Clyde and I were setting up our easels, sitting in our regular places—him closest to the exit, me dead center on the opposite side of the ring, waiting for the model to arrive. Professor Leng, in his usual fit of laziness, snoozed at his desk, long giraffe neck extended over the table like a buffet feast. Clyde motioned towards him, sticking a thumb in his muzzle. Baby needs his blanket, he mouthed, and we both laughed quietly as other students filtered into the dusty room. One of the girls, a horse with a red beret, tight lips, and a loathing for Leng's proneness to sleep clopped her hooves loudly against the floor when she saw him, her fury echoing like gunshots on the linoleum. Leng jolted awake, head rising like a serpent.
He greeted us with bleary eyes, wiping drool away before explaining the assignment. We were to work exclusively in grayscale, focus on shadows and lighting. Use whatever materials we wanted as long as it translated to black and white. The rest of us mumbled agreements, pulling out art supplies, laying our tools in our favorite grips, waiting for the subject to arrive.
And wait we did.
Leng checked his watch frustratedly after the ten-minute mark passed. Silent, awkward minutes ticked by. The nocturnals didn't seem to mind when the small hand rose past eight, but horse girl was a perfect picture of rage, staring furiously into her canvas. Quiet complaints grew like weeds among the students. The giraffe coughed uncomfortably, offering apologetic shrugs and nervous eye shifting. After fifteen minutes passed he stood up, prepared to dismiss us when bam, in blew this young heifer, white like snow, entering like a forceful blizzard, freezing our eyes on her as she muttered apologies in an accent I couldn't place. The professor strode forward to shake her hoof, grateful for her arrival and the dismissal of his embarrassment.
Clyde eyed me hard from across the room, making some lewd, gawking gesture, but I couldn't even muster enough focus to flip him the bird, much less take my eyes off her face. She had a gorgeous, broad forehead that melted into the snout, finishing at a wide, black nose that looked like the rocky tip of a snowy mountain. Ears fluttering like wings, she whispered quickly with the professor, adjusting the robe draped over her. Nodding at whatever the professor said, she took her place, waiting to be introduced.
Leng told us her name was Alysia, but as far as I was concerned, it was just another six-letter word for "beauty." Alysia turned with her introduction, waving gently at the class. Her eyes swept around the room, showing off those deep black orbs that, when examined closely, glimmered the faintest blue, tossing me back to when I used to read old Jacques Cowsteau books to feed my juvenile idea of becoming a marine biologist, studying the different zones in which the ocean was broken up to, eventually forgetting that dream and all but one of those definitions that clung to the back of my brain, waiting for this moment to surface.
Disphotic—the level at which light is no longer detectable. Coincidentally, this phenomenon happens nearly 1000 meters below the surface, where pressure reaches over 300 pounds per square inch—exactly how I felt under the brief eye contact as Alysia continued her sweep around the room, landing with her back facing me.
Leng hastily explained the assignment again before extending a hoof towards Alysia. Clasping the robe, she let the fabric slough off her like an extra layer of skin, crumpling at her feet. As soon as the veil dropped, the obsession lurking inside me found something else to focus on other than her beauty—something I knew I would never be able to get out of my head the second I saw it. My reaction was squeezed out of me as if someone had performed the Heimlich to stop me from choking on my own words.
"Oh," I said to no one.
The scar began just below the crescent moons of her shoulder blades. Two thin, parallel lines lead into a latticework of flawless ninety-degree angles that bent over the plane of her back. Corridors and hallways of marred flesh stretched down her skin, shifting direction with the sharpness of a compass, some spanning from shoulder to tail, others contorting, curling into themselves like snakes, ending in a final geometric spiral. I almost gave in right then and there, curiosity brushing the feather trigger of my throat, threatening to let the words blast out into the silent room.
The design etched into her back was unquestionably a maze. Perfect lines of scar tissue rose gently from her skin like crop rows tilled into the earth, barely visible from under the white fur. At first, I convinced myself Alysia had suffered some freak accident, but none of the gruesome scenarios my brain could come up with made sense. Nothing other than they were put there on purpose.
Alysia struck a pose, and muscles bulged under her skin. Even with arms thicker than tree stumps, they still moved with the grace of a swan's neck, curling behind her head, linking at the hooves. Tail swishing, her hips rocked like a storm-troubled ship, leaning dangerously to port side. Finally, Alysia legs locked, pillars of alabaster beneath her torso, completing the form.
