Love-Love || OLD DRAFT

four - three

A/N

I'm terribly sorry for the late late update, college has been hectic af. Like, it's crazy. They never tell you college is going to be this way, so let me warn you, my peeps. High school was just the trailer.

Lol, sorry.

Here's chapter 7

...

"Does it make any sense to you?" Aspen frowned slightly. "Because I don't think it makes any sense to me."

I inspected the half-made structure that sat in the middle of his room. It didn't have any coherent shape, simply sprung outwards with long arms, like a tree, or an amoeba.

"It reminds me of the Hanging Tree by Teresa Jones," I said, absentmindedly taking a seat on the couch.

"Oh my god," Aspen cried, eyes wide. "You know Jones?!"

The unwanted question made me uncomfortable.

"You know sculptures?" he asked.

"Uh." Now how could I tell him I had done my fifteen years of research on everything related to earth, and that I had a fright as a child because the sculptures pretty much spoke to me? "I like earth."

Aspen apparently found it very funny because he burst into laughter.

I simply took a sip of the tea (Satan, it was delicious!) and did not feel the need to elaborate.

Aspen apparently disagreed. He jumped onto the couch next to me and cried excitedly, "Tell me!"

"Tell you what?"

He stretched out his hands for an overly exaggerated flair of dramatics. "Let's talk sculpting."

"I'm pretty sure that's wrong grammar," I pointed out.

He ignored me. "I'm still relatively new at sculpting. I studied some of the classics, the romantics, but I'm clearly a fan of modern art. The Hanging Tree, yes, is gorgeous," he swooned at the thought, "but my favourite of Jones is Conflicted Reality."

"Ah," I broke in. I couldn't help myself.

He eyed me. "Ah what?"

"Ah is me wondering whether to break it to you or not."

"Break what to me?"

I shrugged. "How big a fan are you of Jones?"

Aspen narrowed his eyes at me. "Just tell me already."

I stifled a grin. "It's just - Conflicted Reality is a stolen idea. Jones stole it from an ancient Mayan sculpture. And I'm not just talking about taking the style, or inspiration. No, she actually ripped it off from a ninth-century sculpture that was dug out of Mexico sometime in the 1880s. It's a direct copy," I concluded.

Aspen was gaping at me.

"What?" I asked.

"How do you know that!" He grinned. "Damn, Ridge, you're going to overthrow me in tennis and sculpting!"

If I were him, I'd be careful saying things like that. Nobody ever wanted to meet the competitive Ridge.

"What's your favourite sculpture?" he said when he realised I wasn't going to respond.

I thought about the statue of Super Storm that was under construction in the city square. It was such an ugly big thing. I could've done it so much more justice. "I don't have one."

"I don't believe you!"

"I honestly don't," I smiled, then concluded it was just the tea which was making me giddy for a while now. "I know who made what sculptures, but art - I don't get art."

His grin widened. "You must be the first person who's honestly admitted it." He shook his head. "I don't either, you know, but -" He got to his feet and stretched out his arms as if he were breathing in all the art in the room. It was like I could feel the slight shift in the air. "I wish there was more art in this world," he completed his sentence to his half-made sculpture of a tree.

"And then what?" I said before I could stop myself.

He turned around to face me, his eyes almost sparkling. And his hair - damn that hair should be illegal! "I don't know. We would all fight less maybe."

I wasn't sure why but all breath was knocked out of me and I felt breathless all of a sudden.

"It's silly, I know," he smiled sheepishly and shook his head.

I wanted to tell him 'no, it wasn't silly,' but it was. It was silly! It was something a five-year-old would say. Because all the world contains is conflict. It breathes conflict, thrives on it. I've have had years of first-hand experience in the matter. And if Aspen hadn't, I envied him.

I didn't tell him anything. "Hey, do you wanna go to the State Art Gallery?" I said instead.

He shrugged, then studied my expression. "You mean right now?" He looked at me, eyes wide and it almost looked cute.

I got to my feet, gulped down the tea in one go and kept the cup on the table. "Yes!"

It took him a few seconds to digest my words. "Uh, ye - yeah. Let me go get cleaned up first."

"No, you look fine," I said, suddenly impatient to break some rules.

Aspen ignored me and went into his bedroom. He returned five minutes later in a fresh pair of clothes and hands free of clay. His hair was an unruly mess and the slight smudge of brown on his cheek was still in its place, untouched. I didn't say anything.

"Let's go," he grinned.

I'll admit I was surprised at how he was equally unfazed as I at the prospect of breaking rules. It was way past dinner time and by the rules of the uni, all students were to be strictly inside the campus. I rarely ever was, so I knew all the areas where it was easy to climb across the wall. Not that I ever needed to climb anything to get somewhere, but as a junior, I used to hang out with a bunch of delinquents who used to go out for the movies at night - every night - just for the heck of it.

I suddenly wondered where they were now.

Aspen didn't question me as I led him towards one of the unguarded areas of the campus wall behind one of the hostel buildings. I was about to turn around to lend him a hand, when he ran ahead, jumped and vaulted over to the other side as easily as if he had done it hundreds of times already.

I was frozen to my spot in shock. The wall was 2.35 metres tall.

I heard a scuffle and a second later, Aspen's head peered over the wall, on the other side. "Sorry, I forgot to ask," he said, not even out of breath. "Do you need help?"