a/n: This was written for Sweethearts week 2013 for the theme of colors. I published an abbreviated version on my livejournal. If you would like to read it, that and many of my other stories I wrote for sweethearts week are there. Everything belongs to Hima.
Colors
Arthur thought that Alfred was the color of yellow.
Francis disagreed—he thought blue.
To Arthur though—blue was the color of his eyes, like the sky, like freedom of those giddy late summer, and early fall days where the sky was so open it made you feel like you could do anything.
Overall, from Alfred's smile, to his perpetual cheery attitude, to the way he said Arthur's name, it was yellow.
Yellow was cheerful, or annoying, or blinding like the sun.
Grigoire said it was a good color. The Romani considered it good luck.
Arthur painted that night and forgot to sleep. It happened like that many times. Forgetting to eat, sleep or what day it was, Francis would arrive in the morning with coffee and baguettes in his hands and groan and say, "Mon ami, mon rosbif,(1) now what?"
Arthur's temper would flare, for who could understand getting it just right? For it had to be perfect.
After skillfully dodging Arthur's well-aimed punches, Francis conceded. "Je sais; je comprend."(2) And he left it at that.
Red. Red was the color of Arthur's dreams. Dreams filled with lust, skin, lips, and sweat. Of Alfred's face, of his words, of his touch, of his moans. When he woke, hurting from unmet want, Arthur tried to capture them on canvas.
Francis would just stare at the painting, proud to be the only friend allowed to see Arthur's work first hand, and say despairingly, "Why don't you try talking to the boy? Maybe a date? Mon dieu, je ne sais quoi…"(3) and then Arthur would start throwing paint tubes at him.
"Hermes! You little brat! Hermes!" Francis would cry in horror over his paint-spattered clothes.
"Go fuck yourself, frog, you tosser," was Arthur's reply.
"Ah, Arthur," came the always bright smile and eyes lit from within. "Let me show you something cool."
Arthur would follow reluctantly, and while Alfred chattered on, he would mix the paint in his head to create such perfect lightly tanned glowing skin Alfred always had. Burnt sienna, titanium white, a touch of vermilion, on and on, until Arthur got frustrated on not being able to touch. Some colors just made you want to lick them.
"Uh, Arthur, are you listening?" said Alfred, holding a tube of some god-awful neon purple with glitter paint right in front of Arthur's face.
"Of course, you idiot."
Alfred's face fell, and he continued doggedly on like it always did after Arthur snapped at him, but ever faithfully, "Um, Francis said you have a student show. Um, I'd love to go."
"No." Arthur bluntly said, the scowl on his face even apparent to him.
"Actually, I think it's free to the public." Alfred cheerfully persisted, his hand now showing off a new paint tube of a horrific shade of green.
Green. Green was life. Also the shade of camouflage. Alfred wore camouflage so carefully. As if one despairing look would end some sort of competitive streak of eternal sunshine. Arthur wanted to crush it. Crush that mask, rip the leaves off the tree.
"If you come, I won't even acknowledge that you exist," Arthur snarked. "Go away. You're annoying me."
Alfred did leave then. Went back to the counter and seemed to be arranging something down below, out of sight.
Francis yelled at Arthur all the way back to the studio. "You could be less cruel, Arthur! Serieusement(4), I don't know why…"
Later, "He was crying," Francis told him, coldness in his voice.
Grey, grey was the lining that hid inside Alfred F. Jones. Something grim and sad. Arthur was certain it existed. It might be Payne's grey—blue in tint, lovely in Autumn, but no, it hid there for sure.
"Not everyone is you," Antonio said sadly. " Have you ever considered you two are complements?"
But Arthur was not a color. That would make him purple to be Alfred's complement. Purple was the color of magic, of the deep night. That was not Arthur. Arthur was black. Void. The colors that he created in his art, creating them, making them spring to life, were a lie.
Francis told him that he was his deepest critic and that his inner voice was the liar. Arthur wasn't sure.
"Do you even know what preference he has, Arthur?" Eliza's eyes twinkled as she speculated.