I remembered none of these details.
Like sediment on a river bottom, these things were slowly, forcefully swept away by my fascination with the mysterious injury, watching it shift over the tight skin of Alysia's back.
By some miracle, my eyes drifted to the clock on the wall, where I realized that I'd been staring at her for over half an hour. My canvas, white as her fur, begged for attention. Hastily, I slipped on my "horseshoe," rigging the gadget around my cloven hoof. The metal strands squeaked when I flexed my fingers, causing the pencil on the end to wriggle slightly. Covering the canvas in sloppy strokes, I took down her shape as quickly as possible. Basic construction was easy, marking points in the outline like a topographic map before scraping in the shading. Harsh light seared her form, casting hard shadows over hills of muscles.
I ran into trouble tracing in the more intricate details, but it wasn't in the finities of her structure—it was that damn maze again. There was a pull to it, even after I managed to rip my eyes away, always landing back on the entrance. My vision hovered over the opening, trapped between the thin lines before inevitably getting sucked in. Briefly, I considered drawing her without it, but the idea was struck down violently in my head, almost as if thinking it would tear the deformity right off her back. It needed to be there.
Weaving his neck through the rows, Leng scanned portraits with tired eyes, pausing when he got to mine.
"Interesting," he murmured, and moved on.
Half an hour snuck out the door, and Leng told us to put our brushes down. He thanked Alysia for her time, shaking a hoof as she slipped the robe back on. Even with the scar hidden, it burned through the threads and into my mind. As she stepped down from the pedestal, dread sank my heart like a lead weight. She was going to leave—Alysia and her beautiful mystery were going to walk out of this room, my life, forever. Drunken braveness flooded my nervous system, demanding my legs to move down the rows, barging past other student's imperfect copies of the white auroch until I was there, standing under her expectant gaze even though she was a whole head shorter than me. Her eyes never narrowed, but suspicion swarmed behind them, a rejection cocked and loaded under her tongue.
"Yes?" she asked, and in that moment I was able to figure out where her accent came from.
The Ivory archipelago. Birthplace of gods, olive oil, and philosophers, homeland of bulls and bronze and heroes whose legends have been immortalized, origin of civilization.
"You're from the Ivory islands?" I asked dumbly, but it paid off. She smiled boldly, showing of teeth straight and orderly like cell bars.
"Yes, I'm surprised you could tell," she said.
All I wanted was to ask about the scar—to find an answer and be done with it, but the sudden grin on her lips stuffed the question back down my throat.
"You know someone there?" she asked.
"Great aunt and uncle," I lied. "Never been, though. I want to."
"Where do they live?" she asked, and my tail flicked against the back of my legs.
"Up north." I think she mistook my bad lie as sheepish embarrassment
"You don't know?"
"We're not really in touch."
Her cheek lifted like it had been caught on a fishhook. Alysia asked me if I'd ever had Kakavia, and of course I shook my head.
"Corner of Third and Horn. I get off at seven on Thursdays," she said, and walked out the door before I could ask her if she wanted to know my name.
Clyde asked me if I saw her teats, scooping the air in small hammocks while we walked down the street. Anyone else that didn't know him as well would think he took these classes to ogle women, but those people haven't seen his art. It always started out looking like bird shit on a canvas—nonsensical lines and splotches splattered everywhere, all of it confusing until he shifted his stance. Like a runner arching like a cat before the sprint, Clyde hunches over the chaos in this hobbled, gremlin stance before getting into it, spreading dashes and shading over the plane. Really gets his muzzle right in there, sniffing at the paint and the charcoal, almost like he's hunting down the picture. From there, it becomes a complicated series of connect the dots, taking hours for the final product to come alive.
Hooves beating down on concrete, thoughts of Clyde's artwork slipped away. No. Not slipped. They were bullied out of my skull. Evicted by a raging obsession with Alysia's mark. An obsession that had its own heartbeat inside my chest and bones and throat.
Before I could tell him I never got the chance, something mumbled in the distance, down the gullet of the street. At first, it sounded like a bird—a long, wailing squawk that was sharp, yet frail. But as soon as I had acknowledged it, the sound left, echoes fading into the back alleys.
