Midnight Muse

“What’s going on with him?” He asked, jerking his head to where Rory and Knox were talking quietly. The latter watched Reid and my interaction with intense eyes. “I thought you two didn’t like each other, but now you’re hanging out with him all of the time? Did I miss something?”

A pang of guilt gnawed at my stomach. I felt bad for not telling Reid about my new relationship with Knox, but I’d been wanting to tell him over coffee or lunch, and with the end of the semester projects and tests coming up, the both of us had been too busy to properly hang out.

My cheeks blazed and it was hard to look him in his eyes when he seemed so confused, so hurt. “Yeah, um, Knox and I are sort of dating now.”

He frowned at me, and for the first time in our friendship, I felt like a terrible friend.

Reid frowned. “Sort of?”

“We are.” I shook my head, answering him more solidly that time. “We’re dating.”

I didn’t miss the betrayal that flashed through his eyes. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

I sighed, kicking and digging the tip of my shoe into the concrete for something else to focus on. I didn’t like the way that Reid was looking at me, like I was no longer his friend, which wasn’t the case at all. If there was something more to our friendship, he hadn’t made it known.

It seemed like Knox had enough, pushing up from his motorcycle to ascend the stairs. His strides were long, sure, and his spine lengthened with each step closer, his chest puffing bigger, his shoulders widening.

“Hey, Princess.”

“Knox,” I greeted with a nervous smile, accepting the way he tucked me into his side and pressed a kiss to my cheek. I felt them burn quickly with the blatant display of our relationship in front of Reid. “This is Reid,” I spoke nervously. “Reid, this is Knox.”

The two of them stared, sizing each other up. It made me shift on my feet and Knox’s arm around my waist only tightened, showing me off, staking his claim.

It was awkward beyond belief, to say the least. Neither of them greeted each other and it was as if they had both been waiting for the other to break eye contact first so that the other could snap at their neck like a rabid dog. I shot a look towards Rory, but her head was buried in her phone, an enormous smile on her face, completely oblivious to the pissing contest that was happening right up the stairs.

A muscle ticked in Reid’s jaw before he ripped his gaze away from Knox to settle back on mine. The caramel eye sharp and confused, the blue sad and untrusting. It made my chest ache, and my words twisted on my tongue. I wasn’t able to get anything out before Reid abruptly said, “I have to go, actually, before I’m late. I’ll see you around, Quinn.”

“Reid,” I called, but he’d already turned down the stairs and was brushing past Rory, whose eyebrows furrowed with concern at the sight of him. She tried to speak to him as well, but he brushed her off gently. When she shifted her bright azure eyes on me, confusion swimming in them like pools, I deflated into Knox’s side.

I feel similar now to how I did then, defeated and glum. The piece of drawing paper before me is filled with the darkness from my charcoal, my fingers coated in the chalky substance, and the shapes I’ve been sketching stare back at me, taunting me, because no one is going to be able to finish this except for me.

It’s a fairly simple task, to draw yourself as some sort of hybrid animal that represents our inner selves, but as I look in the mirror hanging to my left, I can’t seem to figure out what kind of creature resonates with me.

Rory has drawn herself mixed with a dove, for peace and hope. Hope that she’d get over the heartbreak that Max left her with at the end of freshman year. Hope to find someone that would treat her better.

When I asked Ace, Slate, and Knox what they had done when they took this class last year, Ace had said that he drew himself with dragon features, Slate morphed himself with a grizzly bear, and Knox had drawn himself as a bat.

The last time I spoke to Reid before our friendship became strained, he’d been drawing half of his face as a fox, and I’d seen one of the other girls in our class, Wynter, I think her name is, drawing herself as a phoenix. Everyone seemed to light up with their ideas immediately when Beatrice had announced the final project, and I think I was the only one who ducked their head, unsure of what to do.

Voices down the hall startle me from my thoughts. I set my chalk down when I recognize the tenor, the laughter echoing around the silent building. Knox and Slate appear in the doorway to the classroom. Slate is splattered with clay from working on his own final sculpture of the year, something that he’s been boasting about but refuses to tell any of us what it is, and the smile that lights Knox’s face when our eyes connect is just perfect.

I didn’t realize how tense my shoulders were, but the way that they fall at the sight of him makes me realize how exhausted I actually am. There isn’t much time left until this project is due, and I’m sure to remind myself that once again: I need to focus.

But the way Knox’s gaze drags down to where my hands are settled in my lap, coated in soot from the charcoal, flaring with an impossible heat that makes my stomach flip-flop and my thighs try to shut around the drawing horse I’m straddling, I’m forgetting the deadline and the project I’ve barely started.

I’d like to straddle him instead.

“Hey, Princess,” Knox greets, leaning down to press a firm kiss to my mouth. My stomach explodes with butterflies and I can’t help but to slant against him, my energy from my long night sapped with his softness.

His hand caresses my cheek and he frowns, concerned as he examines my exhausted and frustrated state.

My heart flutters at the warmth, at the care he shows me. How he isn’t afraid to hide his hands from me because I’ve spent night after night showing him just how beautiful they are.

“Hi,” I reply with a soft yet strained smile, turning to Slate next. “Hey, Slate.”

“Hey, Quinnie. How’s the art project coming along?”

I crumple, leaning further into Knox’s warmth. “Not amazing, if I’m being honest.”