.

You bump his shoulder, “What? It’s a good answer!”

“No, you don’t get it,” he nudges you back, “Art isn’t about just beauty.”

“Then what?”

“You’ll find it yourself,” he answers simply and you groan.

The art building comes into view and Minghao still doesn’t turn to leave. You’re feeling your earlier dread creep into your forefront but it's less daunting as it was an hour ago. You want to thank him but you’re tongue tied, still navigating in this new dynamic between you. And you wonder how everything changes from here.

Minghao insists on staying. Not verbally, but he asks you where your thesis draft was and while you hesitate, you have a feeling you can trust him. He sits on a table beside you, going through the embarrassing amount of red marks and revising what he could on your laptop. You would stubbornly protest and insist he could go home at this point, but you’re a little desperate to get some things off your plate.

The sounds of your pencil gliding across paper, the soft music, the clicking across the keyboard and shuffling of papers were all that filled the silence of the room. There are occasional questions about your papers from Minghao, and in turn you ask for his opinion on your progress. You’re mildly shocked he doesn’t make any passing comment on your mistakes. Perhaps, you villainized him a little too hard.

It’s 2:56 AM by the time you’re done. Your body feels like shit but you’re happy with how everything turned out. You’re finished, Minghao has done some revisions on your thesis, and you’re packing up and ready to go. 

Letting out a loud groan, you reach your arms over your head, feeling the strain on your lower back, arms, and fingers. Minghao does the same, albeit with more grace than you possess. He looks tired too, but he doesn’t show it. 

“Thank you, Hao,” you offer him a tired smile, “I’d probably have curled up and cried if you hadn’t come here.”

He gives you a nod and a soft smile, tucking your laptop away.

You tilt your head, suddenly remembering, “By the way, I should have probably asked earlier, but why did you come here? I mean, you could have talked to me right after class. Instead, you came here at such a late hour.”

It must be the fatigue or the lighting but you swear you saw the tips of his ears turn pink.

He doesn’t answer, just waves his hand and reaches for you to usher you through the door. You quickly realize, Minghao may not be capable of lying but he sure can avoid telling you the truth. 

“You should go home and rest,” he tells you and you faintly feel his palms running up and down your back, “You don’t have to go to the meeting, or attend class.”

“But I have to!” you interject, “The meeting with Professor Jeong has to do with the midterms, and we have to be there in his class. Also I have to submit my charcoal project then attend the exhibition seminar.”

Minghao sighs in exasperation but he also understands that he can’t convince you otherwise. 

“At least get three hours of sleep. How far is your place?”

You tell him your address and he frowns, holding your wrist before you could reach the main entrance, “That will take you almost an hour to go and back.”

“Uh, yeah,” and you realize that would mean you’ll only get an hour of sleep at most before you can freshen up and eat so you can pretend to be a sane person to get through the day. But it is preferable than the idea of sleeping here and carrying on the day in yesterday’s clothes and makeup does not appeal to you at all.

Minghao pauses for a while, regarding you with a thoughtful gaze that takes everything in you to not squirm. 

“How do you feel about going back to my place instead?” he suggests, “It’s much closer, you can get at least three hours of sleep in a proper place before we have to come back here. You can freshen up there and I don’t have a dryer but I know I have some clothes that might fit you–”

Your wide eyes make him stutter to a halt and even in the warm lighting of the building, it’s unmistakable that you see how he turns red at his suggestion. 

“If you don’t mind, of course,” he finishes, releasing his fingers that were curled on your wrist so you don’t feel like he was particularly pressuring you. 

You give it some thought, and you just know you’d be freaking out about everything that transpired tonight if it weren’t for how bone tired you were. 

“Okay, Hao.”

Minghao’s small apartment was neat and homey with all his personal pieces mounted on the walls or stacked by the doorway. He apologizes for the mess since he didn’t expect anyone to be over but you just scoff and wonder what his home looks like if he did clean. Your exhaustion barely takes it all the tiny details that make his home. So you both move swiftly, chucking your shoes off, putting away your things while Minghao asks you to wait for fifteen minutes so he could prepare his bed and get changed. You tell him that the couch, hell even the floor was fine. You’ll only be sleeping for a few hours anyway. But he leaves you no room to argue as he disappears down the hall to his room. 

