The observation hits something raw. I dip my brush back into crimson, adding another layer to the rope marks on the nearest canvas.
“Isn’t that the point of art? To transform?”
Maya steps closer, examining the rope patterns.
“Sometimes transformation is beautiful.” Her voice drops. “Sometimes it’s dangerous.”
I set my brush down. “Like Adrian’s chocolates? The ones that tasted like a void?”
Her eyes dart up, caught. “Yes. Like that.” She runs her fingers over the edge of a canvas. “Does Gabe know you’re painting this?”
“Not yet. I want to surprise him.”
“We’re both in deep, aren’t we?” Maya says softly. “These men—there’s something about them that pulls you in past the point of reason.”
I think about the spiked mask, about Gabe’s voice commanding me to beg.
“Adrian looks at me like he’s solving a puzzle,” Maya continues. “Like I’m the first person who’s ever seen him clearly.”
“Gabe sees layers in me I didn’t know existed.” I tracethe line of a bruise on the painted skin. “He finds them. Brings them to the surface.”
Maya seems to be weighing her words carefully, her fingers tracing the outline of a particularly explicit canvas where Gabe’s shadowed form dominates mine. I can see the struggle behind her eyes—something trying to escape but being forced back down.
“Just... be careful,” she finally says. “Some doors, once you open them, you can’t close again.”
The concern in her voice catches on the edges of my attention, but I’m already mentally mixing colors for the next piece—deeper burgundy for the bruises, a translucent glaze for sweat-slicked skin.
“I don’t want to close this door,” I say, my fingers twitching with the need to get back to painting. “You don’t understand, Maya. These feelings, these sensations—they’re like finding patterns I’ve been searching for my whole life without knowing.”
My eyes dart to three different canvases at once, seeing connections between them that probably only make sense in my brain. The geometry of submission. The mathematics of desire.
“Why do you keep warning me about Gabe?” I step closer, focused on her face. “What do you know that you’re not telling me?”
Maya’s eyes shift away. “I get a bad feeling around him. The same emptiness I tasted in Adrian’s chocolates—” She stops herself. “People aren’t always what they seem, that’s all.”
My mind latches onto the inconsistency immediately. “But you’re with Adrian. You’ve been defending him for weeks.”
“That’s different,” Maya says too quickly. “Adrian understands me.”
She doesn’t believe her own words. I can see it in the tight line of her mouth, hear it in the hitch in her voice. Maya, my best friend, is hiding something.
“What aren’t you telling me?” I press, my attention fully on her now.
Maya says nothing for a long moment, her fingers fidgeting with the edge of one canvas. When she finally meets my eyes, there’s genuine concern etched in the lines around her mouth.
“I know Gabe enjoys certain dark pursuits. I don’t want you getting hurt, especially when you’re diving in headfirst like this.” She gestures at the explicit paintings surrounding us. “These aren’t casual explorations, Amelia.”
I cross my arms, feeling defensive of both Gabe and my art. “Maybe I enjoy dark pursuits too. Maybe I’ve been waiting my whole life to find them.” I run my fingers over still-wet paint. “Not everyone needs to be protected, Maya.”
The tension hangs between us before my best friend’s shoulders relax slightly. She recognizes the boundary I’ve drawn.
“Fair enough,” she says, the concern not entirely gone from her eyes but tempered now with resignation. “Your mind has always worked differently. Maybe you see something in him the rest of us don’t.”
“Like you with Adrian?” I counter, unable to resist.
Maya rolls her eyes but smiles. “Touché. We’re quite the pair, aren’t we?”
“Always have been.” I grab a rag to wipe paint from my hands. “Remember when Professor Winters caught us smuggling wine into figuredrawing class?”
