except despite checking “everyone can reply” for replies, I see no speech bubble. :U

@theartofmadeline
Stranger Things

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Show & Tell

#extradirty
sheepfilms
Aqua Utopia|海の底で記憶を紡ぐ

izzy's playlists!
Cosimo Galluzzi
occasionally subtle
2025 on Tumblr: Trends That Defined the Year
DEAR READER
Not today Justin

oozey mess
Peter Solarz
taylor price
Sweet Seals For You, Always
h
trying on a metaphor
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda

seen from United States

seen from United States
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seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
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seen from Ghana

seen from Saudi Arabia
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@stu-tow
except despite checking “everyone can reply” for replies, I see no speech bubble. :U
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Tássia Bianchini, Untitled - 2015
Oil on canvas - 18 x 24 cm / 7″ x 9.4″
Marina nevy is Cecilia (Heather’s bab) .^.
The majority of her gifs in that collection have her in heavy makeup, and straightened hair, so it took me a minute to recognize her.
III suck.
You know the way that children play make-believe in the garden? I did that and I thought, ‘This will do for life. Why would I want to do anything else?’
*slides a 20 dollar bill to anyone who will bring in Nick as well*
I'm sure Kyle will
Oil Painting, Abstract Canvas Painting, Modern Wall Art, Original Artwork, Large Abstract Art, Modern Art, Canvas Painting, Oil On Canvas by artfan1981 http://ift.tt/1POmo9V
Luke Treadaway in The Nightmare Worlds Of H. G. Wells [Episode One: The Late Mr. Elvesham]
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Mark Chadwick | Website - Spin Paintings, 2009
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someone tell me who to write for
JADE
someone tell me who to write for
JADE
Windows Like Eyes - with Stu
Rubbing knuckles bruised sick-yellow and hurt-purple, Lucas regarded the monument made flesh who continued, despite his jabs, to deflect and protect. There was a kindness in the walls of the man with the beardy face and cloven feet that Lucas didn’t quite understand. Stuart couldn’t fathom it and Lucas couldn’t decipher it. It was something they were both unused to, and something the latter of the two was now trying to view in a new light: they weren’t quite in the grasp of the torch of trust as of yet, but he’d found the pocket version and was inclined to shine it on Taniel; at least for a trial period.
He’d brought him good tidings in the form of cocoa, after all.
There was a derisive sneer that toyed around the corners of Lucas’s lips like fish hooks at the mention of kindness in a verbal way, however. The knee-jerk reaction was to wave it off, but instead of dismissing or wavering, he instead fixed a steely blue-green stare on Taniel–a sea wave against a wall of sand and time. Head cocked to one side, he sipped his hot chocolate and studied Taniel–seeing him not as artistically or dreamily as Stuart, perhaps, but seeing him as…a companion. A friend. To Stuart, at any rate. A man, more than an idea, though.
“We’ve been stung before,” was all he said in regards to honey and bees, before setting his cup down, fingers drumming idly. “That being said, your…compassion,” he managed to keep the drawl out of his Londonderry voice. “Is appreciated.” There was a short pause in which Lucas regarded Taniel almost ruefully, then raised the cup to him. “As is the rest of you.” He tossed back the remainder of the second helping of something hot and sweet without so much as a wink (that existed more in his words than his demeanor).
There was another silence following Taniel’s explanation, and Lucas slowly folded his hands under his chin–not laying down his invisible cards just yet, but certainly holding. He watched Taniel as one might the rising of the sun, with a mixture of trepidation; wariness, and eagerness. A hunger, as if the new day, for Lucas, couldn’t come fast enough. The splice cocked his head to one side and observed; soaking in the sunlight that was Taniel’s warmth and explanation. As philosophical and frilly as it might’ve been to some, Lucas basked in it. It was an opening; a vulnerability. A vein into which he could tap to find the nest of arteries needed to protect Stuart, but more than that, it was…trust. Truth. It was Taniel’s truth, awash in wonder and gilded in ancient glory, but a truth nonetheless. Truth, much like art, was priceless: you could weigh and measure it all you wanted, but at the end of the day, it’d always mean something more to somebody else than it might mean to another.
