#simdoodles

It wasn’t as that he didn’t have the skill to accurately portray his own face on canvas - quite the opposite, in fact. The portraits he’d given his mother on her birthday had been perfect; each one of his siblings and his parents portrayed on the canvas as if he’d taken a picture and printed it. He’d played with colors for each, touched them up with gold leaf sheets - they were some of his best works to date.

So why is he having so much trouble painting himself?

He’s considering the mistakes in the his latest piece, laying in pieces at his feet, when a knock distracts him from his thoughts.

Before he can answer, the door slides open with a quiet whoosh, and his father steps into the room - and then pauses, taking in the mess that greets him. He blinks, and Giral has half a moment of blankness before panic seizes him and he rises, dropping his ruined art to the ground as he moves to shoo his father out of the room.

“Father? What--?”

“Is everything alright? Your mother sent me up here to get you for dinner. What’s--?”

“It’s just Mom’s birthday present,” he says hastily, hands on his father’s arm, trying to shoo him back into the hallway. “Let’s talk somewhere else--”

“Do you need any help?”

Giral blinks.

“...what?”

Torin gestures towards the mess of art thrown haphazardly about the room. “Is there something I can do to help?”

“Help…?”

“What are you trying to do?”

Dumbfounded by his father’s sudden interest in what he’s doing, he just looks down at the wreck of his room and says, “I’m… Mom asked for a painting of myself, but I can’t get it right. Something’s always wrong.”

Torin nods thoughtfully, brushing past his son and walking over the the painting he had just thrown to the floor. He sits on the bed as he picks it up, considering it with a serious, determined expression on his face. Giral can’t do anything but watch, confused, from the doorway.

“What do you see when you look in the mirror?” his father asks after a minute, eyes still on the painting.

Giral’s mind races with answers, echoes of insults he’s called himself since he was young - stupid, inadequate, useless, disappointment - but rather than voice any of those, he just shrugs, joining his father on the edge of the bed.

“I see your mother,” Torin says when Giral doesn’t answer. “I see her in everything you do. You are so alike. Headstrong, determined, smart - I know you want her to be proud.”

Torin runs his fingers over the ruined painting, tracing Giral’s face. 

“She’s so proud of you…”

And so am I.

He doesn’t say it, but he doesn’t need to - Giral knows his father well enough to know that. Giral’s eyes burn, a knot forming in his throat as Torin sighs and pats him on the shoulder, rising to his feet once more. He returns to the door, pausing to look back at his son as he says, “Come to dinner. Your mother would like to see you.”

As would I.

Giral nods, feeling a bit numb around the fingers as he rises and follows after his father. Just as he reaches the door, he pauses, looking back on his messy room, his father’s unspoken love pumping through his veins like hot iron - and he smiles.