“Not every ballerina starts out gracefully.” MG

A Painter

Mary T. Godwin

A narrow and angular woman walked out from behind the scenes. She smiled brightly. Her clothes were a mix of dark crimson, garden violet, sunny yellow, and turquoise blue. Her auburn hair was put into a plump bun that sat rightly atop her head as bits of loose hair found its way in front of her face, she casually brushed it off as she strutted towards the interviewer.

“Hello there! It’s so great to finally have you on the show!” The blond woman beamed, her bleached teeth contrasting sharply against her coral pink lipstick. “Come, sit! Sit down, right here.” She gestured to a sizeable beige chair and sat down almost immediately after the triangle of a woman became engulfed in the large chair.

“It really is such a pleasure to have you here! So tell us about yourself! When did you first know that you were an artist?” The blonde woman leaned in, faux intrigue spilling out from her mouth in the full gallons .

She could see the images unfolding in her mind. It was a brown dog named Carl. He had a blimp of a body with a craft store pink tongue and black charcoal eyes. He was married to a pumpkin orange cat named Amanda. They lived together in a neon green meadow where it was always sunny and the vibrant blue sky smiled at you. Their house was lemon yellow with a blood red roof. It was the ugliest painting to have ever been created, but was a masterpiece to a five year old.

She spoke, “When I was young, maybe five or six I painted one of the UGLIEST paintings ever. Really! It was just awful. It was this fat brown dog named Carl and his wife Amanda. They lived in this awful bright yellow house with a grossly dark red roof. Honestly, just thinking back to all of the bright colors gives me a headache.”

“Oh wow! You certainly were quite the creative child back then, huh?” The blond female spoke and gestured for the audience to laugh. An almost comedic laughing rang out. “Now, what about your family? Tell us a bit about your home life.”

She lied and spoke with a smile, “My home life? Oh well my parents were great, really nice people. I remember showing that painting I made to my mom after it was dry and she loved it! She said it was the best painting she’d ever seen. I think she hung it on the fridge or the wall, but I don’t remember. I mean it all happened so long ago…”

The memory flooded back to her in an instant. It was a masterpiece until she saw it. She thought it’d make a better ashtray. Carl and Amanda went up in flames. Their lemon yellow house with a blood red roof in the neon green meadow would be lost forever. The vibrant blue sky stopped smiling and it became a twisted black mass before crumbling into ash.

“Oh wow! Talk about a loving household. What about a few years later? When you were a teen, perhaps?”

Another lie and another smile, “A few years later, when I was a teen I was really popular. I had a lot of friends, I went to sleepovers. Honestly it was all so much fun! I even went out partying a few times, experimented with a few things... You know how teens are.”

Her memory of complete and total isolation was lucid. There was a stone tower shrouded in fog hidden in the middle of a vast forest. The tower was mossy and beginning to crumble from years of neglect and abuse. The fog was poisonous and would suffocate anyone who dared to breathe it in. The forest was corrupt, filled with dying and decayed trees as new saplings struggled to live. At the peak of the tower was a lavender painted figure.

“And in your later years?”

Her smile faltered ever-so-slightly for a moment before she fixed it again and spoke, “Later on in my life I left my parents house, went to college. I kept painting and started to sell my work.”

She could still see her painting every time she closed her eyes. A woman was made of triangles, squares, and odd shapes alike. They were a mix of colors. Greens, blues, oranges, the occasional yellow. The colors swirled and stirred freely confined within each shape. Her features were odd, mismatched, misplaced, but so was the entire painting.

“Oh wow! We’re so glad to hear that. It’s really interesting! Do you think you’re going to have any kids? Or perhaps you could tell us about when you decided to get married?”

With a slight wave of her hand she babbled on, “I dated a few people, but it was never anything too serious. At least that was the case until I met my husband. We met in class once and well, I guess we just really hit it off. We dated for a while before we decided to get married. It’s been about five years since then and I’ve never been happier. Kids? Oh I don’t think we’re going to have kids anytime soon.”

That heart ache felt far too real for her. The silhouettes of two people face each other. The background was stained glass, the only colors being pinks like rose and pearl. They were joined hand in hand, a mirror image of them was attached to their waists. The woman's silhouette facing away from the man's. The male’s silhouette faced away from the woman's. He was dressed as a playing card fool.

“Oh my! I never would have guessed that! Isn’t that just outrageous everyone?” The blonde woman turns and motions to the crowd, they erupt into a series of noises, agreeing with the woman.

“We really would love to hear more about you, but I’m afraid we’re just about to run out of time. Anyway, it’s been great having you on the show. A real treat!” The blond woman smiles at the other woman. They hug briefly and the geometric woman walks off the stage, disappearing.