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“I… admire Shin.”
Lili blinked and looked up from her paints to glance over at Peter after that quiet murmur of a declaration. She couldn’t tell if he was talking to himself or if that was directed at her. It wasn’t directed at Shin. He wasn’t here, or anywhere in the painting department, for that matter.
Lili was having a bit of artist's block herself, but her fellow oil painting student seemed like he was having it way worse at the moment, because the canvas he was currently glowering at was even more bare than her own.
Dried paint clung to the tips of Peter’s finger as he brushed the paintbrush onto his canvas. His eyes were becoming unfocused as he stared upon the blank spaces on the canvas. “I… truly, deeply admire Shin…” Peter repeated.
Peter stood in front of a big white canvas already put on an easel, fingers gripped tight around the handle of his paintbrush that refused to move across it. He seemed to be battling with himself, reaffirming whether he wanted to do this or not.
“…Oh, um. I agree! I admire Shin, as well! He’s quite amazing,” Lili offered in response. “It was a pretty nice surprise when he arrived here. I’m happy to have met someone from home all the way out here.”
“Even before I met him properly.” Peter added. “From the first time I laid eyes on his art, his style and skill as an artist were just…”
Peter wrung his hands and seemed at a loss for words. There were many people at the visual arts school who were less than stellar orators, but it was unusual for Peter, of all people, to trip over his words or get wrapped up in his emotions like this.
“Something mysterious came over me the first time I saw Shin’s work in person. Something mysterious shook me to my very core, like nothing ever had before in my life. It was more than excitement. I was captivated. There’s no other word for it. I yearned for art like that. It’s always on my mind. I wonder so much about what Shin will create next that I can hardly think of what I myself want to put to paper. Seeing how expressive and breathtaking his art is made me suddenly realize everything that my own art was lacking in.”
Peter looked down at his collection of paints.
“I look at the paints on my palette, and all I can see is Shin’s face. I look at a canvas and I just see his retreating back, and the distance between us as he gets farther and farther ahead to a place I can’t follow.”
How do you paint an idea? How do you capture a vision in your mind’s eye and preserve it in oil? How do you make that message reach others without words? These were the questions that filled Peter’s head after every stroke. Every tiny path he made on the canvas felt abstract and empty.
A jumbled mess of lines that made no sense. A pile of meaningless smudges that meant nothing, would touch no one.
“…I can’t do this,” Peter eked out. “There’s an image in my mind’s eye, and I can’t capture it on this canvas, no matter what my hands do. I want to give shape to my vision, and I… can’t.”
He trembled, the brush clenched in his hand.
“Drawing… used to be so simple. I loved art. I wanted to study what I loved, truly and freely. To pursue a straightforward passion, without faltering. It was that uncomplicated. That was everything to me. But now…”
Peter could almost feel the brush handle splinter between his fingers from how tightly he closed his grip.
“My confidence dwindles every time I so much as try to pick up a brush. I hate my art. And I hate it more with every brushstroke I try to make. I don’t know what I’m doing here anymore. Shin has only just arrived here, and his work is already on display in the gallery. And he’s earned that. No one’s art has ever deserved that honor more than Shin’s does. And yet…”
Peter whispered to himself, through gritted teeth.
“…I’ve been at this for years, and I’m falling so far behind him. Everything I could even imagine making is overshadowed already in my mind by what I’ve already seen Shin create.”
Shivering, he could barely paint a tiny excuse for a line. He finally just released his grip, and the brush slipped through his fingers and fell to the floor in a splatter.
“I can’t do this. Every time I draw, it’s clearer and clearer to me. I’m of ordinary talent. Everything I create is unremarkable, and I never knew that until I saw how deeply art could touch me when I saw Shin’s works. How can any part of me long to be as good as Shin or to walk alongside him when he is so out of my league?” His hand gripped the side of his canvas, fingers pressing into the primed, woven fabric stretched taut over the wooden frame. “Shin is everything I am not. I’m just… Peter.”
“Peter, don’t say that!” Lili practically scolded. Peter looked at her, surprised at the naked look of empathy and pain on her face. “You’re amazing. We all respect and admire you, too! You’re our friend!”
She was clearly being genuine. Lili was a bright, kind person too. He felt all the guiltier for dragging her down when they were meant to be working.
Peter gave Lili a hollow smile and waved his hand. “I’m so sorry, Lili. I wasn’t looking for pity or sympathy. I’m just thinking out loud. And perhaps I’m just feeling a little down on myself.” Peter sighed. “I’m just confused about what comes next for me. I’m just confused about these feelings.”
