Chapter Text
One October morning, hundreds of people gathered in a large presentation hall for the annual art exhibition at Mercer Able University. Chatter fills the modern and empty walls of the art house until a bright booming voice breaks through.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank you all for coming today to sponsor our magnificent artists who will be presenting their latest pieces. Please keep talking to minimal and no cell phone usage during the presentations. Thank you and we will begin shortly.” The echoes of the last words peter as the people start to converse, this time at a lower level.
Backstage, a short girl with short brown hair and brown eyes waits patiently on a plastic chair that would creak at her every movement. The show commenced, the other contenders would go on stage and give a speech about their piece and what inspired them or any other comments they would like to share. All of that became faded noise as the girl focused on picking her cuticles while her leg bounced rapidly. 12 Other students sat with people they knew or with friends brought in to watch privately on a livestream tv in the comfort of that very backstage room. Except for her, Po-
“May we please welcome Pomni Rees to present her work.”
It almost took her a minute to process her name. Without wasting any more time, she shot up and walked as fast as her stubby legs could go to avoid making the audience wait. She dressed formally as you would for an interview. The sound of her heel click clacked as she walked across the stage stopping to the right side of her piece that was covered with maroon fabric. “Whenever you're ready” the announcer mouthed to her. She pinched two sides of the fabric and slowly dragged it off her painting. Once revealed, the audience abrupted in applause. Pomni stood there awkwardly like it was her first time. It grew a smile on her face hearing the appraise. She was then handed a microphone to give a few words about her piece.
“My inspiration for this piece was actually my niece- umm," the audience shared some ‘awes’. “She was recently born, and it made me think about how important it is to be loved in this world especially at that age... although abstract, this painting to me resembles hands reaching out to comfort you.” She pulled the microphone away from her face, and she gave a nervous look to the announcer off to the side, in which he returned the nod. She was able to walk off the stage, and her painting was moved to the hallway gallery for people to inspect closer after the show.
Backstage she sighed deeply, this wasn't her first time, but public speaking is not her excelling skill here, it was painting. She returned to the same creaking chair backstage, smiling at the other students as they quietly shouted her words of praise. She fell back into her chair and began to pull her phone out of her purse when the announcer's voice ran around the room.
“Please welcome Jax Mercer to present his work.”
Her eyes stared at the TV streaming the front of the stage. She watched his 6-foot-something-self mope across the stage, and she even heard the audience whooping loudly from behind thick walls. She didn't care to carefully listen to his speech, she's been there done that with him, Principals son. Her eyes still watching him as his painting was there for everyone to see, probably unoriginal but of course everyone wanted to go down in history, so they needed a bite out of that (Him or his art... who knows these days.) He walked off finally, applause still roaring as he settled down into one of the chairs beside her. Pomni didn't notice her body stiffened when he sat down, only the chatter of the other students praising him more comfortably than they did her. Her eyes remained on her phone scrolling through Twitters daily news and what not. And without even looking, she felt his eyes curiously glancing at her, for a bit too long. She felt like she could be a scared black cat for Halloween.
The Show came to an end, and the students were parting ways, occasionally being stopped by local news reporters for a quick word. Obviously, son-of-the-dean, Jax Mercer was always hoarded with microphones and cameras to his face, sometimes even sharpies and smaller prints of his work. He always fixed his curly brown hair before leaving the building, it was routine. Pomni followed behind him, she had to, kind of. Pomni and Jax both knew they lived in the same apartment complex, same floor, same hall. She was always following him no matter how hard she tried because her 3 smaller strides per second was his 1 and larger stride, so it was a little hard for her to take the lead. She didn't think this whole ‘following’ thing even occurred to him, it was just her passing time. Counting the steps.
They both made their way to their apartment doors when unsurprisingly a few students were there to ask him questions or whatever. He quickly told them off, which wasn’t unusual for him since he's a busy guy. Pomni froze at her jarred door with the key in the hole waiting for the students to leave.
