This story was written for the lovely Mostly A Lurker's fundraiser earlier this year, where a story collection raised funds for MaL and Leo's HEA. it was wonderful to be a part of it!

Sincere Thanks to LightStarDust for her Beta magic, to Conversed for her Slash authenticity pre-read and to LisaMichele17 for her UW/Seattle insider pre-read. Also, thanks to the lovely evieeden for making a banner to go with the story- you can find the link on my profile. Cheers, ladies!

Disclaimer: Apologies for liberties taken with the curriculum and student space at the SoA, UW. I do not own Twilight.

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March 1993, School of Art, University of Washington

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Why can't I look away?

Just look away.

Just fucking look away!

Edward slides the bridge of his glasses up his nose and follows the compulsive gesture with another helpless glance.

Where's a drama student when you need one? They can usually be trusted to walk the halls in gaggles, bitching loudly, talking with their hands, being generally obnoxious and harnessing all the available attention while being all... dramatic.

Except when you need them.

With nothing going on to draw everyone's attention, Edward tries to be very circumspect in his perusal. He's James fucking Bond.

Half a world away at the end of Edward '007' Cullen's cagey stare, a black silhouette contrasts sharply from the bland orange brick wall he's leaning against.

Edward's eyes slide over the guy's usual wardrobe: black jeans so tight that they strain at the seams over his sinewy calves and thighs, scuffed black combat boots laced halfway up his shins with the lace-ends flapping around undone and a black leather coat so worn that it's almost second skin. Even his name is black.

Well, Lenoir, anyway. Edward wonders if the guy has French ancestry.

Black, black, black, leaning against the wall with his gang of three. They're all revolving around him like he's the sun and they're just rocks in his gravitational pull. If he looked any more bored, he'd be asleep.

Fucking Goth. What is it about him?

Is it that huge blue-black bird's nest of dreadlocks? The smudged black eyeliner? Is it the walk that makes him look like he's parting the seas in slow motion? He glides through the halls, a head taller than anyone else, and they all fall out of his way as though he were pushing them away with telekinesis.

How does he do that?

Edward walks on, not daring any more glances. He hates being just like the rest of the sheep, staring at the fascinating oddity: Garrett Lenoir, the Goth King of UW.

No sooner does Edward think this than he senses eyes boring into the back of his favorite Bleach t-shirt.

Edward walks on, seemingly oblivious, when inside he's anything but. He'd pay real money to know who's looking at him with so much force that he feels it like a physical shove square between his shoulder blades, the spot red and hot like a burning bullseye.

He looks down at his feet as he skulks away, feeling like he needs to watch his step, like that shove is actual and there's a cliff he might stumble off if he's not careful, with jagged rocks and surf below, ready to swallow him up.

Just before diving into the lecture hall doorway, he shoots his eyes around furtively, looking for the source of the itch that drills right through his clothes. Helpless to stop himself, he glances back again and cops the hazel bullets. Garrett Lenoir's drilling a hole in Edward's head with his eyes. If he stared any harder, there would be smoke.

Stunned, Edward almost bashes into the door frame on his way into the theater, but somehow, the universe cuts him some slack and he makes it in without knocking himself out in front of everyone, bar a painful whack with his shoulder. He hisses and clutches it like he's trying to keep the pain from flying out in zig-zaggy thunderbolts, then gets the hell inside and out of sight, feeling like the world's biggest tool.

In the lecture theater, he takes his usual seat by the aisle, almost in the back row. He likes this one for the little horned demon drawings that adorn the backs of the seats in black Fineliner and pen. Edward doesn't know who made them, but he likes them all the same, and they keep him company in the dark of this cave. He has even added a couple, a little goblin here and an ogre there.

He stays near the aisle so that he can pack and run the moment that the lecture is finished without waiting for any droopy half-asleepers to flop the hell out of his way.

Perched in his narrow plastic chair between the podium and the exits above, Edward sets himself up for an hour of relentless droning, then starts playing with his hair. He yanks it and pulls it and flops it around, half-waiting, half-watching, but fully keyed up like he's just drunk four Dr Peppers. He's not at all surprised when his leg begins to bounce. Bounce, bounce. Bouncebounceboucebouce.

From the sidelines he watches the hall fill with various types of disgruntled members of Gen Y, his eyes always returning to the aisle seat a few rows down. To his annoyance, it remains empty, even as the lights are dimmed in preparation for the slideshow that goes with this Art History lecture.

