Broken Shades

Still Here, Standing

Rosé rolls her eyes as she keeps reading the text on her phone. She knows preparing an exhibition is easier said than done but knowing that doesn’t mean she can’t get frustrated. She never has any problem with paintings though, after all art is art. The thing people see the most about art is the art itself. As long as people still can enjoy the art, still can feel the emotion inside them, it doesn’t matter whom the one that created them (although Rosé’s also aware not everybody see it that way). Too bad she can’t say the same about the other things.

Preparing an exhibition means she needs a lot of help, people she can trust, and people that trust her. And being a painter with drugs history sure doesn't make gaining trust becomes an easy thing.   

Rosé sighs. Maybe she can ask Somi to talk with the gallery manager but it will be better if she’s the one that do that herself to prevent any misunderstanding. Somi already has a lot of things to do anyway, thanks to her profession as Rosé’s manager. Or maybe she can ask Lisa for help. That girl knows this gallery manager better than her after all.

With that in mind, Rosé quickly types a reply to the gallery manager so they can have a talk tomorrow. After that she quickly asks Lisa if she can accompany her tomorrow. Rosé watches until the message already sent before she lets out another sigh. Now what she needs to do is wait. And painting again.

With that thought, Rosé puts the phone into her pants pocket and ties her hair into a ponytail. After she finishes, Rosé turns her eyes to the half finished painting in front of her.

“So this is how your studio is like. I always want to enter this room.”

Only to whips her head at the sound of familiar voice from the entrance of the room.

“Even since you told me you have a personal studio in your apartment, I always curious about this place,” the intruder says again as she takes off her sunglasses (today it’s a white stripped one). With totally ignoring Rosé’s flabbergasted stare, the other girl takes a lazy walk deeper into the room. “It’s a bit messy but it won’t be studio if it isn't messy, right?”

Rosé keeps her bewildered expression (she’s sure she doesn’t hear any doorbell rang) from her standing position as she blurts, “How do you able to get in?”

Jisoo just gives Rosé a grin while keeps inspecting the room. This time her focus is at some paintings that lean neatly against the wall. “Ever heard a thing called password?”

“But I never give you my password.”

“I saw when you input the password. I have eyes, you know, even though they often covered by these,” Jisoo says again as her finger taps the sunglasses shades.

Rosé slowly brings her hands to cover her face and once again sighs. This girl is scarily observant. Maybe she needs to change the password to her place.

A sudden but soft touch at her hands startles Rosé. She quickly removes the hands from her face only to see a white envelope that Jisoo holds. With an eyebrow that rises questioningly, Rosé takes the envelope. She just opens it, takes the paper inside it, and begins to read when she hears Jisoo’s voice.

“The HIV result. It’s negative. I think it’s a good thing for you, right? That means you don’t need to take any responsibility.”

“You really make it sound like I make you pregnant,” mumbles Rosé. 

The bartender happily ignores what Rosé said though and keeps waltzing around the painter’s studio while dropping her purse carelessly on the floor. With her eyes still scanning the room calmly, Jisoo says again, “Although you still need to take responsibility for leave me to take that result alone. Also for saying you would be busy yet spending days in my place.”   

“Well, in my defense I actually thought to use those days to create drafts for the paintings and do some sketches. It’s not my fault I found inspiration in your place,” retorts Rosé as she walks to the only table in this room on one side of the room to put the envelope down. “Not to mention you also the one that insisted the sunglasses can’t go anywhere so the only thing I can do was sketching in your place.” This bartender has too many pairs of sunglasses. It actually took days to sketch them all.

“But that wasn’t exactly bad. It made you spending a lot of time in my place and I like having you around. By the way, what’s the exhibition called? It has name, hasn’t it?”

Rosé glances at Jisoo while her legs begin to walk back to their early position, in the front of her half finished painting. The way this girl can be so calmly change the subject still baffles Rosé but she starts to get use to it. The fact that Jennie does that often too also helps.

“Guess.”

