girls of effulgence | bts

thirty-two

The colors of the girls were no more. It was as if someone had dripped water onto the chromatic and bright ladies and spread all of the colors from them onto the couches, flowers, and tables, leaving them as sketched and boring pencil drawings.

It was a literal sense as well. The girls were cut out from an old photograph and were taped onto the colorful background. All seven of them were dark grays, whites, and blacks, and their smiles had been wiped off by the whiteout that had hazed over them. The color was oozing away from them, dripping and slopping away from the girls like the colors were evaporating. One could even see the colors floating away from them like the wind swept petals if they looked hard enough. The sight was so horrid that the two boys had to shut the door and hold each other, sobbing into each other's arms.

They weren't sad because of how the girls now were, they were sad because, inside their hearts, they were the ones that have caused this. They'd be lying if they told someone that these girls just happened like this. In fact, sad wasn't even close to what either of them had felt. There was no way to personify the everlasting image that seared into their brains, the image of happiness vacuumed out of seven girls who should have never had anything to do with them but had the unfortunate displeasure to ever be on their radar. And now, because of their evil, the sins had ruined seven innocent lives.

And as Greed walked down the hallway and stood at that very same door where the tears were shed, he wondered if those very same tears blotted out his own colors as well. Greed's hand shook as he raised it to knock. He decided in his mind that it would be better, and also more polite to knock instead of barging in like Envy had done. This way would force one of them to get up and move. It seemed like a good idea, unless they all felt so unmoved to not stand up, and Greed would stay outside their door forever, stuck.

Three pounds echoed through the air, and then three inside Greed's chest. He had done it, there was no turning back from it now. Greed put his hand down and then put it behind his back, and interlocked his hand with his other. It was only time to wait. Time was only something that was man-made, unlike he, the sins, or the virtues. This would be simple to wait on.

Greed's three pounds inside his heart escalated into hundreds when he heard footsteps on the other side of the door. He tensed, his entire body tensed with the terrible thought of what he was going to see behind that door. What was he going to say? Do? He wished he had rehearsed lines to say because at that moment he felt like an actor that had forgotten them on stage.

As the footsteps drew nearer, Gluttony's heart wept faster and faster, and harder and harder. What was he actually going to say? He suddenly forgot why he was even at the door. Would leaving the door be polite? Could he simply disappear into nothing? Maybe the girls were moving around now and they were ignoring him? He thought that was okay if he was them he'd want to ignore him too.

The doorknob twisted and two unseeing eyes shifted into focus, looked back at him.

Every question Greed had inside him drooped and he had no idea what to say. The eyes had nothing to say either, though he was glad for that. Seeing eyes talk would confirm that he was indeed going insane. "Can I help you?" Said a small voice that Greed was glad was not his own. "Erm," he said intelligently back. He felt like he was asking a girl on a date and he was just as human as a human could be.

Though he could not speak, Greed could see perfectly well. The girl's eyes, whichever one was brave enough to speak with him, were still as gray as they were on that unforgettable day. If not so, they were even damper than they were before, like a blind man's eyes.

Those same eyes blinked, and from where Gluttony could see, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Feeling the need to speak, in fear of her shutting the door on him, he puffed up his chest and tried to say something, anything.