Author's note: Not gonna lie, substitute writing for drawing, coffee for alcohol, and take out the obsession with Enjolras and this is essentially autobiographical. As such, though I am well aware that R has more interests than just his art, I have focused on that one because this was written so that I could get rid of that damn itch and get some sleep and so I wanted to be able to relate. (Or, more to the point, wanted him to suffer the same things I was.)
It feels like an itch in his soul, an itch he doesn't know how to scratch and which cannot be ignored. A cliched comparison, true, and were he someone else he would strive to come up with something different, something more original and less worn out. He's not someone else though, and cliches are all he deserves, especially at a time like this when nervous energy fills him and all the alcohol in the world can't quell it entirely.
He throws a spiteful look towards the canvas set up in one corner of the room. It sits there, partially covered with paint, taunting him. Half of him aches to take up the brush once more and tackle the muse again, pinning her to the canvas with vicious strokes until the fervor has passed and he can once more retreat behind a shell of cynicism and detachment. The other half, the half that has wrestled with this all evening, wants to take out his frustrations on the canvas itself, wants to rip it into pieces and crush it to the ground beneath his bare feet in a fit of vicious childishness. He does neither of these things. Instead he drinks, bottle held carelessly in hands that could once have been called talented. He drinks to quash inspiration and to find it and not even he could have said which option he actually desires.
Alcohol or not, the canvas draws him back like a siren, its song nearly as treacherous as the one that ensnared Odysseus and made more dangerous by the lack of men to guide the ship away from them. He is alone, torn between the insistent tugging within him and the inability to answer its call properly. He picks up a pencil, swapping bottle for discarded paper, and tries to sketch something, anything. The lines flow awkwardly from his hand, angles harsh and forms unrecognizable. He has no plan, no vision, just the insistent tug of his innermost soul.
He has always hated his innermost soul.
After only a few strokes he throws down the paper in disgust and stalks away again, snagging the bottle as he passes. He paces, drinking until the bottle is empty and replacing it with another. Red wine this time, taste sharp and thick on his tongue. He does not take the time to notice its subtleties, just pours it into his mouth until he feels like he might choke. The wine does not chase away the itch, but it dulls it some, dilutes it and takes the edge off, turns the nervous energy to reckless courage to creeping despair. It does nothing to banish the gold from the corner of his mind, nor has it ever. Sometimes he thinks that the very act of drinking to destroy that ever present thought constitutes an act of profoundest idealism in and of itself.
With a sigh he trudges back to the canvas, glaring at it hatefully. They would laugh if they could see him now, those few he calls his friends, would laugh as they saw all his carefully constructed barriers crumble in the face of artistic frustration. He would laugh with them, of course, would laugh and would drink and would joke about his own predicament and would drink some more.
The lines do not come any easier this time, but he sticks with it anyway, dragging his hand across the thin paper until his pencil nearly rips a hole in the center. His fists clench convulsively, wrinkling the paper, and he forces himself not to rip it to shreds. He is not entirely certain why he bothers, why he continues to try, why he does not just give in to the discomfort and the despair. It is not as though he is unaware of his own worth, or lack thereof. He deserves this, really, deserves the torment of a glorious muse shackled to an irrevocably flawed body, deserves the restlessness and the discomfort and the tightness in his chest that no amount of breathing or drinking can relax. He knows full well that he has accomplished nothing, that he will accomplish nothing, that he has no right to accomplish anything. And yet he smoothes out the paper again, a helpless chuckle caught in the back of his throat. He sits, bending over the paper, pencil held firmly just as he was taught so many years ago. His temples throb but he does not pause for a drink to dull the pain. He draws, beating his mind back as his fingers work, hating the image coming to life before him but hating it less than the alternative.
They told him he had talent once, his teachers and his friends. They told him he could go far if he only applied himself, told him that it would take very little work to produce masterpieces. He knew better than to believe them. He has seen masterpieces, and his work is but a poor imitation, barely even a shadow. He's a realist, though others would disagree. He knows what it takes to be great, and he knows that he doesn't have it. Yet still he sketches, dabbling in art because he cannot seem to set it aside, because no amount of drinking and cynicism can quite make the need vanish completely.
Beneath his hands a face emerges, one instantly recognizable to those who know it, testament to its uniqueness rather than his own skill. He wishes he could be surprised by its presence but he is only resigned, well accustomed to this part of his mind. He has drawn other things, of course, has drawn countless other scenes and dozens of other men. But always he returns to this one, returns to girlish lips and delicate features and eyes that could stop the fiercest general dead in his tracks if they so chose.
He does not draw in himself. He has drawn himself before, first as a student and later out of some kind of morbid curiosity, but he does not draw himself here. His image has no place in the picture, not when he himself is so unworthy. His strokes grow harsher, spurred by a sudden flood of anger, and around the face dark clouds form. Even they cannot quite hide the radiance, though they make a valiant effort. His mouth twists into an ugly scowl as he shades them in, expression bitter more than angry.
He stops when he reaches the end of his bottle. The paper before him is covered with marks, aborted sketches surrounding the half-completed portrait. He feels numb at last, emotions emptied onto the page before him. Slowly he rises, swaying as the alcohol makes its presence known. His hands are trembling and he feels the pencil slip from his grasp. He lets it fall, watching the paper flutter to the ground to join it. It lands face up and hard eyes stare up at him, piercing despite the medium in which they have been rendered. He turns away..
Stumbling, gasping onto anything he can find for balance, he makes it to his room and falls onto his bed, drained rather than tired. He does not remove his shoes. The fire in the other room burns low, more embers than anything else. His eyes slip closed and he sleeps, empty of all save alcohol, fingers streaked with lead, mind nearly devoid of gold.