No Place Like Home

Ashlynn Scarlett

Seamus

"Ello there! How ya doing? I just want to give a big shoutout to my friend Ash, who drew this. Don't pretend you're not a super - we can all see how incredible this is. So naturally I've been rewatching Toy Story, and I noticed something strange..."

Seamus finished recording and smiled. Making videos made him so happy. He could just be excited about his favorite topics and share his ideas with the world without having awkward conversations with real people. Real people like Ash.

It was difficult to remember that they had only started talking yesterday. They had talked late into the night, discussing theories and getting to know each other.

"Oh wow it's late. I just noticed. Don't you ever sleep?"

"No."

"Yeah yeah"

"I'm serious. I don't sleep. I can't. It's rare that I get more than 4 hours a night."

"What do you do with all that extra time?"

"See if you can't guess"

"Draw? Art?"

"Can't. it's too dark. I don't have good lighting in my place"

"Says the girl who draws with her eyes closed! Why does that even matter?"

"I don't know, it just does!"

"You stay up late rereading Harry Potter."

"Sometimes, but usually I watch YouTube videos. One of my favorite YouTubers makes these great videos about movie theories and such. He's also really cute."

"Oh really? Who is this mysterious YouTuber?"

"His name is Seamus Gorman. You probably haven't heard of him."

"I don't know that I have. Your favorite, you say?"

"Indeed. He's always so passionate and excited. It's contagious."

"And he's really cute?"

"Well he does kind of look like Darla..."

"Oh come on! I don't even have braces anymore!"

"I'm just kidding!....mostly"

They continued on for most of the night, eventually stopping when Seamus said he had to make a video the next morning, and he couldn't do that if he was asleep. "Unlike some people, I require at least 6 hours of sleep to function properly, and you wouldn't want to be responsible for a sub-par video, now would you." Seamus hated to say goodbye. Ash was... indescribable. She seemed just like him, and she totally understood what he was saying. And she seemed to genuinely like him... Seamus was glad they were getting to be friends.

It was Saturday, and Seamus didn't expect Ash to be at the art school, but, remembering what she had said about the lighting in her place, he decided to walk by anyway. Just in case. He hadn't actually mentioned that he had seen her there. Every day. Or that he had watched her draw him yesterday. He wasn't sure why.

But there she was. She was facing the window this time, and Seamus pulled his hoodie down over his face, not wanting to be recognized. Ash had her eyes open this time, and seemed to be drawing the people outside. She wasn't drawing the whole street, just certain people. She did quick 30 second sketches with her charcoal pencil, all dark lines and bold strokes. She drew a man in the short time it took him to pass the window, then flipped the page and drew the next, never hesitating, and never looking at her paper. Seamus was mesmerized. He stood to the side and watched, just out of her line of sight, as her pencil flew over the paper, pulling the figures out of it. Figures that almost seemed to be moving, emerging from the page. Seamus didn't know how long he stood there, but he was still there when Ash flipped the final page and closed her sketchbook. She sat for a moment, catching her breath and calming herself before slowly standing to place the sketchbook back inside her bag, then grabbed a new one from a box half full of them on the floor. On the front cover she wrote: Ashlynn Scarlett, #266.

Ashlynn Scarlett. The name she hadn't wanted to tell him. Why? Why wouldn't she tell him her name? Names made friendships real. Unless she didn't want that? Why? Did he do something wrong? No. He had to stop second guessing himself. Maybe she just wanted him to call her Ash.