Chapter Text
Nani preferred silence.
Not the hollow, awkward kind where people tried to fill the air with cheap and stupid words, but the real kind of silence. The one that hung heavy in the air like charcoal dust in the fine arts studio, the kind that whispered in brushstrokes and oil stains. He liked mornings before anyone arrived, when the only sound was the soft whir of the ceiling fan and the low hum of sunlight against the frosted windows of the empty studio.
So naturally, he hated Thursdays.
Thursdays meant the “Creatives and Communicators Crossover Project”
A mouthful of a program that was launched with much fanfare by CMASU’s Student Development Council. It was, as Hong had put it: “A fancy way of making introverts suffer.”
“You’re going again?” Dew asked, eyebrows raised, as Nani packed up his sketchpad with more force than necessary.
Nani didn’t answer but continued packing his bag with a straight face.
“Take that as a yes,” Win muttered, sipping iced espresso like it was wine. In which Nani looked at them as if they were the one bringing him misery.
“Don’t glare at us like we're not the enemy,” Est added from the corner, fingers moving quickly over a tablet screen, animating a wolf with a shark costume.
“We didn’t invent the experiment.”
“I know,” Nani said quietly and continued fixing his stuff. “I just don’t like… pairing up with people I don’t know.”, he added.
“You don’t like pairing up at all,” Dew replied. “Be honest.”
Nani just looked at them then shrugged. They weren’t wrong.
The project was simple in theory: Arts and Humanities students were randomly paired with people from Psychology, Communications, or Social Sciences. The aim? Explore how emotional expression, repression, and understanding function across different personalities. The students called it the “EQ Buddy System.”
Nani had survived three weeks already. Three weeks of excruciating awkward meetings with strangers, answering icebreaker questions that made him feel like a glitch in human programming. And yet, today felt different. Felt off. Like a calm before a storm type of off. Maybe it was the weather. Too humid, too bright. Or maybe it was the email he received just last night:
Subject: Project Re-Pairing Notice
Due to unexpected withdrawals, your partner has been reassigned. New schedule: Thursday, 1:00PM, Room 14D. Please attend punctually. – CMASU EQ Development Council
He didn’t like changes. And he didn't like this type of change.
Room 14D smelled like lavender spray and overcompensation.
Rows of bean bags were scattered across the floor. Whiteboards were filled with psych diagrams: circles labeled “Avoidant Attachment” and “Hyperempathy Loops.” Nani sat near the window, sketchpad on his lap, pencil moving idly over the page where a vague outline of a torso, blurred at the edges.
The door slammed open.
“Holy hell, this place is too clean,” a voice announced, loud and unapologetic.
Nani didn’t look up. He knew exactly who it was. Sky Wongravee, he’d seen him around campus before. Impossible not to. Black-painted nails, silver rings stacked like armor, piercings glinting under lecture hall fluorescents. Sky was the definition of noise, mood swings and rebellion with a grin. He was everything Nani avoided like smudges on a perfectly white canvas.
“Room 14D?” Sky asked, to no one in particular.
The student facilitator – View, probably a psych senior, smiled too widely. “Right on time, Sky. You’re with Nani today.”, she announced
Nani finally looked up. Putting down his pencil and directly looking at the chaos.
Their eyes met.
Sky’s smirk froze for half a second. Nani didn’t blink just staring.
“Of course,” Sky said, plopping into the beanbag across from him. “The silent painter boy.”
“You’re late,” Nani said quietly with the hint of boredom and indifference.
Sky blinked. “And you’re predictable. This is gonna be fun.” he said sarcastically as if a show was about to start.
Back at the Fine Arts common room, Dew, Win, Hong, and Est had formed a little watch party – not for TV, but for Nani’s emotional progress, which was equally rare and suspenseful if they may add.
GROUP CHAT: ‘Nani’s Emotional Emergency Support Unit’
Dew: who’s his new partner???
Est: some psych kid I think
Hong: pls tell me it's not that Wongravee kid
Win: it is
Dew: NANI IS GONNA KILL HIM
Est: or fall in love. Those are the options.
Meanwhile, across campus, Sky’s own group was watching the chaos unfold from the Psychology Lounge, surrounded by beanbags, iced coffees, and existential dread all in one.
GROUP CHAT: ‘Sky’s Circus Troupe’
Tee: So?? How’s the new art boy??
Mark: The quiet one, right?
Nut: I give it two weeks before sky snaps
William: Two days. He hates silence.