You nearly doze off where you had waited for him but you wake to the gentle shake on your shoulder and his gentle whisper that you could move to his bed. He’s in a tank sweats, and he leaves his own blanket and pillow on the couch. You groggily follow after him to find freshly changed sheets, a worn shirt and basketball shorts folded at the edge with a towel and makeup wipes. 

That suddenly alarms you and before you wonder out loud if he had a girl. He regards you with an incredulous frown, “I use them.”

You blink and recall the times he did wear mild makeup and how you had particularly drooled over him when he showed up to class wearing a smoked out eyeliner.

Minghao gives you a brief rundown of where things were and if you ever needed anything you could just call him. You nod, feeling yourself get a little too lightheaded. He bids you goodnight, and leaves. 

You’re barely under the covers when you’re knocked out of exhaustion, eased by the scent of him that surrounds you.

The next morning, you’re both too tired to talk the fifteen walk to university so you take the morning bus.

Physically, you both are tired.

But there’s new energy thrumming between the both of you. You look up at Minghao from where you’re seated. The bus was full this morning, and he offered his seat to an elderly woman. The gesture alone solidified your recent realization that you did indeed, villainize Xu Minghao too harshly. 

Well that and the way he woke up earlier than you to make you breakfast and coffee then help you fit into his sweater and sweatpants. They don’t fit like they should but you’re tickled pink at the thought of wearing his clothes. He took one look at you, and returned with some jewelry pieces and accessories that he felt would pull the outfit together. It felt like you had your own personal stylist. You felt prettier than you did in your own clothes and you call the fluttering in your stomach an acid reflux from how much coffee you consumed…which grows ten times worse when Minghao gets ready and shows up in an outfit with the same color palette as yours.

The sun was just rising, filling the bus in its golden hue. Minghao was standing over you, hand on the rails above while he looked out the window behind you. The sunlight flashes over his eyes each time you pass through a building, the grown out platinum locks are flat and curled loosely around his face, and even with the evident exhaustion, he was so beautiful. Were his eyes always this brown?

Sensing your stare, he glances down and this time, you don’t squirm or look away. You’re content to just look at him, admire his features up close and finally notice the mole at the corner of his eye that was barely noticeable from the length of his hair. Unconsciously, your lips stretch into a fond smile. 

Minghao smiles back.

There’s an evident change in your gait, in the way you enter a room, and hold yourself. It startles you how at ease you were the entire morning even running on three hours of sleep. It might be your body running on sheer willpower alone but your heart tells you it had something to do with how much closer Minghao is now. 

Everything runs smoothly as you accompany the students in finalizing mid term projects that were centered around the theme of identity and their self portraits.

Up until you hear a loud clatter and a surprised gasp.

You flip your head over to one of the stations where you had seen a student prepping her canvas for varnishing. It was the same girl from a few weeks ago that had pushed you to confront Minghao’s tactless statement. Her hands are over her mouth as she gapes at the knocked over paint over her canvas. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it hadn’t fallen over half of the face on the canvas. She quickly reaches for a rag and starts rubbing which disturbs the paint underneath. You walk over noticing the frustration and anxiety in her eyes, knowing that she had to submit this within the hour. 

Minghao reaches her before you could and that makes her panic more. 

“Hey, don’t, this could work,” he tells her calmly before reaching for the same paint that had spilled over. 

“No, it’s ruined,” she croaks, hands shaking at her sides.

“I like to believe that mistakes are fixable,” he assures. You stare at him, and find yourself wondering when did he become ten times more attractive in the last twelve hours. 

You attend to the other students who call for your attention all the while sparing glances over to Minghao and the distressed girl. He shows her a sample of what he’s envisioning and she’s quick to nod and follow with newfound hope.

By the time there’s ten minutes left till they had to scurry to their next class, you approach the two and take a look at the final product. You’re impressed at Minghao’s creativity and how quickly the student had worked to make it look like it took days. The stain over the half of her face had been shaped and improvised to look like it had been a silhouette of a mask. 

“See, fixable,” Minghao points out while the student lays her brush down.

“Happy accidents?” you offer giving her a pat on the back. Your co-teaching assistant rolls his eyes before shaking his head with a smile.

