Written on My Heart

She was almost perfect.

Her skin was soft and warm, her smile faint yet radiant. Dark curls danced around her face, brushing her cheeks like the softest of hands, refusing to be held back. Her eyes shone with secret sadness and glittered with untold joy.

If only she was real.

The tip of his pencil darkened the swirls of graphite hair, its rhythmic scratching the only sign that there was a world beyond this paper. The pencil might as well have been a part of his hand itself; his soul seeped onto the page with every stroke. Then he stopped. Yes, she was almost perfect. Almost.

Marc examined the cover of the book next to him: Sienna Evergarden and the Golden Veil. The girl on the cover matched his drawing almost perfectly, down to the almost-smile she wore. And yet, something was still missing. Maybe it was the lighting.

Marc glanced upwards, shielding his eyes from the sun’s glare. No, not the lighting. It was bright but cold, not quite warm enough to be almost June. The other students of his high school were milling around with the signature lethargy of the end of the year; by this point, nobody had the energy to pretend they cared. He slid back further on the edge of the concrete steps, hoping that shadows would hide him from view.

No such luck. Amongst the apathetic crowd of students, there were two figures moving with a purpose, and they were coming towards him. Marc recognized them by build before he saw their faces—Zane and Austin. Dread settled low in his stomach.

“What’cha doing, loverboy?” sneered Zane, who was convinced that he ought to be famous and was the only person on the planet to hold this belief.

Marc kept his head down. “Just get it over with. I’ve got money if you want it.”

“That takes all the fun out of it,” complained Austin, a boy with the appearance and intellect of the average boulder.

“Yeah, even your girlfriend is ashamed of you,” Zane added, kicking a rock at Marc's sketchbook. It hit Marc's leg instead. “Or she would be, if she was real.”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Marc said flatly. “Why is this any of your business?”

“Because I said so,” Zane replied intelligently. This, in his opinion, was the only reason anyone should do anything.

“Give me that.” Austin grabbed Marc’s sketchbook and leered at the drawing. He snorted and showed it to Zane.

“Now, that’s just sad,” said Zane. “She is way out of your league, Martin.”

“That’s not...” Marc sighed and decided to stay quiet. “Can I have that back, please?”

“So polite. This girl would not touch you,” Zane laughed, ripping the page out of Marc’s sketchbook. “I think I’ll keep her. She’d be much happier with me anyway.”

“Give it back,” Marc demanded quietly.

“I don’t think I want to,” Zane said. He handed the drawing to Austin. “But I don’t want it either. It’s ugly anyway.”

Marc’s fists curled in his lap. “Give it back.”

“Fine. Here.” Austin dropped the drawing in a puddle with a smirk.

“C’mon. Let’s leave loverboy alone with his girlfriend.” Zane led Austin back towards the school, snickering.

Marc crept towards the puddle and quietly scooped up his soggy drawing.

“One last day of this,” he whispered, brushing a few droplets away with his thumb.

Water rolled down the paper, running from her eyes like tears.

Marc studied the flyer in his hand as he walked.

Sketching Life: Thursdays at 3pm

Arts and Community Center

Anything to get away from home for a while, he thought. Summer had its benefits, but being trapped at home with his mother was not one of them. He could lose himself to pencil and paper for an hour or two, maybe even learning something in the process. It sounded like the perfect sanctuary.

As Marc made his way to the site of the class, he could feel the eyes of passerby sliding over him, as if he were another building or a particularly boring billboard. He was the sort of boy who managed to be funny-looking and entirely forgettable at the same time; he had long legs but a short body, eyes that were never just one color, and skin that hung like dusk between light and dark. His thin frame looked as if it ought to strain under the weight of the books he was constantly carrying, but on the contrary, their weight was familiar. It was comforting to know that he would always have the freedom to escape to another world.

There, up ahead, among the patchwork of doors that ran along the sidewalk, was a pair of double doors with a flyer on them that matched his. Marc pushed on the doors, but they refused to open.

A girl with dark, curly hair pulled on the door and went in past him.

“Smooth,” Marc muttered to himself, noticing that the doors read PULL. He tugged on the handle with more force than was really necessary and stepped inside.

The space was filled with a mismatched assortment of paint-spattered tables and chairs. Paintings and sketches adorned the walls, while works of sculpture and pottery covered the shelves. Marc felt at home instantly.