“Because art is his shield,” Lucas replied; his own brand of honesty in exchange for Taniel’s own. His voice had softened, albeit the words still held the clipped assurance Stuart lacked when he spoke. There was a crispness to the words; a curtness that, while not rude, dismissed the poetic meandering of a young man with a stammer in exchange for a no-nonsense ferocity. All this he tempered for Taniel, his voice mellowing. “I needed to know you didn’t intend to wrest that from him in order to better yourself.” His eyes flickered across Taniel’s face idly.
“He’s very fond of you,” Lucas said at last, scratching his nose and finally glancing away. “As you might be aware.” He decided to try something–another truth; Stuart’s truth, passed along through a grapevine of nerves and fractured genetics, slipping between his teeth–smoke itself would have more substance than the whisper that followed the words prior:
“In you he sees a shelter. He feels safe when he is with you.”
Taniel coughed into his cocoa, hiding a startled grin. Stuart flirted like a storybook maiden with a surprisingly knowledgeable streak; Lucas flirted like an oncoming truck that swerved at the last second. All the same, Taniel knew the difference between a winsome game of chicken and an invitation to pursue. Chuckling, he lifted his cup in rejoinder.
Lucas gathered his words while Taniel regained his self-possession. He was looking appropriately solicitous by the time the man - men? - across the table spoke. A wince cracked the smoothness of his face. “I don’t break shields anymore, Lucas. And… forgive me if I’m speculating off-mark, but aren’t you his shield? I thought art was his sword. He uses it to fight back,” mused the dead city. “Anyway, Stuart’s art is his. Whether he chooses to share it with me or to guard it or burn it - that’s always going to be his choice.”
“I’m very fond of him,” Tan replied, smiling. “I’m even growing rather fond of you. Do you think we could be friends, you and I? He’d probably like that.” He trailed off when it became evident Lucas was preparing to say something weighty-
-and was utterly unprepared.
Time hiccuped, and Taniel remembered to act like he inhabited his body rather than being inhabited himself. He blinked and cooling tears shivered off his lashes. He studied them on his hand like he didn’t know what they were. Blinked again. Sniffed. Made his shoulders his again and took a deep breath.
“Thank you. Both of you. I’ll do my best to live up to that trust.” A heartbeat. “May I hug you?”
Smirking to himself at the reaction he wrought from Taniel, Lucas steepled his fingers yet again and pressed them against his mouth almost prayerfully; apologetically. He was, of course, not even a teaspoon remorseful, but rather, relished the laughter. He wasn't all violence and vindiction. He could find amusement in the amusement of others, after all. Especially now that he and Taniel weren't to be sworn enemies--for the time being, at any rate. He'd keep his calendar and options open.
"...Touche," dryly drawled the redhead with the ragged knuckles, offering Taniel acknowledgment in the form of a slow nod. A paintbrush was as good a sword as any--whether it was wielded from the broken edges of a shiv in a pinch or as it was originally intended; to garnish canvases with color and bring life to imagination; solidity to dreams.
There was a quiet moment once again as Lucas regarded Taniel with a vague expression of wide-eyed bemusement. Someone? Fond of Lucas, of all beings? He had a hard time believing that, but he was more than pleased to hear it. Startled; but pleased. He kept that close to his chest, like most things, and simply smiled in reply, brows shrugging. Friendship was something that came easy to neither Lucas nor Stu, and the steward of the body piloting the two of them was currently unavailable for consultation on the matter. He pursed his lips, nose scrunching. "Only if we don't have to make gaudy friendship bracelets." He flicked a bony wrist. "I'd hate to spoil the aesthetic I'm perfecting. It's 'scrubby vagabond', not 'bohemian dreamer' that's in at the moment."
Wariness settled under his skin in a prickling wave, and Lucas shifted in silent discomfort at the sight (and salty scent) of tears, absently picking at a scab on his knuckles. Birds cooed in the alcoves of buildings nearby, the wind whistled a soft and subtle sigh across the cobbles; tossing damp and defiant leaves. All this passed in the fraction of a moment, yet it seemed an eternity. His stomach churned, and Lucas felt it more to do with the unfamiliar sensation of guilt than the cocoa he'd ingested. He could be grateful for that. He could be grateful Taniel had not reacted more poorly to the offering he'd given him, too, for that matter. Gratitude.
Another foreign concept for Lucas Rodgers.
