wally's lament.

[ 6 ]

⫸——⫷

A cold sweat broke out over your skin as you watched Wally place a canvas on his easel, which was in the front of the room. He started talking about lines, shape and color, sometimes painting something on his board as he went on.

You were shaking slightly and tried to hide it. Wally told everyone to paint a tree, but when you tried to do so, your hand was shivering so bad that you painted a green and brown blob. It hardly looked like a tree at all.

Wally started to walk around the room, individually critiquing everyone on their shading and whatnot. He started with Poppy and went down the line, which meant he would be critiquing you last. Sometimes, he took something off of the coffee table — a utensil or a new color — and handed it to a friend to instruct them to use it.

You absently worked on fixing your tree. You had taken two brushes and a small amount of green, brown, tan, black, blue and yellow paints from the table and were working on making your terrible blob look better. It was not working, for your thoughts could not depart from Wally.

Soon enough, it was your turn. He leaned down next to you, looking over your shoulder and examining your artwork. "And how are you doing, Charlie?"

You felt your heart rate quicken. If your anxiety stayed this high for much longer, you were sure to have a heart attack. It already felt like you were teetering on the edge of a full blown panic attack. But you had to keep it together. For appearances.

"I'm doing fine," you managed. "I'm not great at shading."

"That's okay!" Wally said. He examined your painting for another moment, then looked at you. You avoided his pointed gaze. "Mind if I give you some tips?"

"Sure."

"So, I can see you have some blue and yellow. As I'm sure you know, those combine to make green — so, instead of using green mixed with black to shade your leaves, use yellow mixed with blue, or green mixed with blue. It offers a more natural change."

You briefly remembered when you first met Wally. His voice was currently giving you that same soothing sensation that a singer's voice might give like it did before. But unlike that first day, you were too afraid of him to slip into that lovely daydream of having dinner with him again.

"That makes sense," you breathed.

Wally paused, staring at you. He was smiling. You forced yourself to glance up at him and offer a smile in return, hoping it would make you look less anxious. It probably did not work because the second you looked into the depths of his eyes, the blood flushed from your face. You quickly looked away again and started to mix blue and green in your palette.

"Are you okay?" Wally whispered. "You look a little pale."

"I'm okay," you said. "Just nervous about my painting."

"You have nothing to be nervous about. At least, nothing regarding your artwork." Wally smiled, then stood up.

He was so kind. So charming. So terrifying. So handsome. So threatening.

You took a deep breath.

It was fine. Just because he knew what your name used to be did not mean he knew what you did.