Sky: Sent a Photo (a picture of nani busy sketching)
Sky: Pretty but emotionally constipated
Tee: sky.
Nut: SKY.
Mark: bro that’s illegal
William: send more.
The door to Room 14D slid shut behind the last stragglers as View, the project facilitator, clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention. She has an easy smile and sharp eyes, her voice carries authority throughout the room.
“Alright, everyone, settle in! Today’s project is about emotional complexity specifically, on how suppression and expression can exist side by side. You’ll be working in pairs, mixing fine arts with psychology or communications, to create a collaborative piece.”, she instructed
Nani slid his sketchpad closer, fingers twitching against the rough cover. He could feel Sky’s gaze like a live wire piercing through his soul.
“We’ll give you a theme and some materials to work with,” View continued, “and you’ll have two hours to brainstorm and do everything. After that, each pair will present their work and reflect on their process.”, she finished and they started handing in papers containing more information about the topic.
Sky grinned like he was already halfway to the presentation stage, arms crossed behind his head as he sprawled in the beanbag. “Sounds like fun.”, he whispered
Nani said nothing, drawing the shadowed outline of a face on the page. Half hidden, half visible.
View handed each pair a folder. Nani’s read: “Emotional Repression and Expression.”
Sky looked at the sheet, then at Nani. “Guess they want us to figure out what makes people hide stuff.”
Nani’s eyes flicked up briefly. “Maybe it’s survival.”
Sky nodded. “Or fear. Or just not knowing what to say.”
Nani tapped his pencil on the sketchpad. “What about art? Can it speak what words can’t?”,
Sky shrugged. “If it’s good.”, he stated
Nani glanced around the room. A few other pairs were already brainstorming, some talking fast, some just staring like Nani.
Sky shifted closer. “So, how do you want to start? You draw, I talk?”
Nani smiled faintly, that caught Sky to pause for a second and even surprised himself. “Maybe.”
The two began. Nani’s charcoal traces formed the beginning of a figure though fragile but tense. Sky talked quietly at first, weaving psychology theories with personal observations about emotional walls and masks.
Their voices blended with the scratch of pencils and rustle of paper.
Sky surprised Nani when he hummed a low melody, tapping rhythm on the desk. “Music can unlock things too, you know?”
Nani’s eyes flicked toward him. “I didn’t know you were the artsy type.”
Sky grinned. “Not really. But I appreciate a good beat.”
Halfway through the session, Nani’s phone buzzed. He looked and it was a message from Dew.
Dew: How’s the chaos partner?
Nani: He’s loud.
Dew: That bad?
Nani: Yes.
Dew: LOL.
Sky peeked at the screen. “Dew, huh? Your support squad?”
Nani nodded. “Emotional Emergency Support Unit.” He smirked. “You have one too?”
Sky laughed. “The Circus Troupe. Same idea.”
As the afternoon sun shifted, their project evolved into a mixed media installation. Nani’s charcoal figure merged with layered sound clips Sky recorded, some snippets of conversations, breaths, laughter, and silence. The combination was raw and unexpected, like two worlds colliding or even clashing.
Sky looked at their work, then at Nani. “This is… pretty cool.”
Nani shrugged but couldn’t stop the small smile.
After packing up, Nani walked out of the studio with Sky. The campus was alive with students heading to clubs, cafes, or late classes.
Sky lit a cigarette, the tip glowing red against his black nails. Nani hesitated but said nothing.
“Don’t tell me you’re one of those anti-smoking artists,” Sky teased.
Nani shook his head, watching the smoke curl. “I don’t judge.”
Sky smirked. “Good. Because I’m full of bad habits.”
They walked side by side, an awkward rhythm settling.
“You’re not as scary as I thought,” Nani said quietly.
Sky’s eyes flickered. “You’re not as cold as you pretend.”
Nani chuckled softly. “Pretending is easier.”
Sky looked ahead. “Maybe we both have masks.”
Nani nodded. “Maybe.”
Later, in the Fine Arts common room, Nani’s phone lit up again.
Win: You survived. Barely.
Hong: Spill the tea!
Est: Did Sky break you yet?
Nani smiled and typed back.
Nani: Not yet. But it’s early.
Meanwhile, Sky’s phone buzzed with messages from Tee, Mark, Nut, and William.
Mark: How’s art boy?
Sky: Complicated.
Tee: The good kind?
Sky: We’ll see.
