Colours [MASHIKYU]

13 - Violet

"You'll get cold in that," Junkyu says in the Tiny Room the next day. "Violet isn't exactly the warmest of places."

He's wearing a big puffy coat today that goes down to his knees and makes his arms look four times their size. He gives an identical one to me.

"What colour is this?" I ask as I let him slide my arms into the coat. I've seen this colour a lot, but I haven't been able to link it to any of the colours I've learnt with Junkyu.

"It's black," he says as he gives me some grey gloves to wear as well. "Technically it's a shade, not a colour, but people who say that are generally annoying so um yeah that's the colour black." I laugh and Junkyu smiles and his dimples appear which makes my heart beat fast because I really, really love him. "It's the darkest out of all the colours. Kinda depressing. But looks nice when you wear it."

I take a moment to look around the Tiny Room, at all the doors which before were just different non-whites but are now colours. I walk in a little circle, gliding my hand over their smooth and bright surfaces and letting memories of the past week dance in my head, until I reach violet.

"I don't want this to be the last one," I whisper.

Junkyu sighs and chews his lip. "Me neither, but let's not think about that yet. We'll just have to make this one extra special, won't we?"

I nod, reaching out my gloved hand to take his. He kisses me on the forehead before opening the violet door and pulling me along.

As soon as we're through, we collapse onto the floor in a heap because it's incredibly slippery. As my eyes adjust, I realise we're on ice. Not white or transparent ice like I've seen, ice tinged with a colour similar to that of the door. The sky is a variety of shades of this colour, clouds swirling around on top of each other to create a sight so beautiful it could be a painting.

"Skates. I knew I was forgetting something," Junkyu mutters. "Yedam! Could we get some help over here?"

The violet boy appears and glides over to us. He's wearing shoes with blades on the bottom that make a satisfying sliding noise as he moves, and carries another pair in each hand.

"Hi Junkyu. And you must be the one and only Mashiho. I'm Yedam." He gives me a boxy smile as he passes a pair of blade shoes to each of us. "Welcome to violet, even though it's not really violet, only some parts are violet. We just call it violet, it's weird. Welcome to purple, more like. Have you ever been ice skating before?"

I shake my head. Is ice skating what it's called when you move across the ice with blades on your shoes?

"Don't worry, Junkyu sucks at it so you won't be the only one falling."

Junkyu gasps in outrage. "Hey!"

Yedam laughs. "Wanna put your ice skates on?"

I push my feet into the blade shoes, ice skates (which are very heavy), and tie up the thick laces. Junkyu does the same and Yedam helps us onto our feet. I immediately feel off balance. He gives me a quick lesson on how to move before saying he'll let us figure out the rest on our own, although I still have no idea what I'm doing. Hopefully Junkyu does.

"Okay, see you guys. Have fun," Yedam says.

"Bye, Yedamie." Junkyu waves.

"Thank you!" I call as he zooms away from us, then turn to Junkyu. "I'm going to fall so much."

Junkyu laughs his adorable laugh and his pretty eyes get that familiar excited glint in them. "I would promise to catch you, but I'll probably fall just as much. Who cares? Zip up your coat for thick padding, and no one's watching us, so we can fall as much as we want."

I zip it up, then Junkyu takes my hand and pulls me to the right a little. We both fall over immediately and can't stop laughing for about a minute before we stagger up again.

"Maybe holding hands isn't the best idea," Junkyu says. "Okay, I'm gonna go for it."

He begins to slide awkwardly away, but after a while his legs have separated too much to the point he's almost doing the splits, and he drops again. I glide over to check on him, focusing on moving my feet the way Yedam did.

"How did you do that?" Junkyu's eyes almost pop out of his head when I reach him. "That was literally perfect, like Yedam level perfect. Why is everyone around me so talented?"

I chuckle and reach out my hands to help him up, but he ends up just pulling me down with him. The coat slides up and my knees knock painfully against the ice.

"I'm sorry." Junkyu pouts. "You can keep skating without me."

"Rubbish," I say, and stroke a piece of black hair out of his eyes. "Doing anything without you isn't worth doing."

This makes him smile, which prompts me to kiss him on his button nose which is red from the cold.

"Are you going to tell me about the colours?" I ask.

So he points to different sections on the ice and in the sky, how all of it is purple and only some violet, the other parts are lilac, lavender, plum, mauve. I like the soft lavender the most, which is the colour of most of the ice and the colour of Junkyu's hoodie which he wears under the coat. I like all the different shades, actually.

"Purple might be my favourite colour," I say, twirling a string on his hoodie around my finger.

"It's very pretty," he agrees. "And this place is so beautiful. I mean, just look at the sky. It's all so... ethereal. Exquisitely perfect."

I nod, but while Junkyu gazes up at the swirl of purple clouds, I gaze at him. His red nose, cheeks and ears, his smooth black hair poking out from his lavender hood, his deep brown eyes reflecting the sky, his pink lips parted slightly.

"Ethereal," I repeat. "Exquisitely perfect."

He tilts his head, blessing my eyes with his beautiful ones looking into them, then he shuffles over to me and our lips meet. Warmth drips through my body from the spot where he kisses me and the cold doesn't feel so cold anymore.

"This isn't very effective ice skating," I say with a laugh when we break apart.

"You should keep going! Practise until you feel strong enough to drag me along with you. I wanna watch."

"Fine."

So I skate in small circles around him, which gradually get bigger, and I begin to fall less and less. After a while, I skate back to him and offer my hand.

"Let's do this."

Junkyu actually holds up pretty well this time, and we're able to get a fair bit of distance before we topple over each other.

"I'll consider that a success," Junkyu says proudly.

I start to wonder how long we've been here, and then I remember. After this, there's no more colours in the rainbow (and I still don't know what the rainbow is), no more beautiful, magical, impossible places for Junkyu to take me, no more of those boys to meet. No more slices of heaven. Just the hell of white.

I can't let that happen. I can't stay there. I can't live the rest of my life in that place. Every day just going to the cafeteria, the doctor, my room, maybe someone else's room, not doing or achieving anything, then going to sleep, waking up and repeating the whole thing again. I hate it. I can't do it anymore.

"Junkyu," I say quietly.

"What is it, my Mashi?"

My eyes sting as I take both his hands and bore my eyes into his, letting him know that I'm dead serious, and that I've never been more desperate for anything in my life.

"Get me out of there."