Chapter Text
The art studio on campus is at its busiest during weekdays, so Sunny requests special permission from one of his professors to use it on a Sunday afternoon, citing extracurricular work that he needs to get done in private. She is sceptical of Sunny’s explanation—fair enough—but still grants him access, so when Sunny tries the door at around 3 o’clock on Sunday, he’s pleased to find it unlocked.
Kel isn’t taking any art classes this quarter, so he has told Sunny, so he doesn’t spend a whole lot of time on this side of campus. As such he marvels a bit as they walk inside, at the murals on the walls and the paint splatters on the floor. Sunny lets him take his time, making his way over to a spot with plenty of nice lighting and starting to set up.
“Okay,” Kel says, swinging himself over on his crutches to meet Sunny at his stool. “What do you need from me? I’ve never done this before.”
Sunny spares him a glance before looking back down at his paint supplies. “Not much. You mostly need to keep still. I’ll grab you a chair in a second.” He picks up his pencil first and foremost, then takes out the canvas he’d prepped last night with a layer of beige paint. He doesn’t expect the blue to be showing by the time he’s done, but it’s easier than working on a white canvas. Setting up his easel, Sunny looks away from his task for a moment to scan the room, then settles on a more comfortable-looking chair to drag over and direct Kel into.
Kel lies his crutches against the wall nearby and drops gratefully into it, stretching out his leg. He winces and remarks, “Lucky that I’ll be sitting for a while, huh?”
“Don’t push your leg too much,” Sunny mumbles with a look shot in that direction. “It’ll be at least a few hours. Painting takes a while.”
“Right, I’ve seen videos and stuff,” Kel says. When Sunny looks at him curiously, he adds, “I mean, mostly Bob Ross, but he always takes a bit…”
Sunny snorts and nods. Bob Ross videos are definitely the type you put on and settle in for. It amuses him that that’s Kel’s frame of reference, though not in a bad way. Sunny has as much respect for Bob Ross as he does for any painter who made artistry widely accessible like that. He lays out his set of paints, frowning a little as he checks everything over to make sure nothing is running low, then looks back up at Kel.
“You don’t have to be like a statue,” Sunny clarifies, on the point about sitting still. “Just don’t move around too much. Here.” He reaches into his bag for his sketchbook, hesitates, and then passes it over. “You can look through this for something to do. If you want.”
Kel handles the sketchbook with an amount of reverence that is perhaps undeserved, and Sunny finds that his skin crawls the longer he stands there, watching Kel perceive his artwork, so he turns away and plops himself down on the stool, leaning forward to sketch Kel out. This much is easy, mostly because he doesn’t have to be precise at this stage since all his pencil lines will be covered by the paint anyway. Also, Sunny has been sketching Kel so much over the past couple months that doing so is practically second-nature to him by now. It’s the painting part that will actually be daunting.
As Sunny had expected, Kel had been immediately receptive to the idea of being painted. He’d offered to pay Sunny for it, even, before Sunny reassured him that getting to do this alone was payment enough. (Although he does like money, so maybe he’ll let Kel commission him another time.) He hasn’t however had the opportunity to explain to Kel just how much he’s been drawing him lately, nor would he know how to say it even if he took the initiative and brought it up. It is cowardly, but also just easier, to pass over the sketchbook like that, but it also makes it impossible for Sunny to look at Kel’s face for much longer than it takes to get a general impression of the look on it.
At the moment, Kel’s jaw is slightly slacked, and his eyes are wide. “Wow, Sunny.” His adam’s apple bobs when he swallows, and when Sunny looks over it’s obvious he’s reached some of the sketches of him. “These are…”
Sunny grumbles quietly. He can tell Kel is having a positive reaction, but he’s so early into the sketchbook that Sunny doubts anything he’s seeing is all that impressive. “Don’t be shy.”
“I’m not.” Kel’s smiling, Sunny can hear it in his voice. A glance over shows that Kel’s face has flushed a bit, and he’s looking between Sunny and the sketchbook, almost like he’s marvelling a little. “You really see me like this?”
What a question. Sunny puts his pencil down and bites his lip. “Approximately,” he decides. “I’m still not… happy with any of those.”
“Why not? I mean…” Kel’s looking at the book again. “You know yourself best and all, but these are… I mean, you’re really incredible, you know that? Really. I don’t know anyone who draws this good.”
Sunny thinks perhaps that that speaks more to the lack of artists in Kel’s life than any skill on Sunny’s own part, but he’ll take it as a compliment anyway. He does draw well, even if what Kel is looking at isn’t exactly his best work. Also, maybe Kel is biassed. They’re dating, after all, and all of the sketches are of him. Why wouldn’t he like them? Sunny knew he would like them. Really if anything this is just all the more reason to make this painting something Kel is even more impressed by.
Though in the first place, Sunny thinks he probably shouldn’t be finding all these different reasons to rationalise Kel’s compliment. He should just take him at his word that he likes it and move on. It’s not as though he’s ever known Kel to be disingenuous for any reason. He’s positive and kind and sincere and those are some of Sunny’s favourite things about him.