“Talent doesn't run in blood” she mutters under her breath. Jax hears it, he leans against his door squinting at her 15 feet apart.
“Maybe try harder next time,” He scoffs with a smug smile painted on his face. Pomni frowns and leaves that embarrassing conversation by slipping through her door and shutting it a little too hard. Sure, she might've let him win that by leaving and slamming her door, but its not her first loss. Pomni and Jax have been rivals since first year.
Pomni could still hear it, the echo of their first argument. It had started over something small. A group critique, a difference of opinion, a stupid brushstroke. The studio had smelled like wet paint and coffee that morning, sunlight cutting through the dust and chaos of canvases. Everyone else had gone quiet when Jax opened his mouth.
“Still overdoing the lighting, Pomni?” he’d said, leaning back in his chair like he owned the room. “You’re supposed to draw emotion, not blind people.”
She hadn’t even looked up from her easel. “Better to blind them than bore them,” she’d shot back, her pencil gliding across the canvas. “At least my work feels alive. Yours looks like it was made by a robot.”
The room had gone still, the kind of silence that carries sparks in the air. Someone had whispered, “Here we go again.” From that day on, every competition turned into a battlefield. Every critique was a war zone. Every project somehow ended with one of them storming out and the other pretending not to care. The professors said they pushed each other’s limits, calling it “productive tension.” Their classmates had a different name for it. The storm and the spark. And maybe they were right. Jax had always been the spark, precise, quick, dangerous when lit. And Pomni? She was the storm. Unpredictable, loud, impossible to ignore. Together, they burned through every room they entered.
_____________________________
Students and staff received an email from the faculty, calling a meeting Monday morning.
Monday morning rolled around and the lecture hall was packed. Half the art department squeezed into squeaky plastic chairs, buzzing with rumors. Whenever there was an email from faculty reading, “special announcement,” it usually meant someone had accidentally set a kiln on fire again. But this time, it was different. Pomni could see Jax looked mildly interested. Pomni sat a few rows behind him, her pencil was tapping with aggression. Dean Mercer took the stage, beaming the way only administrators can this early in the morning.
“Students,” he began. “We have a very exciting announcement. The renowned curator and art critic, Shelby Ragtha, is offering one of our students a mentorship. a once-in-a-lifetime chance to exhibit under her guidance.”
The room erupted into whispers. Mentorship with Shelby Ragtha meant international galleries, connections, fame, and probably no more instant ramen for dinner, atleast for Pomni. Dean Mercer raised his finger.
“But! There’s a twist. This mentorship will be awarded to a pair of artists. The selected duo must create one collaborative piece that captures the theme of ‘truth in layers.’”
A collective groan swept the room. The students here were territorial. Sharing creative control was basically emotional surgery. And then, Shelby Ragtha herself stood. Cool, composed, draped in an outfit that looked both expensive and kinda cheap, but in a creative way.
“I’ve reviewed your portfolios,” she said, her voice smooth as a palette knife slicing paint. “And there’s one duo whose work and tension embodies artistic truth.”
Pomni leaned forward, pulse quickening. Jax slouched lower in his chair, already bracing for whatever disaster was coming.
“Pomni and Jax.” Silence.
Then chaos. Pomni shot to her feet.
“With him?” She pointed.
Jax barked a laugh. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
Shelby smiled, unfazed.
“Your rivalry is electric. Raw. You challenge each other in ways most artists never experience. I want that energy on canvas.” She insisted
Dean Mercer clasped his hands. “It’s decided!”
“It’s a mistake,” Pomni muttered.
“I second that,” Jax added.
“Too late,” Shelby said sweetly. “Congratulations, you two. You’re the truth in layers!”
And just like that, two rivals found themselves shackled together by the most dangerous force known to man, a mandatory collaboration.
Dean Mercer insisted to see the two to assess location and schedule. Pomni and Jax shuffled into his office.
“Dad, is this a joke.” Jax muttered.
Mercer scoffed and started.
