Muse

N-Count

A muse is a person, usually a woman, who gives someone, usually a man, a desire to create art, poetry, or music, and gives them ideas for it.

I sighed for the nth time of this day and crumbling the poor paper into a ball and tossed it to the bin—joining another paper ball that was facing the same fate as the new one. I grumbled in frustration because I was failed to write a new song and decided to call off the day. I put my beloved guitar to the corner of my room and stretched my back.

“Chanyeol! Someone’s looking for you!”

I heard my mother shouted from the kitchen and I furrowed my eyebrow. I thought I didn’t have any appointment with Baekhyun, Yixing hyung nor Wufan hyung to talk about our performance on our school winter festival today. So, who?

“Coming, mom!”  I said lazily and got out from my room and climbed down the stairs just to found out a girl. I couldn’t help but smile when I recognized the short-haired girl who was smiling at me—showing me her beautiful teeth.

“Oppa!” she pouted, “what takes you so long just to come down from your room?”

I couldn’t help but chuckled and playfully ruffled her hair and made her whined in protest, “Sorry, Namjoo. Oppa was quite busy.”

“But you promised me!” she pouted again. I wrinkled my forehead. Promise? Did I promise her to take a stroll on the beach again? Damn, but its winter now, so there’s no way I promised her something stupid like that.

“Promise? What promise?” I asked confusedly. Namjoo sighed in defeat.

“You said to me that we’ll go to art gallery today, oppa.” She explained, “You know, because you said to me you kind of lose your inspiration. That’s why we’ll go to art gallery. Searching for inspiration for your new song…”

“Oh?”

“You really forgot about it, huh?” she groaned and I couldn’t help but chuckled because of my childhood friend’s behavior.

“Sorry,” I said apologetically and she nodded her head, “wait for a minute, I’ll grab my camera in my room.”

“Okay,”

Click.

I smiled when I clicked the gallery button and view the result of today’s photograph. Mostly I just took pictures of these painting that were displayed in here. I pouted to myself because I still couldn’t find my inspiration. My muse.

I moved to another section and breathed a fresh air after able to passed the crowd. God, I needed some space. Then, something caught my attention and made my feet stop moving. I blinked before turning my head to the side.

She was holding the painting with her eyes twinkled in admiration. Without wasting any time, I grabbed my camera and took a shot.

Click

She looked up from that mother and daughter painting and a beautiful smile formed—decorating those seemingly perfect face.

Click. Click.

She placed the painting down and ran those slender fingers to feel another painting without taking off that breathtaking smile.

Click.

Damn, who’s this person? Everything she’s doing was just beautiful—something I haven’t seen for a while. Whoever she was, I had to know her name, her address, everything. Because finally I guess I found my muse, my inspiration…

She pulled her hand back just to put her short hair to back of her ear before her pink lips made a perfect ‘O’ shape to the painting in front of her. Then she to my direction. I blinked stupidly before instantaneously clicked my camera again.

Click. Click. Click.

I pressed my gallery button once again to see the result of my picture of my beautiful muse. My eyes widened and I almost dropped my beloved camera when I recognize the faces of my new muse.

That face… that smile…

I looked at her direction and I saw her walked in fascination to see another painting which was displayed in this art gallery. My mind froze and I could feel my cheeks blush—maybe out of embarrassment… or perhaps something else?

She kept going and going, slowly disappearing from my sight. I swear no matter how cheesy it sounded, I felt like there’s butterflies in my stomach.

“Namjoo…”  I breathed, finally admitting that she was the one who caught my attention. My best friend. My childhood best friend.

And I ran away.

I was confused, like, really really confused. Since that day on the art gallery—approximately two weeks ago—I really couldn’t face Namjoo like I used to be. Was I really that blind? Or even stupid? Why I didn’t realize it from the beginning? Namjoo was pretty—no. she’s beautiful, gorgeous, attractive, adorable, wonderful, lovely, she’s just… perfect. And I admit that I was a stupid hedgehog—that’s her nickname from her for me because she said my hair looked like a hedgehog—for not realizing my feelings for her even though we’ve been known each other since I was seven and she’s five.

I know that I’m a coward. And here I am now, sitting on the corner of the library, watching my beautiful muse wrote down her essay on her book. Sometimes she would put her fringe behind her right ear because it blocks her view to read the thick book, her delicate finger flip the pages of the book, and her beautiful smile sometimes shows up when she finally could find what she was searching for—

“Yeol!”

Unwillingly, I turned my head from that beautiful view and furrowed my forehead when I saw my best friend.

“What’s wrong, Baekhyun?” I asked. He grabbed a seat beside me and looked at me.

