paint boy
you are the colours
you breathe. you are the colours. you move them around in your palm. there are blues and yellows and greens and purples and reds and oranges. there are swirls where the colours blend together, shapes vaguely resembling humans or maybe a two-legged animal or monster or a flame. the wet paint gets under your bitten nails. you are everything and you are nothing and it matters all the same.
he breathes. he is showing you his lego set, reaching for a piece. the ceiling light is bright. his hand brushes your arm. you are the colours. you move them around. the colours are changing now. they mix. in a small spot on your wrist they become a warm yellow, smiling up at you. it grins. it has eyes. it beckons you to it.
there are posters on the walls and glow-in-the-dark stars hung to the ceiling with sticky blu-tack. he is smiling, a toothy smile, he has dimples. the yellow on your wrist has a voice and it is telling you to smile back. you urge the corners of your mouth upwards and find it makes you feel rather nice.
then he wraps his arms around you and the yellow is no longer warm it is scalding and all over your body. the paint mixes and sticks to you in new ways. your heart is in your throat, it is throbbing, you want to puke it all the way out. you are burning up. you are scared the paint will burn up. the ceiling light is too bright and you will be naked then beneath it.
you stand up. you walk across the room tiptoeing through the legos and plastic figurines to the door and through it and you close it quietly behind you and you leave. you leave him. sitting on his knees on the floor with the flower in his hair and his freckled face glistening and illuminated by the lamplight and his mouth open. you are scared.