Chapter 1

Elouan taps the front desk anxiously. This is not the job he had imagined when he moved into the city, following some impersonal script to talk to strangers in the front of a workshop. It felt as if his dreams of engineering had been dashed upon the cold reality of logistics.
He is far more suited to machines than people, why wouldn't anybody else see that? Working here he would speak to more strangers in a day than he'd meet in a year back when he lived in the countryside. There was no room for familiarity, no time to become acquainted, just a constant cycle of performing a formal politeness until either party had gotten what they wanted.
In a way the entire city had felt like this; you would meet so many strangers so constantly that if you ever made even a little time for them, you would never have time for yourself. And so it was that nobody reached out to a stranger, and nobody had reciprocated when Elouan tried to reach out himself, not even his colleagues at work.
It is the beginning of summer. Almost a month into this job Elouan had found himself unable to see eye-to-eye with the other boys and men of the workshop. The one time he had joined them for after-work drinks Elouan had found himself talked over and struggling to add anything to their conversation. He would have left were it not for the company of Lucile, the sole woman amongst his coworkers, who had made a point of enquiring about the boy and making him feel at least a little included. She must have been a bit lonely, he supposes.
She is an odd girl, probably a decade Elouan's senior, with a tough, humourless demeanor that she only seems to let down around him. At first his immature mind had interpreted that vulnerability as some kind of exciting and wild affection directed at the boy, but he recognises now that what she felt for him was far closer to a sisterly care. For some reason that feels a lot nicer.
The boy's train of thought is disrupted by a fist tapping against the side of his head, as if imitating knocking on a door.
"Can you hear me? Elouan?" It's Lucile, the boy looks over in mild bewilderment. "It's dead today, I don't think we're getting any more customers so I'm gonna close up early."
"Does that mean I can go now?"
"It means you can help me pack up, and then you can go."
The pair make quick work of the front of the shop, Elouan sweeps as Lucile tidies up the desk. This job would usually be down to just him, so she must really want to get out early.
"What's this?" Lucile asks, waving a little wire-bound notebook.
"That's my sketchbook, don't look in there - aghhh!" She's already flicking through the pages. His sketchbook is a private document. It's not that he doubts his ability as an artist - much - but more so that this sketchbook does not represent the best of his work. It is a place for doodling and experimentation, not quality work, and as such he never shows it to anyone.
"Elouan, these are really good."
"N-no, they're just sketches, they're completely unfinished. Not presentable at all."
"Sure, but they're good sketches. You've got a really good sense of proportion." Elouan doesn't say anything else, he just stands in a feeble pose with his head down and his hands fiddling. "How long have you been doing this for?"
"Um, since I was a kid. Maybe fifteen. I paint sometimes but I'm no good at it, I still have a long way to go." As he replies she continues to flick through, pausing now and then to soak in the details of a particular page.
"Did you know there's a life drawing class that runs near here?"
"Life drawing?" He tilts his head inquisitively.
"Yeah, a bunch of artists meet up to draw models and stuff, apparently it's very good practice."
"Oh. Thank you, but I don't think I would get much from that."
"What do you mean? You want to improve right? It could make you a lot more confident."
"No thank you. I've always worked best alone, without other people breathing my neck telling me what I'm doing wrong."
"I think you might be misunderstanding how an art class works." She's probably right but he doesn't want to admit it. "Please can you just try it, at least? You just have to go tonight, just this once to see what it's like, you don't even have to stay until the end."
"I'll think about it."
"Thank you. You know I'm only grilling you about this because you need it, right?"
"Right."
"It doesn't take a genius to see you're lonely, I just think you need a push is all."
She is right about that. The girl is only trying to help him, very selflessly in fact. Since moving here she's the only person who's ever really looked out for him. He feels a twinge of guilt for arguing with her.
"Lucile?" He asks.
"Yes?"
"I'll go. Thank you for telling me about it."
The boy isn't sure if he sincerely meant that. Once he gets home the day starts to crawl by, the thought of the art class looming in his mind as he considers whether it's actually worth going or not. By the time the evening arrives he's bored out of his mind, and wanting to make good on his promise to Lucile, he reluctantly packs his sketchbook and a bag of art supplies and heads out.
It is a brief walk from his house, no more than 20 minutes, and mostly along the riverside. The cobblestone roads quiet down around this time of day, or rather, its quiet for this city; too late for most people to be leaving work, but too early for anyone to be going out. Elouan watches the shimmering reflections of roofs and chimneys in the murky water below as he walks. He turns off a sideroad away from the river, and before long he's faced with an old looking building, like some kind of warehouse, large and sparingly adorned.
The lobby is empty, and the boy begins to wonder if he had entered the wrong building as he passes through empty staircases and corridors until he sees a light on through the window of a wooden door. He pauses outside it, hearing faint voices and a whisper of music within, and after a nervous sigh he pushes through the doorway and into the room.
