Elara's Canvas by Diana Kohut

Elara stared at the blinking cursor,

a cold, unwavering beacon in the otherwise dim glow of her laptop screen. It was her third year, and this wasn’t just a dissertation; it was the dissertation, the capstone of her literature degree. Whose story was it? Definitely hers, Elara’s, caught between the crushing weight of expectation and the terrifying blankness of the page.

What was happening here? She was drowning, plain and simple. Her small student room, usually a chaotic but comforting nest of books and half-finished art projects, had become a war zone of crumpled notes and forgotten mugs of tea. The air itself felt thick with unwritten words, heavy and oppressive. Every paragraph felt like pulling teeth, every sentence a monumental effort. Her mind, usually a bustling marketplace of ideas, was now a desolate, silent landscape. She’d spend hours staring, the screen a glaring white void against the deepening indigo of the evening sky outside her window. That colour – a deep, almost bruised purple-blue – seemed to seep into everything: the shadows clinging to the corners of her room, the ink stains on her fingertips, even the heavy, melancholic thrum behind her eyelids when she finally tried to sleep. The entire project felt like an infinite, intimidating indigo ocean, threatening to pull her under with its sheer, overwhelming depth.

What was at stake? Everything, really. Her scholarship, first and foremost, which was tied to maintaining a certain grade point average. Then there was the very real fear of disappointing her parents, who had sacrificed so much for her to be here. But perhaps most acutely, it was her sense of self-worth. She’d always prided herself on her academic abilities, but this dissertation, "The Subversive Female Voice in Post-War Irish Poetry," was proving to be an insurmountable peak. Was she truly capable of this? Or was she just a fluke, an imposter masquerading as a serious student? The stakes were her future, her confidence, and the quiet dream of pursuing a Master's degree. If she failed this, all those carefully constructed plans would dissolve into that pervasive indigo haze.

Just when the indigo felt like it might swallow her whole, a small, stubborn sprout of emerald green caught her eye. It was her neglected succulent, tucked away on a shelf, thriving despite her absentmindedness. It was a tiny, vibrant splash of life, cutting through the gloom. A thought, an unexpected connection between two disparate poets, sparked in her mind. It wasn't a grand epiphany, but a small, steady light. She grabbed a new sheet of paper, the crisp white a welcome contrast to the bruised indigo of her thoughts. This wasn't about genius, she realized, it was about perseverance. Slowly, deliberately, she started to jot down bullet points, then phrases, then tentative sentences. The words were still hard, but now, instead of being pulled down, she felt a quiet, upward tug. Each idea, each connected thought, felt like a tiny thread of emerald green weaving through the oppressive indigo, creating a path forward. The immediate crisis wasn't over, but the suffocating feeling began to recede, replaced by a focused determination. The indigo hadn't vanished entirely – it was still the backdrop of her late nights – but now, she saw the emerald emerging, a promise of growth and a renewed, vibrant hope for the story she was finally ready to tell.