"Aye, Brontoburger's probably still open, and I don't think I can get home without a little fuel," he said, patting his stomach," said Clyde.
I checked my phone. 9:43.
"I'm down. Where is it?" I asked.
Clyde raised an eyebrow. "Where it's always been?"
Raising a paw, he pointed down a block towards the giant neon dinosaur, then to my horns.
"What, your brain lose reception or something?"
Swiftly hip-checking the wolf, I laughed as he stumbled into the wall, bags swinging across his body like vines. His brushes clattered inside their cases like tiny bones.
"Dick," he choked out. "You're buying my cricket fries."
"You trying to cop out of the whole 'starving' artist?"
"Yeah. Looks like you could use a little starving yourself, bud."
"I'll make sure to slim it down tonight. Make it a double patty instead of a triple."
"You crazy?" he said, grinning sharply. "I'm going for the quad stack. Extra jumpers."
Our burgers (and order of large crickets) came fast on a bright green tray served by an old elk with chipped hooves and weak, flaky antlers that reminded me of barnacle encrusted ships. Thanking the man, we grabbed our burgers, ready to dig in. But while my fingers scanned the wax, I couldn't find the folded ends. Looking down, I saw my thumbs running over the smooth, white surface. Flipping it over yielded the same result. Just a pale, round face soaked in grease. The beginning of the wrapper eluded me, even as I scratched at the other side. It was simply trapped. Clyde laughed at my confusion.
"Christ, it's a burger, not a Rubik's cube."
More frustrated seconds ticked by. Clyde laughed louder the deeper my eyebrows sank, turning the meal over and over. Finally, he snatched it out of my hooves, unwrapping it before I could demand it back. Confused, I turned both my hooves belly up like dead fish.
"The hell?" I asked as he handed it back, perfectly plated on its paper.
"Telling you man," he said, swatting my horns again. "Brain of yours needs a tuneup."
"Show some respect to the man that bought you jumpers."
"What are you talking about, dude? I have mad respect for those smooth moves you pulled with her after class. What'd she tell you anyways? Grandma's secret recipe?"
"I think we have a date on Thursday."
Clyde gagged, a chunk of ground up cricket shooting across the table as his irises transformed into egg yolks.
"You talked to her for like two minutes. Are you serious? Don't fuck with me on this."
"Corner of Third and Horn," I replayed. "Gets off at seven on Thursdays."
"Bull's got horns," he nodded, aiming for a high-five.
Clapping his paw over the table, we finished our food, scarfing the rest down before splitting ways.
Of course, the second I was out of Bronto thoughts of Alysia flooded back in. Her form consumed me for the next mile and a half. I couldn't help but feel as if something permanent had settled into my organs. My tongue scraped against the back of my teeth, carving that beautiful 'L,' retreating to make room for the 'Y,' forging into an 'S' that slipped by like a summer day, ending with the final, relaxing 'Ahhh.'
"Lyisa. Lyisa. Alysia. Ah-lysia."
My mouth slaved away at her name. I caught the flak of awkward stares from the nocturnals as I wandered their street, but I didn't care. The three syllables kept me on pace until I reached the stairs to my apartment. Heading to the door, I was about to grab my keys when the realization hit me—Which pocket were they in? Hooves hovering just above the denim lip, I stood in front of the door, the decision weighing down on me, heavier by the second. Left or right? Chilled air sliced past my open mouth. Sweat budded on my forehead. Deep in my lungs a laugh wanted to escape, but the grip of fear kept it locked down. Night curled into my vision, closing me off.
From behind me, the murmured wail I heard before called out, long and loud. This time, it was clear, and with a tremor I knew exactly what it was. The desperate call of something lost—final cries of a mammal whose body had given up except for the lungs, which strained horsley as they watched the last embers of hope blow away, fleeing into the night, abandoning them to the black. Terror skimmed over flesh. I dared not turn around. That terrible sound echoed up the street like the eerie whine of a violin drawn out to impossible lengths. It was waiting for me to choose—
LEFT OR RIGHT?
—so I plunged my hoof into the left pocket. Cold metal bit into my palm, and I almost cried in relief. Jamming it into the lock, I burst through the door, ramming a shoulder to close it, the slam of wood clapping the wail, and the rest of the world, shut.