"...Depends," said Lucas finally with a sigh, rising. He wiped his hands on his jacket instinctively, made a great show of bracing his legs, and motioned with both hands somewhat dispassionately. He could feel the weight of the world's squeeze loosening its grip. Soon he'd slip back into darkness and silence to watch, rather than wield, but he waited nonetheless to be present for this moment--just to be on the safe side.
"Just don't blow snot into my hair and we should be alright."
Stuart flirted like a storybook maiden with a surprisingly knowledgeable streak; Lucas flirted like an oncoming truck that swerved at the last second.
that’s amazing
Windows Like Eyes - with Stu
Steepling his fingers after pushing his container back at Taniel for a refill, Lucas lifted his gaze from the table to the city cast in bronze across from him. There was a vague moment where it seemed Lucas might get up and leave–something in his body language that foretold of flight, rather than fight, but it faded the longer he held himself still.
Lifting the refilled cup to his lips, Lucas shrugged with his brows and drank deep–setting the container back down after a moment with a satisfied sigh, examining the back of his hand for a moment. The heat reacted on his skin like a conduit, channels of manipulated genetics igniting in the form of a faint glowing in his veins that gradually faded. He flexed his fingers and folded them again, eyes drifting back up to Taniel once more.
“…He has moments of awareness,” said Lucas finally, through his teeth. Said teeth were bared, almost smiling, one finger circling the opposite hand’s knuckles. “But for the most part, he sleeps when I am out and about.” His head canted to one side, jaw setting after a momentary reworking; a worrying. He chewed on something not there; digesting concepts, perhaps. Testing the air as Taniel could, though perhaps not as directly.
“He’s already biased toward you, though. I wouldn’t worry.” Lucas’s gaze sharpened, and he leaned forward slightly.
“Now, my first question, my glittering friend, is to ask what your intentions are with Stuart.”
Taniel wanted to give Lucas his own gloves, a warmer coat. If he’d known Stuart glowed when warm, he would find a way to never let the artist feel a chill. As it was, he only listened and blew warm air into his cupped hands.
“And you never sleep.” A moment of pity showed in Taniel’s eyes, shortly replaced by something harder. “Stuart’s bias doesn’t concern me. Of course I want him to think well of me, but I said I wanted him to form his own opinions about my answers to your questions, didn’t I? I’m not trying to lead him - or you for that matter.”
Lucas’ function dictated his thinly veiled hostility. Taniel took a deep breath and refused to rise to it, even if he did have to glance heavenward for patience. Once, he too was walls to keep out invaders, and it gave him empathy for Lucas’ implacable distrust. “I value Stuart’s friendship,” answered the city. “He’s gentle and kind, his art is fascinating, and he treats me respectfully.” He took a sip of cocoa and let Lucas digest that for a second before continuing. “I’d like to return those feelings and be his friend. I can’t help what I am, Lucas. Part of me is motivated to help him create a comfortable life for himself because that’s the role I was designed to play, but my personal feelings of compassion and interest for him are rooted in who he is.”
Taniel’s fingers toyed with the fringe on his pashmina scarf, braiding it absently. “You can think whatever you want about my motives and speak to me like I’m showing Stuart the respect and affection he deserves just to suit my own ends. I’d say I don’t care, but I do. I’d like for us to be friends too, Lucas, if only for his sake. Whatever you choose to believe about me, I’m not going to turn you away if you ever need me.”
“Now, let’s see… Do you share Stu’s love of art?”
“No,” Lucas’s tone was unexpectedly quietly. The acerbic quality; the snide sharpness, seemed diluted by either Taniel’s sincerity or the cocoa’s charms. He fidgeted with the old scars on his fingers, on this shared body’s skin, and contemplated their origins, his entire body language suggesting something secret. Something fatal. When Lucas finally looked back up, his features had hardened and hollowed again, but the eyes stayed–human, somehow. As human as he or Stuart could be, now. “Alright, then, alright.” Lucas’s hands lifted lazily. “No need to get sand in your shutters.”
