The week drags on painfully, all my free time going towards finishing my current project. It's the worst thing I've done all year, but I'm glad it's out of my head. The downside? Now there is nothing to distract me from my endless sketches of Everett.

Pencil, charcoal, even a very poor watercolour and they are everywhere.

This evening is one of my rare, free evenings and I decide to head to the studio, my fingers aching to wrap themselves around something new for a change.

I make my way up the stairs and flick on the lights. I open up my sketch book, ignoring the multitude of loose sketches and focus on something a little more abstract.

I decide upon a highly stylised whale that I had sketched out about 4 months ago. I hadn't understood the fluidity needed to transfer my sketch into the clay until I had met Everett. Now the sweeping waves and the curvature of the fins just make sense.

I push in my headphones and get to work, my eyes fixated on the clay in front of me. I work for what seems like hours, my hands repeatedly slipping into the water bowl beside me, picking at my tools as I shave away, dimple and press at the clay.

My focus is broken suddenly when a shadow dips into my line of sight. I turn, inhaling sharply when I meet mismatched eyes.

I look down, standing up unsteadily as I wipe my hands on my apron. I pull out my earphones, cringing as I stretch my aching back out. I must have been hunched over for hours.

Everett steps forward, examining my sculpture with a curious gaze. I glance over to my sketchbook, somewhat mortified that all of my sketches of him are on display.

"Amyas wasn't kidding." He says quietly, his eyes flicking to the sculptures behind me.

I glance at them, proud of the gleaming metal sculpture that I had slaved over for months. I had learnt to weld, hammering every single piece of copper by hand for that piece.

"Did you need anything?" I ask suggestively, arching an eyebrow as I wipe my hands properly with my cloth. My bravado is a false pretence and I do everything to ignore the slight tremor in my fingers.

"I was just picking up a canvas for my brother." He says airily, his eyes flicking back to the sketches, completely ignoring or blissfully ignorant of my cocky demeanour.

I sigh, moving towards them as I pack them back into my folder.

He picks up one of them, examining it and I squirm inwardly.

"This is me." He clarifies, rather than asks and I look at him properly for the first time. My eyes greedily take in the new angles of his face, accentuated by the lamp light. The shadows cast across his face, such a unique angle.

"Yes." I say finally and he glances back down at it.

"It's good." He says.

"That's not all I'm good at." I quip, smirking at his unimpressed expression. He looks at the sketch for a little longer than I'd like, my good-humour slipping slightly.

"It's not right." I mutter, snatching it from his fingers and shoving it into my folder.

"You did it from memory?" He asks and I nod.

"I have a good memory." I murmur. He pauses for a moment, thinking about that statement.

"Then why isn't it right?" He asks provocatively and I purse my lips, examining him again.

I scold myself for enjoying this so much, this back and forth. I am reminded just how little I actually know of him, this elusive character. With every morsel or information I'm given I crave more, need more.

"I normally get to observe my models. Touch them, move them. It's a process." I say eventually, frustrated all of a sudden as I pack my tools away with a little more force than necessary.

"Do you want to?" He asks abruptly and I look up harshly. His expression is blank, unreadable.

"What?" I ask, my voice embarrassingly hoarse.

"Do you want to observe me? Touch me, move me?" He asks, repeating my words back to me like poetry.

I can feel the hunger in my bones. The ache to have this man, all of him, to work with him, on him, under him. I feel it more with him than I have with anything else. Yes, the answer of course is undeniably yes.

"No." I say instead, watching his brows furrow slightly. I hate the taste of the word on my tongue, but he doesn't understand.

"No," I breathe, dropping my tools onto the table and moving towards him.

He doesn't understand, how could he? Let him see, I decide. Let him see my intensity. Let him call me crazy and 'too much' and cringy, just like all the others. Let him see the madness that's operating in my soul, driving me to the brink of sanity. It just might save me.

"I don't want to observe you. I want to memorise every inch of you. I want to paint you, sculpt you, be with you. I wouldn't be able to stop myself. You're an obsession, a muse... inspiration that artists search their whole lives for." I say, my eyes roaming all over the man I can't allow myself to touch.

I've never loved a day in my life, but this man in front of me makes me want to. And I can't. To observe this man, to touch him and move him as I wish, it would be torture, because I want so much more. I'm afraid that, for the first time, the art wouldn't come first. And the child in me has lived through enough pain for a lifetime, he can't face another loss.

"No, I don't want to observe you." I whisper, watching him exhale slowly.

I watch eagerly as he purses his lips for a moment before nodding. He grabs the canvas from Amyas' corner, opens the door and closes it firmly behind him.

I sink into my chair, groaning as I tug against my hair. I got what I wanted, so why does it feel like such a loss.