Elliant settled himself in the dim room, immersed in his own sketches. The only sounds were the quiet scratch of his pencil on the sketchbook and his eyes darting back and forth between the picture he used as an inspiration and his sketchbook.
After a few minutes of constant pencil strokes, the sound of the pencil dropping on the table broke the silence.
Elliant looked at his masterpiece with satisfaction, and sighed as he slumped back on his chair.
Then, he stretched his arms out and yawned, whispering to himself, "This will do for today." as he closed his sketchbook and put it away.
The peaceful night went by and it was now morning. Currently, Elliant was having his breakfast with his mother.
Only the clattering noise of the plates, spoon and fork was heard in the dining room.
After finishing his last bite, Elliant immediately stood up from the table without hesitation.
"I'm going now."
He himself knew that he won't get a reply but he still tried and waited.
Feeling pathetic for expecting something, he pursued his own lips and left the house with bitter feelings.
Arriving at school was always a monotonous task for him, filled with the same repetitive days. He had grown used to it after all this time, yet it was still tiring and exhausting.
Elliant arrived at class early. Ignoring the loud chatter of his classmates, he took out his textbook and sketchbook.
Elliant decided to read his textbook early while he still had the time, before the class officially started.
He was in the middle of reading in peace when suddenly, he heard someone call out to him.
"Hey, Elliant."
Putting his book and sketchbook aside, he looked over to the person who had called him over.
"Elliant! The Advisory Teacher is looking for you."
A short girl with long hair yelled in the room loud enough to catch everyone's attention.
Though he wasn't in the mood to go, he reluctantly stood up since he had no choice.
The chair he had been sitting in made a loud creaking sound as he rose and left the room, attracting their stares and filling the class with silence.
Elliant was so preoccupied with his thoughts that he bumped into someone in the hall, he quickly looked up in embarrassment.
"Sorry." Elliant mumbled in a low tone, his eyes glancing up at the person for a brief second before looking away.
Elliant looked back behind and so his eyes fell upon the person again, who visibly has his face scrunched up in annoyance.
Once again Elliant darted his eyes away seeing the other's face.
The guy's friends flocked over him when elliant bumped into him.
"Don't mind him." one of Clyde's friends whispered to him.
"You okay, Clyde?" another friend chimed in.
"He's always been like that so don't feel bad" another friend of him added.
To be honest, Clyde was only irritated because his mood's become foul since earlier but Elliant added fuel to that fire making him even more in a worse mood.
His anger soon dissipated as confusion took over him questioning whether where that guy will be going, class is about to start soon and there's no way a guy who's a freak when it comes to studying will skip class.
Clyde then shook his head and urged his friends to leave. "Let's go, we'll be late."
The door to the classroom slowly opened, and Clyde and his classmates stepped in, only to find out that class had already begun.
Clyde and his group were immediately asked about why they were late, but in an effort to avoid trouble, they quickly laughed off the question, thinking nothing of the teacher's remark.
"Ah, don't worry about it, sir." Clyde told their teacher.
"It's not like we've missed anything important, right?" Clyde reassured his friends with a smile.
As Clyde and his group finally took their seats, the teacher let out a sigh of resignation.
After a few moments, Elliant arrived in class with an exhausted expression.
"I'm sorry for coming in late." Elliant bowed his head lightly to the teacher for his late arrival.
In response, the teacher swatted his hands on the air with a smile. "It's okay, sit down."
Elliant quitely came back to his seat. Feeling like something is off, he tried to search through his things.
His face slowly paled as reality began to sino in.
His sketchbook is nowhere to be found.
It may seem like a no big deal but for him it is because it contains all the drawings he exerted his effort into.
He glanced around to search for who might have his sketchbook but found nothing.
"Is something wrong ?" The teacher asked noticing Elliant's behaviour.
"Y-yes sir." Elliant answered in a shaking voice.
The teacher, despite feeling worried, only hummed then moved on to the lecture.
Throughout the lesson, Elliant was listless.
He's thinking where could his sketchbook be?
What if the one who found it was Gawhain?
The sudden train of thoughts made him fell dizzy, he bowed his head on the table and the teacher saw him but the teacher only sighed.
The train of thoughts went through Elliant's head, which made him dizzy and unable to focus. He bowed his head on his desk, which the teacher noticed, but the teacher only sighed ignoring his actions.
Elliant was too anxious and worried to focus on anything else.
On the other hand, the other students murmured around saying something like.
"If I did that he would've yelled at me."
"He definitely saw that." One student uttered.
"I know right, he should've scolded him atleast a bit so that the favouritism wasn't that obvious." another student added.
As the class got louder and louder, the teacher took matters into his own hands and broke a piece of chalk to call for silence.