“Soo... lab 103 A is available or 12 C which is a little quieter but Ill have to send an electrician to look at the lights according to this report. So how bout it!” He beamed. Pomni and Jax side eyed each other, waiting for the other to speak up first.
“We can do-”
“12 C will work, I'm gonna need more quiet times if I'm dealing with all this” Jax stated, cutting Pomni off. She didn't protest, but glared at him with his snarky remark.
______________________________
The art department had many crimes to answer for. Broken sinks, missing brushes, and that one incident involving glitter and the ventilation system, weird coming from the highest class art school there was. But assigning Pomni and Jax the same studio space for the entire semester? That was a cruel and unusual punishment. The first day of their “collaboration” started like a hostage exchange. Jax arrived early, peering around the room before fully entering. He slid his bags on the ground, claiming the left half of the studio. He arranged his supplies in surgical order. Brushes in size order, paints in neat, military rows. Even in color order, holy shit was he into dudes or something? It looked less like an art studio and more like a ‘guess the psycho test.’
Pomni entered fifteen minutes later, slowly pushing open the door with a quiet sigh. She saw his setup, squinted, and immediately started spreading her canvases across the floor like she was marking her territory.
“I didn’t realize this was the Museum for peoples with ODC,” she almost laughed, kicking aside his tape measure. Jax didn’t look up.
“Just try to keep your chaos from contaminating my workspace.” He affirmed.
“Contaminating? It’s called living,” she shot back. “You should try it sometime.”
By day two, they were arguing about the lighting. By day three, music. They actually agreed to switch who got speaker privileges each day. By day four, it was wall space, smell, and whether seasons even had color palettes, or were they just subjective?
Their classmates had started placing bets on who would snap first. (Most said Pomni. Jax said Pomni, too.) Still, somewhere between the insults, something else started to creep in something unspoken and far more dangerous.
One afternoon, Jax finally lost patience, stepping back from her painting with a frown.
“You paint emotions like you’ve never felt one.” It was like he was looking at gum under a table, disgusted but not surprised.
Pomni’s brush froze midstroke. The words hit harder than he probably meant them to, but she didn’t flinch long. Her eyes met his, sharp and steady.
“You paint perfection like you’re scared to mess up.” She threw.
For a moment, neither said anything. The air was thick with tension, the kind that buzzed right beneath the skin. Then Pomni turned back to her canvas, adding a violent slash of color.
“Don’t worry, Jax,” she added, voice low but steady. “If I ever want lessons on emotional suppression, I’ll ask.”
He smirked, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. Outside, the campus clock chimed the hour, indifferent to the quiet war unfolding inside the studio. It wasn’t peace. But it was something.
By the third week, their fights had lost their sharp edges. They still bickered, of course it was practically their love language by now, not that they felt any affection towards each other, the idea would NEVER cross their mind. But between deadlines and exhaustion, their arguments had started to blur into something quieter.
Overtime. The studio became a second home, comfort for the both of them. The overhead lights buzzed softly, coffee cups gathered like extra supplies on the table, and the city outside slipped into that hushed, midnight rhythm that made everything feel softer, smaller. Sometimes, they didn’t even talk. Tonight, they just worked side by side, backs turned, sharing the same silence like it was a truce. That’s when Pomni saw it. Jax was sketching, not his usual architectural precision or perfectly balanced forms, but something tender. A girl curled in on herself, lines trembling with emotion. It wasn’t polished, it was honest with jagged lines and placeholding colors. The kind of thing he’d never show in class, or to anyone at all. Pomni felt her heart weigh down, scared she would be punished for seeing this. For a long moment, she just watched him the way his brows furrowed, how his pencil slowed when he thought too much, the way he never thought to fix his hair at all. She’d never seen him like that, unguarded.
“Didn’t think you knew how to draw feelings,” she murmured finally, breaking the quiet.
He startled, hand freezing mid-line.
“It’s nothing,” he said too fast, flipping the page over.
But there was a faint blush creeping up his neck, the kind that betrayed his humble character more than he wanted to admit. Pomni smiled not mocking this time, just curious.
