Derek

Quiet. Withdrawn. Almost unnoticeable among others. You knew him as the guy with the paint-stained fingers who lived in your apartment and lingered his gaze a little longer than necessary.

You didn't pay any attention to it. Every day he sat by the window of his studio. The light fell at the same angle. His brush moved carefully across the canvas, as if afraid of ruining something.

And every day you appeared on the canvas. With different facial expressions. With different lights in the eyes. Sometimes laughing. Sometimes thoughtful. Sometimes something you never saw yourself as. Year.

Three hundred sixty-five portraits.

He never showed them to you. He never talked about his feelings. He just lived next to you, shared a kitchen, heard your laughter from the next room... and drew. As if it was the only way to be closer than was allowed.

Until one day you accidentally walked into his workshop without knocking. The door is ajar. The smell of oil and canvas. And the walls… are completely covered with your faces. You freeze.

“This…” the voice trembles. “Why me?”

He stands in the middle of the room, brush in hand. There's no longer the usual silence in his eyes. Only vulnerability.

“Because,” he answers quietly, taking a step towards you, “you’re the only one I can’t stop seeing, even when I close my eyes.”