Jisoo gives Rosé a quick look after that word left the painter’s lips even though those eyes quickly change their destination to the paintings in the studio. To the similarity they have. Then her eyes move upward to the sketches that hang on the wall. The sketches of objects that Jisoo knows better than anybody after all every single pair of sunglasses on those drawings are hers. Her eyes then move lower, to a certain object that rests calmly on the table, to a pair of sunglasses with transparent frame.

“Broken shades?” Jisoo says slowly with a smirk that begins to make an appearance on her face.

Rosé nods. With her eyes still at the painting (it seems she needs to add a little gray color then she will add some other colors at random parts) she says, “The exhibition is in two months although the exact date isn’t decided yet. Do you want to come? I can book you and Jennie two free tickets.”

“I love to and do you mind if I smoke?”

Rosé looks to Jisoo who at this time already takes out a cigarette box from her pants pocket. “You always smoke in my place.”

“Yes but this room is your sanctuary. It’s different than any other room.”

That’s true.

“I prefer if you don't. I don't want anything happen to my babies.”

Jisoo nods at that and she puts back the cigarette box into her pocket. With her eyes once again look at the paintings around them, Jisoo says, “Your babies are nice. How many years have you painted?”

Rosé shrugs as she answers, “I’m not really sure, I already like drawing when I was only…5? Or is it 6? I don’t really remember.” Rosé shrugs again. “But I only start drawing on canvas when I was around 11.”

“That’s quite long. You really like painting, don’t you?”

Rosé glances at the bartender that still looks around her studio with such interest. She then says, “Yes, I like it. I really like it and I enjoy every moment of it. Every stroke my brush made. Ever shapes I created. Every emotion I put to the canvas.”

Rosé smiles a little. “The love just grows even more after I entered an art school. My time in there wasn’t always easy but I learnt a lot, met a lot of people, gained a lot of experience...” The smile turns into a fond one as Rosé keeps talking, “When I was in my third year one of my professor asked me to be his assistant at his project which I enthusiastically accept. Those few months working under him are one of the best experiences I ever get. Experience that always helped me even after I graduated.”

From the corner of her eyes, she can see Jisoo looks at her but Rosé keeps her eyes at the painting in front of her even though she doesn’t really see it as those eyes grow soft and her lips keep smiling fondly. “Painting after painting. Exhibition after exhibition. Gallery after gallery. Collaboration after collaboration. Every place I go. Every artist I work together with. Those are the best time of my life.” And her smile begins to drop while her eyes turn dark. “Then I met them.”

“Drugs?”

Rosé closes her eyes as she slowly nods. When she opens her eyes, a heavy breath follows. “They didn’t do it right away. It’s slowly but surely and before I knew it nearly all of people I know left me.” Rosé takes another heavy breath and even though her eyes still stare blankly to the canvas, she knows Jisoo looks at her with (once again) an unreadable look. “I don’t blame them anymore now but at that time I mad at them. I trusted them yet they left me alone. And people talk.”

Rosé once again takes another breath and when she talks again her voice is just above a whisper, “Those people, they would look at me and when they thought I couldn’t hear they would say ‘Drugs got her’ but even though that’s what they said I know what they really mean was ‘She’s finished.’”

Jisoo keeps her eyes at Rosé as she speaks, “What did you do after that? Prove to them that they were wrong?”

The painter lets out a cold sneer at what the other girl says. “I’m not superhuman, Soo. Of course not, I fell deeper into depression instead. I isolated myself in this studio, isolated myself from the world, drowned into drugs even more.” This time she lets out a hollow laugh. “I couldn’t even paint. My fingers trembled when I held the brush. I couldn’t create even a single line. And I ended up…” Rosé stops abruptly mid sentence and for a while she doesn’t say anything. Her eyes slowly move to the bartender. Jisoo doesn’t say anything either but same like always, her expressionless gaze holds no judgment and (same like always) Rosé finds it somehow comforting.

