C r a y o n s

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As long as he could remember Youngjae always liked to draw. Colours simply fascinated and opened a whole new word in his child-like mind. He started with memorizing them all or as much as he could, his tiny hands reaching out for his coloured pencils, pens, markers – you name it -  to fill that blank piece of paper with a piece of his world.

The lines were shaky, messy, and most of the time it made absolutely no sense. You couldn't tell where it began or where it ended, but in his mind every bit of it clicked into the right places. Soon it wasn't enough.

A piece of paper didn't convey it all, parts of his world left unattended. It didn't feel right.

One day, after school, he tore off all the the pages from his sketch book, scattering them around on his bed. He tried to organize them, glue them all together in one seamless picture, but as much as he tried it was in vain. Hot tears ran down his cheeks out of frustration as he yanked the cover of his bed making all his drawings disappear out of his sight.

That day he used walls of his room as his canvas.

He ignored disproving glances from his parents, lectures about his behaviour issues fell deaf on ears, because, in his mind, they were the ones in the wrong.

No one was surprised when he enrolled into a private school centred around the subject of arts. It was sort of expected. However, no one expected such a lively and energetic boy to become so introverted and shut off from the world. It felt eerie how much he had changed through the years and grew up before their very eyes.

He didn't need anyone. All of them were just another colourless and forgettable face lost in the sea of unimportance. He didn't have any time to spare for them.

Youngjae spend hours upon hours after school just sitting in the art classroom mesmerized by all the paintings hung on the walls, basking in the ethereal beauty of it all. The smell of fresh paint lingering on the canvas made his heart flutter in excitement and his skin tingle in a pleasurable way; he felt in love.

His stomach swelled with pride as his fellow classmates showered his out of this world skills with praise. A tiny smile escaped past his lips as his eyes fell on his latest masterpiece: a park full of blooming cherry blossom trees. So bright, so rich in vivid colours it took your breath away. So great in detail only an expert can achieve. You could spend hours of your time counting all the petals painted on the trees: each of them different in shape and form. That's how detailed it was.

“It lacks emotion.”, his art teacher commented one day. “It doesn't have any soul. It radiates nothing and it's lifeless like a corpse.”

Those softly spoken words were laced with worry, gentle arms snaking around his body in a comforting hug, shielding him from the words his mind refused to piece together and accept.

“I'm sorry”, he mumbled under his breath, because, in his mind, they were the ones in the wrong.

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You can find glimpses from 'Vivid Dreams' in this chapter. Some things are foreshadowed in both. Thanks for reading and suscribing. :)