There was another pronounced silence as Lucas took in Taniel’s words. There was an honesty to them, a sense of reverence that sent prickles of uncertainty across Lucas’s flesh. Each nerve hummed like a warning sign, an electric fence network of trepidation. Were Stuart awake, it would’ve been exactly what the boy needed and wanted to hear. That was the danger of it. Whether it was Taniel feeding Stuart dreams instead of the other way around, or actual truth in the form of open-hearted friendship, Lucas wasn’t entirely ure. He disliked being unsure. It was why he existed; to find the truth in things. And he could now seek said truth out with toxins and powers he hadn’t had before. No need to resort to violence unless he felt like it–and Taniel, strangely, didn’t bring that out in him. If anything, Taniel calmed him. The conundrum was that sensation made Lucas want to be on edge. Dizzying.
“…Thank you, Taniel.” Luca darted his tongue over his lips to wet them, brows furrowing. “That was–more than I was expecting, I mean…” He tapped his chest absently; drumming with both sets of fingers. “This–us…” He chuckled faintly. “We’re not used to kindness. Especially not from strangers, not when the last strangers we met prior to this are the exact reason I exist before you now.” He flippantly flicked a hand into the air; wrist rolling with a flourish (and a crack of old injuries in the bones there that’d never healed quite right). “Not when said strangers made hives in our head and filled our waking days with chemical wasps and medicinal yellowjackets.” He tapped a temple absently. “There’s a buzzing here, Taniel–it never quite goes away.” Not even after Stuart had broken out. It had mutated; translated itself into other forms of anxiety, new varieties of buzzing. But it never left.
It only continued to sting.
“That stays with him,” said Lucas idly. “I could no sooner lift a brush like he does than he could throw a punch as I do.” He picked dirt from under his nails, glancing down. “What does art mean to you, Taniel?”
The expansionary impulse burned strong in Taniel when Lucas referred to the people who had caused Stuart pain. It was the urge to extend his borders to insulate what lay behind him, ensure that no one within the empire of his heart would have to feel threatened by outside forces. The feeling was dangerous. Even when he was mudbrick and real bronze, the people brought into his compass did not always take it well or thrive. The ones who lived to the fullest were those who came to him under their own power.
Taniel tightened his arms folded over his chest against the painful, hollow ache that always followed such thoughts. Sometimes he wondered if he would be better off with buzzing like Stu’s instead of the abandoned silence. Probably not.
“You deserve kindness,” said Taniel. “Both of you. You never rest, Lucas, and you always look for the worst because you’re designed to protect him from it. And protect him you do. Admirably. But… perhaps sometimes he’s right in giving the uncertain a chance to be good.” He grinned an infectious, dimpled grin for all that it was tinged with an edge of his aches. “I had a metaphor about honey and hives, but it’s stuck on the tip of my tongue. Something about attracting bees. Bees are nicer.”
Closing his eyes and rubbing his temples dissipated some of the tension. He chuckled, eyes still closed. “You’ve inadvertently asked me a very existential question. Art is the product of thought and effort and imagination. I appreciate art because I appreciate people. I appreciate people because they made me.” Dreamy fondness suffused Taniel’s face, softening the taut lines emptiness had brought briefly to his features. “Time and slander colored me as an edifice of sin, but from the first I was built to contain wonders. If I can’t love the craft of people’s minds, then I am good for nothing at all. Art is new and making even if a piece is old or complete, a feeling of awe and insight, a chance to live for a time outside the confines of your own head and fall in love with someone else’s worldview.” Taniel trailed off, eyes still closed, letting Lucas understand that he was handing over a window of emotional vulnerability in a gesture of trust.
“If the artistry stays with Stuart, then why did you yourself ask what art meant to me?”
Rubbing knuckles bruised sick-yellow and hurt-purple, Lucas regarded the monument made flesh who continued, despite his jabs, to deflect and protect. There was a kindness in the walls of the man with the beardy face and cloven feet that Lucas didn't quite understand. Stuart couldn't fathom it and Lucas couldn't decipher it. It was something they were both unused to, and something the latter of the two was now trying to view in a new light: they weren't quite in the grasp of the torch of trust as of yet, but he'd found the pocket version and was inclined to shine it on Taniel; at least for a trial period.
He'd brought him good tidings in the form of cocoa, after all.
