He'd lost it.
He'd lost it!
Matthew had emptied the contents of his backpack onto his bed, ransacked his bedroom from desk to dresser, and had made a thorough sweep of the house. There was no getting around the situation. He'd lost it.
With a groan the boy slumped onto his chair and let his head fall onto his desk with a hard thud. He groaned again, this time in pain.
That was how his brother found him ten minutes later.
"Yo, dinner's ready bro…" Alfred trailed off in confusion at the sight of his twin.
The two were nearly identical; their face shapes were the same, their hair the same dirty blonde, and their facial features synonymous. Alfred cut his hair short, though, and Matthew grew his out until it brushed his shoulders. Both boys were tall, but whereas Matthew's frame was lanky, Alfred's was filled out from hours spent playing football and working out in the gym. That didn't mean Matthew wasn't fit, he just had a leaner body type and a more sedate lifestyle.
In addition to physical differences, their personalities were vastly different. Alfred was the extrovert, risk taker and troublemaker. Matthew was the calm and collected brother. The fact that he was sprawled across his desk in a state of extreme distress was very odd.
"Umm…. Mattie?" Alfred asked, not quite sure as to what he should do.
Matthew let out a long groan in response.
Sighing, Alfred walked over and sat down on his brother's bed. "Hey, I don't speak cow, bro. What's up?"
There was a long pause. Finally his brother shifted his head slightly so that one eye peeked out at him.
"I… I lost my sketchbook," Matthew mumbled.
Alfred's eyes shot up and he leaned back. "Whoa… at school?"
Matthew nodded and slowly sat up. "I guess… I don't remember seeing it on the bus."
Since he'd just watched a couple Sherlock episodes, Alfred felt more knowledgeable in the matters of sleuthing than he actually was and decided to take the case. "Well, where was the last place you saw it?" he asked.
His twin frowned a bit. "Lunch, I think... - No! It was Spanish." His scowl deepened. "I remember Senora Sanchez threatened to take it because I had it out during class. Gabriel wasn't at school today, so I set it down on his seat so she wouldn't see it."
Alfred nodded knowingly. "You guys are working on that huge Christmas book project, right?" He'd had Sra. Sanchez last year. Matthew nodded and he continued, "So you had a bunch of papers and glue and scissors on you desk, and you lost track of the time and scrambled to clean up." Matthew nodded again, his eyes widening. Alfred hid a smirk as he leaned back even farther. "When you were cleaning up you totally forgot you'd left something on someone else's chair... and left class without your sketchbook."
"Yeah… yeah, I guess I did!" Matthew exclaimed.
The football star laughed and stood up. "Don't worry bro, Sanchez is super responsible. She's probably got it locked up safe and sound in her desk." He clapped a hand on Matthew's shoulder.
"Now c'mon, dad ordered takeout instead of cooking today."
Matthew smiled gratefully and they both clattered down the stairs.
By lunchtime the next day Matthew was plotting how to get away with murdering his brother.
Senora Sanchez didn't have his sketchbook. When he'd talked to her before school she'd looked at him as if he were slightly insane. She hadn't even seen his sketchbook.
He'd ended up skipping lunch to look through the lost and found (to no avail) before shuffling off to the library, something he often did after eating. The librarians had greeted him cheerfully and he'd responded in a fake cheerful voice before slumping into one of the few armchairs the library provided. After several attempts to try and sketch on some lined paper, he gave up and flung an arm over his eyes to block out the glaring brilliance of the light fixture directly above him.
He knew others would think he was overreacting. After all, it wasn't like he'd lost his homework or a pet. What most people didn't understand was that losing his sketchbook was like losing his heart. He literally felt like his chest was hollow.
A loud, "A-hem!" made him flinch and look up. Standing directly in front of him was a tall, lean girl with pale skin and silver hair. Her red eyes bored into his dark blue ones with an intensity that made him gulp and shrink back. He knew who she was. This was Julchen Beilschmidt, senior and the star of the girl's soccer team. Rumor had it the tiny black-rimmed heart on her neck was an actual tattoo and not, as she claimed, just something she constantly redrew with sharpies.
"Are you Matthew Williams?" she asked, crossing her arms. Matthew nodded and gulped again.
She nodded as well and dropped the backpack she'd been carrying onto the table next to him. He watched as she slowly unzipped it and pulled out…
Matthew let out a soft cry and jerked forward. Julchen smiled and handed him his sketchbook. He clutched it to his chest.
"I found it on my seat when I went to Spanish. Your name was on the first page. I remembered that Lovino'd mentioned you once or twice- You are friends with Lovino, right?"
Matthew nodded, but a shrug would have been more accurate. Lovino was abrasive and rude, and only seemed to tolerate Matthew because he wasn't "a frickin' idiot like everyone else". It was a little ironic, considering that Lovino's sister - who he protected with every fiber of his being - was one of the biggest, sweetest airheads Matthew had ever met.
Julchen grinned. "Anyway, Lovino said it was yours and then yelled at me for not turning it in to the teacher. After the rant he finally told me you'd be in the library during lunch. So here I am." She shrugged a bit.
"Did…" Matthew's voice cracked and he hastily cleared his throat. "Did you look through my sketchbook?" Ugh, he shouldn't be this nervous. Why should he care what a total stranger thought about his drawings?
...Why did he ask himself stupid questions?
To his relief, Julchen shook her head. "Just the first page." She picked up her backpack and turned to go. "Later." She waved casually and strolled out of the library. Matthew watched her go, wide-eyed.
After a while he sighed at flipped through the pages of his sketchbook, relieved to see them safe and sound. He froze when he reached a sketch in the middle. It was uncolored and not very detailed, but he'd been going for a simplistic style.
A female polar bear was standing on an ocean of ice and snow. She was looking back at her cub, who was taking his very first steps out of the den and into the sunlight. Stuck to the page was a sticky note covered in bold handwriting.
Knowing me, I probably just lied to you about snooping through your book. You're wunderbar at drawing! This picture is my favorite. ;D ~J.B.
Matthew slumped down into the seat and let out a groan.
A/N: Never, EVER diss the importance of an artist's sketchbook. One of my friends treats her sketchbook like her baby. I remember accidently knocking it onto the floor one day and her screaming her head off while I quickly picked it up and apologized a million times. She forgave me, but I could tell I'd ruined her entire day. :\