The afternoon filtered into the art club room like a blade of slanted light.
Rikako was working silently, her brush immersed in dark colors, when the door opened slowly.
Sarahina entered and stood still for a few seconds, then spoke in a hesitant but direct voice:
— "Senpai... do you like zombie girls?"
The sound of the brush sliding across the canvas stopped.
Rikako turned her face slightly, letting a hint of a smile curl her lips.
— "Dear kohai," she said softly, "pull up a chair and sit next to my painting."
He sat down next to her, his hands on his knees, staring at the canvas.
Rikako observed her for a moment, then resumed speaking in that calm, sharp voice she used when she was about to teach something.
— "You know, kohai... I don't like zombies. They no longer have desires, they no longer feel fear, nor shame. They're just bodies that move out of habit."
Then she lowered her gaze slightly, her smile thinning.
—"I, on the other hand, love what still resists—the blood that flows, the skin that trembles, the eyes that cannot lie."
Sarahina lowered her head, touching the black ribbons in her hair.
—"Then I'm not a zombie..." she murmured.
Rikako put down the brush, leaned toward her, and touched her cheek with her paint-stained fingers.
—"Oh, no, my dear kohai. You are not at all. You are my living canvas, the one that still stirs under the touch of the brush."
Sarahina blushed slightly, then whispered:
—"That's enough for me, senpai."
Rikako laughed softly, a low, sweet sound, and returned to her painting.
