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Meeting

The lamp's crooked neck stooped over the hunched figure. The room was dim without any windows and a dead light bulb that had yet to be changed. 

The figure sat in his seat staring blankly at the monitor screen. Scraps of scrunched and torn paper flourished the desk and ground around him like white leaves. His weary eyes bored holes into the screen, he had not completed any compositions and each one in the past two weeks had ended in the recycling bin. He lacked inspiration and no matter how much he racked his mind or how long he stayed in his studio, he could not get any work done.

Yoongi let out an exasperated sigh. He irritably scuffed his fingers through his fringe, cussing under his breath. He took one more look at the arrangement before switching the program off in frustration. Leaning over his desk, he massaged his temples in attempt to relieve the pounding in his head probably due to exhaustion and over-work.

Slowly lifting his eyes, Yoongi glanced at the time in the corner of his computer screen. Despite the room being dark and heavy, it was actually the middle of the afternoon on a cool winter day. He grumbled, bickering to himself before deciding that after two days of being cooped up in his studio, he should go take a step outside.

Quite reluctantly, Yoongi rose from his seat, body and limbs creaking as he walked over to pick up his coat and scarf from the rack. He swung on the large coat over his sweater and loosely snugged the grey scarf around his neck, muffling the breaths on his lips. A mild complaint left his mouth before he opened the door to go wander aimlessly in the streets in search of inspiration.

The chilly air bit at his fingers as Yoongi began to regret not ever wearing gloves. Gloves were a nuisance anyway. Slightly tucking the scarf under his chin, he cooed hot breaths on his fingers. 

After having wandered the neighbourhood without a single thing striking him, Yoongi had taken a bus towards the city but hopped off at a random stop after losing track of time. He now found himself strolling through unfamiliar streets. Assuming from the peacefulness and lack of skyscrapers, he was somewhere on the very edge of the city.

Looking to his left, there were several coffee stores and small businesses. The people inside looked warm and cosy, sheltered from the cold. Though in fairness, the soft rays of the sun still shone through cracks and warmed the tips of one's nose outside. 

Yoongi noted a thin passage to a jazz cafe between a hairdresser and barber shop, possibly a place Namjoon or the vocalists might fancy visiting. The streets were calm but quite uneventful since Bangtan had already made their own take on Urban Zapaka's 'Cafe Latte.' Reusing the 'coffee' and 'cafe' theme was out of the question.

After a few more minutes mindlessly walking, Yoongi found himself in front of a large art gallery a bit closer to the heart of the city. The big hunk of a building stood before him in all its grace and intimidation, it was a rather old piece of architecture held up by several ionic columns. Though he was not particularly interested in the visual arts, with nowhere else to go Yoongi convinced himself that looking at some paintings and sculptures could give him the prompt he was so desperately in need of.

Yoongi loosened the scarf around his neck as he filled his lungs with the clean air of the gallery. The ladies behind the desk lifted their brows at his mint tuffs of hair as he made his way to the first room. Yoongi roamed around regarding no piece for longer than three or five seconds.

‘I was right. Visual art doesn’t interest me,’ Yoongi admitted to himself as he walked into another white walled room. Though there were different subjects in each area, he still questioned why so and so was acknowledge as art or how a landscape could at all be interesting and gauged at for so long. He judged each person who stared in trance at a painting on the wall that seemed to have no meaning other than that it was a tree or a bowl of fruit or a lady or simply what it was—paint on a canvas.

Until his eyes landed on her.

He spotted her in the Renaissance room of the art gallery, gazing silently at a painting. Her straight hair was lazily thrown over her shoulders in a low ponytail, flowing smoothly down her back. As time went on, her brows furrowed and she found herself leaning closer and closer to the canvas, as he did to her.

The girl did not say a word or have wires stuck to her ears. Only a small bag hung on one shoulder and held a booklet and pencil in her hands. She was so quiet yet her thoughts were so loud in the room, so evident in the way she gazed, reluctant to look down at her page b with words and swift sketches. Something in the way she walked, slowly from heel to toe before coyly pausing for another ten minutes at a piece worthy of her attention, captured his breath and refused to return it. Oh how much did he now crave her attention?

He followed her from Durer to Rubens, from Cezanne to Dali, Duchamp and Freud. He was just as enticed by her as she was to the art; both drawn in slowly, hesitantly, then all at once to the point it became difficult to tear their attention and walk away. Her eyes were fixed on the paintings as his were to her. Gazes never left their subject and only yearned more.

His quiet footsteps fell like soft rain on an umbrella, waiting for the sun to hopefully turn around and look his way. When it did, the clouds in his sight faded and waves tumbled in his stomach. Why become so nervous just by a look? Then she smiled and he felt his chest give in, finally letting out a breath.

Realising he had been caught red handed, Yoongi suddenly noticed how long he had been following her and shamefully dropped his gaze.

‘Oh , did she notice?’

He thought frantically for an excuse. He bit down on his lip then hesitantly looked up at the girl once more. Fortunately—or unfortunately—she had already returned to viewing the art, attention wavering only for that split second glance.

Yoongi let out a sigh, was it out of relief or disappointment though? She was so beautiful, so indulged in her own world, and something about that just made him want to know more but he had never been the kind to initiate a conversation. Then again he had never been the kind to follow someone for half an hour, or follow someone at all—full stop.

Timidly Yoongi picked up his courage from the glassy gallery floors and approached her. He stopped by the painting next to the girl. The work was a dark distorted portrait that looked bruised and honestly frankly extremely grotesque. He pretended to analyse it for a moment before looking over his shoulder to the girl. She was staring at a similar painting but obviously in more depth and admiration. Lightly, he coughed in his fist and she accordingly glanced. On the instant of eye contact, his mind blanked.

“This weather is giving everyone colds,” she said softly with a smile in his moment of hesitation. Her voice rang on a sweet note in Yoongi’s ears, melting off any chill left in him. He felt his insides flutter and dance at how her gorgeous dark brown eyes winked as she smiled.

“Yeah,” he breathed in astonishment. In attempt not to let the conversation dither, he hastily gestured at the paintings before him. “What do you think about this?” he blurted abruptly and a bit too loudly for the few others in the room.

The girl giggled as he was hushed by two other gallery-goers before taking a step back to analyse the painting as a whole. She hummed in thought for a moment and habitually began tapping her pencil on the side of her leg. She looked at the other paintings beside it since the three seemed to be a short series of work by the artist.

“I like the fluidity and morphing of the faces and how they seem to merge and distort into each other—“she gestures at the three paintings, drawing waves of motion through the air, “—it’s like a collision of raw emotion. It is true, pure, undiluted emotion.” She smiled at the works, her hand dropping back to her side as she sighed in admiration, “Bacon’s work is so beautifully disturbing.”

Yoongi blinked, ‘wow’ accidentally slipping his lips causing the girl to flash him another breath-taking smile. He turned away, shyly chuckling in embarrassment whilst scowling at his slipup.

“I’m Kim Junghwa by the way,” she said smiling courtly.

“Min Yoongi,” he stammered in response.