No matter how he tries, Edward can't concentrate on the slides, though he usually loves these kinds of lectures. Sitting with elbows on knees like The Thinker, fidgeting and worrying the fuck out of his scruffy hair, he finds his eyes repeatedly drawn to that hideous orange seat.

Every time he does it he's surprised, like he didn't mean to look there again, but oh look, Lenoir is still not there.

It sucks all his attention like a ravenous black (orange) hole. Again and again, he comes back to it, and the void in it, like he's just cycling mindlessly, stuck in an orange loop.

The entire lecture flashes by in the blink of an eye while he stares at that stupid, empty chair. For the life of him, he can't remember anything about it at all, and when he looks down at his notes, there aren't any, though normally they'd be meticulous.

All over the page are looping drawings of prehistoric Venus figures, with their great, pendulous breasts and rotund bellies, scratched with enough force to tear the paper.

Ahh. So that's what the lecture was about. The sacred feminine or... big tits through history or maybe the importance of not having any arms and a giant ass, or something.

When the lights brighten again, Edward remains in his seat, blinking away flash spots on his eyes. Rubbing them with the heels of his palms, he hopes that none of this will be on the finals.

Unsettled, he remains in his seat as the theater empties around him, people dashing for freedom and scattering out through the exits and away from the recycled air, though normally he'd be the first one out. He looks around for the familiar magnetic presence, thinking that maybe Lenoir sat elsewhere today. It would be weird, because he's never done that before. Not that Edward has been watching.

No. Never that.

Trying to look busy, he begins to pack his bag, haphazardly throwing in the notepad and shifting in his seat to encourage circulation in his uncomfortably numb ass.

Silence descends as the place empties and he finally concedes to himself that he's disappointed Lenoir didn't make it to the lecture today. Normally, the inky, thick mop and turned up collar are directly in Edward's field of vision, flanked by his buddies on either side.

It's weird— he was right outside earlier.

Edward knows that he's bordering on obsessed. The guy's like a fucking siren, and Edward doesn't understand why he's so attracted. If Lenoir's presence draws him, the guy's absence has thrown him totally off kilter.

There are plenty of interesting people attending the School of Art. Many of them are like Lenoir- goths dressed in black and velvet, wearing their sixteen-up Docs and their hair down in lank curtains.

Lenoir, though, he's something else. He's hardcore, a storm cloud in everyone's periphery. He wears black, but it's these big, fat-soled combat boots over tight jeans which shouldn't be physically possible to pull on. He wears the long coat but his actually looks like the real thing, like he lives, breathes and sleeps in it. On his head, a formidable nest of jet-black dreads sways with his every movement. Dried white plaster dots and little metal burns pepper his clothes sometimes, and so they should— he's a Sculpture major.

On the inside of all that monochrome though, he's this bright, bright presence, a beacon, a burning pyre. He's like nothing, like no one else.

Edward chews on the end of his pen, hard.

It's weird— it's not like Edward and he are friends. They've never spoken. They move in different circles. Well, Lenoir moves in a different circle with his gang of cronies than Edward would had he a circle to move in, with the exception of the circle of two that he and Rosalie usually form.

She's not here today either, which is why Edward's attention is entirely consumed by the space Lenoir should be occupying. She'd be sending an elbow into his ribs or a stomp to his foot by now, to remind him to get his head out of his ass, but she's sick and hasn't been around campus for a couple of days. Edward's kind of floating without her to ground him in the prosaic.

Edward and Rose met on their first day as freshmen and have been inseparable ever since, immediately recognizing each other in their discontentment.

Edward had looked at her chest and she was immediately on his case, wanting to know where he got off staring at her tits. He said that if she didn't want him to check out her rack, she wouldn't have worn a Breeders t-shirt.

She'd smirked and flipped him the bird, lit up a cigarette, flicked purple-streaked blonde hair out of her face and that was that. Instant best buds. It helps that they aren't attracted to each other, though God knows, she's pretty special to look at, with her strutting walk and those tiny skirts and black Docs she wears.

She's a photography student, a junior like Edward. They have no lectures in common but always find each other around campus anyway. With her, he feels like he's part of something. She's the one who bought him this Bleach t-shirt a couple of years ago after they saw Nirvana at the Paramount together. It's the one that looks like a jam session in negative, heads banging, hair flying.

Today, without her, he's just floating on his own like a stray Rice Krispie in a bowl full of Fruit Loops.

Edward thinks he might be going insane.

Stupid fucking Goth. What the fuck is wrong with me?

