Cities that Never Sleep

xviii

There were times where Finn had to stop himself from looking for her in crowds of students as he walked through the campus. He'd hesitate every time he passed her apartment complex. He glanced for her on his errand runs when he strode the streets of the city.

Deep down, he hoped that Katherine would enter the cafe one day, order her usual, and sit down at their table while typing away at that laptop of hers.

She never did-but what was Finn expecting? Katherine was long gone. It had been over two months.

What was Finn expecting? It wasn't like they were dating, or that they had committed to something. Katherine and Finn's relationship wasn't official, and it wasn't black and white. They're relationship was like Finn's practice canvas with coffee-paint. It was coated in different shades of brown: messy and unordinary and confusing.

But Finn still felt like Katherine abruptly broke off this relationship that meant something to him, even though Finn didn't quite know what that something was. He knew how that something felt like, though. And in truth, it left him distraught.

Finn soon quit his job at the cafe. He started working harder in his studies. He applied to various art schools. He even joined the local art club at the university. And he tried not to think about her.

In his art club, there was one boy he began to converse with regularly. His name was Noah, and he had a dry sense of humor, wore fedoras most of the time, and was obsessed with Banksy: the anonymous and satirical street artist. One night, Finn invited him over to his dorm to share artwork, as nerdy and amateur artists did. Finn had a collection of pieces from watercolor paintings to charcoal drawings, some of them unfinished and not his best work. But there was one painting in particular that Noah was drawn to.

His eyes stopped on the wrinkled canvas paper hiding in between Finn's desk and the wall, instinctively getting up to see what it was.

Finn bit his lip, uneasy as he watched Noah fish the painting out from its hiding place.

"It was just some project for university," he shrugged it off.

But Noah wasn't listening. He just stared at it for a long minute before Finn coughed.

"Sorry," Noah said when he finally broke away from the painting, "it's just-it seems so simple yet is so enigmatic. What was your inspiration, if you don't mind me asking?"

Finn scratched his neck shyly. He stared at anything but the coffee painting. "A beautiful mess, you could say."

Noah stared at it again, eyes beaming like a little kid's when he woke up and remembered it was Christmas. "It's brilliant!" he turned back to Finn, who didn't look convinced, and added, "Really! You should offer it to a gallery. Attract some attention. I could show this to my professor, he'll definitely take a liking to this work."

Finn blushed, but was hesitant. Did he really want to share this part of him to the rest of the world?

"Come on, man. I know it'll be successful."

While he considered it, Finn stared at the painting shaded in brown, remembering that he was letting go.

And that was enough for him to say yes.