“But you really are a good artist. You don’t have to feel like you don’t belong here. You deserve your place here just as much as any of us. We’re all giving it our best, and that’s what counts, right?” Lili said.
“You’re right, of course. I know that. I just…”
“I can’t help comparing myself to others, too. I think most of us do that. Almost every artist I know does,” Lili admitted. Almost, with an obvious exception that both of them knew. Lili glanced over to that irreverent artist in question, who had already finished his sketch and was slumped over on the desk, sleeping soundly and using his half-eaten, charcoal-blackened bread as a makeshift pillow, hair a mess, shirt half-tucked.
Peter followed her line of sight and understood the implication. “Ah. Yes, Kit has always been amazing. The uncontested number one at this school. And that has never bothered me. He’s been my best friend for ages, despite his antics.” Peter looked back to Lili. “And you as well. You’ve made waves ever since your arrival, Lili, more than I ever did, but that didn’t throw me off my game.”
“Then, why are you suddenly being like this…?” Lili asked.
Peter let out another sigh and dropped the diplomatic smile. “Ever since Shin arrived… something has changed. No, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that everything has changed.”
“…I get it,” Lili said quietly.
“You do?” Peter asked. “I hardly understand it myself.”
Lili nodded. “Trying so very hard, giving it everything you’ve got, aiming for a goal, and then… just falling short of that. Struggling and suffering. Trying to pour your heart out on a page, then ripping up that page and starting again, right? Making our best and seeing that it’s not good enough. Everything changes when you see art that moves you so suddenly that suddenly the world has new colors. Sometimes, someone’s art feels so world changing, that the world feels larger and you feel smaller all at once, right? Like your eyes are open to so much more than you ever thought possible? It’s like that, isn’t it?”
Peter’s eyebrows arched. “…Yes, exactly. That’s precisely how it is. How can you put it into words so well?”
“Because that’s… the same as my feelings for Kit,” Lili answered, much to Peter’s surprise. “From the very first charcoal sketch I saw him doing on the bridge. ‘Everything changed’.” Lili looked up at the blue sky through the wide window of the room. “Before I came here, I was so sure I was number one in the world! I knew I could be, easily! And then… Kit showed up just to stand in my way, with his weird black bread and shimmering asagi-blue eyes and muddy shoes and the aquamarine paint and that story about those lilies in the cave and that milk bottle that he…” Her voice trailed off, and her cheeks tinted pink, and she cast a glance at Kit to check for any reaction from him. He just quietly snored next to another brand-new masterpiece. The look in her eyes softened for a moment as she looked down at his mouth, lingering there for a moment. She raised a hand to her own lips, slowly tracing them with trembling fingertips. “That milk bottle that he…” she repeated. “A-and those dumb lilies that don’t even exist!”
Clearly, there was a story there. Peter wouldn’t dig into it. Neither Kit nor Lili were very open books in that regard.
Lili huffed and shook her head, finally terminating that line of thought in her mind. Her ponytail bobbed furiously behind her, and Peter couldn’t help but think back to Aphrodite’s tail. He could see the resemblance Kit had alluded to, he supposed. Peter kept that thought unvoiced as well.
“Ugh! I’m going to take the number one spot from him this time for sure!” she suddenly declared, with a fire in her eyes. Peter shifted slightly in his seat, letting out a huff out air that may have been a chuckle, though he otherwise still seemed mostly unconscious. “Laugh it up for now all you want, Kit Church, I will still beat you and show you something truly world-changing!”
Peter cracked a smile and laughed a little himself. “Never a dull moment with you two, is there?”
“So, is that how you feel with Shin?” Lili asked, finally bringing them back to the original topic. “That kind of frustration?”
Automatically, Peter shook his head in denial. “It… shouldn’t be. Right? It can’t.”
“Why not?” Lili pressed, and Peter bristled.
“Shin is a good man,” Peter attested. “He is bold and ambitious. And lovely and sincere. His art seems like it comes so honest and easy. And I admire that about Shin, the brilliance of him. That’s what art should be. Admiration for our fellow peers. And I admire Shin. I do.” Peter looked again at his empty canvas. “…Which is all the more reason why this ugly bitterness inside me disgusts me. Why can’t I just marvel at Shin’s work and leave it at that, like I can for every other piece of art I ever saw before his? I hate my own heart for not just being able to let that admiration sit and be happy for my friend. I hate this bitterness and insecurity welling up inside me. I hate myself for my lack of raw talent. But I hate most of all the thought of turning any of this hatred on Shin himself.” Peter groaned and buried his face in his hands in pure shame. “Shin is a kind, caring person. Why do I find it so hard to feel happy for his success and proud for his accomplishments, like a good friend ought to?”