“Nothing’s usually the most interesting part.” She pushed.
He didn’t answer, but she noticed he didn’t move away either. Later that night, as she worked, Jax found himself watching her in return. The way her anger seemed to dissolve when she painted alone. How her hands always trembled a little before the first stroke, like she was afraid of the blank canvas. Once she started, though, she was fearless. Wild. A little scary. He never told her he noticed. But he stayed later after that. Every night. And somehow, without meaning to, they began to move in sync a rhythm built out of shared quiet, unspoken admiration, and the soft sound of brushes against canvas. For the first time, the studio didn’t feel like a battlefield. It felt like something closer to peace.
The late nights had become routine. The kind of unspoken rule neither of them mentioned but both followed. Some days they spent actually conversating, most, they just worked in the same rhythm, brushes and pencils trading the silence between them. The world outside their studio blurred into background noise. Deadlines, classes, people who still thought they hated each other.
Tonight however, the quiet felt heavier. The air was thick and electric, the kind of stillness that warned of rain. Pomni worked barefoot, paint streaked across her hands, her hair pulled into a halfhearted bun. Jax sat across the room, sketchbook open, pretending not to glance at her every few minutes. Outside, thunder murmured like a distant drum. The storm had been threatening all evening, waiting for the right moment to break. When it finally did, it came fast. Wind rattling the windows, rain streaking down the glass. The fluorescent lights above flickered, buzzing irritably. Pomni barely looked up from her canvas.
“If the power goes out, I’m blaming you,” she grins.
Jax smirked without looking up. “Figures. You’d blame me for the weather, too.” And then the lights gave one last flicker, and went out completely.
“Perfect. Guess the universe wants me to stop working.” Pomni cursed softly.
Jax’s voice floated through the dark, calm and dry. “Or maybe it’s trying to save your painting from you.”
She threw something small in his direction, probably an eraser. It hit something solid followed by a quiet ‘ow.’ There was a pause. Then laughter soft, and surprisingly comforting. It echoed in the dark like something fragile breaking open.
“I guess we have to wait this out, I'm gonna sit on the floor and die,” Pomni joked.
She shuffled to the edge of the solid table, careful not to knock anything over. She slid down, leaning against the table, legs stretch out in front of her. She sighed deeply, wiggling her feet back and forth. Jax hesitated, then got out of his seat.
“Save space for me” he grunted, sliding his back down the wall of the table, stretching his legs out as best as he could between the two tables, which ended up in with his knees bent up. He ended up a bit too close to her than he intended to. He noticed. Their legs both stretched out, his foot up against the side of her thigh. Neither of them moved, or readjusted. The storm outside painted the walls in flashes of blue-white light. The silence was deafening, but the two could hear every decibel. For once, neither of them was pretending to be fine.
“You ever think about why you paint what you do?” Jax asked quietly after a while.
Pomni hesitated, fingers tracing the lines on her palm. “I… paint dreams, I think. Ones I don’t remember having.”
He turned his head, studying her silhouette.
“Maybe they’re memories?” He added.
Something in his tone made her chest tighten, not because of the words themselves, but the gentleness behind them. No one ever spoke to her like that, like he meant it. The next flash of lightning revealed his face. They were just close enough that she could see the faint smudge of charcoal on his jaw. Without thinking, she reached over and brushed it away with her thumb. For a heartbeat, neither of them moved. The air felt charged not just from the storm, but from the silence between them. Jax’s breath caught, barely audible. He didn’t pull back.
Pomni’s voice came out softer than she meant. “You’re not supposed to say things like that.”
He smiled faintly. “And you’re not supposed to look at me like that.”
She let out a quiet laugh, trying to hide the flutter in her chest. “You wish.”
But even as the lights flickered back on harsh and fluorescent. Neither of them moved right away. The distance between them suddenly felt too small to be called rivalry anymore. By the time they stood, the storm had started to fade. But something else had begun to form in its place.
