It was night.
She hurried through the damp streets, littered with slippery, cold snow. Her gloved hands clutched at the paper bag tightly, her legs, adorned with knee-high boots, took wide, hurried strides. She was tired, having stayed awake all night with cheap coffee and stacks of homework and reports due the next day.
Nevertheless, she was happy.
She stopped abruptly at the traffic light, her cheeks tinted with a shade of red to match the colour of her hair. She knew he was going to be there. There, in the coffee shop, among the crowds of people, silently savouring his coffee and the music. She had always stared at him while her friends chatted on, studying every detail of him, studying him from the hair to the jacket, studying him from his eyes to his feet, studying the camera he often held in his hands.
Through him, she saw a nobody, lifeless and lonely.
She wanted to see somebody in him, she wanted to see him with someone. Because, there he always was, in that murky corner alone, with no one, with the darkness of that corner engulfing his lanky being.
She peered into the paper bag and smiled at the sight of the green scarf. She had constantly noticed him without a scarf during the frosty winters. Soon, he wouldn't be too cold.
The traffic light turned green.
Her every step was as light, as graceful as a deer.
The car failed to see that it was green-
The girl failed to see that it was zooming towards her-
--
There, in the center of the road, a cry erupted.
She felt blood, the stickiness of it all. She saw the scarf drenched in her own redness. She saw the driver's shocked face. She saw people.
She saw him.
He was emotionless, sipping his coffee.
She felt her vision going blur, the snow was numbing her. He was out of the coffee shop. He walked past her, stepping on the scarf drenched with the maroon redness.
She felt the rhythm of his shoes perfectly in time with her cries, singing inside of her.
Her body was losing control, she was slipping away into the warm darkness.
There she was, in the center of the road, alone.
There he was, on the other side of the pavement, alone.
--
There it was. Another day of dull dreary darkness, he thought, sipping away at the warm frothy rich broth. His days were multitudes of silent screaming black and destitute of any iridescence at all. The drone of the Bach piece soothed his mind, sore from the memories and depression. Even though monochrome, he would never forget the last few times he had with colours.
He would never forget.
--
She forced another stroke of pastel paint onto the painting on the easel, exposing the raw, strong green which scintillated with life from the artist, her life vibrant enough to spark riots of colours. He propped a skinny elbow onto the lacquer wood table and adjusted his focus on her.
She had the radiance of an overly ripe peach, her skin colour was pinkish and her presence seemed to denote a sudden burst of sweetness in the environment. Starbursts, he had once told her while she added finishing touches to a barn in a watercolour artpiece. You remind me of Starbursts. Sweet, addictive and insubstantial when taken in small amounts.
She had blinked her big blue eyes at him and let a smile trail off her face slightly. She was never good at accepting poorly formed compliments.
Now, he watched as this Starburst girl painted with such ferocity, such an ardent passion for art. Bright, striking, bold colours all over the plain, rice-coloured canvas. She had told him before, "The only time when I would stop drawing would be the day I can no longer pick up a pencil, be it or not my hands or my toes."
He didn't know how he had encountered her, really. She was not like a deepest gem hidden in a treasure chest, nor was she one to showcase beauty like a peacock, strutting about make-believe runways and burdening her face with makeup as think as head armor. However, she was not one that one would dismiss as plain either. She had soft, round features, her eyes delicately woven onto the heart-shaped face, her nose was not sharp but not blunt as well, and her lips parted, forming a girlish pout. She had long, wheat-coloured hair which she often left the way it was, and a mild honey scent lingered around her. She was rather pretty, to sum it up, although her resemblance to a child was uncanny. The innocence which she wore about her never changed after so long. Perhaps that was what had captivated him, made him take multiple shots of her as she painted.
She held a perfect poise which he loved so much. His collection of photos were littered with her as a subject, over and over. Picture of a picture. Apple of his eye.
She smiled as he held up the camera. Raising a hand, she motioned for him to stop. Then, with renewed vigor, she attacked the fresh canvas with hard lines, occasionally stopping to peek at his pose. After an hour, she gently placed the marker down and got up, walking over to him, who was now aching as he held the camera. Removing the camera from his hands, she placed the portrait on his lap, held his hands and sat him down on the floor, rubbing his hands gingerly. He gave the girl a look and his heart softened. He loved her and she loved him, he took pictures and she took his pictures and added life to them.
The portrait was black and white, she had drawn him simply, with fluidity of the lines and the black colour of charcoal, adding his name in smart cursive writing at the bottom of the portrait.
But he looked alive.
--
After that very day she drew a portrait of him, she stopped drawing altogether. That day, the only colour he could remember was red. The only thing he could remember was how innocent, how angelic she still looked, even when she was a mess, a frenzy of maroon run amok, splattered all over her cream coloured sundress and then running, sprinting down from the creases of the dress, forming oceans of blood on the car seat. Her tears were parallel to her smile. With broken glass piercing his eyes and his hands in a vicegrip on the steering wheel, he opened them both and reached for her hands. He had to get a last look before he went. He remembered the way he cried and screamed at her to survive despite the irony of being in the same situation. The cries of a pitiful animal, whimpering and sobbing.
The last image of colour he had.
The last image of life he had.
The last feel of her skin.
The last day she lived.
The last day he lived.
--
And now, he was at the very coffee shop, the very avenue where the accident took place. He could never stop himself from coming back here. He could remember the exact path to take to get here. She had loved the vanilla lattes at this shop particularly, and having a tendency to spoil her, they always went there. She had claimed that that shop's coffee gave her inspiration for her drawings. So she drew there while he took snapshots of her. The shopkeeper had always prepared their lattes and a friendly grin to invite them beforehand.
He lifted the mug to his lips. Not a single drop fell into the abyss of his digestive system. That's all, he thought, picking up his camera and jacket.
He walked out of the store and crossed the road, not stopping even when he stepped on something. He couldn't see it anyway.
There he was, on the other side of the pavement, alone.
Oh man I'm sorry for not updating in more than a year. I was really really busy as it was my major exams this year and I couldn't afford to be a slacker unless I didn't want my tertiary education in a good school. The first part of the story was written like...late last year. OO It was only after my major exams this year that I rummaged through my computer and found all my fiction files and I spotted this and I realised I never got to finishing it. So I decided to finish it up, to finish up this uncompleted oneshot. After...one+ years of procastinating. Gah.
Christmas has just passed over here, so merry christmas to all :D