F L O W E R S | TRONNOR A.U.

O N E

Troye can understand art. He understands how to bring a picture to life, he understands the dire importance of using a 2H pencil for sketching instead of a 2B (because really, it is more important than most would think), and he understands when to use oils over acrylics. Troye understands how to create highlights and shadows, where to put them, and he knows how to do all this with something as simple as the ballpoint pen you find in your car.

Troye can't understand why Connor compares him to something so complex and beautiful as art, when he is in fact nothing of the sort. He sees art in everything except the mirror that he loathes and loves all at the same time. He doesn't understand why Connor would ever want him either, when Connor is the most exquisite piece of art that Troye has ever laid eyes on.

But he does, and they are here, and how could he complain?

Of course, though, there is an art to Connor's freckles that constellate on his chest, forming pictures and stories that Troye imagines to himself when he can't sleep at night. Art is seeping from the way Connor swirls milky creamer into his coffee, black as midnight. There is art in the way his forest green eyes are catching the glimmer of the sun on this warm March afternoon when he leans upwards because he can't stop taking pictures of the flowers. Troye can't stop sketching them, or dragging an oil pastel across a sheet of card stock to add a hint of orange in the coral pink rose in front of him.

He's half-lying-down on a bench in a section of some huge, public garden that Connor dragged them to, creating roses out of his fresh oil pastels that he got the other day with money from his special jar. Troye's grateful that his boyfriend has got earphones in, and nature is chirping all around them, so that he can't hear the low, occasional grumble of his empty stomach. If he heard, Connor would suggest they stop to eat somewhere, and Troye doesn't fancy the idea of that.

Troye already had to purge earlier when Connor made breakfast out of spontaneous decision making. He didn't want to worry Connor, so he shoved eggs or toast in his mouth as if he didn't notice the way it would get mushy on his tongue and feel gross sliding down his throat. He then went off to take a shower, ran the hot water, blasted a Spotify playlist, and jabbed at the entryway of his throat until he felt clean again.

Troye hates purging, he really does, and he doesn't do it often. It's never been his deck of cards; he prefers more to not eat at all. Troye also hates deceiving Connor, but he doesn't mean to find himself bent over the toilet, trying to avoid his teeth from bothering the cut in his finger that's already there from relentlessly pushing his digits against them and down his throat. He doesn't mean to have to ignore the burning tears forming in his eyes when he gags around them.

He doesn't mean any of it.

But it happens, and he lets it, because it feels so worth it when he steps on the scale to notice that the number on display has dropped one pound lower. It's all really worth it when he sees his chest bones more clearly than the week before, and he reminds himself of all this when he sits in his room contemplating suicide because he doesn't want to do this anymore; he's already spent the past 4 years of his life doing this.

He just can't stop. He knew what it would mean to be in a relationship; he knew he would have to lie to Connor, but those green eyes and that soft smile pulled him in faster than he could think twice.

"Tro, look at these pictures." Connor takes out his earphones and pulls Troye's attention from peeling back the wrapper on a pastel, coming over to show him his pride and joy. Troye sets down his pastel to give him his full attention. Connor's a photography major, and it's his whole life. He knows just as much about a camera as Troye knows about drawing pencils. They both have these intense passions to distract them from everything else when it becomes too much. Plus, they've got each other, and Troye has the satisfaction of taking out his pain on himself in the form of malnutrition.