Edward blinks, realizing that he's alone in the theater. Everyone else has already filed out and the place echoes with emptiness. Every creak of his seat and scuff of his Converse is like a thunderclap in a cavern. He packs away his chewed-up pen, wondering what to do with the rest of the afternoon. He should probably be in the studio, painting, but his head's not in it. He's frazzled. Twitchy.

Hoisting his trusty hessian satchel's leather strap onto his shoulder, he stands to stretch. Rising to full height, he reaches his arms up and yawns. Just as his mouth is at its most cavernous, he catches a movement in the periphery and jumps violently, almost biting off his tongue. Spinning, he locks eyes with the reason for his frazzled state of mind.

Garrett Lenoir is standing uncomfortably close. He's literally right beside him at the end of the aisle.

Of all the people it could have been, it's the guy whose presence leaves him grasping at straws for sentences that string together with sense.

How long has he been standing there?

"Jesus! Don't-"

"Sorry, I didn't-"

Edward can't move away, he's trapped by garish orange plastic seats in front and behind and the Goth is blocking the way out of the aisle. He's standing ramrod stiff and confused by the guy's proximity. So much so that his legs begin to vibrate with the tension of being stuck mid-stride.

He tries for 'relaxed', but he's pretty sure that Lenoir can see straight through his 'relaxed' and right into his 'freaked out'.

"Don't sneak up on people like that!" he chokes out, pushing his glasses higher up on his nose.

"Sorry, man, didn't mean to," Lenoir says, laughing. It's genuine, throaty and deep. Edward mentally slaps himself for analyzing a guy's laugh.

"I thought you heard me coming," Garrett elaborates.

"Obviously not."

"Obviously," Garrett repeats and so they arrive at an impasse. He's not making eye contact. Rather, he appears to be conversing with Edward's Adam's apple. Edward is tempted to swallow a couple of times just to see if Garrett's eyes bounce along.

"How tall are you?" Lenoir asks offhandedly.

"What? How tall? Um, six-two, I think." A pause. "Um... why?"

Perplexed, he watches the hazel bullets rise and hover intently over his unshaven jaw for a spell, and he finds himself keeping very still, like the guy's a cobra and sudden movements will result in certain death.

Edward's almost holding his breath and trying not to twitch any part of his face until they're actually looking each other in the eye.

Okay, this is weird. Please look at something else now, he chants in his head. I have lost the power to move my neck, so it's up to you, freaky Goth guy.

Another moment of this and Edward's about ready to start howling like a hysterical hyena.

"I didn't take any notes, if that's what you want." Where the fuck did that come from? This isn't high school!

"Nah, man, I don't want your notes."

"What then?"

Garrett seems to consider this. Lazily, he flicks his eyes over Edward's face again, like he's seeing the parts and calculating the sum.

"I need your help with something."

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Walking side by side with the Goth King of UW like it's the most natural thing in the world, is almost the most unnatural thing Edward has ever done.

Except for the time he ate a "cookie" that someone gave him at a party and spent the next few hours being a water buffalo.

That was pretty exceptional and entirely not natural.

Much like the goth Garrett Lenoir and grungy Edward Cullen being seen together, as they walk to the Ceramic and Metal Art building studios.

"Help with what?" Edward is suspicious, eyes darting around.

"With a piece I'm working on."

"Oh," he says, wishing for a more imaginative reply.

They walk on in silence, and from under the cover of his floppy hair, Edward looks sideways at the windows they pass, watching their two figures. They're almost the same height, though Lenoir has an inch or two on Edward.

Actually, it might just be his bad posture.

Imperceptibly, Edward tries to walk a little straighter to see. He watches Lenoir take long, easy strides and wishes that he looked more like that when he walks- more like he owns his own body. Instead, he always manages to look somewhat awkward, his version of a loping gait more like a hunched-over shuffle.

He huffs and looks away.

The closer they get to the studio, the more anxious he becomes, though undeniably, he's excited to see the work Lenoir's been making. As juniors, they've seen some of each others' work at the cross-discipline critiques that happen every couple of months, but this is different.

This is Lenoir's inner sanctum, though he shares it with another third-year student, Katrina Denali. Edward's been outside of this room before, but never inside.

He'd sooner be tortured (as long as it didn't involve branding irons, because then he'd squeal in two seconds flat) than admit that a couple of times while working late in his own studio, he'd snuck up here to peek. He'd peered into every tiny rip in the newspaper lining covering the windows trying to see inside, with no success.

Now, finally, here's his chance and he's looking around curiously from the moment Garrett unlocks the door.

