Carmen’s eyes fell on another shade, one that was of Asa’s eyes, reminding her of coffee beans in their most exquisite form. Then another shade which reminded her of his eyes again, but when they were illuminated by the sunlight that sometimes fell on Asa’s face in the most perfect angle, making his eyes look like grounded coffee being blended into water, an almost liquidised gold.
And then Carmen’s hand was reaching for a brush, her hand flying as she splattered the blank canvas in front of her with all the pieces of Asa, the way those pieces seemed to still linger in every nook and cranny of her life, paint splatters that she could never erase.
And then Carmen remembered.
She remembered why colours mattered, why shades of them mattered; why art had always, always mattered.
Carmen remembered because Asa was art himself, the one masterpiece she never truly allowed herself to appreciate and cherish when it had been within her grasp, just waiting for her arms to reach out and take a hold of it.
Asa San Román was a thousand shades of brown and gold, and Carmen West had turned him grey.
“Carmen.” She heard a familiar voice from behind her, and she turned to see her art teacher standing there with a puzzled look. “What are you trying to paint?”
Carmen’s eyes flickered back to the indecipherable piece she’d just created. Then again, indecipherable to whom exactly? Beauty was always in the eyes of the beholder and the same notion applied to the interpretation of art too.
“I don’t know,” she murmured.
This seemed to amuse the teacher. “You always give me that answer when I ask you what the meaning behind your works are.”
Carmen couldn’t exactly name it, but something about that remark got to her. Maybe it was how her teacher still held onto a shred of hope that Carmen would one day offer a genuine response, or maybe it was the sudden realisation that she had been closing herself off to people even in these small ways.
So, when the teacher turned to begin walking away, Carmen spoke. “Warmth,” she said, making the teacher stop in her tracks and turn back around.
“Warmth?”
Carmen gestured to the half-dried painting in front of her. “It’s supposed to be warmth,” she said softly. “Like, if warmth had a colour or could be turned into art, this is what I believe it would look like.”
And if warmth was a person, Carmen knew what he looked like too.
Carmen had known warmth. Had known it in its purest form. And truth be told, she missed it.
She missed him.
“That’s…that’s actually pretty deep,” the teacher said, mouth lifting into an appreciative smile. “Quite the perceptive mind you’ve got there, Carmen.”
She just smiled in response, watching as the teacher walked away and headed towards another student, probably asking them what the story behind their painting was.
Asa’s and Carmen’s story couldn’t be narrated through one single painting though. No, a museum would be needed for that.
A museum where everything that hung on its walls were timeless and spoke of ancient souls and were simply magical, forever preserved for future generations to discover and marvel at.
But is that what Carmen wanted? To let them be nothing but a part of history? For her to watch him behind glass doors? Didn’t she want to be lacing her fingers through his instead? To stand beside him? To feel that certain warmth only he was capable of spreading through her?
No, Carmen decided. She didn’t want to watch him from behind glass doors. She didn’t want to marvel at him like a common stranger.
She wanted him. Not the way he made her feel—but him.
She wanted his beautiful mind, his heart of gold, his courageous soul—every crack, crevice and jagged edge of Asa’s entire being.
Carmen had to hit rock bottom to climb back up, and maybe it worked the same way with relationships too. Sometimes two people had to crash land before they could soar. A big maybe. And an even bigger sometimes.
But Asa had once told her that life always found a way and that she just needed to know where to look. Carmen was willing to take a leap of faith towards the possibility that the two of them together could just be the one in a million that found a way.
She wasn’t going to wait for life to find that way for her. She was going to put herself out there and pave a path with her own two hands and feet. Because the problem wasn’t that Asa and Carmen were the wrong fit. They’d been the perfect fit, just with horrible timing.
And Carmen wanted to believe that the right people with wrong timing could be lucky enough to find their way back to each other.
It was a belief she was ready to fight for. A belief she was ready to wage war against the whole universe for.
•••
Carmen was so not ready to wage that war. She was standing a few feet away from Asa, watching as he grabbed a book from his locker and stuffed it into his bag and all she could do was stare.
She wondered if it was an old classic or if he was just rereading the Harry Potter series all over again. And if it was the latter, she also wondered if he had to skip the death of that Black character, a scene that Asa had once mentioned was unbearable.
She almost started walking towards him right then, but caught herself before she could get any further. Every time her feet took one step forward, all that echoed through her head was a brokenhearted “I hate you”.
Part of Carmen was hesitant because she didn’t know what to expect if she actually did approach Asa. She’d never been on the receiving