The student gives you both a fulfilled grin, “Happy accidents.”

The interaction sticks with you and you find yourself suppressing a giddy smile as you stack up the individual student folders with their rubrics and grade. You had four more things on your checklist today, attend your drawing class, submit your project, head over to the exhibition seminar before going home to go over Minghao’s notes on your thesis.

Just as you turn around to bring the papers over to Professor Jeong’s office, Minghao takes them off your hands and blocks the doorway. Confused, you look up at him to find his figure looming over you. It feels like a stern warning coupled with his next words, 

“Listen, I know the next class is important and you’re too stubborn to ask Professor Jeong’s help with your schedules…but why don’t you skip the exhibition seminar and just head home to rest?” 

You shake your head softly, “I can’t, you know how important that seminar is for our final exhibit.”

“I’ll take notes and send them to you. And if that isn’t enough for your detailed oriented ass, I’ll record the whole thing,” he offers, firmly planted at the door until you agree with him. Your heart does a little backflip at that and honestly, you’d prefer Minghao taking notes for you than Vernon any day.

“Hao, you’re tired too. You stayed up with me, worked on my thesis, and took care of me at your own home.”

Now that you say it out loud, it hits you just how quickly everything escalated between the two of you and how you’re both not at each other’s throats.

Was Minghao truly mean this whole time? Or did you have a wrong perspective?

“But I wasn’t the one basically living in Professor Jeong’s studio for the past two weeks,” Minghao pressed and you ignored the fact that he noticed, “You need to sleep it off.”

“But-”

He sternly says your name, “You’re not going to be of any use running on three to four hours of sleep, take outs, and coffee.”

There it was, the straightforward, cutting nature of Minghao that would piss you off before he even speaks. But this time, it doesn’t and you listen to him.

He walks you to the bus stop after class, and gives you a small wave from where he stood as you pull away.

Xu Minghao hates you, you stood on that for the longest time.

And now, you’re not so sure if he ever did in the first place.

The weeks that follow are less stressful than the last but when graduation season closes in the calendar, the stress and the tight schedules amp right back up to newer heights. While you vowed that you would never fall back into that routine of staying late in the studio, you couldn’t help it when you’re between attending classes, seminars,assisting in them, and preparing your own corner of the exhibit all the while finishing your thesis.

You’re sick of staring at blank canvases, half finished ones, empty tubs of paint, and crumpled paper towels.

Your projects and graduation are all that occupy the forefront of your mind that you barely find time to reflect on the shift in your relationship with Minghao. He’s close enough for you to call him a friend but friends don’t do what he does for you. Friends don’t pack lunches for you on your busy days. Friends don’t call you on the weekends just so they could simply talk to you. Friends don’t offer to stay in the studio with you till the late hours. Friends don’t carry your bag or hold your hand with an excuse that it's gotten too cold. Friends don’t leave you their spare keys or pick you up when you stay out too late. Friends don’t tell you to keep their burrowed clothes when you crash into their place and attempt to return them.

And when Vernon had obliviously called Minghao your boyfriend in front of him—he doesn’t even deny it. 

Friends don’t do that.

You push that in the backburner, you had too much on your plate to think about that.

Xu Minghao doesn’t hate you like you thought he did.

You settle for that.

You’re back to where you were again a few months back, despondent, lackluster for your art whenever you had to create just for the sake of meeting a deadline and expectation. You’re at the homestretch but you told Minghao how much you’ve been feeling nauseous anytime you enter a studio. He had hummed sympathetically, suggesting that maybe you needed to learn a new medium so you could have an experience without any pressure of meeting an instructor’s expectation and consequence.

“Your clay is tilting,” Minghao says. "Your pressure’s unsteady.”

You carefully adjust your palms to even out the balance but one corner ends up being thinner than the other. You hear him click his tongue and there’s a momentary hot flush that fills you.

This was supposed to make you love art again.

But you hate it.

You hate that his critique has an effect on you. You hate that you listened to him once he suggested you try your hand at something you’ve rarely done. You hate that even in a practice without a rubric or expectation, you’re still harshly scrutinizing your creation. You hate that you’re feeding into your self loathing because you hate what’s becoming of your clay. You hate that you feel something in your chest ebb and flow in overwhelming waves. You hate that you’re losing your composure over your failing art.

