The studio smelled like turpentine, charcoal dust, and half-finished ideas. It was late—of course it was late, because both of you thrived at hours where the rest of Nevermore was dead silent. You and Xavier had claimed this corner of the academy as your own from the very first week. Two easels side by side, canvases leaning against cracked brick walls, sketches layered over sketches until it all blurred into one enormous, chaotic mural of the both of you.

You’d always clicked. He was that brooding, annoyingly gifted boy who could turn shadows into shapes and paint emotion like it was bleeding from his veins. You were fire to his quiet smoke—bold strokes, colors so vivid they demanded attention. Opposites, but in a way that only made sense in art: your chaos and his control completing each other.

It had been friendship at first. Sharing paint, teasing each other’s drafts, long nights with music humming from someone’s old speaker while you worked until your hands ached. Xavier was the only one who could sit in silence with you for hours without it feeling heavy. The only one who understood that art wasn’t a hobby—it was survival.

But lately, something had shifted.

It wasn’t about the way he leaned over your shoulder, his breath brushing your neck as he pointed out a detail in your sketch. It wasn’t even about the way your knees kept bumping beneath the shared worktable, neither of you pulling away anymore. It was in the pauses—how you caught him watching you mix colors, how his sketches of faceless figures suddenly had your profile hidden in the lines. How laughter lingered too long.

That night, it was quieter than usual. He was working on some moody piece—charcoal smudges staining his fingers—while you battled with your own unfinished canvas. The room was soft with lamplight, warm shadows dancing over peeling plaster.