Garrett's space is light and airy, with exposed beams above and concrete floors below. All the SoA studios are, really, but this one seems to be graced with just the right aspect to garner all the light through the big windows above eye level without any of the glare of the late afternoon sun. It's kind of bizarre that a guy who's basically black from head to toe suddenly becomes luminous when he steps into a beam of that waning light.

For a moment, Edward is speechless, just eating up the image of Garrett's thick black dreadlocks glowing with a tangerine corona in that dying light. Up close, Edward can see the blond roots at his temple, somehow making Lenoir more human.

On the verge of speaking, his mouth hangs open, any words swallowed up by the static in his brain as he watches the Goth slide his black leather coat from his shoulders, throwing it to a chair, then walk with arms upraised into his hair.

Deft fingers gather up the dreadlocks into a rough and ready ponytail, and Edward hungrily ogles the details, like the narrow hips, and the splash of skin above Garrett's black jeans, the blond down at the small of his back, a few freckles sprinkled across it. The guy's a Schiele drawing waiting to happen: expressive lines and sinewy gauntness, eroticism bordering on the visceral.

Ironically, Edward thinks, even Schiele's voyeuristic viewpoint is reflected in the way he himself is processing this scene.

Inside his head, Edward's already drawing.

Abruptly, he realizes why he's been staring at this guy, seeking him out, gravitating toward him for over a year now.

It's because somehow he'd always known that Garrett had this in him- this... electricity.

Somewhere inside, he'd known that Garrett was the human equivalent of a Lava Lamp. It's like he's been waiting to be switched on so that his beauty and his weirdness could float around each other in one vessel like water and oil, never blending but somehow working.

Of course, there's no way he can ever vocalize this and not sound like a total sap. Edward blinks, and thankfully, Garrett's momentum has carried him beyond the radiance. Out of reach of the sun's embers, he's a man again, albeit a fascinating, frighteningly strange one.

Much like anyone else here, Garrett likes to hang up pieces of inspiration all over his walls. No wonder Edward couldn't see through the windows, the newspaper lining them is actually buried under overlapping layers of postcards, printouts, photocopied book pages and many little prompt sketches. His materials are strewn all over the industrial-looking dusty space; half-completed sketches lying around all over the place, along with various pieces made from metal and clay, just two among many mediums explored through the two and a half years Garrett has attended UW.

Then, there is the current work. Edward blinks.

There are body parts strewn all over Garrett's studio.

It's yellow and orange in here, and the white plaster forms have taken on a creamy, rich tone. Some are assembled into semi-complete figures, but most are just pieces of appendage shaped plaster.

"What are you working on?" Edward asks, a flutter of excitement low in his belly.

"Can I cast you?" Garrett replies.

"Wh-what?" Edward darts his eyes around like he expects to find a subtitle hanging in mid-air to help him understand the question.

"You heard."

Edward stops thinking and looks up into the hazel bullets glaring straight into his eyes.

"I think you're exactly what I need. You'd be perfect," Garrett explains, waving an index finger in a big circle to indicate all of Edward. "You have what I want."

What you want?

"And what is that, exactly?"

"You're tall. Good build, not too skinny. Strong."

Edward looks down at himself, then back up to Garrett, wondering if he's being mocked. Looking down again, he holds his arms out a bit, as if to say, 'Where?'

He's wearing his trusty uniform: the usual short sleeves over long ones, jeans with frayed cuffs collecting dirt, well-worn grey Converse with the soles rubbed flat on the outer edge, black-rimmed glasses, floppy, scruffy hair. What the fuck is Lenoir seeing that he's not seeing?

"So, will you do it?"

"What exactly are you-"

Garrett sighs, exasperated. "Look, it's not the House of Wax, alright? I'm not an evil mastermind. You will live."

"So you say!"

"Here, look at these. This is what I'm going for. I want to cast you."

Garrett takes up a handful of loose drawings and holds them out for Edward to see. They're pen and ink sketches, planning drawings. Contorted bodies of men and horses, arms held up with fingers clawed, violent and visceral- a study in passion.

"This is what you're making?"

"Yeah."

"Pretty awesome." It is, really. It's fucking awesome. If Lenoir pulls this off, this gothic, fractured, industrial Horseman of the Apocalypse will be riding into the UW exhibition space at Sandpoint, at the end of the year in time for assessment.

"So what do you think?"

Edward looks up to see the day's last embers make a halo of Garrett's hair. He says the first thing that comes to mind.

"When do we start?"

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A/N: Thank you for reading. Good? Bad? Indifferent? This is a story in three parts, to be posted over the next few days.