There was a derisive sneer that toyed around the corners of Lucas's lips like fish hooks at the mention of kindness in a verbal way, however. The knee-jerk reaction was to wave it off, but instead of dismissing or wavering, he instead fixed a steely blue-green stare on Taniel--a sea wave against a wall of sand and time. Head cocked to one side, he sipped his hot chocolate and studied Taniel--seeing him not as artistically or dreamily as Stuart, perhaps, but seeing him as...a companion. A friend. To Stuart, at any rate. A man, more than an idea, though.
"We've been stung before," was all he said in regards to honey and bees, before setting his cup down, fingers drumming idly. "That being said, your...compassion," he managed to keep the drawl out of his Londonderry voice. "Is appreciated." There was a short pause in which Lucas regarded Taniel almost ruefully, then raised the cup to him. "As is the rest of you." He tossed back the remainder of the second helping of something hot and sweet without so much as a wink (that existed more in his words than his demeanor).
There was another silence following Taniel's explanation, and Lucas slowly folded his hands under his chin--not laying down his invisible cards just yet, but certainly holding. He watched Taniel as one might the rising of the sun, with a mixture of trepidation; wariness, and eagerness. A hunger, as if the new day, for Lucas, couldn't come fast enough. The splice cocked his head to one side and observed; soaking in the sunlight that was Taniel's warmth and explanation. As philosophical and frilly as it might've been to some, Lucas basked in it. It was an opening; a vulnerability. A vein into which he could tap to find the nest of arteries needed to protect Stuart, but more than that, it was...trust. Truth. It was Taniel's truth, awash in wonder and gilded in ancient glory, but a truth nonetheless. Truth, much like art, was priceless: you could weigh and measure it all you wanted, but at the end of the day, it'd always mean something more to somebody else than it might mean to another.
"Because art is his shield," Lucas replied; his own brand of honesty in exchange for Taniel's own. His voice had softened, albeit the words still held the clipped assurance Stuart lacked when he spoke. There was a crispness to the words; a curtness that, while not rude, dismissed the poetic meandering of a young man with a stammer in exchange for a no-nonsense ferocity. All this he tempered for Taniel, his voice mellowing. "I needed to know you didn't intend to wrest that from him in order to better yourself." His eyes flickered across Taniel's face idly.
"He's very fond of you," Lucas said at last, scratching his nose and finally glancing away. "As you might be aware." He decided to try something--another truth; Stuart's truth, passed along through a grapevine of nerves and fractured genetics, slipping between his teeth--smoke itself would have more substance than the whisper that followed the words prior:
"In you he sees a shelter. He feels safe when he is with you."
Windows Like Eyes - with Stu
The concept warmed Taniel; Lucas’ snide remark slapped him in the face. He was glad the chill air and hot cocoa would excuse the stinging heat rising to his cheeks. It was hard not to feel ashamed of his needs and feelings when he heard them parsed in such a way.
Taniel forced himself to think of Lucas’s comments like lockpicks, trying to crack him open or make him reveal a secret. Better yet, Lucas was sweeping for land mines before Stu could set them off. Lucky for everyone that all Taniel’s traps were farther below the surface than either Stu or Lucas could trigger.
“Alright,” said Taniel. “We’ll play one for one. When you said you would let Stuart know I’d stopped by earlier, does that mean that he is less, ah, aware than you are when you occupy the place he inhabits now?” Taniel lifted his hands in a placating gesture and also offered the thermos to Lucas for a refill. “I ask because I’d like him to be able to form his own opinions about my answers to your questions.”
Steepling his fingers after pushing his container back at Taniel for a refill, Lucas lifted his gaze from the table to the city cast in bronze across from him. There was a vague moment where it seemed Lucas might get up and leave–something in his body language that foretold of flight, rather than fight, but it faded the longer he held himself still.
Lifting the refilled cup to his lips, Lucas shrugged with his brows and drank deep–setting the container back down after a moment with a satisfied sigh, examining the back of his hand for a moment. The heat reacted on his skin like a conduit, channels of manipulated genetics igniting in the form of a faint glowing in his veins that gradually faded. He flexed his fingers and folded them again, eyes drifting back up to Taniel once more.
“…He has moments of awareness,” said Lucas finally, through his teeth. Said teeth were bared, almost smiling, one finger circling the opposite hand’s knuckles. “But for the most part, he sleeps when I am out and about.” His head canted to one side, jaw setting after a momentary reworking; a worrying. He chewed on something not there; digesting concepts, perhaps. Testing the air as Taniel could, though perhaps not as directly.