“I ended up staring at the blank canvas which looked exactly like how I was that time.” Rosé stops again for a few seconds and when she finally talks her voice comes out so soft it’s nearly nonexistent, “Empty.”

“I couldn’t even paint so I ran to them again. To the drugs,” Rosé says again with a voice so soft, it barely can be heard. “It’s ironic, I know they destroyed me but I couldn’t live without them so I kept consuming them and ended up destroying myself even more.”

The painter takes another breath while her eyes become cloudy with memories. Rosé is aware luck maybe one of the reasons she’s still able to stand here, at her studio (and at now). Just like that one time when the landlord came to her place one morning because she didn’t pay the rent yet only to find her lying on the floor complete with all of her vulnerability. Forced to stop swallowing herself in pity for a while after she pushed herself into the limit with consuming drugs after drugs.  

Rosé remembers the panic on Lisa’s and Somi’s face when she opened her eyes at the hospital hours later. Rosé remembers the tears on their face, the sadness, the anger. Rosé also knows they felt like that because they care and she can’t be more grateful for that. 

But not at that time. Not at that time.

Even after she got discharged from the hospital, she still couldn’t be able to let those drugs go. Even when Lisa changed the lock to her apartment into password so it will be easier to keep an eye on her. Even when Lisa and Somi tried their best to always be there for her. Even after all of that she still drowned even more into despair, still lock herself from the world, while her career crumbled down in front of her.

Another heavy breathe echoes in the room. Her eyes are not at the bartender but Rosé knows Jisoo still looks at her. She doesn’t use those eyes to look at Jisoo though. The painter sweeps her eyes to the half-finished painting in front of her. To its friends that scatter in the studio. To the brushes, the paints, the sketches. To the gray floor that covered by sunlight from the window. Rosé then turns her head to the window. Her eyes gaze at the blue sky as she slowly sits on the floor.

Rosé always likes the sky. When she was young, she often stared into it and even though she knows how far the sky is, it always looks reachable. She knows someday she’ll be there, flying in the upper part of the sky like a bird. And yet when she was lying on the gray and cold floor that time, with white powder and empty bottles all around her, even her studio ceiling seems unreachable. And she would let out a silent scream full of anger and self blame. She wonders, was that why she couldn’t walk or fly that time? Because she was too busy pounding the floor in regret while blaming herself and the world?

Rosé is barely aware of the sound of footsteps come closer to her but she’s completely aware of a sudden soft touch on her back. Rosé turns her head only to see Jisoo sits with her back facing her while leaning against her. It makes Rosé leans back at Jisoo while their fingers intertwined with each other’s on the floor. Rosé drops her head softly to Jisoo’s shoulder and with her eyes that look at her studio ceiling the painter lets out a sigh.

“They save me,” Rosé says suddenly and still with a soft voice. From the corner of her eyes she can see Jisoo glances at her. “The paintings, they save me.”

“I don’t really remember what happen and it’s purely coincidental but one day when I gained my consciousness after another round with the drugs, I saw it. A painting on a canvas,” Rosé says again. “I confused at first but then it dawned on me that I was the one who paint that. My first painting in a long time and I did it when I under the effect of drugs.”

Rosé can feel one of Jisoo’s hands lets hers go. That hand moves up to gently touch the painter’s hair, stroking it. Rosé closes her eyes and lets herself enjoying the soft touch as her mouth opens again, “Art is a way of expressing feeling. Art is honest. Art is like a reflection of ourselves.” Rosé lets out a breath. “The painting was really different from anything I’ve ever created. The brush stroke, the shapes from the lines, the color that overlap with each other. They were so wild and at the same time so free.” And her eyes slowly open to once again look at the ceiling of her studio. “It was weird but I wasn’t freaked out. On the contradictory, I felt intrigued instead. It was like seeing a part of me that I don’t know ever existed.”   