__________________________
A week later, the storm had passed outside and between them. On the surface, everything went back to normal. They still argued about paint quality, lighting angles, and whose music playlist was worse. But something underneath had shifted. The edges of their words were softer now, their silences less heavy. Sometimes, when their hands brushed while swapping supplies, neither of them pulled away right away. It was almost easy.
The late afternoon light spilled through the tall windows, painting everything in gold, the dust, the canvases, even the air between them. Pomni stood on her stool again, stretching to tape a new sheet of paper to the wall. Her final concept was fighting her. The piece that was supposed to represent the truth in art. All her attempts piled up in the corner. Nothing she painted looked right. She was too stubborn to ask for help and too short to reach the top edge. Jax leaned against his easel across the room, watching her with a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.
“You know,” he started, “there’s a thing called a ladder.”
She turned, tape between her fingers, brow furrowed. “You know, there’s a thing called minding your own business.” She shot back.
Jax chuckled, pushing off the wall. “I’m just saying, watching you fight the wall every day is exhausting. For me.”
“Tragic,” Pomni said, sticking the tape just short of where it needed to go. She jumped, missed, and grumbled under her breath. Before she could try again, Jax stepped up behind her, close enough that she could feel his warmth even without touching him. He reached over easily, pressed the paper flat with one large hand, and smoothed the tape in place.
“There,” he concluded.
Pomni froze not only because he was too close, but because she could smell the faint scent of graphite and coffee on him, the kind of scent that clung to long nights and quiet focus.
“Show off,” she muttered.
Jax stepped back, his voice low. “Efficient.”
She turned, glaring up at him, chin lifted in challenge. “You think tall equals efficient?”
He smiled. “Well, if it helps.”
Pomni rolled her eyes but didn’t move away. The light caught in her short brown hair, painting strands of copper where it met the sunset. Jax noticed and hated that he noticed. She turned back to her canvas, pulling her brush from her pocket like a weapon. “You’re blocking my light, genius.”
He took half a step to the side, still watching her. “Better?”
“Barely,” she said, though her lips twitched. That almost smile she never quite let out around him. Jax went back to his work, the air between them charged with something quieter than an argument but heavier than silence. Two artists. Two styles. And somehow, one heartbeat too close.
It took until the last thought for Pomni to give up on this sketch. With that she ripped the last page out of her sketchbook. Seems like the sketchbook gave up too. Her head fell back, eyes closed but facing the roof, defeated. Her head slowly bent back to normal and she opened her eyes, letting in the world, well, room around her. She looked around for anything she could destroy with what was on her mind. She saw it. A thick yellow sketchbook.
He’d left it on the shelf, the one neither of them seemed to use the whole time they occupied the classroom, half buried under sheets of tracing paper. She picked it up, a name in the corner signing “Jax Mercer.”
She didn’t mean to snoop at least, not at first. She flipped through the pages, expecting anatomy sketches or compositional grids. Instead, she found something else entirely. Page after page, Jax had drawn her. Not perfectly, not the sharp, technical precision he showed in class, but in the same loose, emotional style she’d caught glimpses of that stormy night. Soft pencil lines. It was her face. The same slight curve of her jaw, the same small scar just above her eyebrow, the one she’d had since she was a kid. But the date scrawled at the bottom corner made her breath catch. Two years before they had met.
Pomni’s fingers trembled. “What?” She whispered, shaking her head as if she were solving the worlds greatest murder case. It didn’t make sense. Jax hadn’t even known her then. Couldn’t have. Behind her, Jax had noticed where she had moved from her workspace, his eyes darting to the sketchbook in her hands, and then to the drawing she was holding. The color drained from his face. For a long moment, neither spoke. The song on their speaker cutting through the silence,
'I said what I said'
echoing the rhythm of her pulse. When Pomni finally found her voice, it came out quiet almost fragile.
'So I wouldn't have to say'
“Why do you have this, Jax?”
'What I wasn't ready to'
He didn’t move. Didn’t answer. His silence said everything.
'Tell you.'
-I said what I said, The Softies