"I think he's straight." Francis sighed as Antonio kneaded his back. Arthur had been dragged to one of those infernal hall parties. It was no party—it was sitting around and gossiping, eating powdery snacks made by Alfred, and taking turns massaging each other.
"Why don't you just ask him?" Toris said desperately.
"No. My gaydar went off, and it's fail proof." Elizabeta's finger waggled in the air.
Will you all sod off, idiots. Was Arthur's internal voice. Outwardly, he ate the sweet powdered sugar concoction.
This talk, it was all brown. The ugly brown that happened when one muddied their oils.
"Who's what?" Alfred's cheerful voice asked, one strong arm curled around two twelve packs of soda pop and the other balancing six pizzas. Arthur tried to ignore the flexing beautiful muscles.
Everyone hushed suddenly. "Uh, we were talking about sexual preferences," Toris said honestly. Alfred flushed.
He squirmed, even with his load. "Well, I brought food!" and smiled straight at Arthur.
Arthur looked away, burned by the brilliance of it. He shrugged and left. Alfred tried to convince him to take some food with him. "Seriously, you know, dude, so you have something edible to eat."
Arthur hated the idiot.
(He loved him, he loved him, he loved him) beat his heart.
He didn't deserve him, all black mutated, ugly inside, ugly outside. Beauty was to be observed, not corrupted.
(Love was a soft soft pink, that glowed like the oils of the Masters of the Renaissance. Tinted, many layers, the white joy shining out of the soft pink covers, so beautiful it made him weep, once he realized what it was. No. Love was not for him.)
"Ah, Arthur! See! Told you I'd make it. Wow! There's so much stuff here! I mean, seriously, wow, look at that." A casual arm was thrown over Arthur's shoulder, broad hand holding strange murky colored punch.
Arthur looked at the painting Alfred was staring at, "I mean come on, I could paint better than that! I mean a five-year-old could. What do people do? Just throw a bunch of paint on a canvas and say, 'hey it's art!'?"
"I agree," said Arthur quietly.
Alfred just quirked a perfect brow at his agreement. His tirade continued on, "I mean I wouldn't let this person graduate, come on, I mean this person…" Alfred had gotten close up to the painting to read the inscription and artist. His words stopped suddenly.
Orange. Orange is a strange color. It's delightful in a quirky way, but oftentimes it becomes muted, dark, nasty. Forgotten, ill-used, old. The deepest, grossest thing. Hideous.
"Oh my god." Alfred breathed out, "Oh my god."
Arthur knew what he was seeing.
Nocturne for Alfred #1
Arthur Kirkland
Oil
Alfred looked ill as he walked slowly down the side observing the five large paintings. The red made him blush and by the end he looked at Arthur with a terrible look in his eyes.
Black. Like the void, technically colorless Alfred had complained one day, black was technically not a color. Alfred was a rainbow of colors, like prisms, shooting out light and wonder everywhere.
Storming through the throngs of students and guests (Arthur had no family who would come) Alfred went outside.
Panic grew, something Arthur had never felt before, shocking lime, fuchsia, dark brown. "Alfred," he called running after him, not caring who he ran into, "Wait!"
Outside, he chased Alfred who was now walking down the sidewalk outside the student gallery, "Wait, Alfred!" The boy was wiping at his face.
Alfred turned around fists clenched, and yelled, "No! Fuck you! I'm done with waiting."
The coldness in his eyes, it was no lovely Payne's Grey, it was terrifyingly dark Rembrandt red, the bloody visceral color that reminded Arthur of gaping wounds, and pooled death. "You talk about me behind my back, you mock me, and you call me names. My friends were right about you. They told me to drop my stupid infatuation. Well, they were right."
"Arthur, mon dieu(5), what is going on?" Francis whispered behind Arthur's right shoulder. He must have followed behind the two of the them.
"Alfred, I can explain…"
"And then you paint pictures of me or for me or whatever! Like you idolize me?! Like I am special to you? Then you say I can't come see them? What the fuck?" Alfred wiped away a tear with a shaking hand. "You get your laughs off me.."
