Under a Shade of Blue | Namjin

4- Presents in Blue

"So that's why you never let me see any of your drawings before?"

We were standing in front of a pile of my portraits of him scattered across my bedroom— from the desk, to the bed, to the floor; all my failed attempts at finding the right shade of blue creating a color gradient wave.

"Pretty much," I leaned against his back and wrapped my arms around his waist, "but now you can know how I truly see you. Well, sort of."

"Sort of?" He grabbed a portrait from the bed, dragging his fingers across the splashes of blue that surrounded his sketched image. "Every single detail on these is spot on."

"Yeah, except for the most important part!" I let go of him, snatching the paper from his hand. "The blue is all wrong. It's always all wrong."

He sat on the edge of the bed, pulling me close. "Aren't you a little hard on yourself?"

"No, you don't understand!" I whined and pouted like a child, putting the sketch down. "Your blue is what drew me to you the first time we met. It was so strong that I couldn't see anything around you on campus, just your aura."

"What about now?" He asked.

"Now that I feel more comfortable around you it only outlines your silhouette, like in the drawings." I hovered my hands around his body, trying to show him where his aura came to an end.

He scrunched up his eyebrows. "Wait, so you never actually needed glasses?"

"No, I never actually needed glasses!" I stomped my feet immaturely. "Have you ever seen me wear any since then?"

"I just thought you were really forgetful!"

"Yeah, ok, we're not all like you, mister." I tapped the glasses he had remembered to put on for once.

"I can't believe this relationship was built on a lie," he joked, hugging me.

"Oh, shut up!" I playfully hit him on the back, his laughter spreading across the room.

"Sorry to break it to you but I can see just fine." I rubbed soothing circles against his back. "So fine that I can apparently also see a color that seemingly doesn't even exist."

He looked up at me, slight concern in his eyes, letting me know the displeasure in my tone hadn't gone undetected. "Maybe you're like a mantis shrimp."

"I'm like a what now?" I asked, stepping back.

"Like a mantis shrimp." He repeated with a laugh. "They're these colorful little crustaceans that live in the ocean; and whereas us mere mortals only have 3 basic color receptive cones— red, green, and blue— they have 16 of them! Which means that they can see hundreds, maybe even thousands of colors that we can't even begin to imagine! Doesn't make them any less real though."

I smiled at his comparison, gently running my fingers through his hair, touched he wanted to make me feel valid. "So you're a butterfly and I'm a mantis shrimp?"

"We're whatever we want to be," he said, pecking the palm of my hand.

My smile dropped then.

"Yeah..." I sat next to him, pushing the drawings out of the way.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing." I laid my head on his shoulder. "It's just that reminded me less than 2 months from now I'll have to go spend the holidays with my family and hear my father go on and on about how I'm wasting my life at a school for the arts. Doesn't really feel like I can be whatever I want."

"And what do you want to be?" He asked.

"I don't know." I turned to face him. "I'm here because I like to draw, and it's the one thing I know I'm good at. But I never really considered it as a career; it's more of a hobby, not like you and your music."