The Shift
...
Disclaimer: Obviously, I don't own Lovelss.
Obviously.
It was summer, but even so the coolness of the day seeped in through the walls and into the carpeted room. Soubi sat; his collected art materials spread out on a crinkled white paper around his folded legs, the sun shined in through the lightened windows and illuminated the blonde's workspace. While normally choosing to paint on an easel, today Soubi opted for working bent over apple-sauce style with his art piece laying flat on the floor. The hard pressure from the floor seemed to give a sturdy framework usually absent to Soubi in his life. As he leaned over the painting small airy wisps of platinum blonde hair fell from his ponytail and spread themselves in front of Soubi's eyes. He swatted them away annoyed. He didn't want his vision to be obscured.
Soubi dipped the brush into the dark purple coloring, and waited for The Shift just like he always has. The Shift is not something he can call any other way than what is already is named. When The Shift comes about it's almost always when painting quietly in the privacy of his own home when no one watching him work or spouting unreal or unimportant things that only throw off his concentration.
Alone is when The Shift comes, and alone is where he normally is.
He doesn't remember the first time he felt The Shift, but he remembers many days staying late in the college art room as far from The Shift as he could possibly be when picking up a brush. Yet there he was, in his own apartment, his art materials spread around him with purple paint on top of a bristled brush that was slowly making methodical strokes into the white canvas he picked up on his way home.
When Soubi started painting it had been a butterfly. It always is butterflies, and it always was butterflies. Today though, the wings looked off, and he couldn't seem to make the antennas' shape quite right. He frowned without knowing it, and sweat beaded his skin making the skin cells glossy. With narrowed eyes he looked objectively at the purple creature. It didn't look like it should. He had always had the talent of painting animals, butterflies especially, his art teacher even commented on his ability to paint the small and fragile beings.
"Soubi, you can make a butterfly seem to fly off the page."
This butterfly, the purple one that sat precisely (he had measured) in the middle of the canvas seemed anything but. It did not jump off the page. It did not even seem to draw the eye. When he started the butterfly had been colorful and beautiful, but now without even realizing it he had let the butterfly fade into the background. The backdrop seemed more beautiful than the living being. The creature seemed to lay flat on the canvas not even lifting a wing in greeting.
If Soubi didn't know any better he would have believed the butterfly dead.
Then the painting grew more ghastly. There was a smudge in the top right corner of the canvas. A small scratch was noticeable a little higher than the center, probably when he had bumped it coming in through the door. The colors of the wings where he had added a striking yellow didn't seem to match. There was a pencil line still visible to the eye from when he had sketched the tree branch on earlier. Even the butterfly seemed to be sitting awkwardly if a butterfly could sit. Its body crumbled in on itself and the wings were pinched, and…
It just seemed off.
With a practiced artist's eye Soubi could not believe he had never noticed all the inconsistencies. Growing up he had always had an eye for mistakes and accuracy in artwork. He had gone to art shows staring at the sculptures until his vision blurred so much that he couldn't look at it any longer. He couldn't look at it any longer.
He could not look at this pathetic creature any longer.
He flipped the canvas over pushing the side he painted into the white crinkled paper to keep from messes. The picture would no doubt be ruined now, but the already numerous inconsistencies were painful enough. He might even say they made him angry, but mostly they just made him whistful. He wasn't sure he could ever fix the mistakes without making the art piece worse, and he didn't want to try. He could feel The Shift coming on, more painful than ever, but still just as subtle.
He did not pretend it was not there.
He slowly rose on his hands and knees to then pull himself up to full height. His blonde mane swished back and forth as he walked away from the overturned painting and the bloody smears of violet.
In the sink he washed the paint down the drain, suppressing his urge to just lie down on the cool tile of the bathroom floor and close his eyes. Maybe The Shift had been stopped before it had done permanent damage.
Then again, he could no longer deny its existence.
:::::
Years later Soubi would pull the painting out again from his attic. His would fruitlessly try to tear the white paper from the canvas where it had latched on. When that didn't work, instead of throwing the painting back into the far corner of the stuffy space he would take it back down into his painting room and glue pieces of colorful paper onto the picture until forming something almost completely new.
He left the yellow smears on the canvas.
When he was done many would wonder what the great artist Soubbi was thinking when forming the artwork. Any third greader could be capable of making such a piece.
Soubi took a tack and pinned it on the wall.
It was the most beautiful thing he had ever created.