Artwork [h.s]

sixty-seven

"Sierra" I heard someone call me in the second I entered the classroom and I looked up, discovering that my teacher was looking at me.

I slowly put my bag down next to my desk, taking my time as I took the coat off and carefully wrapped it around the back of the chair under her attentive stare, before finally deciding that I was done and walking up to her desk at the front of the class.

"Congratulations" She simply said, quickly putting an open magazine on the wooden desk between us as soon as I neared her.

I widened my eyes and my gaze drifted to the piece of paper quickly while I covered the last steps between us, immediately recognising the lines of my own drawing on the sheet. I took it quickly and spun it around, widening my eyes when I realised that it was indeed my artwork, and quickly reading the few sentences at the bottom of the page, my lips parting in surprise as I let my eyes scan over it multiple times, not believing the words printed on the paper right away.

Third place. My drawing had won the third place. It wasn't bad at all for an artwork that I'd put together in barely a couple of days. I couldn't believe that I'd made it, and I couldn't help but wonder what would've happened if I'd spent a longer time on the drawing I'd sent in. My mind immediately drifted to the drawing I'd made of Harry, and I wondered how that one would've done instead. I shrugged the thought away, not wanting to think about it in that moment, not wanting it to stain my win.

"You can keep it if you want" she said, barely acknowledging my presence as she sat down at her desk, pushing the magazine towards me with her hand. "It's not like there's someone else who made it anyway."

I nodded slowly, ignoring her last comment and taking it with me as I made my way back to my desk.

The rest of the class went by in a blur and, before I even knew it, the bell rang, signalling the end of it.

I took the magazine, that was still open on that same page on my desk, and I finally closed it, giving my drawing one last glance even though I perfectly knew that I would've found it there when I would've opened it again. I put it in my bag and closed it quickly before putting on my coat and taking all my belongings and leaving the class just as fast.

• • •

"I won third place" I said all of sudden while we were sitting on my bed.

Harry looked up instantly from the book he was studying on at my words. He stared at me for a few seconds as he tried to place the meaning of my words. "That's great" he said at the end, giving me an enigmatic glance.

I smiled, nodding and scooting to the side so that I could take the magazine from my bag, that I'd left at the bottom of my bed. I pulled it out quickly and rushed through the pages, ignoring the first two prizes and showing him mine. "I mean, it's no first prize but I think it's still good?" I said, my question coming out as a sentence as I wondered if he was happy about the result as well, or if he was disappointed because he thought I could've done better.

He finally put his school book down and took the magazine as I handed it to him, staring at it for a few seconds with the same enigmatic look on his face. "The first one was still better" he told me, his voice low, and I rolled my eyes at his words, knowing that he couldn't see me.

"You know I spilled latte on it" I told him gently, wanting him to know that I would've never replaced him if I'd had another possibility. We both knew that he wouldn't have been my last model and that I would've worked with many other people in the future, and we both knew that it was perfectly normal and didn't mean anything, but for some reason I couldn't help but feel like I'd betrayed him in some way by drawing Liam, and I couldn't help but think that he too felt at least a little betrayed by my choice, considering the way he usually talked about it. I wish I could've just told him that it wasn't a big deal at all and that I certainly wouldn't have stopped drawing him just because Liam had modelled for me once, but considering that we'd both come close when Harry had been forced to model for me, it wasn't so difficult to realise why he was so unsettled by it.