Cracking open his paints, Sunny starts to mix colours, and Kel finishes flipping through the sketchbook. Despite the fact that most of their dates are filled with hours of bright and cheerful conversation, now they lapse into silence. It’s another one of those peaceful silences, falling over them like a soft, gentle blanket. Kel seems more at ease than he ever is in a chair, legs slightly spread, head tipped back to look at the ceiling. He fidgets, fingers drumming against the arm, his uninjured leg bouncing occasionally, but otherwise he does pretty well at keeping still. It’s borderline impressive.
Sunny blocks in basic colours and starts going in with finer details on the places that have dried. Rendering with paint is a long and difficult process, especially compared to digital art where you can undo strokes with a press of a button. (Although that should not be taken to mean that painting digitally is necessarily easier than using acrylics; it’s just a different medium with different benefits and downsides.) Sunny takes his time with it, and despite the pressure he feels to make this perfect, he finds himself relaxing a bit, too.
Of course, it helps that his model is someone who puts him at ease so much. Sunny leans in close to paint Kel’s hair, and finds himself filling the quiet.
“I used to play the violin. Still do sometimes, but not as much.”
“Oh yeah?” Kel’s head turns with interest. “You like it at all?”
“Not really.” Sunny doesn’t see a point in lying about it; not like Kel has any reason to be offended. “I mean… I guess I sort of do now. It’s complicated. Fun when I want it to be. Other times not really.” Sunny goes for more paint. “But I quit in middle school because it was just too much. Needed to be perfect and wasn’t getting there. Practised for so long I didn’t get to see my friends at all, and the callouses on my fingers really hurt.”
Kel sounds sympathetic when he speaks again. “Oh, yeah, I’ll bet. I’ve heard about that. From string instruments, huh?”
Sunny nods. “Yeah.” He gives his voice a moment to rest, unused to speaking for such long stretches. Kel doesn’t seem to mind. “It was probably… worst part of middle school. I only played because I thought I’d get to be closer to my sister that way, but we just ended up fighting a lot. She’s a perfectionist too. You’d like her,” Sunny adds offhandedly, “but when we fight… gets kind of nasty.”
“Same with me and Hero,” Kel chuckles. “Oh man, you should hear that guy when he’s angry.”
From Kel’s tolerant and kindhearted older brother, Sunny isn’t entirely sure he wants to. “Siblings,” Sunny muses, and Kel huffs his agreement. “It was okay. In the end. I quit and Mari understood. Parents did too. I guess… not sure why I brought this up. Just one of those things I wanted you to know about me.”
To that, Kel does not respond immediately. Sunny doesn’t stress out about it, recognising this as Kel taking his time to formulate his response so it comes out exactly as he wants it to. Sunny has moved onto rendering the sides of his face (although not his actual expression just yet, too nervous for that) by the time he finally does speak.
“I’m glad you told me,” Kel admits. “I’d like to hear you play sometime. I mean—if you’d wanna do that. It’s okay if you don’t.”
“Would be fun,” Sunny muses. “I’ll let you know.” He shoots Kel a quick smile before returning his focus to his campus. Another silence falls between them, but this one isn’t quite as long; eventually Kel starts to talk about a fight he and Hero had when Kel was entering high school, a really nasty one from the sounds of it. (Reaffirming what Sunny thought earlier about never wanting to see Hero angry, ever.) Kel recounts it fondly more than anything, though there’s a more serious edge to his voice too, and Sunny listens, finding it takes the edge off of doing detail work a little bit.
They go on like that while Sunny paints, trading stories. Kel tells more on balance, because Sunny really isn’t used to all that talking, but he doesn’t seem to mind. By the time Sunny’s painting is done, the sun has set, and Kel’s rambling about one of the basketball games he lost back in the day. Sunny sits up and stretches a little, rolling out his neck, then leans back to beckon Kel closer.
Grabbing at his crutches, Kel comes eagerly, ducking over Sunny’s shoulder to look. He lets out a gasp, and Sunny feels a little flicker of pride hearing it.
He thinks it’s the best thing he’s painted in a while. Kel, splayed out in the chair, knees bent and spread out and his arms draped over the sides. His head tipped slightly back, skin highlighted gold by the sunset, a lazy smile on his lips. It’s his most relaxed smile, the one that comes onto his face after he’s just finished laughing at something, and Sunny even managed to capture the way his eyes glow when they’re half-open, when he’s looking at Sunny like he’s the only person in the world.
He’s looking at Sunny that way right now, once he’s pulled his gaze from the canvas. “Sunny, this is…” Kel’s voice is faint, like he got all the air punched out of it. Sunny reaches back to squeeze his shoulder, and Kel juggles his crutch to snatch up Sunny’s hand, pressing a kiss against his palm. The feeling makes Sunny shudder. “This is amazing. I—wow.” His eyes drift back to the piece, trailing up and down. “Really, you’re incredible.”
Sunny leans his head back to rest against Kel’s chest. “Better than the sketches?”