"Alfred, moy drug(6), what is wrong?" It was Ivan, his silver hair glimmering in the streetlight. Alfred flung his arms out and turned away.
"Alfred…" Arthur knew what he had to say, he just couldn't. He covered his eyes with his hand.
"Fuck this…" He heard Alfred say. The dark side Arthur had always wanted to expose was in that voice. He suddenly realized he had truly wanted to prove to himself that the side never existed. But it did, and it was a torment to Arthur.
"Is it Arthur? Do you want me to tell him to go away?" Ivan's voice was sweet and gentle, like the shiniest of silvers, the color of a blade. "Alfred, you don't need to do this."
"I'm black!" yelled Arthur desperately, "I'm black and nothing can change that. Not you, not anyone."
Francis just snickered, as did Ivan. " You are not black, mon ami."
Alfred got the reference though, those hollow eyes staring at Arthur, turning into daggers, "You are not black, Arthur, it's an impossibility. Black is the antithesis of color. We had this conversation before."
Arthur wanted to cry. To tear down those painting. To pour linseed oil and paint thinner on them and watch them burn. "I know." He gritted his teeth to not say 'idiot'.
"Have you ever considered you are white? That all the colors on those canvas spewed from you because you are all colors combined?" Alfred said, his voice monotone.
"I…" Arthur.
"Just 'cause your family treats you like shit, Arthur, doesn't mean you can treat everyone like shit. Especially me." Alfred continued on. Tears in his eyes. "I don't want to deal with this anymore," He said to Ivan, who put a arm around Alfred to walk him away.
Despair crept up to Arthur, slowly sinking him, grabbing him down into its depths. "Please, Alfred, give me a chance again."
"You've lost him, rosbif."
Arthur gritted his teeth. "I love you!" He yelled at the backs of the two men, and to the surprise of the Frenchman beside him.
Alfred turned his head and looked back.
"I love you. I know I don't deserve you, I never have. I don't want to taint you." Arthur was pleading.
Ivan said something into Alfred's ear. The American bowed his head. Then shook it and continued walking away.
Arthur had erred. He was not black, no such emotion in his life could compare to this one. It was dark, unyielding, and he didn't want to move again. Foolish idiot, he said to himself, you can't do anything right.
Francis just walked back to the showing with him without a word.
Arthur ordered pizza. He had burned his dinner, listened to the fire alarm howling until he realized that someone might call the fire department if he didn't air out the kitchen. The tendrils of smoke were grey.
Like one of those black and white films, greys were the colors in Arthur's life. Thank god it is summer! Francis exclaimed, or you'd fail! Arthur had not painted for a month.
The doorbell buzzed, and Arthur went to answer it.
"Alfred?" he questioned when he opened the door to a young bespectacled man who looked just like the person in question.
"Eh?" the young man replied, "Uh, no. I'm Matthew. Do you know Alfred?"
"Yeah, we are in uni together. Arthur."
Arthur didn't know how he hadn't noticed the long hair with curl in it and the eyes which had a lavender hue. He didn't know how he had thought this man was Alfred.
"I want to beat the shit out of you, Arthur," smiled the man as he quietly stated his threat. "But, I want to hear your side too."
Lavender. Lavender was a color with a strange name. It was light and airy, and little girls painted their rooms with it. But periwinkle, it was grand, light, frothy, like air, that color that everyone argued about, was it blue or was it purple. Matthew was like this. That argument you didn't remember until it came up again.
Arthur liked Matthew.
He was trying to be nicer. Trying to not be so nasty. Trying to remember how each time his brothers had treated him poorly and his attitude right back, how it hurt. Sometimes he saw Alfred and it tore him apart. He would wait. Maybe, one day, Alfred would want him again. Then again, maybe not.
(1) my friend, my roastbeef (petname)
(2) I know; I understand
(3) my god, I don't know what
(4) seriously
(5) my god
(6) my friend (Russian, romanized, male friend)
Grigoire is Romania