“All that doesn’t make you a bad friend, Peter,” Lili said. She balled her hands into fists and nodded her head. “It just means he’s a good rival!”
“A… rivalry?” Peter laughed. “You can’t be serious?”
“Well, that’s what it’s sounding like to me. And I’m very serious. Remember, you’re talking to the woman who’s going to dethrone the Kit Church as the number one art student in this academy.”
Peter’s amused smile dropped into a pensive frown when he realized it wasn’t a joke. Now it was just nonsense, then. “But… this shouldn’t be a competition. Not between Shin and I. We aren’t even on the same art track. His technique is interesting and I’ve studied it extensively, but I’ve never chiseled stone or wood in my life and I don’t particularly plan to. And Joffrey doesn’t seem to feel threatened by him at all as a fellow sculptor. So, what right would I have to feel that way?”
“It’s not about that. It’s about how…” Lili considered her words carefully. “Shin lights a fire in you, right? Like nothing else ever has before?”
“I can’t deny that.”
“So there, see? That’s what a good rival does. And competition isn’t a bad thing, you know,” Lili said matter-of-factly, flicking her brush. “At least, I don’t think it is. It doesn’t have to be. I know it causes some jealousy and bitter feelings, and it’s easy to feel discouraged from it. But it also ignites some passion that you can channel into really good motivation! It’s nice having a moving target to chase after.”
She set her brush down and cleaned off her fingers on a rag, then meandered around the open space between them idly.
“That’s how it is with Kit and me, too,” she continued. “I feel like I’m growing a lot from my rivalry with him. A lot of the things I’ve learned and a lot of the new perspectives I’ve gained have been thanks to this frustrating, rude nuisance that always looks like a mess and sleeps in class. I have to keep my eyes on his art, because I have to see what he’ll create next. And I can’t take my eyes off the artist, because he’s always causing trouble somewhere.”
She reached out her hand, but hesitated at the last moment, her fingers hovering in the empty space for a moment. Then, she moved her hand to pet Kit’s hair.
Without thinking, Lili reached out and brushed her hand over Kit’s hair. It was a silky softness that Lili liked the feeling of. Kit didn’t stir from being petted, and Lili took this as an invitation to gently move her fingers around.
Lili gently threaded her fingers through the messy strands. It was slow, and her fingers brushed over the curls absentmindedly. She brushed the stray bangs from in front of his face and stared at his long eyelashes. Her fingers lingered as she traced a finger over his eyebrows and stroked the soft-looking skin of his cheek.
Lili smiled in spite of herself, swiping her thumb over Kit’s cheek to smudge a black blotch of charcoal that had ended up on his face. They stayed like that for a few moments as the sun gradually rose in the sky, casting the studio room in a warm yellow light. Kit’s face twitched slightly, but the way his head lolled in such a way that happened to lean further into her touch could still be plausibly explained away as the tossing and turning of a still unconscious man.
Lili pulled her hand away after a moment, not wanting to wake Kit up from his slumber, although she would definitely be scolding him for this display of slothfulness later. Her smile became even fonder at the thought of that.
That was quite a gesture to do towards a “rival”. Peter opened his mouth to joke that he certainly couldn’t imagine such a scene between himself and the man that Lili had spuriously deemed as Peter’s apparent rival. But before he could get out even a syllable of that taunt, the image did flash in his mind. Shin, exhausted and asleep, eyes fluttered closed—Peter had seen him doze off during that train ride together, in fact. His face had been pretty. Reaching over and brushing the soft black hair that fell into his face…
Perhaps it’d be too much to say that Peter couldn’t even imagine it. He cleared his throat again, and Lili seemed to suddenly remember herself.
She walked over to Peter. She lowered her voice and leaned in towards Peter to add in a whisper, “Don’t tell him I said this, but I’m grateful to have met him.” She smiled. “So you can feel this way but still turn it into gratitude towards Shin as well.”
Peter made a face. “Thank you, Lili, I appreciate you trying to cheer me up. But, the thing between you and Kit is more…” Peter alluded.
“Hm?” Lili tilted her head, oblivious.
Peter averted his gaze and trailed off, clearing his throat. As obvious as their mutual feelings were, it was likely not Peter’s place to say. Despite everything, Kit was Peter’s best friend, after all. “…No, nevermind. It’s nothing,” he said.
