1
You draw characters speaking loud and clear but you’re not hearing them.” her mother told her, then she kissed her forehead and mumbled how she liked her art and went downstairs. Cecilia wrote these words on her bedroom wall, just behind her headboard for no one to see it but herself to know that it exists.Basma Salem
2
She was always like this, only moves when her mind and heart tells her to move, not doing what everyone demanded her to do.Basma Salem
3
You draw characters speaking loud and clear but you’re not hearing them.Basma Salem
4
Every time she meets him, she feels like he was a new paper ready to be drawn. And she could clearly remember how the first time she met him, he was like a sketch paper filled with grey and blue and black, all mixed up together forming a confusing storm,Basma Salem
5
And she could clearly remember how the first time she met him, he was like a sketch paper filled with grey and blue and black, all mixed up together forming a confusing storm, the second time she met him was like red and orange and everything that burned, the third time it was raining and it felt like the storm would never end. And she felt right now that the storm is ending. When he took his glasses off and she saw the sadness in his eyes, and she could clearly see how the storm is going to leave soon, but yet leaving behind it broken pieces and shattered glasses.Basma Salem
6
It just feels like meeting him again was like seeing a blank paper ready to be sketched, a different idea to be drawn.Basma Salem
7
Her flat looked like a mess —a coloring mess. Once you enter it, you can feel like a person had eaten all the colors and paints and brushes in the whole world and threw up there. But somehow when you enter it, you wouldn’t feel the urge to throw up, actually, the colors mixed with furniture too well, the masterpieces were drawn perfectly that you feel like you are standing in an art museum.Basma Salem
8
Everything was bright and white, even in the night.Basma Salem
9
You can’t move on, if you haven’t forgiven yourself, yet.Basma Salem
10
A mafia could never kill an alliance. That’s how you become safe from the enemy, you befriend them.Basma Salem
11
Was he shiny and bright and something sucked it out of him? Cecilia thought. But stars are a load of fire, maybe his were flamed out, but could they burn out again? After Cecilia drew him and his empty eyes, she wanted to write those words down, it felt like song lyrics. And she did. Making it in bold letters.Basma Salem
12
If you were crossing the road and saw a black cat passing, you may possibly get hit by a car, or a mail boy or the sky could rain in summer, possibly snow. Those were theories, none of them were true. It was like karma; it only happens to you if you believed in them. Myths, Cecilia called them. The guy looked frozen. This is silly, she thought. He could not be that affected by the cat. Cecilia had been working here for a year and she wasn’t struck by lightning, she was alive, of course, nobody chose the cat so this is why she was the oldest pet in the store.Basma Salem