Your frustration reflects, the clay starts twisting unevenly beneath your unsteady palms.

“Like this.”

Warmth covers your back and your arms are braced by Minghao as he cups your hands under his own. You feel his thigh nudge yours away from the pedal as he takes over. He’s gentle just like he always was when touching you. There wasn’t a lot of times to begin with, but enough for you to still feel the burn of his skin against yours. 

The pressure of his palms slowly right the tilt of your clay, and slowly, as you let him guide your movements, it starts to take shape. He stays there, sure and steady.

“There you go,” he murmurs, warm breath brushing against your ear. 

He’s quiet for a while, just letting you feel the right pressure and motions. The silence and his proximity should have made you jump, flustered, and tense. But you don’t. Instead you find yourself releasing a deep breath, unconsciously leaning into his frame while you let his motions ease you.

“It's not just about the result,” he mutters, “It’s also the process.”

You can’t find it in you to disagree with him. You don’t know when or where you got the instinct to constantly defy him. 

Minghao is right. 

Maybe you rushed further ahead with a vision of perfection that you thought you had to meet. And set standards for yourself that you didn’t realize might not withstand the test of time.

“See, not bad for a first timer,” he huffs out a quiet laugh, and it ghosts along your neck.

The wheel slows to stop and you feel like your breathing stops too. Minghao doesn’t let go of your hands, they settle on the wheel, his clay covered fingers curled loosely over your own. 

He was so close, close enough to feel his warmth, feel his heartbeat against your back, and the way  his grown out blonde locks tickle the skin of your jaw. You’ve never been this close before. He doesn’t move away and you don’t want him to. 

You feel him turn his face towards you and you tilt your head to look at him. Minghao was always intense, yet he’s gazing at you gently but with raw want. His forehead nearly touches yours and you can’t find the words to say, unwilling to break whatever fragile tension flows between the two of you.

You don’t know who moves first. But he’s dipped his head to press his lips against yours. It’s gentle, slow, but hesitant at first, almost as if testing the waters. Your eyes flutter close, savoring the tenderness he holds you in. He pulls away, just barely, his eyes half lidded, breathes mingling as if asking if that was okay.

You nudge your nose against his and he dips down once more to capture your lips in a heated kiss. You gasp, pressing even closer. He releases your hands to clasp your waist while you twist your body to throw your arms around his neck. His lips are soft against your own but a complete contradiction to the frantic way he’s pulling you even closer. You sigh against his mouth when he licks at the seam of your lips. He groans when your tongue brushes his and his hand reaches up to cradle your neck. You whimper at the cold sensation of the clay but you couldn’t care less, as your hands come down to caress his shoulders. 

He can’t seem to get enough. Each time you part, he dives right back in till you’re breathless and panting against each other’s mouths, hands grasping where they could.

You try turn your body to comfortably face him but you lose balance on your stool nearly pushing him off. His hands fly to the wheel to balance you both but his hand smacks your wet vase in the process. 

Startled, you pull away from each other and look over the wheel where the vase had been smashed in on one side. There’s a brief pause, you both blink owlishly before slowly turning towards each other. You both burst into a fit of giggles when you see the smears of drying clay on each other’s necks, jaw, and hair. Lightness fills your chest as you watch his grin reach his eyes, crinkling in mirth and cheeks red with what had transpired between you.

Friends don’t messily makeout—literally.

“Sorry,” he murmurs softly, rubbing his nose against yours.

“For what?” you whisper smiling into this tender affection.

“For your vase…your hair…and hm, your shirt,” he chuckles sheepishly. It gives you a whiplash to see him this way, especially when you’ve conditioned yourself to see him as some cold hearted bastard. 

Perhaps, you did have the wrong perspective.

“I’m not,” you smile, sweetly kissing the corner of his mouth, “I’m not sorry at all.”

The first time Xu Minghao saw you, he thought he had never met someone so determined and passionate about their art. He finds himself listening to your every word in Fundamentals of Art, while he didn’t agree with your ideals, it didn’t mean he couldn’t admire you. There was an intense passion in your eyes as you worked and you had always been careful and intentional to perform your best. 

