(Yusuke's Perspective)
The scent of turpentine lingered faintly in the attic as Yusuke sat, cross-legged, before a blank canvas. Moonlight filtered through the window, painting long shadows across the floor like a silent ballet of silver.
He stared at the canvas.
And it stared back.
This was no ordinary artist's block. Yusuke didn't lack inspiration—he was drowning in it.
Ren. Ryuji. Mona. Even himself.
The world around him was shifting in ways that defied explanation, and yet… art had always been his lens of understanding. He'd painted madness, grief, divinity, and rebirth. But this? These recent days of slow, intimate unraveling—the sensual current beneath it all—it escaped his ability to distill.
What was this emotion? This peculiar ache?
He had always thought himself above the mundane pull of desire. He had studied form, not touched it. Observed beauty, never pursued it. Yet when he looked at Ren now, he felt… warmth. A sense of gravity that had nothing to do with admiration and everything to do with longing.
Not merely for physical contact, but for connection. A hand gently brushing against his. A glance held a little too long. The kind of moment that said: You are seen. Entirely.
He closed his eyes.
In his dreams lately, his form had been different. Softer. Curved. Not unwelcome, only unfamiliar. He would run his own fingers along newly shaped thighs, watching light catch on skin he'd never known as his own. He would breathe in the sensation—not shame, but curiosity.
And always, Ren was there.
Watching. Smiling.
Inviting.
Yusuke opened his eyes, heart steady but stirred.
He rose and dipped his brush in red.
It wasn't time to paint a masterpiece tonight. It was time to record a feeling—raw and unfinished.
Each stroke on the canvas was a whisper: desire, confusion, awakening.
He painted not Ren's face, but his presence. The echo of a bond deepening beneath the surface. The tension of eyes that met without words, and the trembling stillness before the storm of intimacy.
Yusuke did not know if he loved Ren.
But something was changing.
And perhaps that was enough—for now.