Mia's voice trembled as she stared at the canvas.
"Why are you drawing that?"
I glanced up from the brush in my hand, black paint dripping from the bristles onto the newspaper I'd spread across the floor.
"Just felt like drawing," I said calmly. "Why are you acting scared? Something happened?"
"What! No. Nothing happened." She forced a laugh that didn't reach her eyes. "It's just… I don't like black birds. Especially this kind of bird. Raven."
I tilted my head.
"Why? What's wrong with it?"
"They steal things," she said quickly. "In fact, they're experts at stealing. They target shiny things."
I looked back at the painting, the half-formed raven, wings spread in shadow, eyes dark and piercing.
"Okay…" I said slowly. "But maybe those shiny things were meant for them?"
Mia's gaze snapped to mine.
She stared at me, long, strange, like she was seeing someone else entirely.
"No," she said, voice low and serious. "They're not."
Silence fell between us.
I sat back on the stool in front of the canvas, dipped the wide brush into the thick black again.
"You're overreacting, Mia."
I started painting once more, long, sweeping strokes that deepened the raven's wings, gave shape to the ruin behind it.
Everything went quiet.
The only sounds were the soft scrape of bristles on canvas and the faint drip of paint hitting the newspaper.
Then Mia spoke again.
"Elliot. I have something to say to you."
I kept painting, but slower now.
"Okay. Say it."
"Look at me."
Something in her tone made me pause.
I sighed, set the brush down.
Turned.
Mia stood there, hands clenched at her sides, eyes shining with something raw and terrified.
She took a shaky breath.
"I love you, Elliot," she said. The words came out fast, like she was afraid they'd escape if she waited. "Will you be mine?"
The words landed like stones in still water.
Ripples spread through me.
I stared at her.
The girl who'd sat by my hospital bed every single day.
Who'd brought fruit when I couldn't eat.
Who'd told me stories about the two years I'd lost.
Who'd never once made me feel like a burden.
I took a slow breath.
She looked back, hopeful, desperate, beautiful in the way broken things sometimes are.
I opened my mouth.
Closed it.
Tried again.
"I'm grateful to you, Mia," I said quietly. "More than grateful. I've always seen you as a good friend. My best friend. But you've been… more than a best friend. You've been there every single day since I woke up. You never left. You stayed with me. You cried for me. You never once made me feel like a burden."
Her eyes brightened. Hope flared.
I kept going.
"Recently… yeah, I've started seeing you differently. More than I thought about it. I really want to try. To start something with you. To see how it turns out."
She stepped forward, breath catching. "That means...."
"But something deep inside me…" I pressed a hand to my chest, right over my heart. "Is screaming that it would be very wrong. Like betrayal. Like I'd be breaking something I don't even remember. So I can only appreciate your feelings, Mia. I can't accept them."
The light in her eyes shattered.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Her face crumpled.
Tears filled her eyes instantly.
She stared at me for one long second.
Then her hand cracked across my face.
Hard.
The slap echoed through the room.
I stumbled back, caught off-balance, and fell onto the palette. Black paint splattered across my shirt, my arms, the floor.
I staggered sideways, cheek burning, and fell against the easel.
My palm hit the palette, black paint smeared across my hand, up my forearm.
Mia stood there shaking, tears streaming now.
"Then look into your heart," she shouted, voice breaking, "and see who's inside it! Don't keep your eyes closed from that most important person!"
She turned.
Stormed out.
The door slammed behind her.
Silence.
I sat there on the floor, cheek stinging, breathing hard.
And then I looked down.
My hands.
Covered in thick, wet black paint.
Smeared up to the elbows.
Black.
Thick.
Wet.
I stared at my hand.
At the black coating my skin.
And something cracked open inside my skull.
A flash.
A memory.
Spilled ink on the classroom floor.
Her kneeling in the mess, short black hair, storm-gray eyes looking up at me.
My handkerchief.
Her voice: "I don't need your pity."
My reply: "I'm not giving pity. I'm helping."
The first time my hands turned black.
Because of her.
Raven!
Everything rushed back.
The rooftop.
Her apartment.
The way she broke under me.
The way she whispered "I love you" in the dark.
The accident.
Her voice on the phone: "Elliot?"
I scrambled to my feet.
Paint smeared everywhere, on the floor, on my jeans, on the canvas.
I didn't care.
I ran.
Out the door.
Down the stairs.
Into the cold January air.
Straight to her apartment.