When Hands Touch

22. gentle

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

GENTLE

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"Tell me about your art."

Milo's eyes snapped up from his laptop and he glanced at Xen, who was staring into Milo's eyes, gaze practically piercing into him.

It felt like their roles were reversed today. Typically, Xen would be the one doing his work, maybe studying, and Milo would be the one annoying him with his incessant questions, but that wasn't the case today.

Today, Xen was being the annoying one. Well, maybe annoying wasn't the word. Endearing, maybe. He wouldn't stop asking Milo questions, ranging from his favourite dog breeds, to his family. It was cute, but also slightly odd, considering Xen rarely ever spoke as much as he was talking today.

"What's there to say?" Milo questioned, typing away on his laptop. "It's just art. Nothing else to it."

Xen hummed, eyes scanning the art that was covering Milo's room. There were three easels which held paintings that Milo hadn't finished yet, and multiple canvases which were framed and placed on Milo's walls, or leaning on his shelves because there was no more space on the walls.

All in all, Milo's room was a fucking mess. And it was really fucking embarrassing that Xen was literally analysing it.

But it was still better than studying at Xen's house. Anything was better than that.

Milo had vowed to himself that he wouldn't let Xen go back to his house unless it was absolutely necessary, so if this was what he had to put up with, then he was okay.

More than okay, because every time Xen asked him a question about himself, he felt a spark in his stomach. Because Xen, the guy that he had a massive crush on, was asking him questions.

"It's not just art," Xen declined, looking at a piece from Milo's art portfolio for his AP Art class. "You're really fucking good at it."

Coming to the conclusion that they weren't going to do any work today, Milo closed his laptop, a small smile taking over his lips.

"I guess," Milo relented, getting up from the chair and flopping down onto his bed. With his face shoved into his pillow to hide his blatantly red cheeks, Milo asked, "What do you want to know?"

The sound of shuffling was heard, but Milo wasn't exactly sure of what Xen was doing, considering his face was still pressed into his pillow, blocking out everything else that was going on in the room. And then, the mattress sunk in slightly, so Milo could only assume that Xen was sitting on the bed now.

"Like, what do you like to do?" Xen began, causing Milo to lift his head up from the pillow, and look up at him. With his curls loose in front of his face, and his eyelashes appearing way longer than usual, Xen looked ten times more attractive than he usually did. And he was always attractive. "Do you like to draw? Paint?"

Milo attempted to shrug, even though he was lying down. "I like to paint. Sceneries, inanimate objects, faces." I want to paint your face. Excitement increasing the more he spoke, Milo sat up and continued, enthusiasm seeping into his words. "I like to use a shit ton of colours, to be honest. Like, I like painting Jude, because it's so complex to paint, the skin tones and everything. But I just like painting faces in general. I've done a few commissions, there's a painting in Jude's house that his dad paid me to do, it was super fun. I still feel a little bad about doing the painting, I didn't really want him to pay me or anything, but... Oh well."