To Express Happiness || Fayne ✔✔

The Arcane 💥

''What...the hell....was that?!''

As he dims the lights, the crispy wind of an urban Colorado night breezes in. Sitting in his chair, he stuffs his face between his palms...and then the whole of his head. His exhaling leaves deep fog in his spectacles. He puts them off, and stares at the lamp for a long time, incredulous to what happened today. Rubbing his chest, Aaron flashes back to how his heart had beaten so furiously, like he took part in the declaration of a war. He could taste the gunpowder in his sauce, sense the mortar in his stomach and the fighter jets deploying missiles of different feelings inside his chest. He was a war-torn nation.  Comparing it with his present heartbeat, he is amazed as to how normal it is now, as if the war started and ended there, with that one, singular smile. 

Smile. When did he last smile? He takes out that same textbook, looks at all the marks he drew with that pen he never bothered to pick up. He runs his fingers through them. Psychotic, yet so mundane. They leave rare, incoherent  patterns in the verse of time. Under the dim lights, he painted a universe inside his mind: the  curtains waving like flags of glory as he makes that dramatic entry, everyone greeting him like he's the captain of the basketball team; some are even mouthing game strategies, the lights glowing brighter, and the smile, as if it had all the colors to paint the picture. 

Why doesn't he remember her face...just ...why? As he moves his hand away from his chest, his eyes wander to his feet. ''Converse shoes, yes! She wore Converse shoes!''. Before he submerges in his dream world again, he hears a frightening voice he should never have heard.

''Aaron....if your laptop is still open at this dead of the night, I'll make sure you're dead too!'' yells his mother from downstairs. Snapping out, his heart picking up pace again, he dives into his bed and fades off to sleep before his mother realizes his laptop has been seized ages ago. 

Next day at school,  Aaron strolls through the ever-busy hall, looking at his Fastrack time to time. He grips his Jansport  as firmly as he wants to paint that small world of his. Classes come, classes go. The clock just never wants to hit 12:40. As he sips his milk in the cafeteria, he wonders what to say to her. ''Hi! I like your smile and your Converse shoes. They add to the  world in my head. This world is all I have, you know. It keeps my heart beating. Thank you so much for being the brightest part of it!'' sounds like in something in between futile flirtation and retard-ness, but it comes straight from his heart. He is clearly blurring the line between fiction and reality, and he knows it, just not the part that he is still getting detested looks for making that awful sound as he sips on an empty milk container. 

12.40!! He crashes into his desk before the previous teacher could even finish rubbing the board. Economics class, yes! Converse shoes, yes! A 'hi', yes! Telling her that she is the brightest part of my world,  (hell) no! Can Aaron at least ask if she likes his shirt he bought (on sale obvio) just for her? His contemplating comes to an end as the bell rings, and the scene of his life begins.

 Every I-don't-even-care faces arrive at the class room, and she comes just before the last one.  she returns the smile of Mr. Nestor, who is still smiling at her. Wow, what a way to begin the scene a.k.a their 4th economics class. ''Well, Mr. Reeves, glad to see you earlier than before''. Too busy, Aaron doesn't even notice it was being directed to him. A pretentious half-smile he gives; third time this week. The end of the class, and the spotlight is on him. 

As Irina bends to take her books from the desk, a shaky voice goes like 'Hi! Nice shoes!' .  She turns back, aghast. 'Oh thank you, but they are just slippers'.  She recognizes that face from yesterday. 'Nice...shirt, I guess? Haha'.  Before that wrapper-eating guy could say anything, Shae comes, out of the blue. 'Yo...back off okay? Try getting more milk at the canteen next time''.  She and the wrapper-eater have the same, blank reaction, but his one seems more wounded.