It's surprisingly busy inside. Over a dozen young adults wearing modern looking clothes mingle, leaning on the walls or sitting around in a circle of chairs surrounding an empty daybed, a few have already set up easels. To the side a record player sits on a sturdy wooden table bellowing out a gentle tune, by its side there are reams of paper and boxes containing charcoal, pencils, sharpeners and various other artistic implements. No need for those, Elouan thinks, he was smart enough to bring his own familiar charcoal stick.
Unsure what to do with himself, Eloaun sits on a chair placed as strategically far away from anybody else as possible. He stays there for a few minutes, fidgeting as he sits, before realising he doesn't have an easel, so he stands up, walks across the room, and takes one from a stack in the corner. Typically he wouldn't use one of these, preferring to hold a sketchbook on his lap, but almost everyone else seems to have one. He looks around for a clock, feeling like the drawing should have started by now, but as he scans the room it gets quiet.
A well dressed girl emerges from a side-room. The others don't seem to take notice of her as much as they take her presence as some sort of signal. They all shut up and find their seats, and as they do so another girl standing to the side who barely looks older than Elouan speaks.
"We're starting now, the timer will be set to twenty minutes." She declares, twisting the dial on a sturdy looking mechanism before finding a seat herself.
Eloaun's attention is drawn to his subject, naturally. He usually prefers to spend a few brief minutes studying by eye before he puts anything to paper or canvas, building a mental image. He hadn't noticed when she walked in, but she's a rather pretty girl, with orange hair and a lanky build. She doesn't wear heels but she's noticeably taller than Elouan, which gives her a graceful if not slightly imposing presence. She sits down reclined over the daybed, with her back propped up by the cushions so her head is level. One arm rests by her side while the other holds the side of her face. The girl is wearing simple black shoes and a green sleeveless dress with a delicate golden trim over a petticoat, both ending just below her knees to give way to white knee-socks bound with ribbons at the top. On her top half she wears a simple white ruffled blouse under the dress with a scarf draped loosely over her collar. Loose, ginger locks spill down to her shoulders.
Elouan stares, he can't seem to stop it. He commands his head to move but his eyes stay fixed on the girl. Perhaps it's her outfit, or the sharp features of her face, or maybe her expression. It's a sort of bored, detached emotion she exudes, raw and graceless in contrast to her perfect makeup and elegant pose. Maybe it's the hair, he thinks, he's always been unusually weak to deep orange hues like her own. This is embarrassing, he thinks, something about this girl overpowers his better judgement and his mind races in a childish, hormonal manner.
Before he can get a grip on himself, the girl looks without moving her head, drawing her eyes towards him. Is he staring too much? Immediately he hides behind his easel, face burning red with surprise and shame. Why is this happening now? The last time he had feelings like this for a girl, so violent and sudden, he couldn't have been older than twelve, and even that wasn't so disarming. This is unbecoming of him. He thinks back across the last few months, he's been alone a lot since moving here, perhaps his biology is simply reacting to a lack of stimulation.
Elouan sighs quietly, he's barely just arrived and already he's creating an awkward atmosphere. Perhaps coming here was a mistake. Nevertheless, he steels himself and peaks from behind the easel. Realising the timer had already run halfway while he was overthinking, he joins the rest of the room in scribbling away, trying not to stare too long or too hard.
He feels like he's being watched, hyper-aware of every sound and movement around him. It's impossible to not feel remarkably out of place here, surrounded by people who know exactly what they're doing. He takes a glance of the drawings beside him, a charcoal piece capturing the subject in negative space, and a fine looking sketch made using some kind of thin grey instrument Elouan has never seen before. Both are leagues better than anything he could produce.
The next hour passes agonisingly slowly. Every few minutes the timer rings, and everybody stops what they're doing as the girl shifts to the next pose before it starts again. The sketches Elouan produces are tolerable and nothing more, capturing her form and the broad shapes her clothes make, but all the faces are indistinct and underworked. The timer rings a final time and the drawings stop.
By the time he's stood up everyone seems to have already started moving, forming little groups and making conversation. The orange haired girl talks to another girl, at least she's too occupied to notice Elouan. He slowly paces towards a group of boys who look only a little older than him. For a minute or two he stands a short distance away from them, hoping by some miracle that their conversation will leave some gap he can insert himself into, some opportunity to be seen and heard, but it never comes.
Before he realises what he's doing. He hastily packs his bag and leaves the door, walking quickly through the corridors, down the stairs, and out of the front door into the cool air outside.
The walk home is tense and cold. Pacing quickly, his arms cross and in frustration and shame he digs his nails into each bicep. The sky has darkened, turning the river into a pool of shimmering black. He had brought a coat but despite the midsummer drizzle he couldn't bring himself to stop walking and put it on. Each minute his clothes soak slightly more and his skin grows colder underneath.
By the time he arrives at his house he's practically running up the stairs. He slams and locks the door behind him as he reaches his room, and plunges under the covers of his small bed, not even sparing a moment to peel off his damp clothes. He tries to wipe his face dry, but moments later his cheeks are wet again with warm streaks running from his eyes.