Chapter Text
Rain blurred the city into watercolor.
From the fourth-floor windows of Blackwood College of Fine Arts, everything below looked washed into grey; traffic lights smearing into wet pavement, students disappearing beneath dark umbrellas, cigarette smoke dissolving into the cold October air.
Wilson liked mornings before the building woke up.
Before music started leaking from studio speakers.
Before professors stalked the halls looking for someone to tell off.
Before the carpentry students started using power tools like acts of violence.
At seven in the morning, the studio floor belonged only to the hum of fluorescent lights and the smell of oil paint.
Wilson pushed open the heavy metal doors with coffee balanced carefully in one hand and his portfolio tucked under the other arm. Rain had dampened the edges of his dark curls, leaving them falling loosely over his forehead. He shoved them back absently as he crossed the empty room.
The corner studio space near the windows was still free.
Thank god.
He exhaled quietly and set his things down.
The space wasn’t much, cracked concrete floors, brick walls stained with years of paint, old industrial sinks that barely worked, but the light near the windows stayed soft even during winter. Good for portraits. Good for Wilson.
He unpacked methodically. Brushes laid flat, charcoal arranged beside sketchbooks, paint tubes lined carefully by shade.
Everything precise. Everything quiet.
Across the room sat abandoned projects from last semester:
a collapsed wire installation,
unfinished mannequins,
a canvas someone had slashed directly through the center.
Art students loved destruction too much.
Wilson pulled his headphones over his ears and flipped open his sketchbook, trying to ignore the exhaustion burning beneath his eyes. He’d slept maybe four hours after staying up finishing commissions. His hands still smelled faintly like rubbing alcohol.
Outside, rain tapped steadily against the windws.
Inside, it was peaceful.
For approximately eight minutes.
Then the elevator down the hall crashed open loud enough to shake the silence apart.
Wilson closed his eyes briefly.
Voices flooded the hallway. Loud ones. Laughing. Someone yelled something incoherent followed by the sound of metal scraping violently against concrete.
A second later, the studio doors slammed open.
Three students stumbled inside carrying an enormous plaster sculpture between them. Or what remained of one.
The thing looked half-destroyed already - a massive human torso cracked down the center with exposed wire twisting from the ribs like veins. White plaster dust scattered across the floor behind them.
Wilson stared over the edge of his sketchbook.
Behind the sculpture walked someone directing the chaos without helping much at all.
Blonde hair fell messily over sharp blue eyes, hair flattened unevenly from the rain. Paint and plaster stained the sleeves of his black hoodie. Rings flashed silver against long fingers as he gestured animatedly while the others nearly dropped the sculpture for the third time.
Pretty, Wilson thought automatically.
The blonde guy laughed at something one of the others said, head tipping back slightly. Loud. Effortless. Veery loud.
Wilson looked away first.
The sculpture group claimed the center section of the studio with all the subtlety of a natural disaster. Someone turned music on immediately - low static and heavy bass crackling through old speakers.
Wilson tried focusing on his sketchbook again.
Failed.
His eyes kept drifting up despite himself.
The blonde guy moved constantly while unpacking supplies: dragging tools across tables, pushing curls out of his eyes with plaster-covered hands, leaning too close into other people’s conversations.
Sculpture student, definitely.
Wilson watched him unwrap smaller pieces from newspaper carefully this time, expression unexpectedly focused. Different from the loudness from earlier. Softer, almost.
The guy looked up suddenly.
Wilson dropped his gaze immediately back to the page.
Heat crawled faintly up his neck.
Embarrassing.
He turned another page in the sketchbook even though he hadn’t finished the drawing.
Across the room, the music changed.
Wilson became aware, slowly and irritatingly, that the blonde guy had moved closer sometime in the last few minutes. Not intentionally close. Just neighboring workspace close.
Near enough for Wilson to notice details now:
blue eyes too bright against the grey morning light,
paint beneath bitten fingernails,
a scar cutting faintly through his upper left arm.
Wilson kept pretending to sketch.
A rolling cart screeched loudly across the floor nearby. Someone cursed. Laughter erupted again.
Then, in the middle of all the noise, Wilson felt it.
He looked up before he could stop himself.
The blonde guy stood near an unfinished sculpture, turning a utility knife slowly between his fingers while looking directly at him.
Wilson’s stomach tightened strangely.
For one suspended second neither of them looked away.
Then someone called the blonde guy’s name from across the room.
“Brando!”
The moment snapped apart.
Brando glanced away immediately, distracted, and crossed back toward the others without another look.
Wilson stared at the page in front of him long after.
Without really meaning to, he turned to a blank sheet and began sketching messy blond hair from memory.