“He’s already biased toward you, though. I wouldn’t worry.” Lucas’s gaze sharpened, and he leaned forward slightly.
“Now, my first question, my glittering friend, is to ask what your intentions are with Stuart.”
Taniel wanted to give Lucas his own gloves, a warmer coat. If he’d known Stuart glowed when warm, he would find a way to never let the artist feel a chill. As it was, he only listened and blew warm air into his cupped hands.
“And you never sleep.” A moment of pity showed in Taniel’s eyes, shortly replaced by something harder. “Stuart’s bias doesn’t concern me. Of course I want him to think well of me, but I said I wanted him to form his own opinions about my answers to your questions, didn’t I? I’m not trying to lead him - or you for that matter.”
Lucas’ function dictated his thinly veiled hostility. Taniel took a deep breath and refused to rise to it, even if he did have to glance heavenward for patience. Once, he too was walls to keep out invaders, and it gave him empathy for Lucas’ implacable distrust. “I value Stuart’s friendship,” answered the city. “He’s gentle and kind, his art is fascinating, and he treats me respectfully.” He took a sip of cocoa and let Lucas digest that for a second before continuing. “I’d like to return those feelings and be his friend. I can’t help what I am, Lucas. Part of me is motivated to help him create a comfortable life for himself because that’s the role I was designed to play, but my personal feelings of compassion and interest for him are rooted in who he is.”
Taniel’s fingers toyed with the fringe on his pashmina scarf, braiding it absently. “You can think whatever you want about my motives and speak to me like I’m showing Stuart the respect and affection he deserves just to suit my own ends. I’d say I don’t care, but I do. I’d like for us to be friends too, Lucas, if only for his sake. Whatever you choose to believe about me, I’m not going to turn you away if you ever need me.”
“Now, let’s see… Do you share Stu’s love of art?”
“No,” Lucas’s tone was unexpectedly quietly. The acerbic quality; the snide sharpness, seemed diluted by either Taniel’s sincerity or the cocoa’s charms. He fidgeted with the old scars on his fingers, on this shared body’s skin, and contemplated their origins, his entire body language suggesting something secret. Something fatal. When Lucas finally looked back up, his features had hardened and hollowed again, but the eyes stayed--human, somehow. As human as he or Stuart could be, now. “Alright, then, alright.” Lucas’s hands lifted lazily. “No need to get sand in your shutters.”
There was another pronounced silence as Lucas took in Taniel’s words. There was an honesty to them, a sense of reverence that sent prickles of uncertainty across Lucas’s flesh. Each nerve hummed like a warning sign, an electric fence network of trepidation. Were Stuart awake, it would’ve been exactly what the boy needed and wanted to hear. That was the danger of it. Whether it was Taniel feeding Stuart dreams instead of the other way around, or actual truth in the form of open-hearted friendship, Lucas wasn’t entirely ure. He disliked being unsure. It was why he existed; to find the truth in things. And he could now seek said truth out with toxins and powers he hadn’t had before. No need to resort to violence unless he felt like it--and Taniel, strangely, didn’t bring that out in him. If anything, Taniel calmed him. The conundrum was that sensation made Lucas want to be on edge. Dizzying.
“...Thank you, Taniel.” Luca darted his tongue over his lips to wet them, brows furrowing. “That was--more than I was expecting, I mean...” He tapped his chest absently; drumming with both sets of fingers. “This--us...” He chuckled faintly. “We’re not used to kindness. Especially not from strangers, not when the last strangers we met prior to this are the exact reason I exist before you now.” He flippantly flicked a hand into the air; wrist rolling with a flourish (and a crack of old injuries in the bones there that’d never healed quite right). “Not when said strangers made hives in our head and filled our waking days with chemical wasps and medicinal yellowjackets.” He tapped a temple absently. “There’s a buzzing here, Taniel--it never quite goes away.” Not even after Stuart had broken out. It had mutated; translated itself into other forms of anxiety, new varieties of buzzing. But it never left.
It only continued to sting.
“That stays with him,” said Lucas idly. “I could no sooner lift a brush like he does than he could throw a punch as I do.” He picked dirt from under his nails, glancing down. “What does art mean to you, Taniel?”