Rosé remembers after that thought dawned into her, she scrambled to grab another empty canvas and pushed it roughly to the canvas stand. She remembers the awkward feeling at having the paintbrush on her hand again and how stiff her fingers were but she paid them no mind. She paid them no mind as she started to paint again. But it didn’t matter how hard she tried she couldn’t make a paint that even close to that painting. So she turned to them again, to the drugs, but this time for different reasons.

Rosé doesn't exactly remember how it feels but she remembers she felt a slight pain when the needle pierced her skin. She could feel the liquid ran through her body but she hardly gave it any thought as she immediately grabbed the paintbrush again. When the effect of the drugs began to wear off, she would inject herself again and immediately returned to her painting. She would inject herself again and paint.

Inject then paint. Inject then paint. Inject then paint. 

She was aware that every intake she took brought her closer to the downfall but she found out she didn’t really care. Because the adrenaline, the thrill, as her brush kept moving on the canvas, it made her felt alive.

For the first time in a long time, she actually felt alive.

“That painting.” Jisoo’s voice that she suddenly hears brings Rosé out from her thought. “Is the painting the one in your room? And also the one in your kitchen and living room?”

With her head still on Jisoo’s shoulder, Rosé nods. She then says, “I was only able to create three of them. Actually I would be able to create more if Lis didn’t stop me.”

“Lis? Your best friend?”

Rosé nods again. “But if she didn't stop me then I won't be able to paint ever again.”

And Jisoo glances at Rosé while the former’s hand slowly drops to the floor.

One of Rosé’s hands gently separates itself from Jisoo’s to touch the gray floor as she says, “She found me here. Lying nearly dead, thanks to all the drugs I took.”

“Overdose.”

Rosé hums as an answer. Yes, another overdose. But when she woke up a few days later in a hospital, she felt different. She felt life began to seep back at her.

“Do you know the first thing I said when I woke up at the hospital a few days after that?” asks Rosé but before Jisoo even has a chance to answer, Rosé talks again, “I said, ‘I want to have an exhibition.’”

Jisoo glances again at Rosé while the former’s hands once again find Rosé’s and the latter welcomes them. Once again intertwined their fingers together. Rosé can feel Jisoo leans back on her a little but the latter doesn’t say anything. Rosé knows though that it’s Jisoo’s way of telling her to just keep talking, so she does, “I know my career is on breaking point and I was aware holding an exhibition at that time wasn’t the brightest idea but I wanted to paint. I just wanted to paint. I want to paint.”

“Was it easy having an exhibition at that time?” asks Jisoo but from a sneer on the bartender’s face, Rosé knows Jisoo already knows the answer. And despite the situation, Rosé finds her lips begin to form a smirk.

“It was hard,” answers Rosé, an answer that Jisoo already knows. “A lot of people already left me, only a few remained and I really grateful to them. Rumors also already spread and I even got some problem with authorities. A lot of galleries didn't want to accept me and until know they still don't.”

“But you finally found a place.”

Rosé nods a little. “We did but that gallery was so small. It was even smaller than the gallery I used for my first exhibition, back when people still barely know me. We needed to change the design so many times and there were some paintings that couldn’t be displayed because the lack of space. The people that came were so few and because of some problems, the exhibition that at first scheduled for five days became two. In the end I lost more money than I got but compare to all exhibitions I already did, that exhibition is the most precious one for me.”

These days when she comes into a gallery or an exhibition or just to another painter’s workshop it often crosses her mind that this is the gallery that would pay high for her (the one that don’t want to accept her anymore), this is people she once worked together with (the one that leave her), and this is the person that wanted to worked with her (the one that don’t acknowledge her now). They will cross her mind but in the end she will shake that thought off because what they think about her isn’t what matter the most.

Rosé slowly lifts her head from Jisoo’s shoulder and moves it so it softly bumps against Jisoo’s. The sunlight from the window that hits her eyes makes Rosé glances to it. The same sunlight that hit the small gallery years ago. The same sunlight that touched her paintings softly as Rosé watched them and thought although for now the bird inside her maybe forced to crawl on the ground, its heart was still beating. And now even when place she could reach before becomes unreachable, her heart is also still beating.  

