Prologue
Springville, Ohio, was the kind of town that felt painted by a gentle hand—wide fields of young corn swaying like whispered secrets, lakes holding reflections clearer than memory, and sunsets that bled soft gold into violet every evening. Life moved slower here, but feelings did not. Especially the ones left unspoken.
Before tragedy rewrote his world, Sandy was a boy who saw colors like music. He came from a small but radiant family—Elizabeth, his mother, warm-voiced and patient; Macoy, his father, broad-shouldered with quiet humor; and Jake, his younger brother, whose laughter was a permanent echo in their home.
Sandy was seventeen when he first met Shawn.
It was early September, the smell of leather, grass, and late summer heat wrapped around Springville High’s football field. Sandy was not an athlete—he was a boy who loved sketching the world instead of running through it. He often sat at the highest bleachers, notebook on his lap, drawing sunsets mid-practice while everyone else watched the game.
Shawn was already a star at eighteen—tall, blond, confident, the town’s golden boy. He moved like someone who already knew where he belonged. The football jersey hugged his frame like a declaration.
Their first real encounter wasn’t romantic. But it felt like something neither could name.
The football spiraled too far during a passing drill—far enough to hit Sandy’s sketchbook and knock it down the bleachers. Pages scattered like startled birds.
“Shit, sorry!” Shawn jogged toward him.
Sandy hurried to gather the loose papers. “It’s fine, really. It happens.”
Shawn bent down, collecting a charcoal sketch of the lake at dusk. He paused. “You drew this?”
Sandy blinked. “Yeah. I like drawing places I don’t want to forget.”
Shawn stared at the paper longer than needed. “Funny. I draw plays so I don’t forget. You draw sunsets. Same panic, different subject.”
Sandy smiled softly. “I guess we’re both scared of losing something.”
Their eyes met—Sandy’s dark, steady… Shawn’s bright, searching. A quiet static filled the air between them, like a held breath.
Jake appeared then, rushing up the bleachers. “Sandy! Mom said dinner’s almost ready. We gotta go!”
Shawn stood up as well, brushing grass off his jeans. “Jake’s your brother?”
“Unfortunately, yeah,” Jake joked.
Sandy chuckled. “Don’t mind him. He’s dramatic by design.”
Jake waved at Shawn. “You’re Shawn Carter, right? The one Coach keeps yelling at to not break his ankle again?”
Shawn smirked. “Guilty.”
Jake leaned closer to Sandy and whispered too loudly, “Dude’s basically Springville royalty now.”
Sandy shoved him lightly. “Jake, shush.”
But Shawn heard, and laughed. “Royalty bleeds too, man. Trust me.”
Another beat of silence—another unexplained pull.
Before they parted, Shawn tossed the football gently into Sandy’s hands. “For peace offering. You keep it. Maybe draw it someday.”
Sandy looked down at the leather ball, warm from play. “I don’t know how to draw movement.”
“You don’t need to,” Shawn said, stepping backward toward the field. “Just draw the moment it almost slipped away.”
Sandy kept that ball for years.
Their next encounters always had that strange tension—quiet, curious, electric, confusing. They never spoke of it, but they both felt it like a second pulse.
Once, in the hallway after a big game, Sandy congratulated him.
“You played well today,” Sandy said.
Shawn leaned against the lockers, helmet tucked under his arm. “You sound surprised.”
Sandy shrugged. “Not surprised. Just stating truth.”
Shawn tilted his head slightly. “You always sound like you’re reading from a novel in your head.”
Sandy laughed lightly. “Maybe I am.”
Shawn leaned closer—not invading space, but bending just enough to blur it. “Then save me a chapter sometime.”
Sandy froze for a breath. “I only write tragedies.”
Shawn smiled—soft, unexpected. “Good. Then I’ll feel immortal.”
But neither of them knew how close that line was to prophecy.
Months passed, seasons turned, and Jake grew into his own world, while Sandy continued painting sunsets and sketching the quiet town he loved.
Then came the accident.
It was during a family spring vacation—Sandy, Elizabeth, Macoy, and Jake driving toward the border of Hocking Hills. The morning sun filtered through the trees, painting the dashboard in warm stripes. The family sang softly to the radio, windows slightly open, letting in the smell of pine and wildflowers.
Elizabeth turned toward the backseat with a smile. “Sandy, stop drawing and look outside for once. You’ll miss the real thing.”
Sandy closed his sketchbook reluctantly. “I’m looking, Mom.”
Jake grinned. “He’s lying. He’s just memorizing shades so he can paint it later.”
Macoy laughed as he drove. “At least our boy preserves beauty. Some people just pass through it blind.”
The irony of that sentence would haunt him forever.
A truck—too fast, brakes screeching, swerving at the bend—collision like thunder splitting earth.
The world turned white for Sandy before turning dark.
He survived. Jake survived.
Elizabeth and Macoy did not.
And Sandy lost the world’s colors.
Years later, Sandy turned 25—blind, gentle, living in the same town that still greeted him by name. He lived alone with Jake, now sixteen, a high school student who became his anchor and his hands when the world felt too distant.
Shawn left town after graduation, working in a corporate office in a city far from farms and lakes, but always returning every weekend. Every weekend, something inside him whispered the same unnamed longing he carried since youth.
