My success in passing through the twin banyan trees seemed to dismantle the last fortress between us. After that afternoon in the square, there was no longer any doubt. We were no longer two strangers who coincidentally found comfort in the same silence. We were Yasa and Keyla. A new entity that people around us began to notice.
Whispers in the corridor followed us like shadows. Curious glances pierced our backs as we sat together in the canteen, no longer in the most hidden corner, but at one of the tables in the middle. I, who had always lived in comfortable anonymity, suddenly became the subject of conversation. "Who's that guy?" they asked. "Why would Keyla Luvena bother with him?"
I didn't care. For the first time in my life, I didn't care what others thought. What mattered was the way Keyla looked at me when we talked, as if I were the only person in the room. What mattered was how her hand accidentally brushed mine when we both reached for the sauce bottle, and we let the touch linger for a fraction of a second longer.
That afternoon, we returned to our first meeting place: the slowly emptying canteen. Dusk painted the sky with shades of indigo and rose. Keyla was telling me about one of Socrates' arguments that frustrated her, while I just listened with a smile.
"You're laughing at me," she said, feigning a pout.
"I'm not laughing at you," I countered. "I'm just thinking, you look really beautiful when you're passionate."
A blush crept up her cheeks, a soft pink flush beneath her pale skin. She looked down, staring at the Plato book on the table. Then, she raised her face again, her clear eyes looking directly into mine.
"Your sketches," she said, reminding me of her request under the banyan tree. "You said you find happiness when you finish them. I want to see your happiness, Yasa."
My heart pounded. My sketchbook was in my bag. It was my most secret world, my hidden paradise. Inside it were all my unspoken thoughts, all the feelings I couldn't name. Inside it, there were dozens of drawings of her.
Showing it to Keyla felt like handing over the key to my heart. Terrifying. But seeing the hopeful gleam in her eyes, I knew I couldn't refuse.
With slightly trembling hands, I pulled the worn A5 sketchbook from my bag. I placed it on the table between us. For a moment, I just stared at its plain cover.
"It's... nothing much," I mumbled, a last defense.
"To me, it's everything," she whispered.
I took a deep breath, then opened to the first page. There were ordinary landscape drawings: corners of Yogyakarta city, angkringan carts, old trees. Keyla examined them carefully, her finger tracing my pencil lines gently.
Then, I turned to the page where I had drawn her for the first time. A sketch of her in the canteen, that evening. Sitting on the long bench, holding a thick book, with the twilight glow illuminating her hair.
Keyla fell silent. Her breath hitched. She looked at the drawing, then at me, then back at the drawing.
"This... is me?" she asked, her voice barely audible.
I just nodded, unable to speak.
I continued to turn the pages. There was a sketch of her in the library, frowning as she read. There was a sketch of her from a distance, as she walked in the corridor. There was a sketch of her hand holding the Plato book. And on the last filled page, there was a sketch of her face as she looked at me under the banyan tree, with an expression of awe after I had successfully completed the masangin challenge.
As I reached that last page, a tear fell from her eye, landing precisely on the paper. She quickly wiped it away.
"I'm sorry," she sobbed softly. "I just... no one has ever seen me like this before. You... you see me. Truly see me."
I reached for her hand across the table. Her fingers were cold, but fit perfectly in my grasp. "Because there's nothing more beautiful to see."
She looked at me, her wet eyes radiating an emotion so profound it choked me. "Yasa," she said, her voice trembling. "Promise me."
"Promise what?"
"Promise you'll keep drawing. Never stop. And promise... you'll always draw me. Draw our world. Draw our future."
Our future.
Those two words hit me like a tidal wave. A future she saw stretching wide before us, full of empty pages ready to be filled. A future I knew would never be mine.
A sharp pain pierced my chest, but I suppressed it deep down. I looked into her sincere eyes, full of hope and love. I wouldn't snatch it away from her. Not today.
"I promise, Keyla," I said, and my voice sounded steadier than I felt. "I promise, every empty page in this book, and in the books to come, will be yours. Ours."
She smiled through her tears, the most radiant smile I had ever seen. She squeezed my hand tightly. For that moment, in the dimly lit canteen, we were two people who had just bound our destinies. A promise had been made, feeling eternal and unbroken by time.
But as I walked home that night, under the starless sky, that promise felt like both the heaviest burden and the most precious treasure. I had promised to paint a future I would never see. And now, every remaining moment of my time, every breath I took, would be dedicated to fulfilling that promise, to filling those empty pages with as many memories as I could, before the pencil in my hand finally stopped forever.