“How’s the song progress?”

The song? Should I tell him the truth that I haven’t written down anything because my head was full of the short-haired girl over there? Nah, he’ll kill me for sure.

“I almost done,” I faked a smile, “give me a week and I’ll give it to you so we can practice with Yixing hyung. How’s that sound?”

He gave me his eye-smile before patted my shoulder, “Awesome! I’ll tell Yixing hyung about it.” He said, “Anyway, what are you doing in here, Yeol?”

“M-me?” I asked back dumbly, “I-I’m doing my assignment.” I lied while nodded my head.

Baekhyun looked like didn’t believe me as he furrowed his eyebrow, “what assignment? And how can you doing your assignment when you’re not even bring any book with you?”

Damn, why he had to be so observant?

Thank lord, I saw with the corner of my eyes that Namjoo was done with her essay and was returning the book to the racks. I gave Baekhyun my creepy grin.

“Sorry, Baek, gotta go,” I said while grabbing my bag “talk to you later,” and with that, I walked out from the library without giving time for the small-eyed guy to give me any reply. I used my long limbs to run after her and finally I was able to found her on the crowd.

“Namjoo!” I shouted and made her turned around. I smiled and fasten my pace. She looked confuse with my sudden call. I grabbed her hand and said, “Follow me,” before pulled her out from our school. She whined in protest but I couldn’t care less. This was already bothering my mind for weeks and I had to make sure about this before I regret it later.

“Oppa, let me go!” she yanked her hand forcefully and made my grip slipped from her wrist. I bit my lower lip and sighed. I looked around and chuckled when realized where we were now, our childhood playground.

“What do you want?” she asked and I couldn’t help but notice sarcasm on her tone.. Her voice snapped my mind and made me confuse. Was she mad at me?

I decided to slip it out, “Namjoo-yah…” I called softly while cupped her beautiful face with both of my hand—made our gaze met. Making me could devour her beautiful feature. No matter how cheesy it sounded, but I swear there’re butterflies on my stomach.

“Did you knocked your head or something?” she suddenly asked and I furrowed my head in confusion, she seemed notice my confusion and continued, “Finally, you’re talking to me again. After two weeks avoiding me since we went to the art gallery.” She grabbed both of my hand and yanked it forcefully.

“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that—”

“Yes you did!” she suddenly shouted and made me jumped in surprise. Damn, she really mad at me. She took a deep breath and said, “You babo! Don’t you know how worried I was when I couldn’t find you anywhere in that gallery? You didn’t answer your phone when I called you! And when I called your home, your mother said that’s you’re already home. And the next day you suddenly were avoiding me for nothing! If I know the reason why I’m fine with it but I’m sure I’ve done nothing wrong to you—”

“I’m confused, okay!” I cut her and I could see she was about to said something but she hold it back with closing again. Both of us were drowned in pit of silence with our mind swam in our head.

Maybe this is the time for confirm my curiousness that bulging me for weeks?

“Namjoo-yah,” I called again and made her looked at me again. I bit my lower lip nervously before saying, “can I try something?”

She titled her head in confusion—how cute, no Chanyeol, now wasn’t the time to think about it—but I just gave him my smile before pulled her closer to me and grabbed her chin softly before pressed my lips against hers.

The feeling when our lips met was just amazing. Butterflies in my stomach felt like burst out. The way our lips molded together was just too beautiful. Everything about her was beautiful. Her thin lips, her sweet taste of strawberry, even her scent. She’s just perfect. Her taste was like the sweetest candy ever. I was drowned and I just couldn’t get enough of her—

—SLAP!

I stumbled backwards and I felt like my world was colliding. No, not from the stinging feeling in my cheek, I’m fine with it.

Where’s that smile? Where did it go? What’s wrong with my muse’s smile?

“You…idiot!” she cried out. I lured my hand to wipe away those sinful tears that stained my beautiful muse face but she snapped my hand away and made me heard sounds of something crashing down. Where that voice’s came from? Was it from my heart?

“Stop playing around with my heart,” was all that she said before turned her heels and ran away from me.

Go get her!

Tell her your true feelings for her!

Those voices kept playing on my mind but I didn’t know why my feet felt so heavy. I couldn’t lift them, I couldn’t chase Namjoo. I couldn’t explain to her that I wasn’t playing around, that I was telling her the truth through that kiss. That I was in love with my childhood friend.

Her hurt expression was all I could recapped on my mind and I went home with heavy heart followed my steps.

.

.To Be Continued.

.

So I finally decided to separate it into two parts because I't too long for my own liking..

I'll update the second part between this week.