Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Rian recoiled.
The tart retort on his tongue evaporated, and he fumbled, his tongue turning clumsy, his heart playing a little rat-a-tat tune against the inside of his chest.
“I...”
“What?” Damon demanded almost helplessly, practically snarling out his frustration. “What now?”
Okay, Rian thought. Okay. White flag.
Damon was waving the white flag.
So Rian could at least put his slingshots away.
“Nothing. I just...wasn’t expecting you to apologize,” he said, shaking his head—and tried a smile, and wondered once again what his smiles looked like. If he even knew how to smile without it seeming polished and practiced and entirely false. But he offered, “You were worried about Chris. And you didn’t know he wasn’t being entirely truthful with you. I didn’t, either. It’s okay. I understand.” And then, because he didn’t know what else to say...he glanced down the hall, toward the stairwell at the end. “Come on. We can talk in my classroom. Once they ring the bell for dinner, the halls are going to swarm.”
* * *
Damon hadn’t looked around much when he’d been in the art classroom before; just enough to not bump into the desks or ruin someone’s work in progress, when half the hand-sculpted clay mugs and pots sitting on wax paper looked like they were one good jolt away from collapsing in on themselves.
As they stepped inside the darkened, faintly echoing space, though, he let himself linger a bit longer, taking in the woven rattan shades that had replaced the standard-issue school blinds over the windows; the table against the wall with the rows of paper-cutting and screen-printing and laminating machines; the rack of thousands of crumpled, well-used paint tubes that took up an entire wall; the crinkled watercolor paintings pinned up all along one wall, some skilled, some clumsy, but enough collected that it would take more than a single year’s classes to account for them.
Anything to keep from looking at the man who trailed into the room behind him, closing the door with a small click of the latch and reaching over to flick the light switch.
Anything to avoid thinking about how Rian had purred Damon in a way that made Damon’s entire body knot up with a sudden wash of taut heat, hitting him out of fucking nowhere and making his blood pressure spiral—only to spike into a rush of frustration when, right after, Rian had just...
Smiled at him.
In that weird way that made him look like he was playing the part of someone else.
God damn, it was already getting under Damon’s skin.
Why the fuck did he smile like that?
Why smile at all, if you didn’t meant it?
Damon sure as hell never bothered.
So he focused not on Rian, but on how the room filled with little discs of spangled gold light; the fluorescent light fixtures in the room had been covered over, their square panels shaded with covers of thin stained glass. Swirling designs of delicate black wrought iron framed fragile panes of gold-tinted glass, until their light fell over the room like motes of faerie dust, gilding everything.
Damon found himself briefly caught—lingering over how the room changed in that light, haunting and captivating, only for Rian’s muted voice to drift over the space.
“Sorry,” he murmured. “Normally it blends with the sunlight so it’s not so obvious.”
“I don’t mind it,” Damon said. “You made those...?”
“I did.”
“Thought you were just a painter.”
“Painter, sculptor, dancer, pianist, violinist, glassblower, papercrafter... I try many things, linger with none.” Rian let out a quietly humorless scoff that sounded like it wanted to be a laugh and failed. “Changing with the seasons, ever fickle.”
Something in that voice that spoke like honey but stung like pepper compelled Damon to look back at Rian.
He understood, then, why Rian smiled that fake, plastic smile.
Because he was smiling now—but it was a small thing full of soft, quiet hurts Damon felt he was never meant to see.
Because Rian’s real smile was lost, pained.
Because Damon wouldn’t blame him for not wanting to show that to anyone if he could help it.
And he didn’t think Rian would like that he’d shown that face to Damon...so Damon turned away, giving Rian a moment to compose himself, glancing over the room and looking for something, anything to fill the silence.
He fell on the largest clay sculpture left out to dry, set out on a back table of its own, far away from the rest. A wisteria tree spiraled up from roots splayed across wax paper, detailed with absolute artistry and care, its bark textured with tiny scored lines, its leaves shaped in delicate trailers so fine and slender it was a wonder they didn’t snap under their own weight. Everything from the arc of the leafy tendrils to the wizened gnarl of the trunk was so realistic Damon could almost see the colors that would be painted on later, bringing it to life from featureless gray.