“Well,” Dorothy clicked her tongue, cutting in. Her own painting was coming along at a nice, measured pace. In fact, it looked like it was almost finished. A still life of some baked goods that looked real enough to take a bite into. Lively and bright, like Dorothy herself, like always. “If you ask me, sounds like you’ve both got it bad. It’s adorable, really! Well, that’s love for you, huh?” She shrugged.
“—EXCUSE ME?!” Lili shouted indignantly, standing straight so suddenly that she nearly toppled her easel over. Kit, remarkably, didn’t move a centimeter. Either he was truly dead asleep now, or he was faking it and playing dead rather convincingly, even as Lili continued to loudly deny, “L-L-LOVE?! W-w-w-w-what are you trying to say, Dorothy?! W-w-why would you ever— Me and Kit are just rivals, you know! Rivals! He’s my rival and also a huge headache for me, too! And anyway, that’s all we’re talking about right now, rivalry! Right, Peter—”
Lili spun to turn towards Peter, but stopped short when she saw the look on his face.
With a thousand-yard stare, Peter just blinked. “Love…?” he echoed, as if the word itself was suddenly alien to him. He raised his hand with great effort to reach shakily towards the lapel of his black button-up, clutching at his shirt over his heart. His shirt balled up in his first, and he could feel his own heartbeat pulse against his knuckles. Dazed, he tested the word on his tongue again. “Love…” Peter felt something in his chest twist again, his own breath stuttering for a moment. “Love, is it…?”
“I-it’s rivalry! Motivation!” Lili insisted, to a chorus of laughter from Dorothy and stubborn silence from the boy who was definitely pretending to sleep at this.
Peter cracked another smile. “In any case, I think I may be feeling motivated now.”
“—Well! Good!” Lili declared, scrambling back to her canvas. “Me, too! I’m motivated! I have a painting to paint so—oh shush, Dorothy! Let’s all focus on our paintings now!”
Peter grabbed a small painting knife. The palette still had some remaining oil paints on the surface. Peter used the tip of the dull knife to nudge them.
Shin was probably hard at work now, too, wielding a specialized knife of his own. A much sharper knife than the one in Peter’s hand now. Peter could imagine it clearly in his mind.
Peter inhaled shakily before sweeping up a generous amount of Japan Red paint on the knife, brought it up before the canvas, and pressed down in one clean stroke. The color spread unevenly, so he used the long side of the blade to smooth out the rest of excess paint, sweeping it across the canvas, spreading it in firm, clean strokes.
He breathed a heavy sigh, as if the weight of the world was lifted from his shoulders. Somehow, he felt much better.
Determined, Peter moved the brush to mix a little of the paint, and using it, he continued to paint on the canvas. Each stroke formed something new, something familiar, something that was finally taking shape.
The more Peter painted, the more he could say, the more he could express, much more than he could so long ago. It had been a while since he had lost himself in anything like this.
He was so absorbed in it, that minutes of focus turned into hours, and colors and shapes turned into something realer. Because, for what felt like the first time in ages, he was painting something that he didn’t immediately want to shred to pieces and throw into the garbage.
He wasn’t sure how much time had passed by the time he finally gave his work a final touch and stepped back to contemplate it. It was a bird. The very same that features in the very first wood carving that Peter had ever seen from Shin. A proud rooster with a bright, arresting red of its comb, and more bursts of red blossoming in roses all around it.
“Wow… Japan Red, right?”
Peter jolted in surprise. When he looked around the room, he suddenly noticed that his fellow oil painting students had already packed up and departed. The only other person there was Shin, leaning against the doorway and staring at Peter’s work.
Peter resisted the urge to step out between Shin and the canvas to obscure the work in some strange flood of embarrassment. “Shin! Good… afternoon.”
“Almost evening now,” Shin corrected amicably. “The others said you were still putting the finishing touches on your work for the day. I thought I would come get you before I headed out to the pub with the others, though. Do you feel like joining us?”
“I… Yes, of course.” Peter hastily packed up his supplies and prepared to throw a cloth over his canvas. “I’ll be right there. Someone has to keep Joffrey in line. Let’s—”
Shin walked up for a closer look before he could conceal it. Peter practically held his breath, waiting for Shin to pass some sort of judgement on it. But Shin gave a smile in approval.
“I like this. I’ll have to make one of my carvings an homage to you as well sometime, won’t I?”
Peter could hardly even find the breath to reply to that. He hadn’t drunk a single pint yet, and he was feeling strangely lightheaded and flushed. His hand found its way to his chest again, and he felt his heart thumping madly against his palm.
So, this emotion was… Well, rivalry, apparently.