There were a few people already there, but Marc didn’t see the girl who’d pushed past him when he arrived. He seated himself in a plastic lime-green chair, set his sketchbook down on the table, and started doodling on the edge of a page.

As the space started to fill, Marc lost himself to the bliss of drawing. Tiny figures scampered up and down the edges of the page, peering out from the corners and dancing along the borders. Surely they had their own lives—stories he had yet to think of, homes and families waiting in his head to be discovered. The possibilities were dauntingly endless. Maybe, for instance, this one—

“Welcome, everyone! Please take your seats so we can start.”

Marc’s head snapped up. He quickly flipped his sketchbook to a new page.

The instructor, a college-age girl with a mane of thick, coarse black curls held back by a colorful bandana, gestured towards the easel that displayed her massive sketchpad. “So, you’ve got a blank page. A lot of people find this part scary, but I think it’s exciting! This is where you do what only you can—decide what you want to create. Inspiration can come from anywhere. While you think about that, let me introduce myself. I’m Daphne, and I love old, silent movies. I’m also afraid of butterflies.” She grinned and adjusted the many colorful bangles that hung from her wrist. “I won’t make you play an introductions-type game—no worries—but I would like you to try and get to know each other! We’ll have a break halfway through where you can talk, if you want.”

Marc grinned. He wasn’t sure he wanted to talk to anyone, but the instructor’s energy was infectious, and he could feel himself relax as she spoke. He already knew exactly what he wanted to draw—he had a sketch to replace, and hopefully to make better.

“Today we’re going to be working on drawing people,” Daphne was saying. A few of the other students groaned. “It’s okay,” she said with a grin. “They don’t have to be portraits. You can draw a character, or somebody you make up.”

She looked, Marc thought, like she belonged in this room—her entire appearance seemed to burst with color, from the jewelry adorning her hands and wrists to the numerous thin belts around her waist, to the splatters of paint on her jeans.

“Let’s start with an outline,” she said, sketching a circle on her paper. “Use a light, gentle hand, since you’ll want to erase this later.” Over the circle, she added a guideline for facial features and a rough jawline.”

Marc, having done this already, watched the other students draw. A boy younger than he was, sporting a head of impressively lime-green hair, was scowling at his paper. Marc wondered where the girl was that he had encountered earlier—he had never seen her face.

“Now, your person will start to come to life at this step,” Daphne explained. “Think about what kind of person they are and try to show that in their features and their expression.”

Marc gently traced the shapes onto his page—bright eyes, a sad smile, a small, rounded nose. His lips curled into a faint smile even just drawing her. In those eyes lay her courage; in that smile, her longing for peace. The words of the lesson faded into the background as his pencil traced the features he knew so well, filling in the gentle curls around her face and shading the rich tan of her skin. He added the almost unnoticeable constellation of freckles just alongside her nose, the hopeful curl of her eyelashes, the—

“Hey, you okay? We’re on break.”

Marc’s head jolted up—

And his drawing was staring back at him, more real and more radiant than his sketches could ever capture. There were her eyes, staring at him through all the colors of a river at once. There was her hair, curling gently around her face and refusing to be held back. She even had the tiny cluster of freckles beside her nose.

He had never seen anyone so beautiful.

“I—fine,” he managed.

“If you’re sure.” She even sounded exactly the way he’d imagined. “You didn’t seem to hear the lesson—I thought you might be in some kind of trance.”

Marc might as well have been. He didn’t want to seem like he was staring at her, but he could hardly help it. “Yeah, yeah, I’m...I’m okay. I was just...just focusing...on the drawing. I like to draw,” he added stupidly.

“So do I!” she said excitedly, apparently having some pity for him. “What are you working on?”

Mark clumsily grabbed his sketchbook and pulled it close to his chest. What kind of creep would she think he was if she saw that? “It’s...it’s not very good,” he said quickly. “And...it’s not done yet...”

“Well, I’d like to see it when it’s done,” she said with a warm smile. Marc touched his wrist under the table to make sure his heart was still beating.

“I’m Sienna, by the way,” she said. She got to her feet and strolled towards the door. “There’s a vending machine outside. I’ll see you after break!”

“Yeah...see you...” Marc slowly set his sketchbook back on the table. Somehow, his drawing looked much less impressive now.