But passionate people burn themselves quickly. 

Hence, he always felt the need to  push you in the right direction even if you had gotten off on an awkward foot.

 That one Thursday in Life Drawing, you had tapped his shoulder, shyly asking if he had any oil pastels to spare. 

“You’re using the same bag. Life Drawing is every Thursday, be prepared next time.”

That’s what he had told you. He meant well, meant to say you shouldn’t be so careless. But when he reaches for his bag to hand you his treasured set of oil pastels from his homeland, he’s confused to see you walking away.

He supposes that isn’t so bad because you befriend that lost cause of an artist, Vernon because of his poor choice of words. But something amazing happens as he watches the dynamic between you push Vernon into the right direction. Minghao sees how Vernon slowly adapts your interests and enthusiasm. Sure, he had an eccentric grasp completely different from what you expect of him but he’s making decent marks in class for someone who had wandered into the wrong major.

Minghao knows it's too late to switch his seat so he makes it a point to come early the next year to sit next to you. And once he’s within your space, he’s suddenly at a loss of what to say. So instead, he chose to introduce himself knowing full well after that it was stupid. You looked at him in offense, and he just stared. He knew you more than your name. He knew your art style, he knew you were not fond of contemporary artists, and he knew you didn’t cook often with how much you do take outs with Vernon. 

Still, he managed to offend you in three words.

But he learns more about you just by being your seatmate and observing. He learned that you like creating peonies when it comes to a session of free drawing. He reads your mood from the lilt of your voice when you speak. He learned that when you’re particularly relaxed and painting, you sometimes hum. He learned that you were a caring friend with how often you’d check in on Vernon’s progress and patiently answer his questions. He learned about your perfectionism and how it both maximizes and hinders your potential.

He also learned that you hated it when he spoke to you, especially when it came to your art. But he figured that he’d settle for your irritated glare and acerbic tone if it meant that you were being challenged.

Because Xu Minghao learned early on that you tend to obsess over the result of your art, perfecting it rather than counting the process as part of art itself. Besides, watching you slowly fall prey to your perfectionism and burnout was also watching you fall away from what art means to you—which was to monumentalize the beauty of living.

Not something that resonates with himself, but if it mattered to you, then he wouldn’t take that away from you.

Over the course of the two years he’s within your orbit, he’s content with the dynamic he’s established with you. It was fun for him most days and he doesn’t truly wonder why he’s adamant in being in your world. If his interest in you meant more than just friendly rivalry, he wasn’t afraid of whatever it would mean.

And the warmth overflowing in his chest as he watches you get ready in his bathroom is undeniably there to stay for the long run.

It’s been nearly three months since that fateful night you kissed. He still blushes at the thought of how desperate he was he hadn’t been careful with his clay covered hands. Now the smashed-in vase and your stained clothes had been immortalized as trinkets. You insisted on having the vase fired and glazed for your exhibit, and to keep your stained shirt as your go-to shirt when throwing clay since you developed a new found love for ceramics.

“Hi,” you grin, giving him a sweet kiss on the cheek when he welcomes you into his embrace. You had stayed the night after another late night to finish setting up your respective exhibits. You’ve done that more often the past month. While Minghao insists you could still wear his clothes, he’s not opposed to the idea of having to clear out the bottom of his dresser for your clothes and keeping a set of your toiletries in the bathroom.

You asked him once if he felt you were both going too fast or if he’d one day regret you. You’ve hated him longer than you realized you didn’t. On the other hand, Minghao was never afraid of whatever would become of his feelings towards you. 

“I feel like I know you in a way that my soul had found home in you before you even knew it was yours.”

You had turned bright red, punched his arm and called him cheesy because he hadn’t even told you he loved you yet he easily spoke poetry of how he felt. He chuckles and kisses your forehead, 

“But isn’t that better than I love you?”

Minghao holds you in a loose embrace, tucking a hair behind your ear with a tender smile, “Are you ready for today?”

You hum, resting your chin on his collarbone, “Are you?”

He nods, leaning down to kiss you softly, “You did so well, baobei. Your grandfather would be so proud of you.”

“Ah,” you quietly squeal and slap his chest, “Stop, you’ll make me cry.”

