The Painter

not today (9)

friday, september 27th.

!TW! violence/abusive parental figure

he had just gotten home from school. when he walked through the door, his ears were met with the sound of his mother's drunken screaming. he pictured her livid face in his mind as he walked up the narrow stairs to his father's bedroom.

on the first step, he could picture his mom's twisted angry mouth in his head.

on the fourth step, her furrowed brows.

on the eighth step, he heard a thud.

on the tenth step, he was racing towards the door to his father's bedroom. he was met with a sight that wasn't unfamiliar. not one bit. his father was calmly listening to his mother's screaming, only speaking hushed words to calm her down.

young william rushed into the middle of the room, not knowing any better. the paintbrush flew across the room, whizzing just inches from his face. the brush was so close to hitting the boy, he could feel the air on his eyelashes. he wrapped his arms around his mother's waist in a desperate hug. the woman tried to push him away, but he just tightened his grip on her waist. she reached her arms down and placed her hands on either side of william's head.

william looked up at her, eyes wide and glassy. she had no remorse as she yanked his head to her side, throwing him out of her way as she continued to berate his father.

it wasn't until almost half an hour later when she had calmed down and went to bed. william watched the whole thing. even though he didn't understand any of it, he was crying.

his father was too busy calming his mother down to calm him down.

that's when he learned to do things on his own.

12 pm.

william was rudely woken up by a particularly loud bolt of lightning, mocking him with flashing lights. he had driven anthony home an hour prior.

this is the first time i've fallen asleep in my bed in months, william thought, sitting up and rubbing his temples. his head was pounding. anthony had persuaded him to get some rest before he dropped him off.

he looked to his right at his unfinished painting. the one of the clearing in the forest.

might as well continue working on that, since it's already decided i'm skipping school.

the blankets rustled as he swung his legs over the side of the bed. he sat up and rubbed his temples once more.

taking a glimpse at his desk, he noticed there was a paper that wasn't originally there. it was folded in half, but the light coming from his window allowed him to see through the paper.

from the bed he couldn't see much, but he could make out a messy heart drawn onto the corner of the paper.

and anthony's signature.

burn the letter. burn the house.

william shook his head. hard. since anthony left, the thoughts he didn't want to think started to come back to him. he felt like a different person. he refused to let himself become dependent though. not like he did with his dad. that would just make it all the more painful when anthony eventually got sick of him.

burn it.

he decided he'd read the letter later.

right now, that's irrelevant. i have a painting to work on.

with that, he sat down and began to work on his painting, perfectly articulated brush strokes creating an illusory setting. naturally, the curiosity as to what resided in anthony's letter drifted off into somewhere unknown as he got lost in his work. he stayed awake until the early hours of the morning working. until the yellow light from the street lamps outside flowing through his windows turned into a grey-white-blue as dawn started to think about showing herself.

burn it.

he fabricated all of the beautiful parts of nature, the rays of sun, flowers, and butterflies. this didn't stop the painting from encapsulating a sense of discomfort, though. he made the branches of the trees knobby, like claws, and the colors were dull and lifeless.

burn it.

his lighter was on his bedside table. suddenly it was tempting. he reached for it, flicking the switch and watching the flame erupt, before it fell back down and became smooth and consistent. he lit and unlit the lighter about ten times before he set it back down.

not today.