“Are you kidding?” Kel laughs. His chin hooks itself over the crown of Sunny’s head, chest pressing against his back. He’s so warm it’s like being wrapped in a heated blanket from behind. “Yeah. This is the best thing I’ve ever seen.”
Sunny nearly teases Kel for the self-importance in that statement, but doesn’t. He knows what he means, and besides that, he’s genuinely so pleased by this reaction he hardly wants to tease at all. Instead he pulls Kel’s hand down to kiss it himself, first on the knuckles and then on the back of his palm, tracing his thumb along the inside of his wrist. Kel had been about to say something else, but Sunny feels his breath hitch against his back before he goes quiet.
Though that does mean Sunny may be missing out on further compliments, he still smirks slightly, equally as pleased by that reaction. “Thanks,” he finally says, tipping his head to look up at Kel’s face. “And thanks for modelling, too.”
“Anytime.” Kel’s smile is lopsided, his face a bit flushed. “Really, this was a lot of fun. Just getting to spend time with you like this.” The hand that isn’t holding Sunny’s is busy holding onto his crutches, so Kel leans forward instead, brushing their noses together. Their lips are so close together that Sunny can feel Kel’s breath ghosting over his face, and the sensation is borderline overwhelming. Like, mind-numbing. Sunny wants Kel to kiss him so badly it’s practically agonising.
In order to make this blatantly obvious, Sunny makes a great show of looking at Kel’s eyes, then his lips, then his eyes again. Kel catches on quickly, letting out a loud, bright laugh, betrayed only by the way his ears flare red. He’s so pretty. He is so incredibly pretty, it’s unbelievable, and now he’s leaning closer, his lips close enough to brush Sunny’s when he speaks.
“You really are amazing, you know that?” Kel whispers. “I mean, seriously.”
Sunny really hopes so. He has no idea how else he could ever deserve someone like Kel. And also, he’s getting tired of not being kissed right now, so he reaches up with his free hand to grab Kel by the back of his neck, tugging him down the rest of the distance. Kel laughs into it, but quickly relaxes, and it’s—
Well. It’s an upside down kiss when Sunny has never kissed anyone before. (Not even Basil, who had seemed really grossed out by the idea of even practise kisses.) So it’s not entirely perfect, and of course the position strains his neck too, but. Kel’s lips are soft, and so warm. He’s so warm. This close Sunny can really smell him, too, the smell of oranges that always seems to cling to him, the underlying smell of his aftershave. That’s the best part about it, the closeness—that and the way he can feel Kel lean into him, just as greedy for this as Sunny is.
It’s utterly indulgent, and they kiss each other for so long that Sunny is breathless when he pulls away. He doesn’t open his eyes until his head stops swimming, and when he does the slight of Kel, pink and bright-eyed, nearly makes him dizzy again. Sunny goes for another quick kiss, then a third, then stops only because Kel is laughing again.
“God,” Kel breathes out. His hand squeezes Sunny’s, and Sunny squeezes the back of his neck in turn, gently so as not to pinch him. “You’re seriously perfect. I don’t know how I got this lucky.”
Sunny feels drunk on it, the weight of those words. He lets himself lean heavily into Kel’s chest as it washes over him, then finally turns himself around, tired of straining his neck to look up like that. Plus, facing Kel on the stool now gives him the benefit of being able to slide his legs between Kel’s, and the position lets them get even closer to one another, so it’s a win-win.
…Really, though, the idea that Kel is the lucky one here is just absurd. Sunny has never liked another person the way he likes Kel. It’s downright incapacitating, and yet he can’t get enough of it. Their time together. The way Kel looks at him. Sunny wants to paint him a thousand times if it means more of this, would paint him a thousand times regardless.
He has to kiss him again. That’s the only way Sunny can communicate what he’s thinking outside of saying a few key words, and it just feels—too soon, to put something like that out into the air between them. Even if Kel would probably respond well to it, Sunny doesn’t want to go there yet. He wants to save that for an even more special moment, a rainy day, if you will.
This, though, this much works just fine for him. The kisses. Kel’s gaze, which is soft and adoring and creeps under Sunny’s skin like warm milk on a sleepless night. He leans into Kel’s strong chest and lets the feeling wash over him completely, so heady it’s dizzying, so completely and endlessly addicting.
Sunny mumbles, “You didn’t get lucky,” and kisses Kel again, this time against his jaw. He feels Kel humming through his chest, maybe some kind of disagreement, maybe an acceptance. Whatever it is, Sunny doesn’t mind, if only because he likes it, being able to feel more than hear what Kel is saying.
There is also a deeper sense of satisfaction that comes from finally getting to paint him. Sunny turns back to the canvas to study his own work, then looks up at Kel’s face. It’s not perfect, of course. No painting ever is. But Kel’s smile in it…
A smile of his own creeps onto Sunny’s face and he relaxes back into Kel, truly content for the moment. Yeah, he thinks he finally got that smile right. And that’s all that really matters, when it comes to painting Kel.