Minghao giggles, pressing an apologetic kiss to your cheek, “Alright, alright.”

“I’m excited to see yours,” you tell him, winding your arms tighter around his lithe waist, “I can’t believe you banned me from looking. I don’t even know how you managed to hide it from me.”

“It’s not that hard when your girlfriend is too busy with her own exhibit.”

“Fair.” 

And he tries not to tease the way you’re visibly glowing when he refers to you as his girlfriend.

With fifteen minutes to spare before the gallery would be open to the public, you immediately find Vernon after the exhibition briefing

“Vernon!” 

“Hey, guys,” he shoots you both a boyish grin, “It’s finally here, huh? We’re nearly done!”

“I mean, Hao and I still have our thesis to worry about but this is something huge to check off the list,” you chuckle. 

Vernon nods, looking between the two of you with a pleased grin, “I called it first.”

Minghao raises a brow, “Huh?”

You huff, feeling heat creep up your neck as you shove your friend, “Shut up, you were right okay.”

Vernon raises his hand in surrender before you shift the topic, “I’m really sorry I couldn’t help you out for your exhibit.”

He waves his hand, “Hey, I told you I got it, okay? I had to eventually be independent from my art parents and make you proud.”

You scrunch your nose at the term and Vernon teases Minghao that he should stop rubbing off on you which earns him a laugh. 

“Besides, I did get really great advice from a friend,” Vernon continues, “I think you’ll be proud.”

Raising a brow, you spare a quick glance towards your boyfriend, “By friend, do you mean Jeonghan?”

“Yup!”

“Is that why we found you both crouched at the parking lot, picking through the gravel a few weeks ago?”

“Yeah,” Vernon doesn’t even seem fazed at how odd and concerning they had seemed. “C’mon, I’ll show you!”

The times you’ve seen your friend this enthusiastic were few and far between so you both follow him to his corner of the gallery. He tells you both to close your eyes once you’re close and he leads you both by your hands. You’re curious to see what he’s come up with. You feel like it has nothing to do with painting because he gets a little too bored with it. Your guess was it had to be some sculpture or something of the like. 

“Okay, in three…two…one!”

You open your eyes to find a glass case of four rows of…rocks. They were off all different sizes, some had a natural grain and crack to them that looked like faces while some had googly eyes. But what really made them stand out was the fact that each of the rocks had their own clothes and accessories from little straw hats, poorly sewn suits, dresses, and track suits.

“Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you…The Ore of Everyday.”

You're in between bursting both in tears and in laughter because this was truly very Vernon of him. It was endearing how his imagination and interpretation exceeds yours. The look on his face tells you he's happy and content. And all the opinions and happiness that mattered to him was his own. That was special. That was Vernon as an artist. If he was to be the next Anish Kapoor as everyone says he would be, you just know he'd be even better.

“Oh Vernon,” you sigh with a proud smile. “This looks amazing. I love the tiny little hats.”

“Right?” he lifts his fingers to your faces to show the scratches and miniscule pokes littered along them, “I think that was the most stressful part but it was worth it.”

“I like how you utilized the natural cracks in them, they really do look like faces,” Minghao commends, carefully examining each one.

“Thanks!” Vernon grins, “Compared to all our other projects, I really enjoyed doing this one.”

You smile softly, a sense of fulfillment and contentment washing over you seeing how far Vernon had come just by being himself.

“Can I see yours now?” you ask Minghao while you leisurely make your way through the gallery with linked hands.

He hums, pretending to think and you pout, already antsy and excited to see what he was so adamant on keeping from you. He laughs before squeezing your hand, “Of course, you can.”

Minghao leads you to his own corner of the exhibition with an unhurried pace. 

“I want you to look at each piece alright, baobei? Don’t take it all in at once.” he tells you just before you round the corner.

You nod, smiling and bouncing on your heels. With a quick glance at your surroundings, he dips his head to kiss your forehead. 

“Okay, let's go.”

He takes you to the first piece, a minimalist and simple approach to what you could recognize as a spiral staircase of your university.  The second piece was a little trippy. The canvas had been painted like a crumpled piece of paper stuck on the wall. Three-dimensional art was something you had been thoroughly intrigued with but  not something you were fond of creating. You praise your boyfriend for his understanding of  texture and the precision of his light and shadow placements. He just smiles, quietly taking in how your eyes become doe like as you look through the rest of his work. 

