f a m i l i a r i t y. - [fierrochase]

fourteen 🐍

ALEX ;

     "Well, it looks like a cake."

     "No, Maggie-boy. It looks like a piece of shit with strawberry frosting."

     "But, it's a cake." Alex cringed.

     "I'm so not eating that."

     "Agreed." Said Magnus as he pushed the failed attempt they wanted to call a cake away from the both of them.

     Alex cringed from the sight of the mess they've made. Magnus looked at her and knew by just Alex's frown that she was bored and had no idea what to do next, just like him. "Hey, wanna hang at the living room?" He asked once he finally disposed of the mush.

     She beamed, and nodded almost instantly. She quickly withdrew her excitement and cleared her throat, making sure she looked as professional as she could be. She didn't want Magnus to know that that's all she wanted—more time with him being idle and just talking about life.

      Alex was almost as curious as Magnus. She had dwelled on the longing, the same longing as a hungry wolf had when it hasn't hunted for days, the same longing as that one time you forgot to bring an umbrella and it rained—that longing you desired that somehow, in another time, how she would wish she had had that umbrella—how she had wished she'd hunted for food. Had she been curious, she would claim a thousand answers, and evaluate to none. As she would climb the highest peaks just to confirm a town's location and physique—how she would let her curiosity make the best of her in many ways obscure to emotions.

     "But please," Magnus said before she went straight to the living room. "Wash your face and hair, you have batter all over it." He said with a laugh that Alex would've painted a million times in different angles, different colors, with different meaning etched in a single laughter. It was as if the sight was Impressionism—a way of painting valid for the audience to feel the same thing that is in the painting, to make the audience experience the same joy, the same happiness in that single painting. Or had it been Expressionism—that of the same as Impressionism, but a way where the painting would express the amount of emotions drifting in the kaleidoscopic sputters of paint. Alex had loved his laughed as much as she loved art, confirming that Magnus' smile is art.

     She laughed and made her way to the sink, adjusting her sleeves as she turned on the tap. Instantly, the cold water came rushing down as she cupped her hands and caught the freezing water, making it have contact with her face and her bangs—rinsing away the batter and the ickiness. And Magnus was beside her, now with a towel in his hands as he looked at her with almost expressionless eyes—but not enough to be cold. Those piercing gray eyes just seemed to speak for themselves, muttering an array of words clustered into poems, a dismantling bouquet of withering tulips that seemed to lack it's colors. Magnus' eyes also carried more that just that—those eyes carried emotions, mystery, an untold story.

     She had finished washing her face and dried it with the towel Magnus had offered her. Magnus washed his face too, and quickly dried off with the same towel. Because you know, Magnus was an independent child—why would he have two towels.

      "So." Alex spoke up. "Let's go?" Magnus nodded and they both went to the living room, Alex leading the way. They both sat down, adjacent to each other as Alex brought out her sketch pad.

     "I've been meaning to ask." Magnus said out of the blue. He too, had grabbed a pad of stationary, a notebook with clear white pages and a pen were in his hands. Alex looked up from her sketch pad, she hadn't sketched anything yet, but she was building up thoughts and ideas of anything—anything but Magnus. She wasn't making the same mistake again, she didn't want to look like a creep to Magnus.

     "Yeah?" She asked, cocking an eyebrow up. Magnus seemed to have blushed, a timid smile brushed upon his face as he had scratched his cheek. Alex would've said he looked cute like that, but apparently, Alex was too caught up in what he was about to say. She was nervous, she was anticipating and fearful at the same time as she held her breathe to what Magnus was planning to ask. "I kinda want to know who that girl was—you know, the girl who uh, asked you to paint me." He chuckled awkwardly. "I'm not really into this whole love thing, feelings, even. So I guess it wouldn't hurt to know what that girl's like. Not that I'm planning on making moves to her! It's not like that!"

     He had crossed his arms over his face, with his eyes closed and lips curled to a frown. Alex wanted to slap herself when she realized Magnus was talking about the girl she used as an excuse for her creepiness—but really, she wanted to slap herself for what she did back there. She didn't want to embarrass herself and make Magnus think she's creepy for painting him, but she also didn't want Magnus to dream of this girl that admires him, and get his hopes up. And Alex made up her mind—she'll tell him the truth.

     "Uhh.." she had started saying as she dropped her sketch pad on her lap. She took in a breathe and picked it up over to the coffee table and sighed—she built up enough confidence as she withdrew her nervousness. She'd have to tell him the truth now or never. "You see, Maggie—"

     "Magnus." He corrected. Alex grunted.

     "Do you want to know or?"

     "Maggie it is."

     "She's not real." Alex said as she drew an outline of Magnus' face, tracing an invisible line of detail to frame his face with that shoulder-length blond hair, doodling the eyes with the same intensity as those of storm clouds. She just continued on drawing without looking at Magnus—a strategy she just at that moment discovered. "That girl who says to admire you is not real. I made her up. I painted you because I was bored."

     "Oh." Alex looked up to Magnus who had a silly look of relief on his face. Why is he relieved? Doesn't this guy know what I said? Alex had protested in her mind. She gave him a questioning look.

     "Won't you be devastated—like ah, What the flipping fuck, Alex? Why? Or something beyond the lines of Fuck you! How dare you make a fool out of me? Or you know, the usual angry react—"

     "No." Magnus said as he cackled lightly, moving his sight to the poem he was writing. "I'm actually fine with knowing that you were the one who wanted me painted—not some girl I don't know." He smiled as he wrote words in his notebook. Alex just traced his face with her eyesight—from those intense eyes looking down to the stationary in his hands, looking as if they were storm clouds that carried precipitation that would fall upon the rooftops of houses, the rain that would fall and calm down those who had issues and attraction to the rain. To the cute button nose, where a few freckles were being stubborn and laid there softly—a detail she had seen only know. Magnus had been pale, but those specks of brown were visible to her now. And somehow, she had the slightest desire to connect those dots, and make them a constellation. As Magnus seemed like the blue serene of the sky—and those freckles were the obscure stars. She had traced to his lips, a smile on it. She had wondered how a person would be so kissable, without having to kiss that person.

     "What are you saying?" Alex laughed—an attempt to shield out her nervousness. Magnus only smiled at her.

     "I don't know. With you, everything just seems more right." Magnus smiled.

     Alex smiled back.

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BITCH GUESS WHO SUCKS AT ANALOGIES AND ALL THIS SAPPY SHIT

ME

ANYWAY I HOPE YOU LOVED THIS UPDATE! I'M HAVING A LONG WEEKEND FROM SCHOOL AND YES FUCK YES I AM ALIVE AND LIVING SO YEAH