“That exhibition showed me that I’m here.” Rosé’s voice comes out soft but steady and full of confidence. “I’m still here, my heart is still beating, and I’m still standing.”

Jisoo doesn’t say anything but she tilts her head so its leans even more against Rosé’s. Comfortable silence engulfs them after that. With steady breathings that echo in the room, with bodies that lean against each other, and with fingers that intertwined with each other’s. Until the silent breaks by Jisoo, “But you’re still not totally clean from the drugs, aren’t you?”

“I’m not,” agrees Rosé. “I took a rehabilitation but it’s not that easy to stop an addiction.”

And Rosé’s head moves slightly so once again it rests on Jisoo’s shoulder. “Well, that’s what I will say to other people but because it’s you I will give you different answer. The more honest one.”

Rosé can hear Jisoo chuckles before the latter asks, “I’m not other people?”

Rosé smiles a little at that question. She then turns her head so her face buried in Jisoo’s neck, inhaling her scent. This girl smoke so much it makes Rosé can smell the smoke scent in her skin but Rosé finds out she doesn’t really mind because behind the smoke scent Rosé also can smell a scent that uniquely Jisoo’s. And Rosé needs to admit she likes that scent.

With her face that buried deeper in Jisoo’s neck, Rosé mumbles against Jisoo’s skin, “You’re surprisingly easy to talk to because I know you won’t judge.”

“Well, I don’t exactly have right to judge. I’m not a saint either.”

The laugh that Jisoo lets out as she says those words makes Rosé’s smile grows wider. “If you’re a saint then I can’t imagine how the bad guy is.” That retorts make Jisoo lets out another laugh. Rosé waits until the laugh died down with a smile on her face before she says again with lips still on Jisoo’s skin, “It’s same like you and smoking. It’s not that I can’t stop, I just don’t want to.”

Rosé lifts her head to look at Jisoo. “Do you know what Rosé Park is famous for now? It’s how she combines the soft strokes with the wild one and makes the painting talk because of them.” Jisoo turns her head at Rosé while the latter keeps talking, “I tried to but it doesn’t matter how hard I do it I can’t create something as wild and free as those paintings you saw scatter in my apartment wall when I’m sober.”

Jisoo looks at her for a few more seconds before she suddenly blinks, finally gets the implication. A slow smirk grazes her face as she asks, “You paint when you’re high?”

“Just sometimes and I only do that for finishing. Still need to keep that addiction under control, you know.”

Jisoo looks at her again before she gives Rosé a nudge. “Do it, I want to see.” Rosé raises an eyebrow. “What’s wrong? I already saw you use that and you’re going to do it anyway.”

That’s true. She’s planning to use that to finish the painting today then this bartender gives her a surprise visit.

“If you’re shy you can pretend I’m not here. I will be as silent as a rock,” Jisoo says again. “Come on, in case you forget I once injected that liquid to you.”

Rosé looks at Jisoo for a while before she lets out a sigh. She then forces her body to stand up and begins to walk into the table. When she’s already in front of it, Rosé pulls the shelves to takes out a syringe and a bottle. With those things in her hands, she turns around only to see Jisoo who, even though still sits on the floor, already turns around to face her with an enthusiastic smile on her face. That sight makes Rosé rolls her eyes.

Without saying anything to Jisoo, Rosé walks into her half finished painting, pulls a nearby small chair, and sits on it. She doesn’t see it but she knows Jisoo’s eyes are still on her. Rosé rubs her arm. Why she’s suddenly nervous? This isn’t the first time she does this even though this is the first time with an audience.

Rosé glances at Jisoo who still looks at her with a smile. She then turns her eyes to the window, to the sight of blue sky with birds fly in it (some fly higher while the others fly lower but all of them fly and that’s what matter). Rosé turns her eyes back to the painting while her hand opens the bottle and prepares the syringe. And with her eyes that still look at her painting, Rosé lets the needle pierces her skin.