The next piece you see had been a painting of a woman, back turned towards you as she works on her art. You realize it had been a painting of you, and as you take in the details–the crumpled pieces of paper at the corner, an inconspicuous paper bag and an open case of charcoal at your side. You tilt your head towards him to find that he’s just content with watching you admire his work. You reach for his hand and he takes it. Giving him a grateful squeeze, you lean into his shoulder as you proceed to the next. 

This time, it's clearly a portrait of you in oil pastel and you recognize it was on the morning bus after the first time you had spent the night. The perspective was from a bird’s eye view so you’re looking up and you wonder if this is how Minghao looked at you back then. Draped in pretty warm hues and eyes bright and colorful from how the sun had hit your face. 

You giggle at the next one: a disfigured clay pot with two hand prints you recognize as yours. You may have the original smashed vase over at your exhibit but Minghao wanted to have his own too. You just didn’t think he would have it displayed in the exhibit. You want to know why he’d think this would fit the theme but you suppose that's the beauty of art, you get to decide what it meant even if it wouldn’t make sense.

The last one is the bigger piece and you bring a hand up to your mouth.

It was an oil painting of peonies spilling over the picket fence and a loosely painted child crouched next to her grandmother as they picked them—exactly how you had described your fond childhood memory to him…once. And you weren’t even dating at that time. 

“Hao…” you turn to him, at a loss for words.

“That’s how you fell in love with art, right?” he tells you softly, “You saw it in the everyday.”

You glance back at the canvas, hit with a heavy wave of nostalgia and clarity of why you loved doing what you do. You liked capturing and immortalizing moments like these with your own hands like your grandfather had. You loved looking at the world in detail, making the most mundane things romantic in your eyes, expressing them through art. 

You feel a pair of arms wrap around you, “And this is me falling in love with you.”

Minghao tenderly cups your jaw, tilting your face towards him. It’s just you and him and it reflects in the warmth of his eyes. You meet the soft plush of his lips in a loving kiss, and you stay there, at home in his embrace.

You had been sure that Xu Minghao hates you. That felt like a long time ago, before both of your perspectives shift.

Now, you’re even more sure that he loves you.

And you love him too.

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Seokmin was a particular man.

Sweet-natured, kind, and warm -- in all the ways a lover should be. Consistent, patient, and dedicated.

He was choosy about the small things in life -- his favourite brand of orange juice (it couldn't be too tangy nor too sweet), his detest of peanuts in food (according to him, they didn't belong anywhere except in airline snack packets), and a hundred other things about him that you'd grown to learn by heart.

Living together and learning how to co-share a space was another curveball in your relationship, and the biggest reason that you both knew each other inside out. Which made it that much harder to kick those habits when you broke up, four years after he asked for your number during a disastrous party hosted by a colleague.

The worst part, you mused, as you lay on your friend's couch with an unreasonably big tub of popcorn while watching a show you couldn't remember the title of, two weeks after the break-up, was that there was no angry ranting to be done, no frustration to be expressed, no one to blame. The truth was, no one was truly in the wrong. There was no screaming and crying, no major disagreement that tipped the relationship off balance. Rather, it had been a once passionate river calming itself, soothing its waves, and then finally reducing to silence. What used to be exciting conversation faded into one-liners. Maybe some things just weren't meant to work out.

You considered being angry at him. After all, anger felt better than regret, and regret was a particularly sour lemon on your tongue. But try as you might, the anger wouldn't come. And for that, you felt even worse.

But life went on, didn't it? The earth continued spinning, and no matter what happened, there would come a day when you finally got up, dusted yourself off, and moved forward.

You like to think that you have moved forward, but no one said you couldn't look back once in a while.

Seokmin, according to mutual friends, had gone through a slump similar to yours. Of course, he was back at work, living as per normal, but there would always be nosey friends who nicknamed the two of you as "parents", and others who proclaimed that they'd never believe in love again if the two of you broke up...

Why? Their number one reason would always be: "Well, you two just always knew each other. Down to the core."

