I never liked arts. I was more on music because beats made me alive. Unlike art, just a compilation of , colors and lines. Nothing more, nothing else. 

 

 Why do I hate art so much? It’s not that I got a failing grade at my art appreciation subject, but it just bores me. There’s no motion in paintings, no beats in lines and no life at still pictures. 

 

 "Why do I have to be with you here?" I asked my bestfriend, Lu. 

 

 "Because you owe me one dude. And we have to cure your disease with arts. I’m starting to worry about you." He just said and paid for our tickets. 

 

 I looked at the gallery not too far from my place. There are people who looks at paintings for too long, like they are waiting for it to talk to them. Some people just stare too short and laugh with their friends, which are loud with their chats not even paying any respect with their surroundings. 

 

 I don’t want to go. I don’t want to. 

 

 "Let’s go?" Lu handed me a ticket. 

 

 No. My eyes pleaded him. 

 

 "You have to. I paid for that." He shove it to my chest. 

 

 Luhan started to walk into the gallery. I sighed and followed him, clutching the ticket and the brochure that the smiling attendant  gave to me when I entered. 

 

 "I’ll leave you here, let’s meet after an hour. Don’t go outside or I’ll page you and arrest you to any guard here." Lu threatened me and I just nod to his remarks. 

 

 He walked away and I started to find a seat. I strolled, not even looking at the paintings, eyes on the floor and searching for a  seat. 

 

 I was still looking when I bumped into a large painting and it almost fell but I stopped it. I saw a bench beside it and sighed when I put the painting stabled on its place. I sat, and put my earphones on. Turned the volume up and high and rested my head with eyes closed on the wall. 

 

 Open your eyes, see the beautiful life in front of you. 

 

 The lyrics tingled my ear and made me open my eyes. There was a big portrait in front of me. It was just what they called abstract painting. There were squiggly lines, circles, lines and dots, and something that resembles a drip. The lines never formed an object, nor had an image. It’s not even colorful, just a faint color of red, like it was fresh blood but the color faded with time. 

 

  I stared at it. Too long, too long that I forgot to blink. When my eyes started to move, I felt a tear fell down. I wiped it immediately and a tear fell down again. I was crying, I was literally crying but I don’t even know why. 

 

  I stood up, my feet kept dragging me into the painting. When I was in front of it, I felt like there was a hand that touched my face. 

 

 My eyes swelled and my heart felt heavy and I just fell on my knees. 

 

 "What happened?!" 

 

 "Are you okay?" 

 

 "Somebody get me water." 

 

 My eyes catch the last glimpse of the painting before I passed out. 

 

 - 

 

 "You’re weird." 

 

 Lu gave me a bottle of water and sat beside me outside the gallery. 

 

 "I need to buy that painting dude." 

 

 "Why?" 

 

 "I just need to." 

 

 He looked at me, wanted to say something but didn’t. He stood up and led me to the clerk which guide me to the management. 

 

 "Can I buy the abstract one, uhm.. where I passed out?" 

 

 "Oh, you mean Do Kyungsoo’s painting? It’s free." 

 

 "Oh, it’s free? Why?" 

 

 "Well, the one who brought that painting told me that if somebody asks me to buy that painting, I should just give it free as accordance to the will of the painter." 

 

 "Will?" 

 

 "Oh, he died. I mean Do Kyungsoo." 

 

 "Why?" 

 

 The manager shrugged, "I’ll just give you the number of the one who brought that painting. His name is Park Chanyeol. Anyways,  I will pack the painting for you, please sit down." I did and also Luhan.

 

  Do Kyungsoo. Do Kyungsoo painted that before he died. I felt a little tinge in my heart. 

 

 - 

 

  Kyungsoo commit suicide. He was a painter, and a singer in a small club. Yes, he was alone. So alone that all he always paint when he’s sad and burn it when someone will see it or accidentally saw a portion of it. He was talented, but he was lonely. 

 

  I am not his friend, just his neighbor who saw him on his last breath. He killed himself, cut his wrist and he used it as ink for his last painting. He put all his life at that painting, that is why you were moved by it. He told me something, it’s called Duende. He said to give the portrait to anyone who will ask for it because it means the painting moved them or changed a little something in their life. 

 

 - 

 

  I stared at the words engraved at his tombstone: 

 

  Do Kyungsoo 

 An artist, who deserved not an award, but a happy life. 

 

 "Yes Kyungsoo. I will treasure your life. I will keep it and live with it. I don’t know who you are but you changed me. I hated art, but you loved it so much you even made yourself into one. Thank you Kyungsoo, for teaching me how to love small things, for making me realize that not everything I hate is bad.  That there are things that I should see in a different view. Please be comfortable there or wherever you are. I’ll visit you often, don’t worry." 

 

 Luhan called my name after I put the flowers on Kyungsoo’s tombstone. 

 

 "Let’s go Jongin!" 

 

 "Yes, coming." 

 

 I gave my last bow to Kyungsoo and when I saw a figure at the top of his tombstone. A pale, short and cute guy smiling at me. 

 

 Thank you, thank you. He whispered and bowed to me.

 

I was stunned and bowed again, ran into Luhan and smiled a little after a  while.