Sky looked up at the sky fading to purple, feeling the oddest thing: maybe this experiment wasn’t torture after all.
Maybe it was the beginning of something neither of them expected.
After the session, Nani wandered back into his studio in Room 3B, the back wing of the arts building. He needed to sketch, maybe repaint. Maybe just sit and let the air settle down on him.
The room welcomed him with its familiar stillness. No laughter, no footsteps. Just oil, canvas, light and the smell of paint lingering in the air.
He placed his sketchpad down and let himself breathe.
But Sky lingered in his mind like leftover paint under his fingernails. The way he spoke, blunt but observant. The way he stared, like trying to peel each layer back one at a time. Not romantically, No, that wasn’t it but like a kid poking a bruise just to see if it still hurt.
Nani didn’t like that.
He stared at the unfinished piece on his easel: a faceless figure floating in water. The strokes felt off now. He picked up the brush, changed the direction, and added smoke. His wrist moved faster, rougher, as if the chaos needed to come out somewhere.
Meanwhile, Sky was in the psychology building lounge, sprawled across three beanbags as his friends surrounded him like planets orbiting a sun that didn’t quite know if it wanted to shine.
“So, what’s he like?” Tee asked, eyes twinkling.
“Emotionally constipated,” Sky replied, tossing a pen between his fingers. “Like one of those beautiful marble statues that won’t talk to you.”
Mark raised a brow. “Sounds like your type.”
“He’s not my type,” Sky said immediately, too quickly. “He’s a project. A walking thesis on repression.”
Nut snorted. “So you're gonna fix him?”
Sky smiled. “No. I’m just going to find the cracks.”
The following Thursday, Nani found himself back in Room 14D. Same lavender-sprayed air, same beanbags. But this time, he was early. Too early. He didn’t like that he was waiting.
Sky arrived ten minutes late, iced coffee in one hand, Bluetooth speaker in the other blasting some distorted indie-electro chaos.
Nani winced. “You can turn that off.”
Sky raised a brow, clicking pause without argument. “No taste?”
“No peace,” Nani said, eyes not leaving his sketchpad.
Sky flopped into the beanbag. “You always this warm and fuzzy?”
Nani finally looked up. “You always this loud?”
A beat passed. Then Sky chuckled. “Alright. Round two.”
Their assignment this week was an emotional storyboard with twelve squares, three emotions, no text allowed. Nani instinctively started sketching tight compositions with soft shadows.
Sky leaned in over his shoulder. “That’s your version of ‘anger’?”
Nani didn’t respond.
“Looks like melancholic constipation,” Sky said, smirking.
Nani stopped sketching. “Do you always talk to hear your own voice?”
Sky sat back, unbothered. “Only when it gets this kind of reaction.”
It wasn’t flirtation. It wasn’t even banter. It was some strange brand of mutual challenge, like throwing bricks at a mirror just to see who'd crack first.
Two hours passed in reluctant synergy. They barely spoke after that.
But when their storyboard was pinned to the wall together with twelve haunting frames that moved from numbness to chaos to… a quiet kind of relief – View called it “unexpectedly beautiful.”
“Who did the color shifts?” she asked.
Sky lifted a finger. “That was me.”
“And the figure details?”
Nani, silently.
“Interesting dynamic,” View murmured, scribbling down to her notes.
Outside, as they left, Sky lit another cigarette.
Nani paused beside him. “I don’t like smoke.”
Sky blew it away from him. “I don’t like silence. Guess we’re both suffering.”
They stood in that growing twilight, smoke twisting with wind.
“Are we doing this every week?” Nani asked.
Sky shrugged. “Unless you drop out first.”
Nani looked ahead, eyes distant. “I don’t quit.”
Sky smiled, just a little. “Good. That makes two of us.”
Back in their respective dorms, both phones buzzed.
GROUP CHAT: Nani’s Emotional Emergency Support Unit
Dew: How’s round 2??
Est: Was there blood??
Win: Or worse—sexual tension?
Nani: Just tension.
GROUP CHAT: Sky’s Circus Troupe
William: Did you push his buttons yet?
Sky: He has buttons. I’m finding them.
Mark: Be gentle.
Sky: No promises.
Late that night, Nani returned to his canvas. The faceless figure was still submerged in swirling paint. He stared for a long time, then dipped his brush in deep crimson and added something new:
A second silhouette. Edges rough. Stance defiant.
Not touching.
But watching.
Like static before lightning.