And you did. It wasn't just you who had managed to learn everything about your other half. Seokmin knew you just as well, remembering every little thing about you: the way you liked your noodles, and how you somehow always forgot your scarf and often had to buy new ones.

That was maybe the biggest thing you both had one thing in common: Knowing that to be loved was to be remembered. In the words of internet slang, remembering each other was your top love language.

Even now, more often than not, you found yourself picking that specific brand of orange juice at the supermarket, striding past the shelf selling assorted nut snacks without a second look, and doing a hundred other things you had come to learn and love about Lee Seokmin. That subconsciousness irritated you to no end.

And God, you missed him. More than you cared to admit. This was so much more heartbreaking than anything you ever went through. How were you, you sighed while putting away your load of shopping (sufficient for 1), to simply pretend you didn't know him, act as if he wasn't your whole world? How could you move on as easily as breathing, when the man who had seen you, loved you, known you the best, occupied every moment of your days? How could you admit to him, and yourself, that the boring conversations were all you wanted now?

It was almost too predictable that you crossed paths again, barely half a year later. At a New Years' party hosted by God knows who, he spotted you the same moment you made eye contact with him.

"Hi."

"Hello."

Awkward was never a word you'd use to describe your interaction with Seokmin in the near five years you'd known him, but it certainly felt that way now.

As he grabbed a bottle off the table, unscrewed the lid and filled his glass, you tried to do the same, to look as unaffected as he did, but both of you knew it wasn't working. For starters, he never drank vodka.

Seokmin would only admit this to you some time later, but he was feeling just as conflicted. And as you both walked back to your respective dates, him to a smiley girl whose name he forgot by next morning, and you to a man who kept thinking you liked spicy beef noodles (you didn't), he couldn't help but wonder if you both had gotten it all wrong.

Somehow, try as he might, he couldn't remember a place where he'd been happier than in the home you once shared.

The truce only lasted another three months.

Three months of Vernon telling Seokmin to wake up and think clearly, and of your friend griping that you were almost never back at your place apart from work.

The truth is, he couldn't escape the personal hell he'd created for himself, watching everyone except for him move on, he admitted to you one night in the pouring rain when both of you just couldn't hail a taxi home from a typical friend hangout.

"I thought we were permanently done," He told you, his teeth chattering as you finally waved down a car and told him to dry up at your house with the promise to "talk later".

And when he walked into your once-shared home, with all the little trinkets and corners full of shared memories you'd built together still on display, the dam finally broke and flooded over.

"You still kept everything." He said, almost in disbelief as he gazed at the ceramic plates you had painted together.

"I couldn't just throw everything out, it would be like throwing you out." You simply replied, reaching for a warm towel for him to dry his hair, and passing him a shirt he had never collected from you. It was your favourite clothing piece of his. He would never take that from you.

And when you helped to wipe the small of his back for him, the one spot he always found hard to reach, Seokmin shut his eyes and decided then that enough was enough. End of truce. He couldn't even remember why you split up now. All he knew was you.

He thought about what you said, finally resorting to thanking his stars that he couldn't throw you out of his life either, all as he strode forward to catch your arm, drag you into his lap and kiss you breathless before you left the room.

And thank goodness, he breathed in relief as your hand cupped his cheek, the familiar warmth springing fresh tears to his eyes, that even when you did try your best to throw him out, you left the door slightly ajar for him to come back.

Things were different from before. The seemingly mundane routine of daily chores and everyday small talk became a blessing. You would never forget when you wished for this a thousand times more than his absence. Life was back to normal, to just-right orange juice and chewy noodles.

It, too, felt like a thousand years ago as you finally looked back at every decision you made, even in Seokmin's absence. At all the times you found him in the fruit juice aisle, in the snacks section, in the thousands of small choices you made without thinking. Somehow, his favourite things had become yours too, because he was now your love language.

And you smiled, thinking of all the cold days when he must have walked past the knitwear section in a store, wondering if you had your scarf . All the other hundred little things he remembered about you, just like you did for him, because...

To be infinitely loved was to be remembered. To be loved was when your better half remembered to keep the door open, just enough so that both of you could always come home...

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author's note: just had to drop something that's been sitting in my drafts for a while :) wanted to also do this for valentines' day but alas it is now mid march hehehe