The students all stopped their chatter, as the topic of conversation was successfully shifted back to the lesson.
The class ended smoothly but Elliant was too worried and anxious about his sketchbook.
"Let's go to the cafeteria." One classmate of Elliant invited Elliant to go with him but he only replied a second late.
"You go first I need to look for my- uhh sketchbook" Elliant explained in a quick pace, obviously panicked, he was vigorously searching through his things.
"Alright." The guy decided to leave Elliant seeing him busy.
The cold breeze swept the room as the soft sounds of things being rummaged by someone was heard.
"Where the heck is it?!" Elliant whispered to himself, his voice suddenly much louder than he intended.
"Umm.."
Elliant looked behind him as he heared a low voice from behind, he saw a person standing in the door.
It was Clyde.
"Is this yours?" Clyde asked his smile showing awkwardness having to talk to the other.
The sketchbook came into Elliant's view as the guy showed the sketchbook in his hands.
As soon as he saw the sketchbook, he didn't waste anytime and he quickly snatched the sketchbook away from Clyde.
"It is mine, thank you for returning it to me."
He spoke in a calm manner but actually he was nervous that maybe Clyde saw the content inside his sketchbook.
Clyde caught up to his reaction and he immediately cleared his name in front of Elliant.
"Don't get the wrong idea, I didn't steal it from you."
Elliant didn't believe it and it was obvious from his frown.
"My friends stole it, I just want to give it back to you before they could even ruin your sketches, you should thank me instead."
Clyde explained how the sketch got to him and he even sound playful in the end.
Meanwhile, hearing those words Elliant became frozen and he panicked as he suddenly asked something to Clyde.
"D-did they see what's inside?"
"They haven't opened your sketchbook when I stopped them."
Clyde answered honestly.
"Really?" He inquired hoping for a more believable answer.
"Really." The other said to stop his doubts.
"I'm gonna go now."
"But I did see.. what's inside."
Clyde spoke in a low and disgusted voice which made the other stop on his tracks.
"What?" His eyes widened in shock and hearing what Clyde said but what he got from the other surprised him.
"I saw your sketches."
Elliant paused trying to analyse what he just said, a few moments later, realization finally hit him.
He frowned upon knowing that Clyde just said that he knows what he has drawn in the sketchbook.
"What.. what do you mean?" He asked wanting to hear Clyde elaborate what he knows
"I meant the naked sketches of Gawhain."
"Shhh!!!"
Elliant became panicked and hushed the other by covering his mouth and making a hush sign.
"For your information, he was not fully naked in my sketches only half!" He whispered to the other quite loud.
"That's still being naked."
Elliant remained silent as he couldn't refute what the guy just said.
Clyde showed a disgusted look as he shoved Elliant's hands away from his face.
"So is he like your model or something because I don't want to misunderstand something."
"He's... not my model" Elliant looked down on his feet while fidgeting the hem of his uniform.
"Can you please not tell anyone about this?"
He looked up Clyde as to which he got a weird look from Clyde.
"You see... he's my friend and it's just hard to hide the fact that..."
He paused gazing at Elliant.
"Someone was sketching him in such a way without a consent."
"I- I know that but just keep this a secret please!" Elliant pleaded as he held Clyde's shoulder so tight.
"Hiss.." Clyde exclaimed in pain.
"Ah... sorry."
Elliant let go seeing Clyde hurt.
Clyde ficed his disheveled uniform and sighed. He stared at Elliant for a second as if he's uncomfortable.
"Alright, I won't tell."
He looked away from Elliant with a frown on his face.
"Thank you very much!." Elliant bowed feeling deeply
"Alright, I won't tell."
Elliant didn't seem fully convinced when Clyde promised to keep it a secret but still he was thankful enough that the guy atleast willing to keep his nasty hobby a secret.
"Thank you very much!"
Elliant offered his thanks and bowed to the other, feeling extremely grateful nonetheless.
"It's nothing." Clyde smiled at Ellian and then made his way to his seat.
After a few moments, Clyde's friend came back and one of them smacked Clyde on the back.
"Why did you suddenly leave?" The guy who smacked him playfully asked.
"I returned his sketchbook." He admitted to them.
"Sigh.. you're too kind for your own good, you know that we only stole it for fun right?" The guy spoke and Clyde turned his head towards him completely facing them.
"That's definitely not fun and nice, Shawn." He said sympathetically.
"We know that ,we just wanna see the top student get mad for atleast once in this whole school year." The guy named Shawn responded in a jokingly manner.
Clyde only smiled at them while the other guy who smacked him laughed with the Shawn.
Elliant observed the three, but mostly at Clyde. He saw how kind the guy was kind yet something was off about him.